Ireland's rich musical tradition has acquired an unlikely ambassador for the 2008 Eurovision song contest: Glove puppet Dustin the Turkey, renowned for his burps and thick Dublin accent. Dustin's song is called Irelande Douze Points (Ireland 12 points).

One judge, Dana Rosemary Scallon, a former Eurovision winner, said: "If it's the turkey, I think we're better not to go into the Eurovision again."

But Dustin vowed to put Ireland, which has a record seven Eurovision wins, back on the map after several disappointing years and finishing last place in Helsinki last year.

Among other things he takes on "goulash-eating" eastern countries which tend to vote for each other's Eurovision candidates.

Professor goes for panties

A Singaporean professor who nicked bras and panties has pleaded guilty to stealing women's underwear from a university dormitory.

The 39-year old man - an associate professor in a Chinese university - was charged for taking women's underwear from a university hostel's clothes-line last December.

The Singaporean professor, who teaches in China, was in the city-state for his leave when he committed the crime. He was caught by a dormitory security guard who found female undergarments in his haversack.

"I have heard stories before about underwear being stolen, but I never thought it would happen to me," one victim was quoted as saying.

Mayor to revive Aztec language

Mexico City mayor Marcelo Ebrard wants all city employees, from hospital workers to bus drivers, to learn the Aztec language Nahuatl in an effort to revive the ancient tongue.

Leftist Ebrard, seen as a possible presidential candidate in 2012, presented his government's development plan this week translated for the first time into Nahuatl.

The next step will be offering Nahuatl classes to city government officials, including the mayor and his Cabinet, and distributing booklets about indigenous culture to 300,000 public servants, said Rosa Marquez who runs the programme.

Nahuatl gave the world words like "tomato", "chocolate", and "avocado", all of which were consumed in ancient Mexico. The native language dominated central Mexico over 1,000 years ago and is still spoken by some 1.4 million of Mexico's 107 million people today but it fell from widespread use after the Spanish conquered Mexico in the early 16th century.

Sarkozy video is internet hit

A video of French President Nicolas Sarkozy telling a bystander to "get lost" has become a hit on the internet.

President Sarkozy was filmed by a journalist from the daily Le Parisien on a walkabout at the annual farm fair in Paris. He offered his hand to a man who said: "Don't touch me, you are soiling me." In reply, Mr Sarkozy said, without dropping his smile: "Get lost, dumb ass."

The video was posted on Le Parisien's website www.leparisien.fr.on and by midday yesterday it had been seen by more than 350,000 people, a spokesman for the newspaper said.

In November, Mr Sarkozy had a heated exchange with fishermen during protests against rising fuel costs. The President challenged a fisherman who had insulted him.

"Come down and say that," Mr Sarkozy was quoted as saying. After the incident, Mr Sarkozy said he refused to have insults hurled at him and would only accept a dialogue between "civilised people".

Lohan, Murphy worst actors

Eddie Murphy and Lindsay Lohan were crowned the worst actors of 2007 at the Golden Raspberry Awards but neither star showed up to accept the spoof Oscars.

For their lack of acting prowess, the veteran comic and the young actress each won three gold spray-painted Razzie trophies worth $4.89 each.

The annual honours were announced by the Golden Raspberry Foundation at a presentation that pokes fun at the Academy Awards ceremony.

Mr Murphy, who starred in the critically savaged comedy Norbit, set a record by winning three of the four worst acting categories while Ms Lohan won two worst actress awards for playing twins in I Know Who Killed Me, a film that was named worst of the year.

Olympic clampdown

Beijing has moved to crack down on drivers who park their cars illegally on a major highway to take snaps from a pedestrian bridge with good views of the major Olympic stadiums, local media reported yesterday.

Authorities have posted traffic police on a highway overpass near the Olympic village in a bid to stop the hundreds of cars and tourist buses from pausing to take photos of the main "Bird's Nest" National Stadium and the "Water Cube" Swimming Centre, the Beijing Youth Daily said.

Offenders would have their number plates photographed by camera-toting cops, and be fined after signs posted two months ago to warn off motorists had not worked.