A round-up of today's world news in brief
Ex-Croatian general goes on trial
THE HAGUE- Former Croatian general Ante Gotovina went on trial at the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal yesterday for driving up to 200,000 Serbs from a rebel enclave in a bloody campaign that made him a hero in his homeland.
Gotovina and fellow generals Ivan Cermak and Mladen Markac are accused of orchestrating the killing of hundreds of people and the shelling and torching of towns and villages as Croat forces retook the Serb-held Krajina region in 1995. - (Reuters)
Cardinal vows to fight on
ROME -Spain's top Catholic cardinal has promised to keep fighting the re-elected Socialist government on social issues such as gay marriage and abortion and urged Catholics of all political parties not to sit on the fence.
Cardinal Antonio Canizares, who is the primate of Spain and archbishop of Toledo, told Italian daily Corriere della Sera he "congratulated" Socialist prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero for his victory. "We are not against democracy, but in favour. Whoever denies the right to life is against democracy and is leading society to disaster," he said, vowing to "fight against the extension of the abortion law and against euthanasia". - (Reuters)
Berlusconi under fire
ROME -Italy's centre-right leader Silvio Berlusconi came under fire from foes and friends alike yesterday for fielding a self-proclaimed fascist in next month's general election.
Mr Berlusconi picked Giuseppe Ciarrapico, a publisher of local newspapers and former chairman of the AS Roma soccer club, as a candidate for his People of Freedom party in the country's central Lazio region. "I am a fascist. But in a cultural way, not a political way," Mr Ciarrapico (74) told the Corriere della Sera daily. - (Reuters)
Police chief's body found
WALES- Tributes were paid to greater Manchester police chief constable Michael Todd last night after his body was found in Snowdonia.
Mr Todd (50) went missing on Monday while walking off-duty in the Welsh mountains. His body was found yesterday afternoon at the bottom of a cliff.
One line of inquiry being investigated is that Mr Todd may have taken his own life, according to sources. - (PA)
Navratilova Czech again
TOKYO -Nine-times Wimbledon champion Martina Navratilova has regained her Czech nationality after saying she was "ashamed" of US president George Bush.
Speaking in Tokyo, Navratilova confirmed she had again become a citizen of the country of her birth, 33 years after she fled communist Czechoslovakia to live in the US. - (Guardian service)
Prince Albert to marry
PARIS- Prince Albert of Monaco will marry his girlfriend, former South African Olympic swimmer Charlene Wittstock, in September, a French magazine said yesterday.
A photograph of the prince, who will be 50 on Friday, and Wittstock (30) filled an online frontpage preview of Point de Vue magazine. - (Reuters)
Book returned after 100 years
HELSINKI- A librarygoer apparently thought "better late than never" and quietly returned a book on loan for more than 100 years to a library in southern Finland.
"We are unclear when exactly it was borrowed and who returned it," librarian Minna Saastamoinen said. - (Reuters)