Children’s home torched
Hours after youngsters at a children’s home in Sugoi, Kenya, finished a soccer game, their fellow players turned on them. The attackers crept out of a coffee plantation, smeared with clay and armed with spears, machetes, bows and arrows. Then they burned and looted the home that served as the only refuge for 130 children with troubled pasts — the Sugoi-Munsingen Children’s Home and School.
Mayor offers to pay for reading
A small-town Spanish mayor concerned about a high dropout rate in local schools has devised a way to keep kids studying — pay them. Agustin Jimenez, Socialist mayor of Noblejas, is recommending the town’s children be given a euro — the equivalent of $1.50 — for every hour they spend reading in the local library. The sweetener is part of a series of measures to be voted on by the Noblejas council in March.
Prosecutor: Tape admissible
A hidden-camera interview with a Dutch student saying missing teenager Natalee Holloway was dead and that he had a friend dump her body at sea is admissible in court, the chief Aruban prosecutor said Monday. The courts in Aruba likely will accept the tape as evidence because it was recorded by a private citizen without any influence by authorities, Chief Prosecutor Hans Mos told reporters.
9 die in building fire
An apartment building fire in Ludwigshafen, Germany, killed at least nine people, five of them children, police said Monday. Police found eight bodies in the building and one woman died in a hospital after the fire Sunday, police spokeswoman Simone Eisenbarth said. Twenty-two people remained hospitalized Monday. The cause of the fire, which started Sunday afternoon, was not clear, Eisenbarth said.
AND FINALLY …
Princess criticized for eating like royalty
First, Crown Princess Masako feasted on a 13-dish special Mexican menu in her honor. Then it was shark fin soup and roast duck at a top Chinese restaurant. Japan’s crown princess has been eating very well indeed in recent months — and being criticized in the press for violating the public image of imperial austerity. Masako’s lavish — and publicly funded — meals have attracted attention as the economy is showing signs of faltering.
