World highlights

¤ Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will temporarily cede his powers to his deputy when he undergoes a minor heart operation under anaesthesia tomorrow, his office said in a statement. It said that it was decided that Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert would assume power during the three-hour operation and recovery period. Mr Sharon, 77, is to undergo a catheterisation.

¤ Italian hostages in Yemen were making headway yesterday, and one government official said the tribesmen holding the tourists could release them soon. "There are positive indications. We could be seeing a resolution very soon," the official told said on condition of anonymity. Other government officials also said the talks were positive.

¤ Several cars, including that of a Finnish diplomat, and the offices of a political party were damaged by gas canister attacks in Athens yesterday. No one was hurt. A home-made gas canister bomb exploded under the diplomat's car, setting it on fire and burning five more cars nearby. A second attack damaged the offices of the ruling conservative New Democracy party in the Athens district of Polygono.

¤ Relief flights were grounded for a third-straight day in northern Pakistan's earthquake zone yesterday and aid workers scrambled to help cold, wet survivors after two days of heavy snow and rain. Despite the bad weather, health agencies said they had seen no spike in numbers of sick people since the snow and rain started on Saturday night, nor any deaths related to the cold.

¤ Two fresh bomb blasts hit the tourist town of Pokhara in Nepal yesterday, following a series of overnight explosions in the Himalayan kingdom, which came just hours after Maoist rebels called off a four-month truce. The explosions coming soon after the Maoists ended their unilateral truce at midnight on Monday has raised fears of a resurgence of violence.

¤ Poland's influential Treasury Minister, in charge of privatisation and supervising state companies, quit yesterday in a blow to the two-month-old minority conservative government and its sell-off plans. Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz had picked corporate lawyer Andrzej Mikosz for the post, calming investors and financial markets who saw in him a guarantee that privatisation would continue under the Conservatives.