IN BRIEF (Page 12)

United States

Smallpox vials found in storage

Federal investigators are probing how vials of smallpox made their way into a storage room at a Food and Drug Administration laboratory near Washington, health authorities said on Tuesday. The vials were labeled "variola", another name for smallpox, and appear to date from the 1950s, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a statement.

Switzerland

WHO reports 50 new Ebola cases

Fifty new cases of Ebola and 25 deaths have been reported in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea since July 3, as the deadly virus spreads through families, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday. The agency said the latest figures from health ministries in the three countries showed a total of 844 cases, including 518 deaths in the epidemic that began in February.

Germany

Suspected Nazi policeman dies

German prosecutors say a Michigan man they were investigating in connection with his alleged World War II service in a Nazi-controlled police force in present-day Ukraine has died in the United States. Prosecutors said John Kalymon was a member of the Nazi-sponsored Ukrainian Auxiliary Police in Lviv and involved in the 1942 roundup and deportation to a death camp of Jews in Lviv.

Russia

New space rocket tested

Russia launched its first new design of a space rocket since the Soviet era from the northern military space port of Plesetsk on Wednesday, aiming to break its reliance on foreign suppliers as well as the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The Angara rocket's quiet debut was in marked contrast to the live broadcast of an embarrassing aborted first launch attempt, watched by President Vladimir Putin via video link from the Kremlin.

AP - AFP - Reuters

(China Daily 07/10/2014 page12)