World Briefs : Man shot dead after taking kids hostage

LUCKNOW (India)• • A man who held two dozen children hostage at his daughter's birthday party was shot dead by police on Thursday night.

Locals beat his wife to death as she tried to escape. All 23 children - the youngest just six months old - were rescued as parents gathered outside the house in Uttar Pradesh.

The man, Subhash Batham, was demanding that murder charges against him be dropped, as well as a ransom of 10 million rupees (S$190,600) per child.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

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Body of French skier recovered in Japan

TOKYO• • The body of French skier Sylvain Lethier, 38, was recovered yesterday after an avalanche struck a northern Japanese mountain where he was skiing with seven other French citizens.

The rescue team found his body off the slopes of the Tomamu ski resort in the northern Hokkaido region a day after the avalanche on Thursday afternoon.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

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German nurse held for poisoning newborns

FRANKFURT• • A German nurse has been arrested for allegedly poisoning five newborns with morphine.

The infants survived but the nurse was nabbed on Wednesday after investigators found an oral syringe containing breast milk mixed with morphine in her locker at Ulm University Hospital in southern Germany.

The case came to light after the babies, between one day and five weeks old, suddenly developed breathing problems "at almost the same time" while being cared for in the same ward.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

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Thunberg nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

STOCKHOLM• • Teen climate activist Greta Thunberg and the global protest movement "Fridays for Future" have been nominated for the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize by two Swedish lawmakers.

"Despite her young age, she has worked hard to make politicians open their eyes to the climate crisis," Left Party parliamentarians Jens Holm and Hakan Svenneling wrote in a letter to the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE