International Briefs

Illness takes toll on North Korea's Kim

BEIJING (AP):

The pompadour was gone, along with much of the paunch. North Korea's 68-year-old dictator Kim Jong Il appeared shrivelled and worn during this week's scaled-down visit to China, signs that his health has deteriorated.

Kim, who almost never travels abroad, had clearly lost weight and hair and appeared to show signs of a stroke reportedly suffered in 2008. His left arm hung at his side much of the time, and he walked with a limp as is common among stroke patients.

South Korean experts also report Kim, known as a heavy drinker, is undergoing kidney dialysis every two weeks.

Protests against suspension of headscarved girl

PRISTINA (AP):

Several hundred ethnic Albanian protesters say they want education authorities to reverse the suspension of a girl from school because she wore a Muslim headscarf.

The protesters, many of them devout Muslims, chanted anti-government slogans as they walked in the capital, Pristina, yesterday. Some carried placards reading 'Stop Discrimination' and 'Veiling of the mind is forbidden, not of the head'.

Arlinda Zeka, 16, was suspended from high school in the town of Ferizaj, 40 kilometres (25 miles) south of Pristina. Although Kosovo's constitution guarantees religious freedom, education authorities forbid headscarves or other religious symbols from schools. Kosovo is 90 per cent Muslim, although largely secular.