World briefs

CHINA is contributing 600 personnel, including 49 from the military, to multinational disaster relief exercises in Malaysia, the first time it has taken part in such an effort, the Defense Ministry said Saturday. China’s contribution will include experts from the foreign and civil affairs ministry, along with local government bodies and troops from the army and paramilitary forces, the ministry said.

NEPAL Thousands of people fled villages and towns along a mountain river in northwest Nepal yesterday after it was blocked by a landslide that could burst and cause flash floods, officials said. The landslide created a dam and a lake 2 kilometers long on the Kaligandaki River, said government administrator Yam Bahadur Chokhal.

IRAN has agreed to grant United Nations inspectors “managed access” to military sites as part of a future deal over its contested nuclear program, a negotiator said yesterday, apparently contradicting earlier comments by the nation’s supreme leader.

AFGHANISTAN  Taliban insurgents attacked police checkpoints yesterday in volatile southern Afghanistan, killing at least 10 officers in the ongoing assault, authorities said. Mohammad Ismail Hotaki, the director of Helmand province’s Joint Coordination Office, said that Taliban fighters attacked 10 police checkpoints in the province’s Sangin district. Hotaki said Taliban fighters captured three checkpoints and continued to surge forward in their assault.

BURUNDI The leader of a Burundi opposition party was killed Saturday by unknown assailants in the nation’s capital, Bujumbura, local media reported. Zedi Feruzi of the UPD-Zigamibanga party was slain late Saturday in a drive-by shooting in which at least one of his bodyguards was also killed, Iwacu, a prominent news organization in Burundi, reported on its website.

SYRIA Islamic State fighters break into the museum of Palmyra, though a Syrian official says its artifacts have been removed and are safe while the U.S.-led coalition conducts airstrikes on the group’s installations near the captured ancient town.

MEXICO The latest in a series of clashes between Mexican authorities and a powerful, fast-growing drug cartel turned into the deadliest confrontation in recent memory, with 42 suspected gang gunmen and one Federal Police officer killed during a three-hour firefight at a remote western ranch.

USA Two people have chained themselves to a support ship that is part of Royal Dutch Shell’s exploratory oil drilling plans and currently moored in Washington state. Eric Ross of the Backbone Campaign said on Saturday morning that Matt Fuller joined student activist Chiara Rose in suspending themselves from the anchor chain of the Arctic Challenger, which is in Bellingham Bay. Rose suspended herself from the ship with a climbing harness on Friday night.