WORLD IN BRIEF

Money for victims of tainted milk

Chinese dairy companies that sold melamine-tainted milk are ready to pay compensation to the families of the nearly 300,000 children who became ill or died from drinking contaminated infant formula, a state news agency reported. Twenty-two dairy producers will make a one-time cash payment to the victims’ families, China’s Dairy Industry Association announced, although it did not disclose an amount, the official Xinhua News agency said. In one of the worst food-safety scandals ever to hit China, at least six babies died and some 294,000 other children suffered kidney and urinary problems from drinking formula contaminated with the industrial chemical.

Cholera epidemic at a crisis point

International aid agencies warned that Zimbabwe’s humanitarian crisis is deepening, with a sharp rise in acute child malnutrition and a worsening cholera epidemic. President Robert Mugabe’s government has acknowledged the collapse of Zimbabwe’s health system, but he also claimed earlier this month that the epidemic had been brought under control and that there was “no cholera” in the country. Acute child malnutrition in parts of Zimbabwe has increased by almost two-thirds compared with last year, aid agency Save the Children said in a new report Saturday. The World Health Organization said 1,518 people have died of cholera and 26,497 cases have been recorded since August.

MP3 player helps rescue skiers

Swiss rescue officials said they found two missing skiers after spotting the light from their MP3 music player. The Swiss air rescue association Rega said it received a distress call from the French tourists late Friday but the skiers’ phone battery went dead before they could be reached. Rega spokesman Gery Baumann said the two men, both 22, were eventually found early Saturday in steep, wooded terrain by a helicopter crew that spotted the light from their digital music player near the town of Savognin in southeastern Switzerland.

Leadership choice will be shared

Guinea’s coup leader said he would allow the opposition and union leaders to help choose a prime minister, in an apparent concession five days after his group declared control of the impoverished West African country. Capt. Moussa Camara also vowed to renegotiate the country’s numerous mining and trade contracts and warned he will execute anyone who embezzles state funds. Camara said he wants to do away with the corruption that has drained the mineral-rich state’s coffers and left the nation’s 10 million people impoverished. Guinea is the world’s largest producer of bauxite, the raw material used to make aluminum, and also produces diamonds, gold and timber.

Vandals target holiday goat

A giant Christmas straw goat that has been targeted in a violent Christmas tradition for four decades in Sweden was burned down yet again on Saturday, an official said.

“It was set on fire early in the morning; it’s very sad,” goat committee spokeswoman Anna Ostman said. “People from 105 countries have followed the goat via the Web cams and many become really sad when they learn that he’s burned down. We have heard from a lot of people, including the United States.”

Vandals have burned the 43-foot (13-meter)-high goat 23 times since it was first set up in the central Swedish city of Gavle on Dec. 3, 1966, to mark the holiday season.

The traditional yuletide goat has also been smashed several times, run over by a car and had its legs cut off.

Survey discovers undersea peaks

Undersea mountains several thousand meters high have been discovered subducted under a tectonic plate that constitutes the sea bottom off the Boso Peninsula in the southeastern part of Japan’s Kanto region, according to a survey by the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology. The agency expects the result of the survey will provide important insights into the mechanism that creates the type of massive earthquakes that it is feared will hit the Tokyo metropolitan area and the south Kanto region in the future.

COMING UP

> Ghana’s presidential contest heads to a runoff vote today, a race that has become a referendum on whether the West African country’s stunning growth of the past eight years has trickled down to ordinary people. President John Kufuor is stepping down after two terms, as required by law.

> Bangladeshis head to the polls Monday to vote for prime minister for the first time in seven years. But the two top candidates, Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina, are former prime ministers charged with corruption, and many voters say they fear the election won’t bring the reform the impoverished country needs.

Mexico beauty queen arrested, loses crown

A Mexican beauty queen detained on suspicion of drug and weapons violations has been stripped of her crown in the Hispanoamerican Queen pageant, contest organizers said. Laura Zuniga, 23, was stripped of first-place honors for “failure to comply with the regulations of the title she represents,” Bolivia-based pageant organizing company Gloria Promociones said. She beat more than 19 contestants from Latin America, the Caribbean and the United States to win the title in October. Runner-up Vivian Noronha of Brazil will receive the crown. The company statement did not specify what pageant rules were broken by Zuniga, who was detained in western Mexico last week along with seven men, some of them suspected drug traffickers. Authorities found a large stash of weapons, ammunition and $53,300 with them inside a vehicle.