World Affairs Overview

Indian minister pens Bollywood love song

INDIA: India's Communications Minister, already a poet in his spare time, has found another outlet for his creative ambitions: penning a slushy love song for a new Bollywood film.

Despite his challenging role as a minister and government troubleshooter, Kapil Sibal took up an offer by actor-director Aditya Om for the film "Bandook" (Gun) and wrote four songs, one of which made it into the movie. Sibal's romantic number "showcases the pangs of separation of two lovers", Om told AFP.

"His exuberant knowledge of literature has enabled him to pen beautiful lovey-dovey lyrics," he added. The Hindi lines include: "romantic eyes, admire shyly, declare love silently". The film, releasing this month, looks at gun culture in northern India and the link between crime and politics.

AFP

French woman trapped in supermarket for New Year

FRANCE: While others were celebrating the start of 2013, an elderly French woman spent New Year's Eve trapped in a supermarket after being locked inside, officials said.

The 73-year-old was stuck inside the supermarket in the northern city of Roubaix after emerging from the toilet to find the shop closed and the doors locked, local firefighters said.

She set off the alarms several times throughout the night but there was no answer. She was only discovered the morning of New Year's Day around 10:30 am.

Despite her ordeal, the woman did not take advantage of the situation to snatch some New Year's treats and spent the night without eating or sleeping.

AFP

'Do-not-publish' Diana photo up for auction

US: A previously unseen press photo of an apparently teenaged Princess Diana that a London tabloid deemed too hot to publish is coming up for auction in the United States later this month.

The black-and-white image from the dawn of the 1980s shows Diana, possibly in a ski chalet, smiling at the camera as she lies comfortably in the lap of a like-aged but unidentified young man reading a book.

By the window stands a bottle of Johnnie Walker whisky, but more intriguing are the words "not to be published" scrawled across the photo with the kind of grease pencil used by newspaper picture editors at the time.

AFP

Malala father gets UK diplomatic post

UK: The father of shot Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai has been given a diplomatic role in Britain while his teenage daughter recovers from her injuries, according to reports.

The Pakistani government announced that Ziauddin Yousafzai would become its education attache at the consulate in Birmingham, central England, said the reports.

Malala, 15, is recovering at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, where she was brought from Pakistan on October 15.

AFP

US town bans bottled water

US: Water, water everywhere -- just not in plastic bottles, says a town in the US state of Massachusetts.

A law passed by the town of Concord went into effect with the New Year, making single-serving bottles of water illegal.

The ban is intended to encourage use of tap water and curb the worldwide problem of plastic pollution.

It only applies to "non-sparkling, unflavoured drinking water."

Jean Hill, an 84-year-old activist, thought up the ban, arguing that bottles fill garbage dumps, while consumers are lured into drinking water they could obtain for a tiny fraction of the cost at their own sink.

AFP

Twin sisters give birth to New Year's Eve babies

US: Twin sisters in Ohio gave birth to two baby boys two hours apart on New Year's Eve, a newspaper reported Wednesday. Identical twins Aimee and Ashlee Nelson, 19, used to dress alike as young girls and both got pregnant about the same time, the Akron Beacon Herald reported.

Aimee's son -- Donavyn Scott Bratten -- was born at 12:11 pm on Monday. Ashlee's son -- Aiden Lee Alan Dilts -- arrived at 2:03 pm. And to make things even easier for visiting relatives, they were both delivered in the same place -- Summa Akron City Hospital. The sisters weren't planning same-day births and were due about a week apart, their mother told the paper.

While they stopped dressing alike once they got older, they often ended up doing the same things without planning it, Marcella Farson said.

"The funny part is that nine times out of 10, one would come home with one thing purple and the other one would do the same thing but pink." That carried over to the pregnancy, Farson told the paper.

AFP