World briefs

CHINA Three children in a kindergarten in a northern Chinese town were killed when a classroom building collapsed, state media said. The children died Saturday after they were rushed to a hospital with severe injuries, the official Xinhua News Agency said. A man who answered the phone at the local county government of Yongqing in Hebei province on Sunday confirmed the three deaths but declined to give more details or his name.

CHINA Ten Chinese miners were found dead yesterday hours after they were trapped underground in an explosion at a mine in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang, state media said. The cause of the incident at the Xingyun Mine in the city of Jixi was under investigation, the state-run China News Service said.
CHINA At least 12 people were killed and three badly injured Saturday in a six-car pileup on a major north-south highway in a southern China province. The accident occurred shortly after 2 a.m. near the city of Heyuan, the Guangdong provincial government said in a statement posted to its microblog. No other details were given, although photos from the scene showed a charred flat-bed truck loaded with steel coils and other burned-out vehicles that were apparently involved in the crash.

THAILAND The wife of Thailand’s crown prince has relinquished her royal title, culminating a downfall that means she is no longer in line to become the Southeast Asian country’s next queen. While the reason for Princess Srirasm’s decision wasn’t clear, it follows revelations last month that several members of her family were detained in a high-profile corruption scandal.

UK The producers of James Bond films have acknowledged that an early version of the screenplay for the new movie “SPECTRE” was among the material stolen in the massive cyberattack on Sony Pictures Entertainment. The producers said in a statement Saturday that they are concerned that third parties who received the screenplay might seek to publish it — and warned the material is subject to copyright protection around the world.

EGYPT A security official says three Egyptians, including two with British citizenship, were detained after a man told police he overheard them discussing ways to destabilize the country.

TURKEY  Police conducted raids in a dozen Turkish cities yesterday, detaining at least 24 people — including journalists, TV producers and police — known to be close to a movement led by a U.S.-based moderate Islamic cleric who is a strong critic of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.