The world in brief

QUOTE OF THE DAY “You cannot declare the wish to stop the bloodshed, on one hand, and continue to pump armaments into Syria, on the other hand.”

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, who said the European Union’s decision to allow

arms sales to Syrian rebels endangers the prospects

for a peace deal, even as he defended the delivery of missiles to the Syrian regime Article, 1AReport: Chinese hack Australia spy plans

CANBERRA, Australia - Australian officials Tuesday refused to confirm or deny whether Chinese hackers had stolen the blueprints of a new spy agency headquarters as a news report claims.

Australian Broadcasting Corp. television reported Monday night that the plans for the $608 million Australian Security Intelligence Organization building had been stolen through a cyber-attack on a building contractor.

Blueprints that included details such as communications cabling, server locations and security systems had been traced to a Chinese server, the network reported.

Des Ball, an Australian National University cyber-security expert, said China could use the blueprints to bug the building, which is nearing completion in Canberra, the capital, after lengthy construction delays.

Ball said that given the breach, the intelligence organization would either have to operate with “utmost sensitivity” within its own building or simply “rip the whole insides out and … start again.”

Attorney General Mark Dreyfus, the minister in charge of the spy agency, refused Tuesday to confirm or deny the report, citing a long-standing government policy of declining to comment on security matters.

Malaysian ferry capsizes; 21 missing

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia - An overloaded ferry capsized after hitting rocks in a remote river in Malaysia’s part of tropical Borneo island Tuesday, leaving 21 people missing and feared trapped inside the vessel, police said.

Surviving were 181 people who either swam ashore or were rescued by villagers.

The vessel was carrying nearly three times its recommended limit of 74 passengers, including many indigenous tribal palm-oil and timber workers returning to their home villages for a harvest festival holiday, said Bakar Sibau, a district police chief in Malaysia’s Sarawak state.

Rivers form the main transportation network for hundreds of thousands of people in Sarawak. Public concerns about safety, including the enforcement of rules for ferry capacity, have occasionally emerged, but major boat accidents in Sarawak are rare.

Libya’s assembly chief quits after ban

TRIPOLI, Libya - Libya’s parliament chief, who served under Moammar Gadhafi before becoming an opposition leader in exile, resigned Tuesday, just weeks after lawmakers passed a bill banning former regime officials from senior government posts.

The law, which may effectively bar the speaker, Mohammed al-Megarif, and several other experienced Libyan leaders from high-level posts for the next 10 years, was adopted May 5 amid much turmoil and pressure from militias.

Libya’s Muslim Brotherhood rallied successfully to push through the so-called Political Isolation Law in the face of liberal opposition.

As al-Megarif announced his resignation before the General National Congress in the capital, Tripoli, he suggested that lawmakers passed the new law under threat of force, and decried what he described as the empowerment of some legislators backed by gunmen.

But he said he was stepping down out of respect for democracy, the first official to resign in accordance with the new law.

Two U.S. officials shot in Venezuela

CARACAS, Venezuela - Two officials from the U.S.

Embassy in Venezuela were injured in a shooting at a nightclub in Caracas early Tuesday, Venezuelan police and the State Department said.

Police spokesman Douglas Rico said one of them was shot in the leg and abdomen and the other was shot in the abdomen.

A police official identified one of the victims as military attache Roberto Ezequiel Rosas. She said he was shot in the right leg during an argument outside a nightclub in the Chacao district of Caracas and was taken to a local hospital. She spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to release the information publicly.

She had no information on suspects.

In Washington, State Department spokesman William Ostick confirmed that “two members of the U.S. Embassy in Caracas were injured during an incident early this morning.” Their injuries did not appear to be life-threatening, Ostick said.

Front Section, Pages 5 on 05/29/2013

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