The world in brief

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“We’re already Russian.”

Natasha Malachuk, a protester in Crimea who cheered the authorities in the region as they pressed ahead with measures to break away from Ukraine and become part of Russia Article, 1A

U.N. experts to Caracas: Explain violence

GENEVA - United Nations human-rights experts demanded answers Thursday from Venezuela’s government about the use of violence and imprisonment in a crackdown on widespread demonstrations.

Six experts with the U.N.’s top human-rights body wrote to the administration of President Nicolas Maduro about allegations of protesters being beaten and in some cases severely tortured by security forces and being taken to military facilities, cut off from communication and denied legal help, U.N. officials said.

The six experts - special rapporteurs Frank La Rue, Maina Kiai, Mads Andenas, Juan Mendez, Christof Heyns and Margaret Sekaggya - report to the 47-nation U.N. Human Rights Council, based in Geneva.

The Venezuelan economy’s downward spiral helped trigger a wave of protests against Maduro in mid-February that has claimed more than a dozen lives.

Venezuela’s U.N. Mission in Geneva dismissed the experts’ request for answers as part of what the mission described as an international disinformation campaign to undermine Venezuela’s government.

Yemen al-Qaida kills one of own as spy

SANA, Yemen - Al-Qaida militants in Yemen killed one of their own men Thursday, hanging his body from a streetlight after accusing him of spying for the United States, officials said.

The officials said a militant firing squad killed the man and publicly displayed his body in the town of Shahr in the southeastern Hadramawt province.

An al-Qaida flier distributed to residents described the execution as “retribution” for anyone who deals with the Americans.

It claimed the man, who was not identified, had been placing microchips in cars and safe houses used by al-Qaida members to guide missiles fired by U.S. drones.

Al-Qaida wields significant power in some remote areas of southern Yemen, where state authority is almost nonexistent. The United States has carried out drone strikes killing and injuring suspected al-Qaida militants.

Officials have said locals help locate militants for U.S.

drone strikes.

Nigerians put whip to 4 gay-sex convicts

LAGOS, Nigeria - Four young men were convicted of gay sex and whipped publicly as punishment Thursday in an Islamic court in northern Nigeria, a human-rights activist said.

The four were among dozens caught in a wave of arrests after Nigeria strengthened its criminal penalties for homosexuality with the new Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act in January.

The men could face further violence in prison if human-rights organizations do not come up with an additional fine of $120 each, said Dorothy Aken’Ova of the Coalition for the Defense of Sexual Rights Network. The four were sentenced to 15 strokes plus a year’s imprisonment if they cannot pay their fines.

Aken’Ova said the men, aged 20-22, should not have been convicted because their confessions were forced by law agents who beat them.

Thursday’s hearings had been delayed from January, when a crowd tried to stone the accused men outside the court and demanded the judge pass the death sentence. Under Islamic Shariah law in some north Nigerian states, homosexuals can be sentenced to death by stoning or lethal injection, though that sentence has never been enforced.

N. Korea rejects talks on more reunions

SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea on Thursday rejected South Korea’s proposal to hold Red Cross talks to discuss holding more family reunions in which relatives separated by the Korean War could meet their long-lost family members for the first time in six decades.

Late last month, the two Koreas held such reunions for the first time in three years, raising hopes for improved ties on the divided Korean Peninsula. But the North has since raised tensions again by testing several short-range ballistic missiles.

In its latest test, North Korea launched four projectiles from its newly developed multiple-rocket launcher Tuesday, with one flying in the area of a China Southern Airlines jet with 220 passengers on board.

South Korea called tests a “provocation” that threatened civilians.

But North Korea dismissed the criticism, calling its missile and rocket tests “defensive actions” and boasting that its projectiles hit targets with precision while posing no threat to international air traffic.

Front Section, Pages 6 on 03/07/2014

Upcoming Events