GLOBAL SNAPSHOT

Haze hits beaches

LONDON: Holidaymakers in Britain had to be evacuated from a stretch of coastline after a chemical “haze” left many with streaming eyes, sore throats and vomiting. Emergency services warned people along the east Sussex coast to keep doors and windows closed on Sunday after 50 people were affected along the shoreline from Eastbourne to Birling Gap, near Beachy Head. Coastguard rescue teams from Birling Gap, Eastbourne, Bexhill and Newhaven raced to help clear the busy beaches as visitors feared they had been struck by a chlorine leak. A Coastguard spokesman said the source had not been established.

US sailors found

SINGAPORE: Divers have recovered the remains of all 10 sailors who went missing after the USS John S. McCain and an oil tanker collided near Singapore last week, the US Navy said yesterday. Navy and Marine Corps divers had been searching in flooded compartments of the destroyer after the damaged ship docked in Singapore. The cause of the August 21 collision is under investigation. The crash ripped a gash in the McCain’s hull, flooding crew berths and machinery and communications rooms. The commander of the Navy’s Japan-based 7th Fleet was fired last week after a series of accidents this year raised questions about its operations.

Bull attacks activist

PARIS: An anti-bullfighting activist who jumped into an arena in southern France was attacked by one of the animals he wants to protect, police said. Two protesters, a man and a woman, were in the audience before managing to make their way into the main ring in Carcassone during the “novillada”, a series of fights involving young bulls. A bull charged at the man who, according to police a received “a long but not deep” injury from its horns. The protester, in his 30s, “was very lucky” that he was not properly gored and was only lightly injured, another source said. He was taken to hospital for examinations. His female companion was not injured and was arrested. Bullfighting is allowed in some southern regions of France.

Lennon dumped

KARACHI: A private school in Karachi has dropped John Lennon’s classic Imagine from a student concert following complaints about the song’s “atheist lyrics”. Students at Karachi Grammar School were due to sing the Beatle singer’s 1971 solo hit at an annual event in a tradition stretching back decades. But school administrators were forced into a late change over fears they could be liable for prosecution under Pakistan’s blasphemy laws.