St Petersburg

Riot police wielding batons beat, kicked and chased anti-Kremlin protesters through the heart of St Petersburg on Sunday, a day after Russian authorities snuffed out a similar rally in Moscow. In the last few months police tactics against opposition marches have been to forcefully clear them off the streets after a certain period of time.

To ride in a golf cart or not to ride? That was the question driving a wedge between Group of Eight (G8) leaders even before they sat down for talks on Sunday. The G8 leaders were trying to bridge differences on the Middle East, energy and Iran’s nuclear programme. But on how to travel around the summit site they looked far apart.

World leaders pledged on Sunday to keep Africa’s woes in mind and to track actively their progress on cutting poverty and supporting development, a move welcomed by campaigners. British Prime Minister Tony Blair put assistance for Africa at the top of the agenda at the Group of Eight summit he hosted in 2005 but this year’s host Russia initially ignored the topic.

The United States and Russia announced on Saturday a plan to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons by setting up international enrichment centres as their leaders sought to give a boost to a big-power summit. US President George Bush and Russia’s Vladimir Putin unveiled the initiative at a news conference after talks ahead of a Group of Eight summit that starts in earnest on Sunday.

A 93-year-old driver apparently suffering from dementia fatally struck a pedestrian and drove for 4,8km with the man’s body through his windshield, police said. Ralph Parker was stopped after he drove through a toll booth on the Sunshine Skyway, traffic homicide investigator Michael Jockers said.

Sex offenders tracked by the state are banned from public hurricane shelters in Florida under a new policy that allows them to weather the storms in prison instead. The policy was created to keep sex offenders and predators away from children, said Robby Cunningham, spokesperson for the Department of Corrections.