The Americas

Brazil
RIO DE JANEIRO — Brazil will extend daylight savings time this year in a drive to save electricity and avoid added pressure on its strained energy sector.

Canada
TORONTO — A Ghanian conservation research centre will assist a Canadian company in harvesting underwater trees in one of the world’s largest tropical hardwood forests in the African country’s Volta Lake region.

Mexico
MEXICO CITY — Federal agents detained 25 federal police officers in the northern border state of Tamaulipas on suspicion of providing protection for the Gulf drug cartel, the Public Safety Department announced, one week after soldiers carried out the biggest cocaine seizure in the nation’s history there.

United States
SANTA CLARITA, CA — A 15-truck pile-up on a rain-slicked Southern California freeway yesterday left 10 people injured and at least one missing, sent flames shooting out of a tunnel and blocked a key link between Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Europe

Italy
ROME — Tens of thousands of Italian conservatives protested in the ancient Roman Forum yesterday against the centre-left government of Romano Prodi, among them a few hundred black-shirted right-wingers giving the Nazi salute.

Slovakia
BRATISLAVA — Slovakia is one of nine of the European Union’s newest member nations that will join the EU’s borderless travel zone by the end of the year, EU Justice and Home Affairs Commissioner Franco Frattini said yesterday.

Ukraine
KYIV — A natural gas explosion ripped through an apartment building in eastern Ukraine yesterday, killing at least nine people and damaging other buildings, an emergency official said.

Other Countries

Afghanistan
KANDAHAR — A suicide bomber on a motorbike detonated his explosives in a crowded marketplace near Afghan police yesterday, killing seven people and wounding 29, officials said.

Australia
CANBERRA — Kim Beazley Sr., a former government minister and the father of a longtime Labor Party leader in Australia, has died, the party said yesterday. He was 90.

India
GAUHATI — About 100 wild elephants have thronged a northeast India island in a river, demolishing homes, feasting on sugarcane and panicking residents, officials said yesterday.

North Korea
SEOUL — A high-level North Korean official left yesterday for an overseas trip including a visit to Syria, the North’s state media reported, amid suspicions the two countries might be cooperating on a secret nuclear programme.

Palestine
SINGAPORE — A Palestinian man flew from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore hidden in the wheel well of a Singapore Airlines plane before being arrested when he fell out shortly after landing, the airline said yesterday.

Sri Lanka
COLOMBO — The large numbers of Sri Lankans reported killed, abducted and “disappeared” amid civil war underscores the weakness of the rule of law in the country, the top UN human rights official said yesterday.

Thailand
BANGKOK — Thailand’s beloved and influential 79-year-old King Bhumibol Adulyadej was hospitalized yesterday after feeling weak on the right side of his body, the royal palace said.
                (Herald staff with agencies)