Myanmar unrest death toll reaches 43

The toll from violence between Buddhists and Muslims in Myanmar (Burma) has risen to 43. Source: AAP

THE death toll from recent communal violence in central Myanmar (Burma) has risen to 43 with more than 1300 homes and other buildings destroyed, state media has reported.

Sixty-eight people have been arrested in connection with the Buddhist-Muslim unrest, which has left 11,376 people homeless, the New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported on Saturday.

In total, 163 incidences of violence have been reported in 15 townships, it added.

Previously the official death toll stood at 40.

The situation appears to have calmed since President Thein Sein on Thursday vowed a tough response against those behind the violence, which he attributed to "political opportunists and religious extremists".

Security forces fired warning shots on Wednesday to disperse rioters. But Muslim leaders have criticised the security forces for failing to stop the attacks.

The clashes were apparently triggered by an argument in a gold shop that turned into a riot, but witnesses say the wave of violence since then appears to have been well organised.

It is the worst sectarian strife since violence between Buddhists and Muslims in the western state of Rakhine last year left at least 180 people dead and more than 110,000 displaced.

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Rudd tells China to be cautious of N Korea

Kevin Rudd faces the media in Brisbane. Picture: Darren England Source: News Limited

FORMER prime minister and foreign minister Kevin Rudd has told officers of Beijing's main defence academy that the world is looking to China to use its influence to quell the aggression of North Korea.

In a speech this week to China's National Defence University, reported by The Australian newspaper on Saturday, Mr Rudd said North Korea's nuclear program poses a serious threat to China's relations with its neighbours.

The speech was made two days before North Korea announced on Saturday that it had formally entered into a "state of war" with South Korea.

In the latest in a string of pronouncements from Pyongyang and tough warnings from Seoul and Washington, a government statement from North Korea said: "As of now, inter-Korea relations enter a state of war and all matters between the two Koreas will be handled according to wartime protocol."

The White House said it took the new warning seriously but added that Pyongyang's threats were following a familiar pattern.

The Australian said Mr Rudd's Beijing address had coincided with the United States' confirmation on Thursday that it had sent two B-2 stealth bombers, capable of carrying nuclear weapons, to drop munitions on a target range on a South Korean island.

Mr Rudd told his audience of officers that the diplomatic efforts of all nations but China had failed to persuade North Korea against its shows of aggression.

But while China had gone to considerable lengths to try to change North Korea's behaviour, Pyongyang had rewarded it by launching its third underground test during China's Spring Festival holiday.

And while China was announcing its new leadership to the world, North Korea had declared its renunciation of the 1953 armistice.

Pyongyang's antics threatened China's foreign policy objectives because Asian nations were beginning to co-operate on regional anti-ballistic missile defences, which could work against China as well as North Korea, Mr Rudd said.

North Korea's threats to bomb the US and its allies and to reduce the South Korean capital of Seoul to a smouldering ruin had come as some in Japan and South Korea were pushing for their countries to develop nuclear weapons of their own.

"Our Chinese friends would also appreciate that other countries of the region have profound concerns about both the nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program of North Korea and its inflammatory declaratory language concerning its preparedness unilaterally to use armed force against the South and other 'unnamed aggressors' in Asia," Mr Rudd said.

He added: "The most immediate and significant threat to a new form of strategic co-operation between Beijing and Washington, and between Beijing and the rest of the region, lies in the North Korean nuclear program.

"North Korea's nuclear posture is of itself causing the US and its allies in the region to enhance their co-operation on ballistic missile defence in order to counter the North Korean threat.

"Such ballistic missile defence co-operation also of course has wider implications for China's national and security interests beyond the Korean Peninsula.

"China's own global foreign policy standing is suffering and will continue to suffer as a result of North Korean adventurism."

Prime Minister Julia Gillard will next week lead a delegation to China that includes ministers Bob Carr, Craig Emerson and Bill Shorten for talks on trade, security and clean energy.

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Vic faithful flock to city for Good Friday

ABOUT 2000 worshippers have re-enacted the stations of the cross in Melbourne as part of an annual event that is growing each year.

The procession, called The Way of the Cross, was started by Melbourne City Churches in Action 12 years ago to bring people together on Good Friday.

Commemorating Jesus's final hours from the last supper to crucifixion and resurrection, it initially attracted just a couple of hundred people, organiser Jamie Pearce said on Friday.

"There was a feeling that there was nothing much happening in the city on Good Friday that was in any way shared," Mr Pearce said.

He said police had estimated the number of people attending this year at between 1800 and 2000.

The procession visited nine city churches, finishing at St Paul's Cathedral, with followers pausing for a reading and prayers with each stop.

Mr Pearce said the gathering on Sunday morning for the final station - the resurrection - will be significantly smaller than Friday's procession.

"It's usually only about 40 of us," he said. "They put on champagne in celebration of the resurrection.

"It's quite a bash."

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Qld toddler injured after boat capsizes

A TODDLER has been left with head injuries after a boat capsized on the Gold Coast.

A Department of Community Safety spokeswoman says paramedics were called out to the incident at Surfers Paradise about 12.30pm (AEST) on Friday.

When they arrived, they treated the injured 18-month-old tot and a 60-year-old man with a cut to his leg.

Both were taken to Gold Coast hospital.

A third patient was assessed but did not require treatment.

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US boy survived on sugar after mum died

A NAKED, malnourished boy found in an apartment with the body of his mother, who had been dead for days, had resorted to eating from a bag of sugar and weighed only 11 kilograms, police say.

The four-year-old's first request after being examined, police in New Jersey say, was a juice and a grilled cheese sandwich.

His mother, identified on Wednesday as 38-year-old Kiana Workman, was discovered dead on Tuesday on the floor of her bedroom after building maintenance workers reported a foul odour.

Because the chain lock was on the boy couldn't get out.

Officer Joseph Sauer said the boy was naked but coherent and not crying when police kicked in the door.

"The only way to describe the little boy was it was like a scene from World War II, from a concentration camp, he was that skinny. I mean, you could see all his bones," Sauer told The Associated Press.

The boy was not strong enough to open the refrigerator and he couldn't tell police how long he had been eating from a bag of sugar.

The boy could not say how long his mother had been dead.

Police said he put lotion on his mother, leaving behind handprints, in an attempt to help her.

Police initially estimated she had been dead for five days before the discovery, but Zieser said on Wednesday it may have been two to three.

Nobody had talked to her for about a week.

Autopsy results were pending but police did not suspect foul play.

Officer Sylvia Dimenna, who travelled in the ambulance with the boy and stayed with him at the hospital, said he was very bright and articulate but tired.

"He said he missed his mommy," she said.

The boy, now in state custody, remained in a hospital where he was being treated for malnourishment and dehydration.

At his age, he should weigh 18 kilograms or more, police said, so it's possible he was improperly cared for before his mother's death.

Police said they were getting calls from around the world from people offering to adopt the child or donate money or toys.

It would be up to the state's child welfare agency to determine where he was placed.

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NZ cricketer critically injured in attack

NZ cricketer Jesse Ryder is in intensive care after an attack left him with a fractured skull. Source: AAP

THE New Zealand cricket community is in shock as Test batsman Jesse Ryder remains in intensive care in hospital after being attacked twice while out in Christchurch with his teammates.

The 28-year-old is in a critical condition in an induced coma in Christchurch Hospital after he suffered multiple injuries, including a fractured skull, in a serious assault in the city early on Thursday.

Police say Ryder had been out for a drink with his Wellington teammates at Aikmans Bar in Merivale following their loss to Canterbury in a domestic one-day match.

There was an initial altercation on the footpath outside the bar involving Ryder and at least two other men, Detective Senior Sergeant Brian Archer told a press conference.

Ryder and two others went across the road to McDonald's to meet up with their teammates, where a second altercation involving one of the men from the initial incident took place at the entrance to the carpark.

It was during the second altercation that Ryder was seriously assaulted and emergency services were called, Det Sen Sgt Archer said.

It's thought at least 10 people witnessed the attacks and police are reviewing CCTV footage from the area.

Det Sen Sgt Archer said police hadn't yet identified the people involved, but they were following "positive lines of inquiry".

There was no indication at this stage that alcohol was a contributing factor to the assault, he said.

Police are working to determine what happened leading up to it.

New Zealand Cricket Players' Association Heath Mills said the cricket community was in shock over what had happened to Ryder.

"It's a sad day for us," he said.

"A number of players around the country are in shock. Our focus now is on Jesse and his wellbeing."

Ryder was due to leave for the Indian Premier League (IPL) on Friday after his services were acquired by the Delhi Daredevils at a player auction in February.

The big-hitting batsman, who has been unavailable to play for New Zealand for 12 months, was picked up for $US260,000 ($A250,100).

The seven-week long tournament runs from April 3 to May 26.

It is not the first time Ryder has been involved in an incident in Christchurch. In February 2008 he cut his hand trying to break into a toilet in a bar in the city.

After a number of other incidents, he admitted he had a drinking problem and last March announced he was taking an indefinite break from international cricket.

He played for the Pune Warriors in last year's IPL and was accompanied by psychologist Karen Nimmo and Klee.

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Gillard defends the 2011 live export ban

PRIME Minister Julia Gillard has defended the federal government's 2011 ban on live exports, ahead of a possible confrontation with protesters in Perth.

Ms Gillard said the government had to place a temporary ban on live exports after video surfaced of Australian animals being mistreated in Indonesia.

"We faced a situation where if we did nothing and images of this kind of cruelty just came back to Australia time after time after time, then community anxiety would have got to the stage where people would have said ban this industry and ban it for all time," she told ABC radio on Wednesday.

"What I chose to do instead was to put in place a ban so we could move to increase animal welfare standards.

"We've done that, and what that means is, we've put the industry on a strong and stable footing for the future."

The new system involves tracking animal welfare standards so people could export livestock knowing they were not at risk of "a sudden outpouring of community sentiment" that would close their business down, Ms Gillard said.

The prime minister will attend a community cabinet in Thornlie later on Wednesday where she is expected to be confronted by live animal export protesters.

Stop Live Exports coordinator Katrina Love said she expected about 100 people to attend the public forum for a peaceful rally, urging the prime minister to announce a plan before the federal election to phase out live exports.

"We will vote for a party that commits to a phase-out and an end to this cruelty," she said.

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