KIDNAPPED CHINESE WORKERS FREED

BEIJING: China said on Wednesday that 25 Chinese workers kidnapped by Egyptian Bedouins demanding the release of their Islamist relatives had been released. TOKYO: The Tokyo Electric Power Co., the operator of the crisis- hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, revealed that some radioactive water leaking from broken pipes was found inside the reactor building.

ISRAELI PREMIER WINS PRIMARY

JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday claimed a solid victory over his sole opponent for the leadership of his Likud party, bolstering his position ahead of possible early elections.

DEADLY EUROPEAN COLD SNAP SPREADS

KIEV: A cold snap that killed 30 people in Ukraine over the past five days spread on Tuesday to swathes of eastern and central Europe, with record lows in Bulgaria and heavy snow in Switzerland and parts of Italy. GENEVA: The World Meteorological Organization ( WMO) on Tuesday launched a new international information system to boost data exchange for disaster risk reduction, forecasting, predictions, and service delivery for food security and health.

DIVERS ABANDON SEARCH ON CRUISE SHIP

ROME: Italian divers on Tuesday gave up their search on the wreck of the Costa Concordia, where 32 people are feared to have died, as workers prepared to start pumping out fuel to avoid an oil spill.

UK TO DEPLOY WARSHIP NEAR FALKLANDS

LONDON: The British Royal Navy announced on Tuesday that it would send its latest high- tech destroyer, the HMS Dauntless, to the South Atlantic, near the disputed Falkland Islands, which are called the Malvinas Islands by Argentina.

DIPLOMACY WITH IRAN STILL HAS CHANCE

WASHINGTON, D.C.: Sanctions and diplomacy still have a chance to persuade Iran to give up its nuclear program as Tehran’s leaders have shown a rational “cost- benefit approach” in their calculations, US intelligence chiefs said on Tuesday ( Wednesday in Manila).

RADIOACTIVE WATER LEAKING INSIDE REACTOR

WMO LAUNCHES NEW INFORMATION SYSTEM