CHAD ALERT: France raised the alert level for its military forces in Chad after intelligence reports that rebels were moving toward Chad’s capital. A Chad rebel group, UFDD, in November declared a “state of war” against French and other foreign armies in an apparent warning to a European force expected to deploy in both Chad and neighboring Central African Republic.
IRAQ PROBE: Britain’s military is investigating allegations that 22 detainees died in its custody and nine others were tortured after a battle in Iraq. Britain’s Royal Military Police began its investigation in December into allegations of human-rights abuses after fighting between British forces and suspected insurgents in Majar on May 14, 2004.
TURKEY BLAST: An explosion ripped through an unlicensed fireworks factory in an industrial section of Istanbul, killing 20 people and injuring 117. The city’s governor blamed fireworks manufactured illegally in the five-story building and ruled out terrorism.
DANCING FUEHRER AXED: There will be no simulated naked corpses — and no dancing Hitler — at the world’s biggest street party in Rio de Janeiro. A judge blocked a carnival float meant to show that the Holocaust “gives you goose bumps.”
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Page compiled from Tribune news services
