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WASHINGTON: In the latest sign of turmoil to shake
Hillary Clinton’s White House quest, her top strategist Mark Penn
quit Sunday after his lobbying ties to Colombia sparked a political
firestorm. The resignation of Penn, a Clinton family loyalist who
had been locked in a struggle for influence with other top advisers
in the former first lady’s inner circle, pitched her presidential
campaign into a fresh crisis. Penn quit after admitting he erred by
meeting, in his capacity as a Washington lobbyist, with Colombian
diplomats who backed a trade deal with the United States that
Clinton opposes. 
--AFP
BANGKOK: Thailand’s prime
minister has lashed out at a famous fortuneteller for predicting his
new government’s downfall in another military coup, local press
reported Monday. Samak Sundaravej used his Sunday TV show to
criticize Varin Buaviratlert, whose clients are rumored to include
ousted premier Thaksin Shinawatra’s wife, and the man who
overthrew Thaksin, former army chief Sonthi Boonyaratglin. Varin
predicted that the coalition government led by Samak would collapse
in the coming months, resulting in political chaos and possible
bloodshed.
--AFP
SYDNEY: Five teenage boys armed
with baseball bats and a machete invaded a Sydney high school
Monday, smashing classrooms and injuring several students and a
teacher, police said. Merrylands High School in Sydney’s west went
into “lockdown” with pupils confined to their classes as the
intruders assaulted students and shattered windows before police
arrived and arrested them. Anxious parents gathered outside the
school as news of the attack spread, later escorting their children
home as they were allowed out.
--AFP
SEOUL: An air force surveillance
plane crashed Monday during a training flight over eastern South
Korea but both pilots ejected safely, an official said. The cause of
the accident over a mountainous region of Gangwon province was not
immediately known. The RF-4C aircraft disappeared from the radar at
around 9:40 a.m., a defense ministry spokesman told Agence France-Presse.
One pilot suffered minor facial injuries and the other was rescued
from a tree, which his parachute had snagged.
--AFP
PODGORICA: Montenegro President
Filip Vujanovic claimed an emphatic victory Sunday in the tiny
Balkan state’s first elections for a head of state since it split
away from Serbia two years ago. Vujanovic emerged to claim the
landslide victory 90 minutes after polling stations closed, when
monitors CEMI announced he had won 52.3 percent of the vote based on
a count of 95.5 percent of the ballots cast.
--AFP
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