World in brief: 3.3-pound truffle fetches $330,000
A Macau casino mogul bid a record $330,00 at auction Saturday to win a giant white truffle dug up in Tuscany, organizers said.
Billionaire Stanley Ho made the winning bid for the 3.3-pound truffle during an auction staged simultaneously in Florence, London and at Ho’s Grand Lisboa hotel in Macau, said auction organizer Giselle Oberti.
The unusually heavy truffle was dug up last week by truffle hunter Cristiano Savini, his father Luciano and dog Rocco in Palaia, a town about 25 miles from Pisa. The Savinis said Rocco started sniffing “like crazy” when he zeroed in on the fungus.
Guinness World Records lists a 2.86-pound white truffle found in Croatia in 1999 as the biggest.
Truffles usually weigh from 1 to 2.8 ounces apiece. Slivers of white truffles, with their strong aroma, are prized in Italy to flavor pasta sauces and rice dishes.
El Fasher, Sudan
Peacekeeper force to be understaffed
Darfur’s peacekeeping force will start in January with less than half the troops initially promised and without key equipment, the force’s commander warned Saturday.
Some 20,000 troops and 6,000 police have been pledged for the joint U.N. and African force. But only 6,500 soldiers will be deployed when the new mission, known as UNAMID, takes over from the current African Union force on Jan. 1, said Gen. Martin Agwai, the force commander. Some 2,000 unarmed, civilian police could also be deployed by January in a best-case scenario, Agwai said.
But the number would still fall far short of the numbers the U.N. Security Council had planned to deploy in Darfur, a region nearly the size of France where 200,000 people have already died and 2.5 million been forced from their homes in four years of fighting between the Sudanese government and local rebels.
Mexico City
Eruptions spew ash miles away
Mexico’s Popocatepetl volcano rumbled to life with six eruptions Friday and Saturday, spewing steam and columns of ash more than a mile into the air.
There were reports of ash raining down on parts of Mexico state and in the capital 40 miles to the northwest.
There appeared to be no injuries or damages and the eruptions were in line with the 17,886-foot volcano’s normal activity, said Teofilo Hernandez, a researcher at the center.
Referred to affectionately as “Popo,” the volcano has been erupting intermittently since December 1994.