SNIPPETS

3 hurt in B’desh blast

DHAKA: Three people were injured on Wednesday when attackers hurled a bomb at a leader of the ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party, police said. The unidentified assailants threw the home-made explosive at local council chairman Mir Mohiuddin in Alamdanga in Bangladesh’s western Chuadanga district, police said. — AFP

Two CRPF men killed

BETTIAH: Two CRPF personnel were killed and another injured in a fierce gunbattle with proscribed CPI (Maoist) naxalites in Bihar’s west Champaran district, police said on Wednesday. On a tip-off, a police team assisted by the CRPF contingent cordoned off Bhelhai village under Laukaria police station in the district late on Tuesday night. — PTI

Spy charge denied

BEIJING: The wife of detained Hong Kong journalist Ching Cheong on Wednesday rejected accusations that her husband was a spy, saying his arrest was a set up to prevent him from publishing sensitive Chinese documents. China has said the senior reporter for Singapore’s Straits Times newspaper, detained since last month, has confessed to espionage for overseas intelligence organs. — AFP

Two ‘Maoists’ killed

BHUBANESWAR: Two suspected Maoists have been killed in a shootout with police in Orissa’s Sambalpur district. The incident occurred on Tuesday night near Buruda village when police launched an offensive. Two Maoists were killed and some are suspected to have sustained injuries in the gun battle, a senior district police official said. — HNS

Goa set for by-polls

PANAJI: The stage is set for Thursday’s crucial by-polls to five assembly constituencies in Goa, under President’s rule and where the legislature is kept in suspended animation, whose outcome could rekindle efforts to form a popular goverment. The state, brought under President’s rule on March 4, has been rocked by political turmoil with Congress-led United Legislature Party and BJP having razor-thin majority. —PTI

2 get lifer in rape case

JAIPUR: A fast track court on Wednesday awarded life imprisonment to an auto-rikshaw driver and his accomplice for raping a German tourist in Jodhpur, in one of the speediest trials for such a crime. Additional District Judge of the fast track court, Jodhpur Praveer Kumar Bhatnagar, decided the case within 16 days of the challan being produced before him by the police on May 16. — PTI