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/ 21 December 2007
Japan’s whaling fleet in the Antarctic will avoid killing humpback whales for now, but will press on with plans to slay 1 000 other whales by early in the New Year, a government official said on Friday. Plans by Japan to include 50 endangered humpbacks in its annual hunt had sparked an outcry from activists.
A plane belonging to Taiwan’s China Airlines exploded and caught fire soon after landing on Japan’s southern island of Okinawa on Monday, but officials said all 165 people on board had escaped safely. The Boeing 737-800 plane, which had just arrived from Taipei, was already being evacuated when the left engine exploded.
The United Nations nuclear watchdog said on Wednesday that North Korea had shut down its nuclear reactor and four related facilities, a major step in efforts to get it to give up its nuclear-weapons programmes. The announcement came as negotiators at six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear-weapons programme sat down to a first day of talks in Beijing.