News in Brief

Boko Haram seizes 40 boys, men in Nigeria
Afp, Kano

Suspected Boko Haram gunmen have kidnapped 40 boys and young men in a remote village in northeast Nigerian Borno state on New Year's Eve, residents who fled the isolated settlement said yesterday. The news of the abductions came out only days later, after residents who fled the village arrived in the state capital Maiduguri late on Friday.

Death warrants for 6 more Pak militants
Afp, Karachi

Pakistan yesterday issued orders to hang six more militants, official said, the latest in a wave of executions in the wake of the Peshawar school massacre, which claimed 149 lives in the country's deadliest terror attack. Pakistan ended its six-years-old moratorium on the death penalty after the terror attack on December 16.

Thousands flee Australian wildfires
Reuters, Sydney

Thousands of Australians fled their homes as wildfires raged across the nation's south yesterday, with firefighters struggling to contain the blazes fanned by strong winds. Six homes were destroyed by the fires in South Australia and Victoria states, officials said, though no serious injuries have been reported.

WB settlers stone US diplomatic cars
Afp, Jerusalem

Jewish settlers pelted a US diplomatic convoy with stones Friday as envoys tried to visit the West Bank to investigate a complaint by Palestinian farmers over vandalism of olive trees, officials said. No one was hurt in the incident.