50 killed in cyclone

ANTANANARIVO: At least 50 people have died in the cyclone that lashed the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar at the weekend, rescue officials said on Friday. In the latest toll, 47 people were still missing and 11,873 rendered homeless by cyclone Gafilo. The figures released on Friday did not include 131 people believed drowned at sea off Mahajanga when two boats capsized. — AFP

Robot to repair telescope

WASHINGTON: NASA may send a robot to service the Hubble Space Telescope instead of astronauts, in a bid to save the telescope from abandonment. NASA announced mid-January it would stop, for safety reasons, sending astronauts to service the telescope, effectively condemning the Hubble to an early demise. The options include “autonomous robotic capabilities to provide a power generation capability that is capable of extending the operational life of the Hubble,” Sean O’Keefe said at NASA’s office. — AFP

Aussie decision criticised

SYDNEY: Australia came in for criticism on Friday after announcing it would pull out of an international aid agency because the UN fund focuses on fighting poverty in Africa rather than Asia Pacific region. Aid agency AusAid told the International Fund for Agricultural Development its aims were of “limited relevance to the Australian aid programme’s priority countries in South East Asia and the Pacific.” The Australian Institute of Agricultural Science and Technology and the Australian Association of Agricultural Consultants flayed the decision. — AFP

Trial over euthanasia

SYDNEY: New Zealand’s euthanasia advocate is to face court next week charged with the attempted murder of her mother in 1999. Lesley Martin nursed her mother, Joy, through five months of cancer before giving her an overdose of morphine. Her mother died the next day. A postmortem report said cause of death was respiratory arrest, possibly due to morphine poisoning. Her book To Die Like a Dog caused police to reopen a homicide inquiry which had been dropped for lack of evidence, and to charge her on two counts of attempted murder. Martin, 40, may face 14 years in prison. — The Guardian

Chile legalises divorce

SANTIAGO: Couples eager to end their marriages breathed a sign of relief in Chile on Thursday as the lower house of Congress approved a bill to legalise divorce. Until Thursday Chile was the only country in the Americas to forbid divorce. Applause erupted in Chile’s lower house after the clause-by-clause vote. — The Guardian

Two charged with murder

SYDNEY: Two teenagers have been charged with the murder of two Thai prostitutes who were thrown into a river near Darwin. The bodies of Phuangsri Kroksamrang, 58, and Somjai Insamnan, 27, were found floating in the Adelaide river by tourist boats last Wednesday. Ben William McLean and Phu Ngoc Trinh, both 18, were arrested at a house near Brisbane on Wednesday and were due to be sent to the Northern Territory for investigations. — The Guardian

Drugs found

MEXICO CITY: Mexican authorities have found a two tonne stash of marijuana that might have played a role in the execution of 12 bodies that were dug up at a house in Ciudad Juarez in January, the Attorney General’s Office reported on Thursday. The 12 victims, who are believed to have been rivals of the Vicente Carrillo drug gang, had been executed as long as six months to one year before they were discovered. — AP

11-year-old raped

LONDON: An 11-year-old Asian girl was raped by an Asian as she walked home in Oldham, a town in Greater Manchester with a large Asian minority. The girl was walking along Lincoln Street when a man coming from the opposite direction grabbed her by the arm and dragged her into an alleyway. The man raped the girl before running off, a spokeswoman for Greater Manchester Police said. — HNS