NATION6

NATION6

20.5 incheshMexico’s flood victims
scramble for food, meds

VILLAHERMOSA, Mexico — Hungry and dehydrated victims of one of the worst floods in Mexico’s history scrambled for government packages of food and medicine, while at least 20,000 people remained trapped Monday on the rooftops of homes swallowed by water. Residents were running dangerously short of food and water after nearly a week of floods left 80 percent of the Gulf Coast state of Tabasco under water and destroyed or damaged the homes of about half a million people. Gov. Andres Granier ordered central streets in the state capital of Villahermosa closed to all but rescue workers to prevent looting.

French charity official
defends group’s intentions

PARIS — A journalist who accompanied French charity workers charged with kidnapping 103 African children criticized the group’s methods Monday, and his documentary showed the workers making little effort to verify the youngsters were orphans from Darfur. But Marc Garmirian defended the charity’s intentions, saying its members were convinced that they were evacuating orphans from the Darfur conflict in western Sudan. Other aid workers who interviewed the children last week said most of them had been living with adults they considered to be their parents and came from villages along the Chadian-Sudanese border. Seventeen Europeans — including nine French citizens — were arrested in Chad on Oct. 25 when the Zoe’s Ark charity was stopped from flying the children to Europe.

Indonesia’s volcanoes
pose threat to villages

MOUNT KELUD, Indonesia — Several Indonesian volcanos spewed hot ash, molten rock and clouds of dark smoke Monday, and scientists warned a violent eruption could come at any moment. The most threatening was the deadly Mount Kelud on densely populated Java island, where a dome of magma was forming under a crater lake and soaring temperatures overheated monitoring equipment. A few hundred miles away, Anak Krakatao, or the “Child of Krakatoa” in English, fired pumice and lava onto its slopes. At least one other of Indonesia’s approximately 100 active volcanoes sent bursts of ash showering down on nearby villages.

Police break network
of pedophiles in Europe

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Police from across Europe have arrested 92 suspects linked to an alleged network that produced and sold child abuse videos to 2,500 customers around the world, authorities said Monday. The videos were sold to clients in 19 countries including teachers, doctors and lawyers, prosecutors said. Authorities said at least 23 mainly Ukranian girls, ages 9 to 16, were duped into performing sex acts with promises of lucrative modeling careers.

Mukasey demonstrations

WASHINGTON — Protesters staged a waterboarding Monday outside the Justice Department, calling for a Senate committee to reject attorney general nominee Michael Mukasey because of his reluctance to define the interrogation tactic as torture. The demonstration came shortly before Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., said he would oppose Mukasey during a Senate Judiciary Committee vote set for today on whether the retired judge should be confirmed to lead the Justice Department.

Bedroom searches raise
some eyebrows in Tucson

TUCSON, Ariz. — The long arm of the law knows no limits — especially when it comes to searching through the belongings of Tucson’s troubled youths. With the consent of parents, the Tucson Police Department’s new gang-outreach unit is searching the rooms of kids in the program. The searches, police and city council members say, are meant to be educational, showing concerned parents signs of gang activity. But they’ve raised the eyebrows of several neighborhood leaders, who view the searches as intrusive and heavy-handed — particularly since the gang unit deals with kids as young as 8 years old and the searches could lead to arrests.

Combined dispatches