Thieves broke into a museum near Stockholm overnight and stole five works by American pop artists Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein, the manager said over the weekend.

The pictures, two lithographs by Warhol and three by Lichtenstein, were together estimated to be worth between 3 million and 4 million Swedish crowns (€314,350 and €422,570), said Carina Aberg of the family-run Aberg Museum.

She said the thieves spent less than 10 minutes in the building. "They knew exactly what they were doing. They had been here and planned the whole thing," she said.

She said the Warhol works stolen were entitled Mickey Mouse and Superman (above left), from a series known as Myths.

The Lichtenstein works taken were Crak, Sweet Dreams, Baby! and Dagwood.

Kids give Pope Mickey Mouse cap

Pope Benedict, who generally wears a white skull cap known as a zuchetto, was given a Mickey Mouse cap with ears last Friday. But, to the disappointment of photographers who would have had a field day with such a shot, he did not try it on.

A group of young people from Orange County, California - where Disneyland is located - gave the Pope the black cap while they were lunching with him during World Youth Day festivities.

They also gave him a California Angels baseball and a stress ball. According to the young people who briefed reporters about the private lunch, the Pope smiled and squeezed the stress ball but passed the Mickey Mouse cap to his aides.

Sewage plant may be named after Bush

San Francisco voters, never thrilled with George W. Bush, may give the US President a parting shot in November by naming a sewage plant after him.

A ballot measure aimed at deriding the Republican President by renaming the city's newest sewage plant qualified over the weekend after organisers submitted 7,168 signatures to the local Department of Elections, officials said.

"What we are doing is satire, part of the proud tradition of skewering political figures that dates back to the Revolution," organisers said on their website, http://presidential memorial.wordpress.com/. "In our opinion it's well earned, for here you have a President who is oblivious to the consequences of his actions, for which thousands have paid with their lives."

The site, which calls itself the Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco, shows the presidential seal with an eagle holding two toilet plungers.

San Francisco has long been a liberal stronghold and is a centre of the movement against the Iraq war, which has been championed by President Bush, who leaves office in January.

Comic relief for foreclosure victims

Borrowers who have lost their homes, thousands of dollars and their good credit ratings can at least have a laugh thanks to real estate agent and website creator Lisa LaShawn.

Ms LaShawn is taking aim at what she considers predatory lenders responsible for a wave of US home foreclosures with the websites www.IHateMortgageBrokers.com and www.AngryMobTshirts.com.

Visitors to the sites can sign an online petition demanding better regulation of the mortgage industry or buy T-shirts with messages such as "Beware of the mortgage broker" and other more vulgar options.

In a sign that mortgage brokers are the new lawyers - the professionals everyone loves to hate - one design says "I hate lawyers" but with "lawyers" crossed out and replaced by "mortgage brokers."

Real estate data group RealtyTrac last week reported there were 252,363 foreclosure filings on US homes in June, down three per cent from May, but up 53 per cent from June 2007.

Illegal smokers threatened with jail

Smokers in the desert state of Niger who break newly-enforced anti-smoking laws by lighting up in public or at work, face punishments of up to three months in prison, the government said.

Smugglers, bandits and rebels in Niger profit from the illegal trans-Saharan cigarette trade - estimated by analysts to be worth €631 million a year - criss-crossing the impoverished West African state's lawless north.

The government's council of ministers in the faraway southwestern capital has decided to adopt ways of applying a May 2006 anti-smoking law, it said in a statement.

Punishments for breaking the newly-enacted law will range from a 5,000 CFA franc (€7.50) fine to three months in prison, a government source said.

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