IN BRIEF (Page 12)

Japan

More stealth fighters wanted

Japan plans to seek funding of 124.9 billion yen ($1.21 billion) to buy six F-35 stealth fighter jets in next year's budget, the Nikkei reported. Japanese Air Self-Defense Force hopes to buy 42 of the aircraft in all to replace its fleet of aging F-4 fighters, the Nikkei said. Japan has bought ten F-35s stealth fighters since 2012, but this will mark its first time buying six in a single year.

Liberia

Slum sealed to halt Ebola

Security forces blocked off a seaside slum in Liberia's capital on Wednesday, stepping up the government's fight to stop the spread of Ebola, unnerving residents and reportedly sparking a protest. In central Monrovia there were few cars or people about as nervous residents stayed inside after President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf ordered West Point sealed off and imposed a curfew, saying authorities have not been able to curtail the spread of Ebola.

Germany

Arms ready for Iraqi Kurds

Germany is ready to send weapons to support Iraqi Kurds in their battle against the jihadist militants of the Islamic State, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said on Wednesday. After other European countries said they would send arms to help the Kurdish forces in northern Iraq, "we are ready to do the same", Steinmeier said. The ministers said Germany would first send more humanitarian aid and nonlethal equipment such as helmets, night-vision goggles and explosives detectors while it checked what weapons shipments would make sense.

South Africa

Worker killed 'by oranges'

Two farmworkers have been arrested for allegedly killing a colleague by pelting him with oranges, South African police said on Wednesday. A quarrel on a farm outside Tzaneen in the northern Limpopo province on Monday turned deadly when the two men armed themselves with fruit, said Lieutenant-Colonel Moatshe Ngoepe. "Babanto Chauke, 38, and two men had a quarrel. The two allegedly started throwing loose oranges at him until he died," Ngoepe said.

India

Yoga guru dies at 95

Indian yoga guru B.K.S. Iyengar, who helped popularize yoga around the world and wrote 14 books on the subject, died on Wednesday at age 95. Bellur Krishnamachar Sundararaja Iyengar's death was reported on his website, which said he had been hospitalized with a kidney ailment over the past week in the western city of Pune. Born in a poor family in Bellur village in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, Iyengar was a sickly child who suffered multiple illnesses including typhoid and tuberculosis.

Reuters - AP - AFP

(China Daily 08/21/2014 page12)