The student was visiting Qixing Park with classmates on Friday when he jumped the 6.5-foot (2-meter) -high fence around the panda’s habitat, said the park employee, who refused to give his name.

The park in Guilin, a popular tourist town in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, houses a small zoo and a panda exhibit. It was virtually deserted when the student scaled the fence surrounding the panda, named Yang Yang, the employee said.

He said the student was bitten in the arms and legs. Two foreign visitors who saw the attack ran to get help from workers at a nearby refreshment stand, who notified park officials, the employee said.

The student was pale as he was taken away by medics but appeared clear-headed, he said.

“Yang Yang was so cute and I just wanted to cuddle him. I didn’t expect he would attack,” the 20-year-old student, surnamed Liu, said in a local hospital, according to the official Xinhua News Agency.

Liu underwent surgery Friday evening and was out of danger, but will remain in the hospital for several days, Xinhua said.

Yang Yang, who was flown to Guilin last year from Sichuan province, was behaving normally on Saturday and did not seem to suffer any negative psychological effects, the park employee said.

He said it was not clear whether the facility would add more signs around the enclosure or put more fences up.

“We cannot make it like a prison. We already have signs up warning people not to climb in,” he said. “There are no fences along roads but people know not to cross if there are cars. This is basic knowledge.”

Pandas, which generally have a public image as cute, gentle creatures, are nonetheless wild animals that can be violent when provoked or startled.

Last year, a panda at the Beijing Zoo attacked a teenager, ripping chunks out of his legs, when he jumped a barrier while the bear was being fed.

The same panda was in the news in 2006 when he bit a drunk tourist who broke into his enclosure and tried to hug him while he was asleep.The tourist retaliated by biting the bear in the back.

Three vast tunnels were opened under central Berlin this month, giving a glimpse of Adolf Hitler’s megalomaniac vision of a new architectural centre for the capital of Nazi Germany.

The 16-metre (50-foot) deep tunnels were constructed in 1938 as part of an underground transport network beneath a series of bombastic buildings designed by Nazi architect Albert Speer, including the biggest domed hall the world had ever seen.

The overground plans, never completed because of World War Two, included boulevards, squares and huge buildings, such as an arch dwarfing the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, and the 290-metre high Great Hall, with room for 180,000 people.

Hitler called the concept, a symbol of the power of the Third Reich, “Berlin — the capital of the world” but in recent times it has come to be known as “Germania.”

The tunnels, between 90 and 220 meters long lying beneath the Tiergarten park, would have accommodated roads and a railway line.

“The tunnels — which are in surprisingly good condition — were part of Speer’s grand plans, what we now call ‘Germania’,” historian Dietmar Arnold, head of the Berlin Underground Association and bunker tour guide, told Reuters.

Last week, Arnold — who runs an exhibition of Hitler’s plans — took journalists on a rare visit into the dank tunnels.

They are closed to the public most of the time because of safety concerns, but visits can be arranged.

“The acoustics are incredible,” said Arnold, who likes singing a note and hearing it reverberate around him.

After the war, British forces in divided Berlin closed the tunnels. They were rediscovered in 1969 but have remained shut. In 1990, a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall, they were handed to the city of Berlin.

The Berlin Underground Association, set up in 1997, has seen a surge in interest in tours of Berlin’s remaining bunkers.

Although most were destroyed, some of the maze of 1,000 World War Two bunkers are intact and serve as a reminder of the city’s violent history.

Propaganda posters and escape instructions on the walls convey a sense of the past. In one bunker, suitcases, helmets, and uniforms from various sites are on show.

“Interest is constantly growing — we have about 150,000 visitors a year to the bunkers,” said Arnold. “That is partly why we want the bunkers to be protected — they are an important part of the history of Berlin.”

By the end of the war, Germany’s most heavily bombed city could protect up to 800,000 people in its bunkers.

(Editing by Andrew Dobbie)

The Japanese government will have to pay damages to the parents of a sailor who hanged himself after being repeatedly insulted by his superior, in the first such court ruling involving a civil servant, media said.

The Fukuoka High Court in southern Japan ordered 3.5 million yen ($32,000) be paid to the parents of the petty officer third class, a court spokesman said, declining to give further details.

Kyodo news agency said the court recognized that the sailor’s suicide had been caused by depression, a result of stress accumulated from insults such as: “You are not qualified as a petty officer third class” and “Are you dumb?”

The sailor had been 21 when he committed suicide aboard a destroyer in 1999, it said.

A lower court had ruled in the government’s favor, saying the remarks from the sailor’s superior had fallen within the scope of training, Kyodo added.

“It is disappointing that the court did not understand the state’s claim,” an official at the defense ministry quoted Vice Defence Minister Kohei Masuda as telling a news conference.

“We will closely study the decision and deal with it appropriately.”

Japan’s defense ministry has been hit by a string of scandals in recent years, including cases of bribery and security leaks.

Cases of bullying in companies and in schools have also made headlines in recent years.

($1=110.11 Yen)

(Reporting by Chisa Fujioka and Yoko Kubota; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)

Indonesia and Malaysia will start talks in August to bridge cultural differences following a squabble last October over a popular love song, a foreign ministry spokesman said on Friday.

The southeast Asian neighbours had bickered over the song, Rasa Sayang (Feeling of Love), which Indonesians claim as their own but was used by Malaysia in a tourism campaign. The spat sparked calls for a boycott of Malaysian products in Indonesia.

Indonesia believes the song originated from its eastern islands of Maluku, as the lyrics of the Indonesian version suggest, while Malaysians say they have been singing the song since they were young.

Discordant notes creep up occasionally in relations between the two neighbours who share cultural and religious ties, speak a similar language and practise Islam.

A eminent people’s group, set up by the Indonesian and Malaysian presidents in July, will start initial discussions on August 29-30 in Jakarta to review history, misperceptions and efforts to increase people-to-people contact.

“We will listen again to their understanding of Indonesia, and our understanding of Malaysia, and why these two nations can easily be provoked over issues concerning the other,” said Teuku Faizasyah, the Indonesian foreign ministry spokesman.

“We see that our relations with Malaysia should have gone further, and should not be based on ethnic group sentimentality.”

The group of 14 diplomats and cultural experts from Indonesia and Malaysia is also considering reviving cultural programmes such as exchange visits and a TV show jointly produced by the two countries.

The programmes were forgotten after one of the initiators, former Indonesian president Suharto, stepped down in 1998.

As the biggest country in the region, Indonesia played a bigger role in the region until the 1990s, but its influence eroded after the political and monetary crisis in 1998.

(Reporting by Olivia Rondonuwu; Editing by Sugita Katyal and Valerie Lee)

South Korea’s President Lee Myung-bak has told officials to give up golf for the moment because it sends the wrong signal just as the economy has hit the rough.

“Golf is not bad but … as prices are unstable and the economic situation is not getting better, President Lee thinks they need to consider public sentiment,” Yonhap news agency quoted a presidential Blue House official as saying.

Lee, a keen tennis player, asked officials to put their clubs away at least in the run-up to the major local Chuseok holiday in mid-September.

His government, which began battling low popularity ratings almost as soon as it took office in February, has had to abandon ambitious economic growth targets for this year because of a global downturn, while fast-rising inflation has triggered mounting wage demands from the country’s unionised labour force.

Golf is hugely popular in South Korea but the high cost sees many players fly off to cheaper parts of Asia for a game.

An average club near the capital charges $250,000 (134,000 pounds) to $500,000 to join and members can expect to pay $250 per guest for a weekend round of golf.

(Reporting by Park Ju-min; Writing by Jonathan Thatcher; Editing by Jonathan Hopfner)

A 27-year-old Egyptian woman gave birth to septuplets early Saturday in the coastal city of Alexandria, family members and the hospital director said.

Ghazala Khamis was in good condition after having a blood transfusion during her Caesarean section due to bleeding, said Emad Darwish, director of the El-Shatbi Hospital where she gave birth.

The newborns, four boys and three girls, weigh between 3.2 pounds and 6.17 pounds and are in stable condition, Darwish said. They have been placed in incubators in four different hospitals that have special premature baby units, he said.

“This is a very rare pregnancy — something I have never witnessed over my past 33 years in this profession,” Darwish told The Associated Press by phone from the hospital.

Darwish decided to carry out the Caesarean section at the end of Khamis’ eighth month of pregnancy due to the pressure on her kidneys. He said Khamis, who already has three daughters, took fertility drugs in an effort to have a son.

Khamis, the wife of a farmer in the northern Egyptian province of Beheira, was admitted to the hospital two months earlier, Darwish said.

“From the initial checkup, I say that none of the babies have any sort of deformities or incomplete organs,” Darwish said.

The woman’s brother, Khamis Khamis, said even though his sister was trying to conceive more children so she could have a son, the family was astonished when they found out she would give birth to multiple babies.

“We thought about an abortion, but then we felt it’s religiously forbidden. So we said ‘Let God’s will prevail,’” he told the AP by phone.

Egypt’s health minister announced that the seven babies will receive free milk and diapers for two years, the brother added.

Police spokesman Arnout Aben says the animals wandered in a group through a nearby neighborhood for several hours after their 5:30 a.m. breakout.

The animals were back at the circus later Monday after being rounded up by police and circus workers with the assistance of dogs. Aben says neighbors fed some of the animals — which he said was a bad idea — but they were tame and nobody was hurt.

Says Aben: “You have to imagine somebody rubbing his eyes first thing in the morning and saying, ‘Am I seeing things or is that 15 camels walking past?’”

The couple, from the southeastern town of Trebic, had some doubts about the child as her hair was blonde and they both had dark hair. Fellow drinkers’ suspicions got on their nerves.

But the test showed neither of the parents had the same DNA as the baby, Czech news agency CTK reported Wednesday, suggesting a mix-up at the hospital. Authorities were looking into the case.

The sighting of a shark 10 days ago in the waters off the port of Bar at first prompted the local lifeguard to order all swimmers and divers out of the water, but they soon went back.

“The appearance of a shark should be accepted as normal. It’s as natural as seeing a bear in the woods,” said Captain Krsto Rakocevic, head of maritime security.

The scare enlivened the tabloid pages in Montenegro and Serbia but was short-lived. The coast of the newly independent republic continues attract record tourist numbers, many from neighboring Serbia, Montenegro’s partner for nearly 90 years until they split last year.

The Bar shark sighting spawned copy-cat discoveries a few days later. Local fishermen said the creature spotted by water-scooter riders off the southern resort of Ulcinj was a harmless thresher shark, native to the waters.

The thresher and the blue shark are common in the Adriatic, prized by game fishermen but rarely spotted inshore. At least one Serbian tabloid last week displayed photographs of a huge Great White shark.

Footage of the Hollywood star sweeping Shetty backwards in a dramatic embrace at the Sunday night event in New Delhi was repeatedly aired on news channels on Monday.

Many saw the act as an outrage against Shetty’s modesty and Indian culture, though Shetty herself angrily dismissed the protests as an “over-reaction” that made India look silly.

Groups of men burned and kicked effigies of the actors in protests across India, including in the northern Indian cities of New Delhi, Kanpur, Meerut and Varanasi as well as in the central city of Indore.

Some called for the actors’ deaths. Others wanted public apologies.

But Shetty, the winner of the “Celebrity Big Brother” reality TV show in Britain this year, said the reaction to the kiss made India look “regressive.”

“I admit it went a little overboard but that was not the intention,” she said to a crowd of journalists and protesters that had besieged her film set in Mumbai on Monday evening.

“He did not do anything obscene,” she said of Gere, adding that they had since spoken on the phone. “He apologized to me and told me to tell the media that he apologized.”

She said Gere was only re-enacting his moves from the film “Shall We Dance” to entertain the audience and communicate in a Bollywood style as he did not speak Hindi.

The clinch between the two stars had originally gone down well when it happened onstage at an event on Sunday night to encourage truckers — seen as a high-risk group in India’s fight against AIDS — to wear condoms during sex.

They whooped with delight and whistled loudly as Gere swooped down on a visibly delighted Shetty to kiss her on her hand and a number of times on one side of her face.

“No condom, no sex,” an ebullient 58-year-old Gere shouted in Hindi to thousands of truck drivers who roared his words back in unison at a dusty fairground in New Delhi.

Indian authorities have been focusing on high-risk groups such as truckers, who have helped spread the virus across the country as many of them have sex with prostitutes during their journeys and infect their wives back home.

The U.S. coffee shop chain has told India’s Controller-General of Patents, Designs and Trademark that the name is deceptively similar to its own name, the paper said.

Husain, an herbal beauty specialist who has a range of skincare and haircare products and salons named after her, is not willing to give up the name, the paper said.

“Why should I give it up? Hundreds of others are deceptively similar. What to do? They have opposed and we will fight,” Husain, called the Herbal Queen, told Mint.

Husain plans to open 25 stores in a year. The shops will have a glamour theme, with posters of movie stars, the paper said.

“My concept’s totally different,” she said.

Starbucks, the latest in a line of foreign companies facing branding challenges in India, is reported to be awaiting permission from the Indian government to open its coffee shops in a joint venture with an Indonesian franchisee and Pantaloon Retail India Ltd.’s founder Kishore Biyani.

The government had sought some clarifications from Starbucks on its joint venture arrangement, local papers have said.

The bar, which normally offers oxygen, is encouraging customers to inhale helium, which distorts the voice, giving a high-pitched cartoon-character sound for a funny effect.

“Valentine’s Day is a special day for couples but its possible to have a party with just two. I wanted to make a different kind of party. Also people who are alone can come here and have some fun,” said Gerard Bazzone, co-owner of the Pure Bar.

But patrons should be wary of pledging undying love repeatedly as too much helium can cause asphyxiation.

Prosecutors told a court in Ibaraki prefecture in eastern Japan the defendant had forced her way into the man’s home seven times between July and October last year despite being ordered to stay away by police, the Mainichi newspaper reported.

Prosecutors said the woman had sent 206 love letters and cleaned the man’s family grave site 85 times. After the prohibition order was issued, she then demanded 1.25 million yen ($10,300) from him for the amount she had paid to get a driver’s license to travel to his home and for petrol costs.

Later, she reportedly started sending threatening letters to the man, saying “If it comes down to it, you could die,” the paper quoted the indictment as saying.

Prosecutors are seeking a 10-month jail sentence because they believe there is a high chance the defendant could commit another offence.

($1=121.71 Yen)