San Jose, Costa Rica – Nobel Peace laureate and Costa Rican President Oscar Arias said Tuesday that he has swine flu, showing that not even a head of state is safe from the virus that has caused worldwide concern but relatively few deaths.

The 69-year-old president and Nobel Peace Prize winner said in a statement that he was quarantined at home and is being treated with the anti-flu medicine oseltamivir.

Arias has been serving on-and-off as a mediator in the political crisis in Honduras after that country’s president was ousted June 28 in a coup.

Musharraf charged for purging judges

Islamabad, Pakistan – Former President Pervez Musharraf was charged Tuesday with ordering the illegal detention of judges during Pakistan’s 2007 political crisis and faces arrest if he returns from exile.

The charge is the latest legal setback for the former military dictator, who now lives in London. If convicted, Musharraf could face up to three years in prison. He could post bail if he returns, but analysts doubt he would come back to face the charges.

Earlier this month, Pakistan’s Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, concluded that Musharraf had violated the constitution in 2007 when he imposed a national state of emergency and purged the country’s courts of 60 judges.

Aid workers shot to death

Moscow – The head of a children’s charity in Chechnya and her husband were found shot to death in the trunk of a car Tuesday in the latest sign of violence and lawlessness in the region and the Kremlin’s inability to contain it.

The killings of Zarema Sadulayeva and her husband, Alik Dzhabrailov came less than a month after the slaying of their colleague, the prominent human rights activist Natalya Estemirova, prompted international outrage.

Friends said the couple stood out in the small community of Chechen aid workers because of their independence from the local authorities, and some suggested the killings were intended to intimidate the few remaining activists left in Grozny, the Chechen capital.