World in brief: Police say U.N. official kidnapped
Gunmen kidnapped a foreigner serving as a regional chief for the U.N. refugee agency in southwest Pakistan today, police said, underscoring the threat to expatriates in a country bedeviled by insurgencies and rising criminality.
The gunmen also wounded the official’s Pakistani driver in the main southwest city of Quetta as the two were leaving for work, senior police official Khalid Masood said. It was not immediately clear where the official is from or the exact scope of his duties.
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka
Hospital hit by shelling
Three artillery barrages struck a hospital in Sri Lanka’s chaotic war zone, slamming into its pediatrics ward and its women’s wing and killing nine patients, the Red Cross said today.
Dr. Thurairajah Varatharajah, the top government health official in the area, said the shells in at least two of the attacks Sunday appeared to have been fired by the Sri Lankan army.
They caused extensive damage to the overcrowded Puthukkudiyiruppu hospital, one of the last functioning health institutions inside rebel-held territory, he said.
The three attacks hit a kitchen, a chapel and the women and children’s wing of the hospital, Red Cross spokeswoman Sarasi Wijeratne said today.
The attacks killed nine people and wounded 20 others, she said. The aid agency, which has offices in the hospital, did not say which side fired the shells.
The U.N. confirmed the hospital was hit several times Sunday by artillery shells throughout the day.
Military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said the army was not responsible for the attacks and blamed the rebels, known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
Mexico City
City reduces water service
Mexico City shut down a main water pipeline under a new conservation program, cutting service to more than 2 million residents Sunday after some reservoirs dropped to their lowest levels in 16 years.
The Mexico City government and the National Water Commission will interrupt service for three days every month until May, when the rainy season begins.
Mexico City’s government says the plan will affect everyone from those living in million-dollar mansions to cement hovels. Another 13 cities in the metro area of 20 million also will see service reduced, the National Water Commission said.
To prepare for the three-day shutdown, residents filled underground cisterns, saved water in buckets to bathe and were flushing toilets and doing the wash only when necessary.