CHINA: Fifteen people have been arrested over the faking of records by rabies vaccination producer Changchun Changsheng Life Sciences.

The 15 include the CEO and President Xi Jinping has ordered an urgent investigation.

The World Health Organisation said “the detection of this by unannounced inspection shows the regulatory authority’s system of checks and balances is working.”

EUROPE: Ex-Catalan president Carles Puigdemont said yesterday he will head back to Belgium to try to raise support for Catalan self-determination.

He’ll return from Germany, following Spain’s withdrawal of an arrest warrant for him and other former Catalan officials last week.

A German court had agreed to extradite him to Spain for misuse of public funds but not on a charge of rebellion, when the warrants were withdrawn.

GERMANY: The German Brewers Association has called on citizens to return their empties to shops, saying high beer sales over the summer have left manufacturers with dwindling bottle stocks.

Shoppers pay a small deposit on bottles in Germany which is repaid when they are returned, so they can be cleaned and reused.

“It would be good if consumers brought their empties back to stores quickly,” said spokesman Marc Oliver-Huhnholz.

LAOS: The Red Cross says 24 bodies have been recovered and 96 people are missing following the bursting of an auxiliary dam at the Xepian-Xe Nam Noy hydropower project on Monday.

Over 6,600 peoples have been displaced from their homes by the breach, which released 176 billion cubic feet of water.

Two South Korean firms are involved in delivering the project and Seoul said it will send emergency relief teams to Laos.