World Watch

SOUTH ASIA
No Silver Lining to This Cloud
A thick brown haze hangs in the air over South Asia, scientists working for the U.N. Environment Program reported. The brown cloud, made of smoke and carbon monoxide that cause respiratory illnesses, suppresses up to 15% of the sunlight falling on it. The haze is altering the winter monsoon, cutting rainfall over northwestern Asia by between 20% and 40%, while increasing it farther east — which may explain this summer's exceptionally heavy monsoon in Bangladesh, Nepal and northeast India. But the cloud is not just a regional problem, the scientists stressed. East and Southeast Asia suffer similar haze problems, and "a pollution parcel ... can travel halfway round the globe in a week," said Klaus Toepfer, head of the U.N. program. On a more hopeful note, he added: "The Asian cloud is man-made, so it can be eliminated."

MIDDLE EAST
In the Wrong Place, at the Wrong Time
The death of a Palestinian man revived criticism that the Israeli army is using human shields as part of its campaign in the West Bank. Palestinian witnesses said 19-year-old Nidal Abu M'khisan was forced at gunpoint to try to get Nasser Jarrar — a senior Hamas militant in the West Bank town of Tubas — to surrender. M'khisan was given a flak jacket and sent to Jarrar's door, where he was killed in a burst of gunfire. The army said it was trying to prevent deaths by having M'khisan warn any civilians who might have been inside. But the Israeli human-rights group B'tselem said he was used as a shield.

GERMANY
Inundated Cities
As floodwaters receded in Austria and the Czech Republic, they rose in Germany. The Elbe River reached a historic high, sending thousands of people fleeing from their homes in the southeastern German city of Dresden. While emergency services concentrated on evacuating residents from the danger zone, authorities also worked furiously to minimize damage at the city's historic Semper Opera House and Zwinger Gallery, with its great art collection. Across southeastern Germany, floods have forced more than 30,000 people from their homes and killed 11.

RUSSIA
Aid Worker Seized
A Dutch employee of the international medical aid group Médecins Sans Frontières was abducted in the republic of Dagestan in southern Russia. Peter-Arjan Erkel, 32, head of the M.S.F. mission in Dagestan, was seized by three gunmen in the suburbs of Makhachkala, the regional capital. Following the abduction, M.S.F. suspended aid work throughout Russia's North Caucasus region. Dagestan borders Chechnya, where M.S.F. and the U.N. suspended operations last month after the kidnaping of aid worker Nina Davidovich. Russian Interior Ministry officials said no ransom had been demanded for Erkel, and M.S.F. said it had not been contacted by his yet-unknown abductors.

NIGERIA
Resign or Else
The ruling People's Democratic Party said it will take strong action against its members who voted to impeach Nigeria's President Olusegun Obasanjo. The lower House of Representatives backed a resolution calling on Obasanjo to resign or else face impeachment on charges of misrule.

SAUDI ARABIA
Bent Out of Shape
The axis of evil developed a kink in it when Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal revealed that Iran, one of U.S. President George W. Bush's three arch-enemies, had handed over 16 Saudi Arabians who were allegedly members of al-Qaeda. The 16 men had fled to Iran to escape war in Afghanistan. The Iranian authorities knew that information gained from the men would be handed to America, said Saud.

CHINA
Political Shrinks
China has revived the use of psychiatry for repression, said Human Rights Watch, a non-governmental group based in New York City. China's abuse of psychiatry to detain and institutionalize its political opponents at least equals and probably surpasses similar practices in the former Soviet Union, the report said. After declining from a peak in the 1960s, political psychiatry has been revived as a result of the crackdown on the Falun Gong sect. A Hong Kong court found 16 Falun Gong followers guilty of causing a public obstruction by demonstrating outside China's main office in the territory.

INDONESIA
Democratic Reform
The world's most populous Muslim state abolished an electoral system that let President Suharto hold power for 32 years. The People's Consultative Assembly passed changes to the constitution including the introduction of direct elections for president and vice president — previously, the Assembly chose the holders of both offices. The Assembly abolished the 38 seats reserved for the military and police, and rejected a call by two parties to introduce Islamic law. Increasing democratization has been contentious. Last month, President Megawati Sukarnoputri questioned whether Indonesians were politically mature enough to elect their leaders directly.

U.S.
Rogue Mail
Postal inspectors investigating the anthrax mailings linked to five deaths last fall inched closer to a solution to the mystery. They found a mailbox in Princeton, New Jersey that tested positive for traces of the bacteria. U.S. Postal Service spokesman Dan Mihalko said the box had been sent to an army facility in Maryland for analysis, as field testing was fallible. The suspect mailbox was discovered during an investigation of hundreds of boxes from which mail is sent to a sorting office in Trenton, New Jersey, where four anthrax-laced letters were postmarked last year.

COLOMBIA
State of Emergency
Newly installed President Alvaro Uribe declared a state of emergency in response to a wave of attacks by Marxist guerrilla groups. The decision will allow the President to impose new legal and security measures to confront what his government called "a regime of terror in which democratic authority is sinking." As one of the first consequences of the state of emergency, the government decreed a one-time tax, which is aimed at raising $780 million to finance extra military spending.

MEANWHILE
Elvis is Toast
New Zealander Maurice Bennett crafted an unusual portrait of the King of Rock 'n' Roll on the 25th anniversary of his death. Two months in the making and covering 5.76 sq m, the portrait consists of more than 4,000 pieces of toast. If Elvis were alive, he'd eat it.