Microchipped dog finds way home -- after nine years

A flea-bitten dog rescued from a squalid backyard is to be reunited with her owners 1,000 miles away -- nine years after she disappeared.

The dog, Muffy, was found sleeping on a tattered piece of cardboard in a backyard in Melbourne with a bad skin condition and matted coat by the RSPCA after an anonymous call.

RSPCA Victoria spokesman Tim Pilgrim said Muffy was found to have been microchipped which did not fit at all with the circumstances so they decided to try to track down the dog's owners whom they found in Brisbane.

"It's amazing that the original owners had microchipped her as it wasn't that common nine years ago and it is amazing that she had come 2,000 km from home," Pilgrim told Reuters.

"We are advising people to get their pets microchipped so we can have some more happy endings like this one."

He said Muffy was believed to have been at that house in Melbourne for about one year after being found as a stray but no one knew where she had been for the previous eight years.

Muffy will be flown home to Brisbane next week to be reunited with her owners who were delighted to hear that their lost pet had finally been found.

Home Business & Finance News U.S. Politics International Technology Entertainment Sports Lifestyle Oddly Enough Health Science Special Coverage Video

Portuguese police have recaptured a convict who had escaped in 1993 and had been hiding in the caves in the mountains for 16 years receiving help from villagers nearby, local media said on Thursday.

The 54-year-old former shepherd, thin and heavily bearded but healthy, was arrested on Wednesday in the north of the country in a police operation dubbed "Cro-Magnon" in reference to Europe's early humans who lived in caves thousands of years ago, Diario de Noticias daily said.

He had been convicted and sentenced to a 10-year term for accidentally killing a neighbor in a discussion over a sheep flock, but escaped after about 2 years in prison.

Local residents were quoted as saying the man, who only had a dog for company during his hiding, never harmed anyone while on the run. A local mayor said the village would hire a lawyer to try to alleviate his sentence.

Police were quoted as saying many locals had been helping the fugitive by giving him food, money or offering odd jobs, but would not tell the police about his whereabouts when questioned. Police say he would have to serve at least the remaining eight years of his sentence.

Jornal de Noticias daily said the man was very worried about the fate of his pet and, when arrested, pleaded to give it to a villager he knew.

Tourists miss isle after GPS blunder

Two Swedes expecting the golden beaches of the Italian island of Capri got a shock when tourist officials told them they were 650 km (400 miles) off course in the northern town of Carpi, after mistyping the name in their GPS.

"It's hard to understand how they managed it. I mean, Capri is an island," said Giovanni Medici, a spokesman for Carpi regional government, told Reuters Tuesday. "It's the first time something like this has happened."

The middle-aged couple, who were not identified, only discovered their error when they asked staff in the local tourist office Saturday how to drive to the island's famous "Blue Grotto."

"They were surprised, but not angry," Medici said. "They got back in the car and started driving south."

The picturesque island of Capri, famed as a romantic holiday destination, lies in the Gulf of Naples in southern Italy and has been a resort since Roman times.

Carpi is a busy industrial town in the province of Emilia Romagna, at the other end of Italy.

Hackers put China flag on Australian film Web site

CANBERRA, Australia - Hackers posted a Chinese flag on the Web site of an Australian film festival in an escalation of protests against the planned appearance by an exiled Uighur activist whom Beijing blames for deadly ethnic riots in China's west, an official said Sunday.


The cyberattack on the Melbourne International Film Festival _ which also received a flurry of critical e-mails _ came after four Chinese films pulled out of the event and a Chinese diplomat protested the screening of a documentary about activist Rebiya Kadeer, whom Beijing says incited the violence this month between Muslim Uighurs and Han Chinese that left nearly 200 dead.

China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang criticized the screening and Kadeer's planned appearance earlier this month, saying: "Everyone knows the kind of person that Rebiya is. We are firmly opposed to any foreign country providing her with a stage for her anti-China separatist activities."

Kadeer, who lives in exile in the United States and will attend the festival in Australia's second largest city Aug. 8, denies any role in the ethnic violence _ the worst China has seen in decades.

Festival spokeswoman Louise Heseltine said a hacker put a Chinese flag on the Web site for 45 minutes on Saturday _ the day after the festival opened _ as well as English-language messages demanding that festival organizers apologize to all Chinese for including Kadeer in the program.

The Web site host discovered hundreds of other attempts to hack into it, Heseltine said.

The Kadeer documentary, "10 Conditions of Love," premiered at the festival Sunday night. There were no disturbances at the screening, Victoria state police spokeswoman Senior Constable Kendra Jackson said. She said police would monitor future screenings.

Australian Broadcasting Corp. television news on Sunday said it had contacted a Chinese citizen in China who claimed responsibility for the hacking.

The hacker sent an e-mail in which he denied any link to the government, saying he was motivated by anger at the screening of the Kadeer documentary, ABC reported.

Festival director Richard Moore said the Web site had been slowed by the hacking, and online ticket sales had suffered.

"We have received over the last two weeks virtually a mini tsunami of e-mails that I can only describe as being vile," Moore told the ABC. "It's part of a concerted campaign, and I think people who are behind it will try to ramp it up even more."

Moore said a Chinese diplomat at the Melbourne consulate two weeks before the festival opened told him to withdraw the Kadeer film.

The documentary's director, Jeff Daniels, blamed the Chinese government for the protests.

"I personally find it appalling that the Chinese government has put the film festival and filmgoers in the position where they need police escort and private security to see a film," Daniels told the ABC.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry had no immediate response to Daniels' allegation, and a Chinese Embassy spokesman in Canberra was not immediately available for comment Sunday. Beijing has previously denied sponsoring or supporting computer attacks overseas.

German official under fire for taking limo to Spain

Germany's Social Democrat (SPD) health minister came under pressure Sunday to explain why she took her official limousine, complete with chauffeur, to Spain where the vehicle was stolen.

Opposition politicians demanded Ulla Schmidt provide more details about the affair, which could damage the SPD who trail Merkel's conservatives by more than ten points in opinion polls in the run-up to a September 27 federal election.

Thieves stole the keys from the chauffeur's accommodation near Alicante, a ministry spokeswoman said on Saturday, adding Schmidt had used the Mercedes for official meetings to discuss healthcare and pensions with Germans who had retired to Spain.

German media reported that Schmidt had paid for her own flight to Alicante, where she was also taking a holiday, but a driver had brought over her limousine to Spain from Berlin.

Otto Fricke, head of Germany's parliamentary budget committee, said he would summon her to answer questions.

"I would like to know which of Mrs Schmidt's appointments required an official car and chauffeur in Alicante and why it was not possible for the embassy to arrange transportation," Fricke, an opposition Free Democrat, told Bild am Sonntag.

Germany's Taxpayers' Association also attacked Schmidt.

"We demand an explanation of why her official car had to be brought almost 5,000 kilometers (3,000 miles) across Europe. Taxpayers' money should not be wasted on the comfort of a minister," he told Bild am Sonntag.

The ministry spokeswoman said Schmidt had rented a car for her own private use in Alicante, a popular retirement and holiday destination for Germans on Spain's Costa Blanca.

Greens budget expert Alexander Bonde told the Saarbruecker Zeitung: "Why does the minister need an armored limousine in Spain? The budget committee will insist that just referring to official appointments is insufficient and implausible."

Saucy sausage ads condemned

A saucy radio advert for sausages which encouraged listeners to reveal "where you like to stick yours" was criticized by Britain's advertising watchdog on Wednesday.

The ads for Mattesons smoked sausages elicited 21 complaints from listeners who said they were offensive because of the sexual innuendo and should not have been aired when children were likely to be listening.

"Think about all the things you can stick this tasty, extraordinarily large sausage in," one advert said.

"Mmm... Pizza, pasta, stir fry. You have any ideas? Give me a call and tell me where you like to stick it."

Kerry Foods, which makes the sausages, said its adverts were intended to be tongue-in-cheek and were not designed to be offensive.

The Advertising Standards Authority did not uphold the complaints about the innuendo because it was not sexually explicit, but said the ads could "cause harm to children."

It ruled the ads should not be aired at times when they were likely to be heard by children.

Tracy Yip had an autograph session to promote her book "Me and You". There were a lot of readers lining up for her autograph. She stated a few hundred

German tourists can now reserve their poolside recliners before they have even left home.

The German arm of Thomas Cook, Europe's second largest travel company, has been deluged with inquiries since announcing that holidaymakers at nine hotels in Turkey, Egypt and the Canary Islands can book recliners in advance for a fee.

Germans are famous around Europe for rising early to reserve recliners near the pool with their towels, and then going back to bed or eating a lengthy breakfast.

This often annoys tourists from other nations, but they will be unable to take advantage of the new service -- it is valid only for tourists booking their trips from Germany, Mathias Brandes, head of communications at Thomas Cook in Germany, said.

Three escape jail in hijacked helicopter

Three prisoners escaped from a jail outside the Belgian city of Bruges in a hijacked helicopter Thursday, authorities said.

Media reports said the escapees flew to the town of Aalter, then seized a black Mercedes from its female driver and robbed a service station before heading for the Belgian coast.

A Justice Ministry spokesman said no one had been hurt, and that the jailbreak had not been from the high-security wing, which had nets to prevent such escapes.

However, media said the escapees included one of Belgium's most dangerous criminals, Ashraf Sekkaki, who had more than 16 convictions for violence, including kidnappings for ransom.

The Belga news agency quoted the spokesman as saying that one of the accomplices who flew the helicopter into the jail had been left behind, perhaps because there was not enough room for all to get away in the helicopter.

Belga earlier reported that four prisoners had escaped.

It is not the first time a helicopter has been used for an escape in Belgium.

In October 2007, Nordin Benallal, a self-styled "escape king" with convictions for armed robbery and carjacking, broke out of Ittre prison south of Brussels after armed accomplices landed there in a hijacked helicopter.

The helicopter was immediately crowded by other prisoners and crashed. Benallal and his cohorts then seized two prison warders as hostages and fled in a car parked nearby. He was recaptured in the Netherlands three days later.

Earlier the same year, Frenchman Erik Ferdinand escaped in a hijacked helicopter from Lantin prison near Liege. He was arrested several weeks later in Italy.

Fate of "marijuana mine" in limbo

An abandoned mine in northern Canada may lose its role as the country's only government-sanctioned marijuana farm.

Production at the mine -- deep under the tundra at Flin Flon, Manitoba -- had to be moved because the facility was not big enough and a deal to expand it had not been worked out, operator Prairie Plant System said on Wednesday.

The mine had been producing legal marijuana for nearly a decade since Canada began allowing patients legal access to marijuana for medical reasons such as controlling pain.

The switch to another location prompted media reports that the operation had gone up in smoke, but Prairie Plants Chief Executive Brent Zetti said that was premature.

Zetti still hopes to strike a deal with mine owner HudBay Minerals Inc HBM.TO to expand marijuana operations within the mine, and said a final decision will not be made until the end of the month.

"It may be or it may not be (closed forever)," Zetti said.

The company, which raises plants for pharmaceutical uses, has other operations in the Trout Lake mine. Its contract to supply pot to Health Canada for sale to authorized medical users runs for another 2-1/2 years.

Some marijuana activists have panned the quality of pot from the Flin Flon facility, saying many medical users simply grow their own or buy from sources other than the government.

Authorized medical marijuana users are allowed to legally grow their own pot.

While medical marijuana's use is controversial, some research has show has shown the drug to be effective in alleviating symptoms of debilitating diseases such as cancer and multiple sclerosis.

Offbeat and quirky, World Games make their mark in Taiwan

French parachutist Vincent Reffet would have been lost without street vendor Tsai Zong-yi during the World Games in Taiwan.

Reffet dropped from the skies during competition but found himself blown outside the event venue before a medal-winning drop. That was when Tsai came to the rescue. On a scooter.

"After realizing that for three minutes no one had offered the athlete some help, Mr. Tsai decided to approach him and offered him a ride on his scooter to bring him back to the venue," event organizers said in a statement Friday.

"He knew some shortcuts, so he also made sure that Vincent Reffet was back as fast as possible.

"Later on, Reffet won gold in freeflying."

The 2009 World Games has gained a name on anecdotes such as Reffet's. The quirky tales showcase the quadrennial event's offbeat sports and give an insight into life in the obscure host city Kaohsiung, an industrial port in southern Taiwan.

"Kaohsiung's citizens have been very warm," said George Hou, a media instructor at I-Shou University, one of the venues.

"Previously these sports were unknown, but citizens went out and supported them all."

Noise levels from fans bordered on frightening at times, said Hou, adding that foreign athletes got more support than the Taiwanese.

The World Games, an Olympics-sanctioned event, showcases 31 sports that have regional appeal but globally fly under the radar.

Televised in 20 countries, viewers saw mermaid-like swimmers glide down lanes without surfacing in the hunt for finswimming medals. They also saw sword duels and female sumo wrestlers. Korfball and lifesaving also got their 15 minutes of fame.

And when female Brazilian athletes went topless on a Kaohsiung beach, police simply asked them to wear more clothes.

As of Friday, Russia led 97 other countries with 33 World Games medals including 15 golds.

Germans can now grab poolside chairs even earlier

German tourists can now reserve their poolside recliners before they have even left home.

The German arm of Thomas Cook, Europe's second largest travel company, has been deluged with inquiries since announcing that holidaymakers at nine hotels in Turkey, Egypt and the Canary Islands can book recliners in advance for a fee.

Germans are famous around Europe for rising early to reserve recliners near the pool with their towels, and then going back to bed or eating a lengthy breakfast.

This often annoys tourists from other nations, but they will be unable to take advantage of the new service -- it is valid only for tourists booking their trips from Germany, Mathias Brandes, head of communications at Thomas Cook in Germany, said.

Naked girls plow fields for rain

Farmers in an eastern Indian state have asked their unmarried daughters to plow parched fields naked in a bid to embarrass the weather gods to bring some badly needed monsoon rain, officials said on Thursday.

Witnesses said the naked girls in Bihar state plowed the fields and chanted ancient hymns after sunset to invoke the gods. They said elderly village women helped the girls drag the plows.

"They (villagers) believe their acts would get the weather gods badly embarrassed, who in turn would ensure bumper crops by sending rains," Upendra Kumar, a village council official, said from Bihar's remote Banke Bazaar town.

"This is the most trusted social custom in the area and the villagers have vowed to continue this practice until it rains very heavily."

India this year suffered its worst start to the vital monsoon rains in eight decades, causing drought in some states.

Lost love letter reunites couple after 16 years

A British man and his Spanish former sweetheart have finally married 16 years after they drifted apart, reunited by a love letter lost behind a fireplace for over a decade, reports said on Monday.
ADVERTISEMENT

Steve Smith and Carmen Ruiz-Perez, both now 42, fell in love 17 years ago when she was a foreign exchange student in Brixham, southwest England, and got engaged after only a year together.

But their relationship ended after she moved France to run a shop in Paris.

A few years later, in a bid to rekindle their love, Smith sent a letter to her mother's home in Spain. It was placed on the mantelpiece, but slipped down behind the fireplace and was lost for over a decade.

The missing missive was only found when builders removed the fireplace during renovation work.

"When I got the letter I didn't phone Steve right away because I was so nervous," Ruiz-Perez told the Herald Express local newspaper.

"I nearly didn't phone him at all. I kept picking up the phone then putting it down again.

"But I knew I had to make the call."

When they were reunited, it was as if time had stood still, said Smith, a factory supervisor.

"When we met again it was like a film. We ran across the airport into each other's arms. We met up and fell in love all over again. Within 30 seconds of setting eyes on each other we were kissing.

"I'm just glad the letter did eventually end up where it was supposed to be," he said, after the couple married last Friday.

Dog Takes Baby From Crib

Only four days old, young Alexander James Smith was swiped from his crib by a mixed husky and wolf bred dog. Smith suffered a skull facture, broken ribs and a collapsed lungs. I can’t even imagine how the dog was able to get him out of the crib without breaking the actual structure itself.

Doctors say Smith is likely to survive, but noted that they did have to use resuscitation paddles to restart his heart.

Alexander’s mom, Chrissy couldn’t believe her son wasn’t in the crib when she returned to his room. As she frantically looked around the house she noticed their dog missing as well. After ten minutes, Alexander’s dad was able to spot the dog in the grassy field 200 yards away from their house.

Fruit seller tries to ride Obama's coattails

U.S. President Barack Obama has inspired an African immigrant to proclaim himself the "Obama of Volgograd" and run for mayor in the southern Russian region.

Campaign posters for Zhoakim Krima, a 37-year-old water melon salesman from West Africa's Guinea-Bissau, have appeared along the main roads in the Volgograd town of Sredny Akhtub, daily newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported Wednesday.

But his campaign slogan, playing on the rampant stereotypes in provincial Russia, seems unlikely to win Obama's support -- Krima has pledged to "work day and night like a slave" for the good of the town, the newspaper reported.

The prevalence of hate crimes and the general distrust of migrants force most blacks to lead low-profile lives in Russia, where the African-born population is tiny.

Goat's crowning as king of Ireland in doubt

The annual crowning of a goat as king of Ireland at one of the country's oldest fairs is in doubt after organizers said the heir to the throne may be stopped from traveling to the festival.

Traditionally a male goat is caught in the mountains of Kerry in southern Ireland and paraded through the town of Killorglin where he reigns for the three days of Puck Fair, a centuries-old festival of drinking, music and dancing.

Locals may have to desperately trek the nearby hills after this year's chosen animal from the Northern Ireland town of Ballycastle could only get a four-day license for the trip south of the border.

"It takes at least a day to bring a goat from Ballycastle to Killorglan and the goat is on the stand for three days. It's not possible to do that within the four days," Puck Fair chairman Declan Mangan told state radio station RTE.

"The people in Ballycastle are looking for another goat who would be able to come for an extended trip to Kerry. In the meantime we have to look around the mountains here just incase."

Mangan said time is already running out for the local goat catcher to find a replacement for the fair which always falls on August 10-12, despite having origins that are not totally known.

"Our problem is if we don't get a goat from the north pretty quick, our goat catch Frank Joy will have to go out onto the mountains and usually he is out for two or three weeks looking for a suitable goat," Mangan said.

However the panic could be good news for one lucky goat.

"If you are a goat here in the mountains of Kerry, you could well end up being the King Of Ireland for the three days of Puck," Mangan added.

Hawks deliver go-away message to Canada Post

Two nesting hawks have managed to do what Canada's blizzards usually can't -- halt delivery of the mail to a few dozen homes in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.

Canada Post said it stopped delivering to 54 Moose Jaw homes after hawks swooped down on a letter carrier and after a supervisor who came in to inspect the area had to dive for cover. Later, another carrier was attacked two blocks away.

Mischelle Read, who lives on one of two blocks affected by the mail stoppage, saw the hawk swoop at a letter carrier in May before mail delivery stopped.

"It was a 'get-out-of-my-area type of a dive' clearly directed at (the letter carrier)," Read said.

But Read, who now picks up her mail at the post office, said her children continue to play outside. "It's not worrying me," she said.

Canada Post spokeswoman Sandra Sobko said the mail typically goes out even during blizzards, although Canada Post does halt delivery to specific addresses when dogs, wasps or other hazards threaten its carriers.

The Moose Jaw shutdown started in May and will last until the hawks leave their nest, she said.

No drinks for the under-16 crowd?

Milan will become the first Italian city to bar drinking for youths aged under 16 when a ban takes effect on Monday, and Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said he favored extending the ruling nationwide.

Faced with a growing youth drinking problem, the city council in Italy's fashion and business capital voted on Friday to crack down on underage alcohol consumption.

In an interview with Corriere della Sera newspaper on Sunday, Berlusconi said Milan was a model for the rest of Italy.

"I'm worried about the reckless way in which young people are using" alcohol, the center-right leader said.

"So other ordinances from mayors throughout Italy would be welcome, they would have my full support."

Milan has set a fine of 500 euros ($705) for the possession and consumption of alcohol for those under 16 as well as for those selling to under age buyers. The under age drinker's parents will be notified of the penalty.

"Children are good at getting around obstacles, we've stepped in with a fully-rounded ordinance," Mayor Letizia Moratti said in a statement.

Thirty-four percent of Milan's 11-year-olds have already had problems with alcohol, and 750,000 minors drink in Italy, the statement said.

Police catch underwear thief

German police uncovered over 1,000 pairs of underpants and more than 100 pairs of swimming trunks after catching a thief nabbing another three pairs for his collection.

The 46-year-old man was caught Sunday pinching three pairs of pants from a sports hall in the western town of Gelnhausen. Police then came across the enormous collection of underwear while searching his flat.

"They were all evidently in use, but had been washed and neatly stacked away," a police spokesman said Monday.

Police are now investigating where all the underwear came from. The suspect claims to have acquired then from car-boot sales and over the Internet.

Japan's "iron man" quits -- at 81

Japanese marathon runner Keizo Yamada has hung up his sneakers at the grand old age of 81 -- although he could be tempted back to run the odd half marathon.

Yamada, who represented Japan at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics and won the Boston Marathon the following year, said the time was right for him to "scale back" on his running.

"I'm not getting any younger so I won't run any more 42-kilometre races," he told Sunday's Sports Hochi newspaper, adding that he still jogs 20km daily.

"I will carry on running for fun to stay in shape."

Dubbed "Iron Man," Yamada ran three marathons this year, including his 19th appearance in Boston, and completed the Tokyo Marathon in a time of five hours, 34 minutes and 50 seconds.

He was one of the pioneers of Japanese marathon running, along with Shigeki Tanaka and Hideo Hamamura, who also won in Boston in 1951 and 1955 respectively.

Kokichi Tsuburaya put the sport on map in the Japan by taking bronze in the men's marathon at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.

Japan's women have had more success than their male counterparts in recent years, Naoko Takahashi capturing gold at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and Mizuki Noguchi winning the 2004 title in Athens.

Hunt called off for drug lord's hippo

Colombia has called off the hunt to kill a drug lord's escaped hippo and will instead try to relocate the beast after its mate was shot dead by order of the government, sparking outrage from animal rights groups.

The giant animals were imported from Africa by late cocaine king Pablo Escobar and put in his zoo. They escaped in 2006 to live in the wild near the Magdalena river in northern Colombia, causing concerns about local public safety.

Colombia was shocked on Friday when photographs were published of the dead hippo, named "Pepe", and by news that the hunt was still on for his mate, "Matilda," who gave birth to a calf in the wild.

Bogota-based beer company Bavaria, owned by SABMiller, offered to bring in animal protection experts from South Africa and Tanzania to find the best way to care for the surviving hippo and her calf.

"We have accepted Bavaria's offer. The hunt is off," a spokeswoman for Colombia's Environment Ministry told Reuters on Wednesday. "The idea is to relocate the animals."

Scores of protesters picketed ministry offices in Bogota on Tuesday, objecting to what they called the "death sentence" handed down against the hippos.

Pepe was killed by a .375 caliber round through his heart. It was a fate not unlike that of Escobar, who controlled most of the world's cocaine supply before being gunned down by police on a Medellin rooftop in 1993.

He was so flush with cash in the 1980s that he flew in hundreds of exotic animals, including kangaroos, elephants, rhinos and nine hippos.

The African zoologists will also study what to do with the two dozen hippos still living at the site of Escobar's zoo, called Hacienda Napoles in the northern province of Antioquia.

"The experts, once they are here on the ground, can help with our effort at finding the best possible place for these animals to live, either inside or outside Colombia," said a statement issued by the Environment Ministry.

Most of the other animals imported by Escobar, seen by Colombians as symbols of his power and extravagance, were given to local public zoos after his death.

And WHY did they let him out?

German police had to rescue a 20-year-old man from a train station suitcase locker after he shut himself in for fun and began to suffocate.

After a night out drinking with friends, squeezing into the locker had seemed like an amusing idea to the man, police in the southwestern city of Ludwigshafen said Friday.

But the laughter faded when he started to run out of oxygen and his companions couldn't open the locker. Police broke open the door and dragged the groggy man to safety.

I see Belgium, I see France, I see lots of underpants

Wouldn’t you love to see underwear from the very most famous person in Belgium?

Well no, I don’t actually know who that is. I was hoping you would.

Anyway, an artist in Brussels has just opened the Musee du Slip, featuring framed underwear donated by mostly Belgian artists, singers and politicians.

Each pair must have been worn at least once by the donor. I’m hoping it’s been washed, too.

Not just content to display the underpants of famous Belgians, the artist hopes to get underwear from France’s first lady, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. Cripes, I have restraining orders to show that isn’t as easy as it sounds.

The artist says he would also like some undies from the pope, “Or the Iranian president. People would queue to see that.”

Maybe they would, but only in Belgium.

Cannes bans nudists after yacht club complains

Authorities in Cannes have banned naturists from a public beach after the southern French town's yacht club complained the naked bathers had begun to get out of hand.

Naturists have been tolerated for years on Palm Beach, which lies directly in front of the exclusive club.

But the yacht club said they had recently begun exposing themselves more visibly to club members, particularly in front of the restaurant's windows.

"We organize sailing for children, we have a restaurant, but when the naturists get up from bathing they walk around naked," a spokeswoman for the club said.

"Until now they were tolerated, they were quite discreet, but the problem that triggered the decision was that recently their behavior became more questionable."

The town hall issued the order Monday banning naturism on Palm Beach.

"Naturists have been coming to the beach for years and this had provoked complaints, notably from the yacht club," a Cannes town hall spokeswoman said.

First time offenders will now face a fine of 11 euros ($15), with more serious cases possibly earning a prison sentence and a fine of 15,000 euros.