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World in Brief: 16/04/2014

Nigeria bus bomb death toll rises to 75

AUSTRALIA: Supermarket workers in Melbourne celebrated yesterday after a hard-fought industrial struggle won them a 10 per cent pay rise over three years, full-time jobs and safety improvements.

The Super A-Mart staff were locked out on March 7 after a one-day strike for a collective bargaining agreement.

The National Union of Workers members thanked trade unionists around the world for their support.

CHINA: More than 10,000 workers at a factory owned by the world’s largest trainer producer went on strike yesterday.

Taiwan-based Yue Yuen makes shoes for Nike, Adidas, Reebok and other brands.

Workers walked out because the company failed to pay full social security and housing fund contributions.

LIBYA: Masked gunmen kidnapped the Jordanian ambassador yesterday while he was on his way to work in Tripoli.

His driver was shot in the attack, but the injury was not life-threatening.

Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh said he had yet to receive any demands for Fawaz Aitan’s release.

NIGERIA: Health Minister Onyebuchi Chukwu said yesterday that three of the people wounded in Monday’s bus bombing had died, bringing the death toll to 75.

He visited hospitals yesterday and put the number of wounded at 141, saying previous tallies had double-counted some patients.

WEST AFRICA: An ebola outbreak has been implicated in the deaths of 121 people, the World Health Organisation said yesterday.

The incurable virus is normally found in central or eastern Africa but there have been 200 suspected or confirmed cases in Guinea, Liberia and Mali.

JAPAN: Hundreds of pro-whaling officials, MPs and lobbyists vowed yesterday to keep hunts going after a world court slapped a ban on Tokyo’s Antarctic programme.

On March 31, the International Court of Justice rejected Japan’s claim that the Antarctic hunt was scientific.

AFGHANISTAN: Deputy Public Works Minister Ahmad Shah Wahid was kidnapped in Kabul yesterday.

Officials said they were treating it as a criminal matter, rather than being related to the Taliban.

Four armed men attacked the minister’s car, injuring his driver.

UNITED STATES: White supremacist Frazier Glenn Cross was charged yesterday with one count of capital murder and one of first-degree, premeditated murder in connection with the deaths of three people at Jewish community sites.

The capital charge caries a possible death penalty.

The 73-year-old shouted: “Heil Hitler” at television cameras when he was arrested on Sunday.

BOLIVIA: President Evo Morales personally handed over documents in The Hague yesterday supporting his country’s claim to recover a Pacific coastline lost to Chile in 1879.

The two countries broke off diplomatic relations in 1978 but trade to landlocked Bolivia still passes through Chilean ports.

Chile has until February 18 to respond.

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