World Briefs

A criminal who taunted police via Facebook while on the run from prison in Britain has been recaptured, four months after his break-out, police said yesterday.

Craig "Lazie" Lynch, 28, became a cult figure thanks to his defiant status updates on the internet social networking site.

Dubbed the "Facebook fugitive", Mr Lynch notched up tens of thousands of "friends" from around the world. There was also a separate Facebook page, "Where is Craig 'Lazie' Lynch?", calling for information which could lead to his capture.

Mr Lynch was serving a seven-year term for aggravated burglary when he escaped prison in Suffolk, eastern England, in September. He was recaptured in the county of Kent, southeast of London, on Tuesday night. (AFP)

Students fake foreign status

Students born, raised and educated in China are using fake foreign passports to get into top universities, which have higher entrance standards for domestic candidates, state media said yesterday.

Fake foreign passports can be bought in eastern China for around 200,000 yuan (€20,222), the Global Times said of the bogus enrolment scam.

Admission requirements for domestic students at China's top universities are extremely high, with only the top scorers on annual nationwide entrance exams offered places.

But for foreign students, enrolment requirements are much lower as many universities want more foreigners to foster an international environment on campuses.

Most of the bogus students carry fake passports from African, South American or Southeast Asian nations. (AFP)

Canada's Inuit sue EU

Canada's Inuit people have filed a lawsuit against the EU in a bid to overturn an EU ban on imports of seal products, major Inuit organizations said yesterday.

The EU ban was imposed in July after decades of protests from animal activists, who said the annual seal hunt was cruel and inhumane. The ban will go into effect in time for the 2010 hunting season.

The Inuit, who call Canada's vast Arctic region home and whose economy relies in part on the seal hunt, say the hunt is humane.

They complain the impending EU ban has sharply cut the prices for seal pelts.

"It is bitterly ironic that the EU, which seems entirely at home with promoting massive levels of agribusiness and the raising and slaughtering of animals in highly industrialized conditions, seeks to preach some kind of selective elevated morality to Inuit," said senior Inuit official Mary Simon.

Seal products include fur used in clothing and oil used in vitamin supplements. (Reuters)

Montenegro's happy hippo

Montenegro's only hippopotamus escaped from the Adriatic nation's zoo during floods this week, officials said yesterday.

The two-ton female called Nikica broke out of her cage and swam away after seasonal floods hit the zoo just outside the Montenegrin capital Podgorica, zoo manager Davor Mujovic said.

"She remains at large, but one of the guards is keeping an eye on her and is feeding her daily," he said.

The hippo found a dry spot a mile away from the zoo as shelter from cold flood waters. Mr Mujovic said zoo guards would have to wait until the water recedes to try to lure the animal back to its enclosure with food.

In Africa, the world's third largest mammal on land is considered aggressive and dangerous but zoo owner Nikola Pejovic said Nikica was not a threat to people. (Reuters)

Minister's slip

A British government minister appeared to give away the date of this year's general election yesterday. The country must go to the polls by June 3 but Prime Minister Gordon Brown has so far refused to publically commit to a date.

Speaking at the launch of proposed law to ban the use of sun beds by under-18s, Health Minister Andy Burnham said:, "I hope you will add your weight in whatever way you can to this campaign and, if we focus on it, we can have changed a little piece of the law by May this year." He quickly corrected himself to say "later this year".

The slip-up follows a similar comment by Europe minister Chris Bryant at an event on Monday when during a discussion on Britain's relations with Latin America, Mr Bryant said: "I hope that by the time of the general election on May 6, relations will have improved." (Reuters)

'Spectacled flowerpecker' bird

Scientists have found a new species of bird in Borneo, the "spectacled flowerpecker", and expressed the hope that the discovery would help spur conservation of the island's threatened forests.

The small bird, grey with white stripes, was spotted in June 2009 on flowering mistletoe in the Malaysian part of Borneo by a group including biologist David Edwards of Leeds University in England.

"We hope the announcement of our discovery will lead to our ultimate goal: conservation of the new species and large tracts of its habitat, which is under threat from clearance for oil palm agriculture," he said in a statement.(Reuters)