BOGOTA, Colombia
Grandpa: Release the dad; hold me captive
A Colombian grandfather to the children of a U.S. defense contractor held by leftist rebels offered Saturday to take his place in captivity, saying the man’s twin 4-year-olds should finally meet their father.
Campo Elias Medina said he will send a letter and photos of the children to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, asking if he can replace his daughter’s boyfriend, Keith Stansell.
“I think it’s more important that (the children) have their father at their side than their grandfather, and plus I’m already 55 years old,” Medina told RCN news.
Latin America’s largest guerrilla army took Stansell and two other U.S. defense contractors hostage while they were on an intelligence-gathering mission in February 2003.
CARACAS, Venezuela
Chavez supporters stage counter-march
Thousands of red-clad supporters of President Hugo Chavez strode through the Venezuelan capital Saturday seeking to counter a national outcry over the government’s removal of an opposition TV station from the air.
The march was in response to a week of large, sometimes violent protests by students who warned that freedom of expression is threatened by Chavez’s refusal to renew Radio Caracas Television’s broadcast license, which forced it off the air May 27.
Thousands of “Chavistas” gathered at an opposition stronghold in eastern Caracas before converging with other marches in the capital.
Chavez accuses RCTV of inciting a failed coup in 2002 and violating broadcast laws.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands
One-time ivory sale to Japan approved
The oversight body on international wildlife trade agreed Saturday to a one-time sale of 60 tons of banned ivory from southern Africa to Japan, despite critics’ fears it would lead to increased poaching of endangered elephants.
The ivory comes from stocks gathered from elephants that have died naturally.
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species said its officials would closely monitor the sale by South Africa, Botswana and Namibia from national ivory stocks. The countries pledged to deposit the revenue in conservation trust funds.
TOKYO
Melon’s flesh intact after 2,100 years
A 2,100-year-old melon with the flesh still on the rind was unearthed in western Japan, apparently preserved over the centuries in a vacuum-packed state, an official said Friday.
Archaeologists used radiocarbon analysis to estimate the age of the fruit, said Shuji Yamazaki, a local official in the city of Moriyama.
Melon seeds have been found in digs across the country, but researchers rarely find melon flesh, Yamazaki said.
BEIJING
Earthquake kills two and injures hundreds
A strong earthquake shook southwest China’s Yunnan province early today, killing two, injuring hundreds and triggering numerous aftershocks, state media reported.
The quake at 5:34 a.m. was centered in the old downtown of Pu’er City, the official Xinhua News Agency said.
The U.S. Geological Survey said it had a preliminary magnitude of 6.2.
At least two people died and more than 200 were injured, 15 seriously, Xinhua reported.
