At least 25 die in landslide

At least 25 die in landslide

MANILA, Philippines

Philippine officials say a landslide in the southern Mindanao region has killed at least 25 people and that more than 100 others remain buried in the rubble.

Compostela Valley provincial Gov. Arturo Uy says the landslide hit a small-scale mining area in Pantukan township before dawn today. The disaster occurred in a region where devastating flash floods triggered by a tropical storm killed more than 1,250 people last month.

Police fatally shoot 8th-grader in school

BROWNSVILLE, Texas

Police shot and killed an eighth-grader in the hallway of his middle school Wednesday after the boy brandished what looked like a handgun and pointed it at officers. It turned out to be a pellet gun that closely resembled the real thing.

The 15-year-old “had plenty of opportunities to lower the gun and listen to the officers’ orders, and he didn’t want to,” Interim Police Chief Orlando Rodriguez said.

Shortly before the confrontation, the boy had walked into a classroom and punched a random boy in the nose for no apparent reason. Police did not know why he pulled out the weapon.

The boy, identified as Jaime Gonzalez, did not threaten students or teachers, and no one else was hurt.

German man charged in LA fires

LOS ANGELES

A German man was charged Wednesday with 37 counts of arson in a rash of fires that terrorized Los Angeles over the New Year’s weekend.

Harry Burkhart, 24, was charged with 28 counts of arson of property and nine counts of arson of an inhabited structure, District Attorney Steve Cooley said.

The complaint also alleged the arson was caused by the use of a device designed to accelerate the fire, he said.

Burkhart’s arraignment late Wednesday was postponed until Jan. 24. He was ordered held on $2.85 million bail.

UK foreign secretary visiting Myanmar

LONDON

Britain’s William Hague was arriving in Myanmar today for the first visit by a U.K. foreign secretary since 1955 — a new sign of the Southeast Asian nation’s warming relations with the West.

Hague was scheduled to conduct talks with Myanmar’s president Thein Sein and government ministers in the nation’s capital, Naypyitaw, before meeting with opposition leader and Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in Yangon.

His visit follows a trip by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in November, as Western nations offer cautious support for reforms that have led to the release of some political prisoners and seen Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy rejoin the country’s political process ahead of April parliamentary elections.

Solo US sailor found in South Pacific

SANTIAGO, Chile

An 84-year-old American making his seventh attempt to sail alone around the tip of South America was found tired but alive by the Chilean Navy on Wednesday after his mast broke far from land in the South Pacific.

The Chilean Navy located Thomas Louis Corogin on his 32-foot sailboat more than 520 miles south of Easter Island, stranded but in relatively stable weather, with ocean swells of about 15 feet.

Corogin, a lawyer who runs a small marina in Port Clinton, Ohio, set sail from Easter Island on Dec. 27. The broken mast wasn’t his only mishap during this adventure — he had sent an email saying he was briefly hospitalized in Ecuador with a cut to his leg, said a friend and fellow sailor, Jack Majszak.

Associated Press