World Briefs

CHINA A court in Xinjiang has reduced the sentences of 11 Uighurs convicted of terrorism and endangering state security, including a naturalized Canadian preacher whose life term had been sharply criticized by Ottawa.

CHINA Asian Champions League winner Guangzhou Evergrande has been fined for secretly filming its opponent’s training session before the second-leg match of the final. Evergrande must pay USD160,000 for several rules violations around the return match against Al Ahli of United Arab Emirates last November. Meanwhile, the club signed star striker Jackson Martinez.

SOUTH KOREA warned of “searing” consequences if N. Korea doesn’t abandon plans to launch a long-range rocket that critics call a banned test of ballistic missile technology. The South’s rhetoric about unspecified harsh consequences comes less than a month after the North’s defiant fourth nuclear test and as diplomats at the U.N. work on strong new sanctions against Pyongyang.

THAILAND Two Russian tourists are badly injured at a beach resort when a speedboat’s propeller severs one man’s leg and cuts deep gashes in the other man’s leg. The men, believed to be in their 30s, were struck while they were diving off Phi Phi island in Krabi province.

MACEDONIA has lifted restrictions on the entry of refugees from the Greek border after Macedonian taxi drivers ended a five-day protest that had closed a key railway line, slowing migrant flows to Serbia. More than 55,000 migrants have passed through Macedonia this year.

UK The founder of budget airline EasyJet has stepped into Britain’s grocery aisles. Stelios Haji-Ioannou has opened a discount grocery in northwest London, called EasyFood, offering canned sardines, soups and pasta for a mere 25 pence — for a limited time only. Prices will go up on the “limited and basic” range after a month.

SOMALIA An explosion and fire blew a gaping hole in a commercial airliner, forcing it to make an emergency landing at Mogadishu’s international airport at night, officials and witnesses said. The pilot said he thought it was a bomb. An aviation expert who looked at photographs of the hole in the fuselage said the damage was consistent with an explosive device.

NIGERIA‘s separatists hijacked a merchant ship with foreign crew, threatening to blow it up if officials don’t free a detained leader agitating for a breakaway of the state of Biafra.

USA Microsoft is recalling about 2.44 million AC power cords for its Surface Pro, Surface Pro 2, and Surface Pro 3 computers sold before March 15, 2015, because of a potential fire hazard. Users have reported 56 incidents of the cords overheating and emitting flames, and five incidents where the cords gave users an electric shock. Microsoft is offering free replacements for the cords.