1. Illegal plastic surgery brokers detained

    Eleven illegal brokers* in South Korea’s plastic surgery* industry have been detained and more than 150 others have been banned from leaving the country on suspicion of engaging in unlawful practices, South Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo reported on May 26.

    The 11 brokers are mainly Chinese and South Korean-Chinese. They posted advertisements on the Internet claiming to help find the best plastic surgery clinics in South Korea.

    According to the police, the brokers are unregistered, charged exorbitant* fees and introduced the patients to unqualified doctors.

    2. Taliban gunmen killed

    Four Taliban insurgents* stormed a guesthouse in the diplomatic quarter of the Afghan capital of Kabul overnight and held out for hours until they were killed by government forces on May 27.

    No other casualties were reported.

    Kabul police chief Abdul Rahman Rahimi said the guesthouse was owned by a prominent Afghan political family that includes Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani.

    The Afghan Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.

    3. Storms kill 17 in Texas, Oklahoma

    Floodwaters deepened across much of Texas on May 26 as storms dumped almost 30 centimeters of rain on the Houston area, stranding hundreds of motorists and inundating* the famously congested highways.

    Several more fatalities were reported — four in Houston and four more in Central Texas. That brought the number of people killed by the holiday weekend storms in Texas and Oklahoma to 17.

    4. 20,000 evacuated due to WWII bomb

    Some 20,000 residents in the western German city of Cologne were forced on May 26 to evacuate* their homes after authorities discovered a 200-kilogram bomb from World War II.

    Schools and kindergartens remained closed and dozens of ambulances were on the scene to evacuate residents of a nursing home.

    The deactivation* of the bomb, which was found near Muelheim bridge crossing the Rhine River, was planned on May 26. City officials said in a statement that during this time the river would be closed for shipping and the air space would be closed too.

    5. Police detained in people-smuggling camps probe

    Twelve Malaysian police officials have been held on suspicion of links to people-smuggling* camps where authorities have uncovered nearly 140 graves believed to hold the bodies of migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh, a government minister said on May 27.

    Police forensic* teams exhumed* bodies from the graves, discovered around 28 camps at six locations along a 50-km stretch of the border with Thailand.

    The dense forests of southern Thailand and northern Malaysia have been a major stop-off* point for smugglers bringing people to Southeast Asia by boat from Myanmar.

    6. Pigeon arrested as ‘suspected spy’

    India police said they have detained a pigeon* suspected of being a Pakistani spy after it was found to have a message stamped on its body.

    Police said a 14-year-old boy in Manwal, a village close to the Pakistani border, brought the pigeon to a police station when he noticed it bore a stamped message on its wing feathers written in Urdu, the official language of Pakistan, and a Pakistani phone number.

    The pigeon’s feathers also reportedly bore the seal of a Pakistani district in Pakistan’s Punjab Province.

    (SD-Agencies)