Brazil: 25 prisoners killed
SAO PAULO — Rioting inmates rounded up rivals in a Brazilian jail cell Thursday and torched it, killing 25 prisoners and showing once again how gangs rule the lockups across Latin America's largest nation.
The prisoners took control of the jail before dawn in the south-central Brazilian state of Minas Gerais and chose to settle scores by locking up members of an opposing gang faction in a cell and setting mattresses ablaze, said police Lt. Andrea Amara Lopes.
Authorities who had been trying to negotiate an end to the prison rebellion sprayed water inside to stop the blaze. A short time later, they found burned bodies littering the smoky cell, the state's public safety department said in a statement.
Britain: Slave-trade apology
LONDON — An emotional Mayor Ken Livingstone apologized Thursday for his city's role in the trans-Atlantic slave trade, saying London was still tainted by it.
The notoriously outspoken Livingstone seldom apologizes for anything, but he choked up as he read an account of the brutal tortures suffered by slaves in Britain's Caribbean colonies. And the politician nicknamed "Red Ken" for his left-leaning views angrily denounced the role of his city's corporations in financing the trade.
"You can look across there to see the institutions that still have the benefit of the wealth they created out of slavery," Livingstone said, pointing through a huge window at the skyscrapers of the financial district. "As mayor, I offer an apology on behalf of London and its institutions for their role in the trans-Atlantic slave trade."
Japan: Finger mailer snagged
TOKYO — Police arrested an extremist Thursday for sending his severed finger to the ruling party to protest the prime minister's absence from a shrine on the anniversary of the end of World War II, officials and news reports said.
Yoshihiro Tanjo, a 54-year-old member of an ultra-right-wing group in Okayama, western Japan, was arrested on charges of threatening Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party, a prefectural police spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity. He said no other details could be immediately released.
Kyodo News agency said Tanjo mailed his severed left pinky finger, a DVD showing the finger being chopped, and a protest statement to the LDP headquarters Aug. 16, the day after the anniversary of the war's end.
Puerto Rico: Officers arrested
SAN JUAN — FBI agents on Thursday arrested 10 police officers accused of planting drugs as fraudulent evidence against residents of housing projects in western Puerto Rico.
A raid on the officers' precinct in Mayaguez discovered a safe holding drugs that were kept in reserve to frame people, U.S. Attorney Rosa Emilia Rodriguez said at a news conference.
The suspects allegedly used marijuana, cocaine and heroin to frame residents of low-income areas between 2004 and 2007. They also made up elaborate details on arrest and search warrants, Rodriguez said.