IN BRIEF (Page 12)

CAMEROON

Bus crash claims at least 21 lives

A governor in Cameroon says at least 21 people have been killed and at least 38 injured when a bus veered off a road and crashed into a tree in a ravine. West Region Governor Awah Fonka said on Sunday that the death toll from the accident on Saturday is likely to increase. He said the bus driver and at least four others were uninjured.

PERU

Tremor destroys dozens of homes

A powerful earthquake struck off Peru's coast early on Sunday, tumbling adobe homes in small, rural towns, killing at least one person and injuring dozens, officials said. The sole fatality was a man crushed by a falling rock, officials said. The last major earthquake to hit southern Peru, including Arequipa and its surroundings, was a magnitude 8.4 that hit on June 23, 2001, killing about 150 people and injuring nearly 3,000.

LIBERIA

Party drops Sirleaf after Weah poll win

Liberia's ruling party said on Sunday it had expelled outgoing President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf for not backing her vice-president, Joseph Boakai, in a presidential election runoff lost to former soccer star George Weah. Sirleaf, 79, will formally hand over power to Weah on Jan 22 after serving two six-year terms.

RUSSIA

Probe after knife attack at school

Investigators opened a criminal case into a knife attack at a school in the city of Perm on Monday which left 15 people injured. Media reports initially said two masked men armed with knives had burst into the school and attacked pupils, but authorities in Perm, about 1,000 kilometers northeast of Moscow, said the attack grew out of a knife fight between two pupils.

(China Daily 01/16/2018 page12)