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Two teenage Bulgarian sisters have been rescued by Italian police from a circus in which one of them is said to have been forced to swim with piranhas.

Police say that while the 19-year-old sister had to swim in a transparent tank, the 16-year-old had snakes draped across her body and suffered bites.

Four members of the family have been freed from what has been described as a "circus of horrors" south of Naples.

Three men have been arrested and charged with holding them in slavery.

The women were paid 100 euros (£78) a week, forbidden to leave the camp and forced to work 15- and 20-hour shifts, according to police.

The Bulgarian family has now been moved to a safe house but their case highlights the plight of people caught up in human trafficking networks in Europe.

The European Union estimates that 500,000 people are affected by trafficking every year in Europe.

In 2006, more than 100 Polish workers were freed from forced labour camps in the Puglia region of Italy where they had been promised seasonal farm-work.

BBC News

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Singapore Airlines has grounded a second Airbus A380 super-jumbo because of a fuel pump problem.

The carrier said the move delayed passengers bound for Sydney on Monday who had to switch to smaller planes.

It added that the A380 in question was now back in service. A similar fuel pump problem grounded another of the airline's A380s back in February.

Singapore Airlines is currently the first and only carrier to enter the A380 into commercial service.

London visit

"The problem is similar to the problem which affected another aircraft a month or so back, but it is important to mention, it is not the same problem, and not the same aircraft," said Singapore Airlines spokesman Stephen Forshaw.

"The problem last time was identified to be with the electrical relay powering the pump, rather than the pump itself," he said.

Mr Forshaw added that this time the problem involved a "premature failure of the pump".

At present the airline has three of the planes, with another 16 on order.

Last week it flew an A380 into London's Heathrow Airport for the first time.

It first introduced the plane in October, on its Singapore to Sydney route.

Other orders

Dubai-based Emirates will become the second airline to use the A380 when it takes its first delivery in August.

British Airways has ordered 12 of the airliners, due to be delivered from 2012, while Virgin Atlantic has ordered six, to arrive from 2013.

The airliner's wings are made at Broughton in north Wales and at Filton in Bristol. The Rolls-Royce engines that power Singapore's fleet are built at Derby.

The introduction of the A380 was delayed for more than a year due to wiring problems.

BBC News

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South Korea is reported to be planning to challenge North Korea on its human rights record, indicating a harder line from Seoul's new government.

Reports quoting unnamed officials say the South is set to vote for a draft UN resolution expressing deep concern over the rights violations in the North.

The South has frequently abstained from such votes, fearful of souring relations with its communist neighbour.

The UN Human Rights Council in Geneva will consider the resolution this week.

The South Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo quoted an official as saying the new government, which took charge in February, regards human rights as "a universal value".

"The government will show the first example of concrete action in the upcoming UNHRC vote," the official said.

The resolution expresses deep concern at what it says are continuing reports of systematic, widespread and grave violations of human rights in the North.

In the past five years, the South has voted for only one such resolution - in 2006 after Pyongyang's test of a nuclear weapon.

The BBC's John Sudworth, in Seoul, says successive liberal governments have taken a careful line with Pyongyang.

They have feared that harsh criticism might upset the efforts for closer engagement between the old enemies, our correspondent adds.

Analysts say the approval of the UN resolution would be the first sign that new conservative President Lee Myung-bak is prepared to take a tougher stance towards the North.

BBC News

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Brazilian mining giant Vale do Rio Doce has abandoned talks to buy rival Xstrata, in what would have been the industry's biggest takeover.

Vale said it had ended talks because Xstrata would not agree to its latest offer of cash and stock.

Vale is already the world's biggest iron ore miner. With Xstrata's mining assets it would have challenged the industry leader, BHP Billiton.

The deal was reportedly worth as much as $90bn (£45bn).

'Mutual decision'

In a statement Vale said it believed its offer "would have created significant value for both sets of shareholders".

Xstrata is listed on the London Stock Exchange and has mining operations in North and South America, South Africa and Australia.

"While Vale and Xstrata continue to believe that a combination of the two companies could realise significant value for both sets of shareholders, we have not been able to reach agreement," said the company's chief executive Mick Davis.

"We have therefore mutually decided to cease talks."

BBC News

[OMEN]

About 30 Tibetan monks have burst into a rare news briefing at a key temple in Lhasa, saying the authorities were lying about the situation after more than two weeks of unrest in the Himalayan region, a witness said.

The Chinese government brought a small group of foreign and Chinese reporters to Lhasa on Wednesday for a stage managed three-day tour of the city that was rocked by anti-Chinese violence on March 14.

The group of monks at the Jokhang Temple, the most sacred temple in Tibet and a top tourist stop in central Lhasa, disrupted a briefing by the head of the temple's administrative office.

"About 30 young monks burst into the official briefing, shouting: 'Don't believe them. They are tricking you. They are telling lies'," USA Today reporter Callum MacLeod said by telephone from Lhasa.

Some wept as they then told foreign reporters stories about a lack of freedom, he said.

Another reporter on the trip said some of the monks asserted that they had been unable to leave the Jokhang Temple since March 10.

The state-run Xinhua news agency said only that the media tour had been "disrupted" by monks, known as lamas in Tibet, but that it got back on track swiftly and that Lhasa was returning to normal after the unrest.

The Tibetan unrest and China's response are at the centre of an international storm ahead of the Olympics in August.

US President George W Bush encouraged Chinese President Hu Jintao on Wednesday to talk with the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual leader.

Hu said the monk must renounce support for independence of Tibet and Taiwan and stop encouraging violence and illegal activities aimed at harming the Olympics. The Dalai Lama denies he wants anything more than greater autonomy for his homeland and has criticised the violent protests.

The unrest began with peaceful marches by Buddhist monks in Lhasa more than two weeks ago. Within days, riots erupted in which non-Tibetan Chinese migrants were attacked and their property burned until security forces filled the streets.

Protests have spread to parts of Chinese provinces that border Tibet and have large ethnic Tibetan populations.

China says 19 people were killed at the hands of Tibetan mobs. The Tibetan government-in-exile says 140 died in Lhasa and elsewhere – most of them Tibetan victims of security forces.

China has poured troops into the region, and Human Rights Watch said the United Nations human rights council should address the crisis in Tibet.

Human Rights Watch said Australia, the European Union, Switzerland and the United States raised human rights abuses in Tibet during a session of the UN Human Rights Council, but China blocked debate, backed by Algeria, Cuba, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe.

"The council has not only the right, but the obligation to address the Tibet crisis," a statement quoted Juliette de Rivero, Geneva advocacy director at Human Rights Watch, as saying.

"It's scandalous that the council ends up silencing those who are trying to make sure it does its job."

Meanwhile, Beijing continued its propaganda blitz and Xinhua quoted "living Buddhas" condemning other monks who participated in the March 14 upheaval.

"According to Buddhist karma, they cannot reincarnate after death because of the sin they have committed," said Chubakang Tubdain Kaizhub, head of the Tibetan chapter of the Buddhist Association of China.

Taiwan's outgoing President Chen Shui-bian called for people to stand up "in the name of universal human rights, positively show they care, and light a candle for the people of Tibet".

He added: "I also call on the Beijing authorities to abandon the use of force and resolve the problem through peaceful dialogue."

Reuters

[OMEN]

Colombia said it seized at least 30kg of uranium from the country's biggest left-wing rebel group, the first time radioactive material has been linked to the four-decade-old guerrilla war.

The uranium was found in a rural area long considered a Marxist guerrilla stronghold just south of the capital Bogota.

It is being examined by government experts, the defence ministry said in a statement, although it did not say where the material came from or what it could be used for.

An expert on Colombia's cocaine-fuelled conflict said rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, do not have the facilities needed to make a bomb with uranium.

"This appears to have been part of a black market operation that the guerrillas were trying to use to make money," said Pablo Casas, an analyst at Bogota think-tank Security and Democracy.

"This is new for Colombia and could bring the FARC into the major leagues of black market terrorist transactions," he said.

The government said information about the stash of uranium was found earlier this month in computer files left behind by top guerrilla leader Raul Reyes, who was killed in a Colombian bomb strike against a FARC camp in neighbouring in Ecuador.

The March 1 raid sparked a major diplomatic dispute between Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe, a conservative ally of the United States, and the left-wing leaders of Ecuador and Venezuela.

Colombia also claims the files show evidence that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has given financial support to the FARC.

The United States, which calls the FARC a terrorist group and has long considered Chavez a destabilising force in Latin America, said the evidence is "disturbing".

Chavez openly sympathises with the FARC but says Colombia's accusations are part of a US-backed plot to smear him. He has also questioned how the computer files could have survived the bombing raid.

The FARC took up arms in the 1960s and is now funded mostly by cocaine smuggling and extortion. The group says it is fighting a Marxist insurgency meant to close the wide gap that separates rich and poor in this Andean country.

"No one believes the FARC wants to blow up Bogota to further the revolution," said a diplomat based in the capital who asked not to be named.

"This seems more like a black market action than military action. It shows again how the FARC is behaving more like an organised crime group than a political group," the diplomat said.

The war kills, maims and displaces thousands of Colombians every year.

Reuters

[OMEN]

Fiji’s military strongman Voreqe Bainimarama has strongly attacked his regional critics and while saying he will still hold elections next year, he has warned they are not the solution.

He gave a speech in Suva today, 24 hours after the Pacific Forum Foreign Ministers meeting in Auckland demanded he honour his promise to hold elections by March next year.

They also said the restoration of democracy should not be held up by Bainimarama's plans to introduce a so-called People's Charter.

In a speech to the military government-established charter group today, Bainimarama - who staged a coup in December 2006 - made it clear he was not impressed with the forum.

“Elections are central to democracy but they are not always, on their own, a magic or quick-fix solution,” he said.

“How can an election, on its own, make a difference when it is based on divisive and race based communal electoral arrangements?

“How can an election, on its own, solve the deep differences that our constitution has perpetuated between the different races in our country?

“Unless there are fundamental reforms, how can an election succeed where it will take us straight back to the grimy old politics of self interest, cronyism and scam mongering?”

Without referring directly to yesterday’s Auckland meeting, the commodore said there needed to be more to international relationships than just discussions about elections.

“It is a risk for all of us in the Pacific for the international community to seem to ignore, until after any election, the many pressing issues that our country faces.”

Bainimarama attacked those inside and outside Fiji who had resisted change, stirred up controversy and disrupted the military government.

“It has not helped that some detractors have been concocting phony criticisms, lighting up little bushfires here and there, so that we spend more of our time and effort in responding to these.

“To all our opponents and detractors, I say this: your persisting efforts to block change will be in vain.”

Bainimarama called on the international community to stop its lecturing habits.

"Opportunities for cheap shots should be resisted as they only harden attitudes. As we know, emotional reactions have in the past accentuated difficulties. But encouragement helps."

Fairfax Media

[OMEN]

WE HAVE TOUCHDOWN: The space shuttle Endeavour lands at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida
The US space shuttle Endeavour has returned to Florida, capping a milestone flight that brought Japan fully into the International Space Station partnership with the delivery of the first part of its research laboratory.
Space shuttle lands in Florida

Unexpected clouds at the Kennedy Space Center prompted Nasa to skip Endeavour's first landing opportunity and delay touchdown, ending the 122nd shuttle mission in darkness, just as it began 16 days ago.

The shuttle dropped off at the space station a storage room for Japan's elaborate Kibo laboratory, as well as a Canadian robot to help astronauts maintain the $US100 billion outpost.

Endeavour brought back space station flight engineer Leopold Eyharts, who spend seven weeks aloft to set up a European laboratory, called Columbus, which was delivered on the last shuttle mission in February.

Nasa hopes to complete three more missions to the space station this year and a servicing call to the Hubble Space Telescope, as it whittles down an 11-flight manifest that must be finished by the time the shuttles are retired in 2010.

Endeavour stayed at the station for 12 days, longer than any previous mission, and its astronauts conducted five spacewalks to install Kibo's storage room, assemble the massive Dextre maintenance robot and prepare the complex for the next wave of construction.

Nasa astronaut Garrett Reisman replaced Eyharts during the mission and will stay on the station until the shuttle Discovery visits in late May, carrying the main section of the Kibo lab.

Reuters

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