"People want to breathe."

ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast (AP) -- Protesters angry over toxic waste dumping blamed for six deaths set fire to a port official's home Friday, beat a former Ivory Coast transport minister and blockaded streets in Abidjan, the country's commercial center.

The waste -- apparently dumped illegally in late August around the city's residential areas -- sent thousands of people to hospitals and prompted the resignation of the entire Cabinet.

Young protesters, many wearing white dust masks and carrying sticks, recognized former Transport Minister Innocent Kobenan Anaky in a car, dragged him out and beat him, said Joel N'Guessan, vice president of Anaky's party. Anaky managed to escape with injuries to his face.

"They attacked him with anything they could find," N'Guessan said. "Then they burnt his car."

Protesters also burned the home of the general manager of Abidjan's port, Marcel Gossio, who was suspended in the dumping scandal. A local journalist said Gossio was not home at the time.

"People want to breathe. They have the impression that nobody is doing anything, while this is a national catastrophe," said a young protester, who gave his name only as Major.

About 9,000 people have sought treatment at health facilities in the past few weeks, with 19 people requiring hospitalization, according to the Health Ministry. Spokesman Jean Denoman said six people had died from exposure to the waste.

Pope's Islam comments condemned

"The pope's statements come to add fuel to fire and trigger anger within the Muslim world and show that the West with its politicians and clerics are hostile to Islam."

Condemnation also came from Turkey where Benedict is scheduled to visit in November.

"His words are extremely regrettable, worrying and unfortunate in terms of the Christian world and common peace of humanity," the Anatolian state news agency quoted Ali Bardakoglu, the head of Ankara's Directorate General for Religious Affairs, as saying.

"I do not see any use in somebody visiting the Islamic world who thinks in this way about the holy prophet of Islam."

In Syria, the grand mufti, the country's top Sunni Muslim religious authority, sent a letter to the pope saying he feared the pontiff's comments on Islam would worsen interfaith relations, AP reported.

In Gaza City, Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya issued a condemnation, saying Benedict's remarks "are not true and defamed the essence of this holy religion and it defamed the history of the Islam."

"We say to the pope to re-examine these comments and to stop defaming the Islam religion that more than 1 and half billion Muslims believe in," said Haniya, who made the remarks after Friday prayers.

Leading Indians urge end of "monstrous" gay sex law

NEW DELHI, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Leading Indian writers, artists, lawyers and academics led by author Vikram Seth have written an open letter urging the government to overturn a British colonial era law that criminalises homosexuality.

Condemning Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code as an attack on human rights and fundamental freedoms, it calls for an "archaic and brutal law" to be struck down immediately.

The law, formulated in 1861 and currently being challenged in the courts, carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail for engaging in gay sex.

"It has been used to systematically persecute, blackmail, arrest and terrorise sexual minorities," said the letter, released in New Delhi on Saturday and addressed to the government, judiciary and Indian citizens.

"It has spawned public intolerance and abuse, forcing tens of millions of gay and bisexual men and women to live in fear and secrecy, at tragic cost to them and their families."

Love is Love is Love.
Plain and Simple.
Live and Let Live.
Treat others as you wish to be treated.
The Golden Rule.


Strong earthquake jolts eastern Indonesia

JAKARTA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - An earthquake measuring 6.2 on the Richter scale rattled eastern Indonesia on Saturday, but there were no immediate reports of any deaths or damage, a meteorological official said.

The epicentre of the quake was on Seram island, 177 km (110 miles) northeast of Ambon city in the Moluccas chain of islands, said Jajat Jatmika from the Indonesian meteorology and geophysics agency.

Hurricane Lane slams into Mexico, thousands at risk

CULIACAN, Mexico, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Powerful Hurricane Lane thrashed western Mexico on Saturday, threatening tens of thousands of people with flash floods after a rampage along the Pacific coast that killed a child.

The storm, a dangerous Category 3 hurricane, slammed into a low-lying coastal area between the northwestern city of Culiacan and the tourist resort of Mazatlan.

Rain fell in Culiacan, capital of Sinaloa state, and shopkeepers rushed to tape up store windows to prevent them from shattering in winds that reached nearly 120 mph (195 mph) further down the coast.

A Category 3 storm can cause extensive damage.

"We are very worried because it is not only coming with high winds but with an impressive amount of rain," Culiacan's mayor, Aaron Irizar Lopez, told Mexican radio.

He said between 40,000 and 50,000 people in Sinaloa who live near rivers and streams might be at risk. Many of the state's reservoirs were in danger of overflowing, he said.

The storm had been expected to move up through the Sea of Cortez and make landfall farther north on Sunday but it swung suddenly to the east and crashed into the coastline.

"It's not normal for a hurricane to hit here," said Jose Lopez, 48, the manager of a Culiacan shoe store. "We've been preparing for it since 11 in the morning, when we heard it was coming."

47 bodies found around Baghdad

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraqi security forces have found 47 bodies, mostly bullet-riddled and showing signs of torture around the capital in the past 24 hours, a Baghdad police official said.

Iraqi police said they were unable to immediately identify the bodies.

Since Tuesday, more than 100 bodies have been found dumped across the capital in killings authorities believe resulted from Sunni-Shiite sectarian hostilities.

The Health Ministry said the Baghdad morgue received 1,850 bodies in July; 1,350 in June; 1,398 in May; 1,155 in April; 1,294 in March; and 1,110 in February.

Lt. Gen. Peter Chiarelli, the commander of the Multi-National Corps-Iraq, said Friday the Baghdad security plan had made the city safer. Chiarelli has visited all of the areas now under coalition control and has seen people in the streets and at the markets, evidence they are returning to their neighborhoods, he said.

He acknowledged the problem of sectarian violence in the capital and said the military had to get a "handle" on how and why it was happening.

Al Qaeda is purposely exacerbating the problem, he said, by perpetrating "spectacular attacks" aimed at maximizing casualties and thereby inciting more sectarian violence. Their task has become easier in the "post-Samarra era," he said.

When a bomb goes off in a primarily Shiite neighborhood, there is a "reaction from death squads, death squads who may move to Sunni neighborhoods," he said. Chiarelli added that similar retaliation occurs when an attack takes place in a Sunni neighborhood.

"And what we see in this instance is executions, executions of individuals, individuals that are picked off the streets sometimes from lists, taken to a location and tortured -- some not even taken to a location and tortured, and just executed," he said.

The U.S. military is working to rein in the violence, and "we're very, very pleased with what has occurred with the Baghdad security plan. And we look forward in the months ahead to seeing conditions in Baghdad continue to improve," Chiarelli said.

San Diego firefighters scramble to safety as a fast-moving Los Padres National Forest wildfire blows up along Templin Highway adjacent to Interstate 5 Tuesday Sept.12, 2006, near Castaic, Calif.

Crews guard mobile home park as wildfire burns north of LA

CASTAIC, Calif. (AP) — Firefighters attempted to keep a 43-square mile wildfire from jumping Interstate 5 Wednesday as the blaze crept within a mile of a mobile home park in the Los Padres National Forest.
Unpredictable winds were driving the fire that was burning across the partly closed freeway from the park in the Paradise Ranch area, said Jim Turner of the U.S. Forest Service.

Officials reported no immediate danger to residents, and no evacuations were ordered. The blaze was 30% contained.

"They came through and knocked on our doors and told us to be prepared to evacuate at any moment," park resident Cherrie Yarborough told KABC-TV.

The fire began on Labor Day and has burned 27,591 acres of forest land north of Los Angeles on the border of Ventura County. The wind-driven flames surged across nearly 11 square miles on Tuesday.

"We've had some extreme behavior," Turner said.

The fire burned picnic tables and recreational facilities near Pyramid Lake, Turner said.

Firefighting costs had ballooned past $10 million, he said. Nearly 1,500 firefighters were at work. No injuries were reported as a result of the blaze, which was sparked by someone burning debris.

Even with the use of water-dropping helicopters, crews have made little progress because there are few roads or safe access spots in the ridge-corrugated wilderness. Turner said chaparral and juniper have grown thick since the last fire in 1960.

Typhoon kills 2 on Japanese islands


Firefighters and residents watch river water going over a levee afetr a typhoon-affected heavy rainfall in Karatsu, Saga Prefecture, southwestern Japan, Saturday, Sept. 16, 2006. Three people were killed Saturday in floods in the prefecture as Typhoon Shanshan, with maximum sustained winds of 180 kilometers (110 miles) per hour, was forecast to continue north toward Japan's southwestern island of Kyushu, Japan's Meteorological Agency said. (AP Photo/Kyodo News, Yukio Kawashima)

TOKYO - A strong typhoon battered Japan's southern Ryukyu island chain on Saturday, and two people died after heavy downpours triggered a landslide, a news report said.

Typhoon Shanshan, with maximum sustained winds of 110 mph, was forecast to continue north toward Japan's southwestern main island of Kyushu where it could make landfall as early as Monday, Japan's Meteorological Agency said.

Heavy rain triggered landslides that killed two people on Kyushu on Saturday as the typhoon approached, Kyodo News service reported.

The storm forced the suspension of dozens of flights and disrupted shipping in the region, public broadcaster NHK reported. Taiwan issued a maritime alert Friday for ships off its eastern and southern coasts as the typhoon passed.

Television footage showed snapped utility poles, blown-over vehicles and wind damage to buildings on the southern islands. On Iriomote Island near Taiwan, wind gusts of 155 mph were recorded — the strongest winds ever observed there, Kyodo said.

Typhoons and tropical storms frequently hit eastern Asia, especially Japan and Taiwan, in the summer and fall. Shanshan is a Chinese term for young girls.

New El Nino sparks weather fears

The periodic phenomenon known as El Nino has developed in the Pacific Ocean threatening extreme weather in many parts of the world, US scientists say.

El Ninos begin with a warming of waters in the eastern Pacific, and there has been a steep rise in water temperature in recent weeks, they say.

This El Nino is likely to strengthen towards the end of the year and early into 2007, the researchers add.

Investigators seek more E. coli-spinach links

WASHINGTON (AP) -- An outbreak of E. coli has been linked to a California spinach processor, but government investigators are looking into other producers as well.

"We're clearly evolving and it is very important to keep an open mind whether there are other products potentially implicated," said Dr. David Acheson, the chief medical officer with the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.

Natural Selection Foods LLC was linked to the E. coli outbreak that has killed one person and sickened nearly 100 others. Twenty-nine people have been hospitalized, 14 of them with kidney failure. FDA officials said they had received reports of illness in 19 states.

"We're waiting for the all-clear. In the meantime, Popeye the Sailor Man and this family will not be eating bagged spinach," said Dr. William Schaffner, chairman of preventative medicine at Vanderbilt University.

Wisconsin accounted for 29 illnesses, about one-third of the cases, including the lone death. The victim's son identified her Friday night as Marion Graff, 77, of Manitowoc, who died of kidney failure September 7.

"We are telling everyone to get rid of fresh bagged spinach right now. Don't assume anything is over," Gov. Jim Doyle said.

Other states reporting cases were California, Connecticut, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Virginia, Washington and Wyoming, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The E. coli O157:H7 strain of the bug has sickened at least 94 people across the nation, the CDC said.