World Briefs

China warned its already tightly controlled media yesterday that the government would not tolerate "obscene, sexual, superstitious or base" advertisements which may embarrass the country over the Olympic period. "Advertising companies have a responsibility to society for propaganda and showing the country's image. Order in the Olympic advertising market directly connects to the national image," the government said in a statement on its website (www.gov.cn).

Instead, advertisers should concentrate on the Beijing Olympics' main themes, such as the "green Olympics" and the "cultured Olympics", the statement said, while special care should be paid to advertisements which have any religious content, refer to rebuilding after May's devastating Sichuan earthquake and anything to do with "sovereignty, territorial integrity and national security".

Those found violating the rules will be "dealt with in accordance with the law", state the rules, issued jointly by six government departments, including the central propaganda department.

Fashionable auction

The private art collection of French fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent and his partner Pierre Berge has been put up for auction and will be sold next February, Christie's said yesterday.

Saint Laurent, one of the leading figures in 20th century French fashion, died in Paris last month at the age of 71.

The auction house declined to estimate how much the collection was likely to fetch but experts have put the figure between 300 and 500 million euros.

French daily Le Figaro said the collection features several hundred pieces including Renaissance jewellery, paintings by masters such as Picasso and Matisse, and manuscripts of the works of French authors Gustave Flaubert and Andre Gide.

Mr Berge, who had amassed the collection with Saint Laurent over a period of almost 40 years, said he "couldn't carry out the sale until after his (Saint Laurent's) death", adding that "the page has turned".

Court in favour of transsexual rights

Germany's constitutional court ruled yesterday that a man seeking legal recognition as a woman will be allowed to stay married to his wife in a landmark decision that further strengthens the rights of transsexuals.

The Karlsruhe-based court ruled unconstitutional a requirement that married transsexuals first get divorced before their new gender could be legally recognised. The court said that law violated a person's basic rights. The court ruled in favour of a man who was born in 1929 who has three adult children and had been married for 56 years. He underwent a sex-change operation in 2002 and wanted to be legally recognised as a woman but could not until a divorce took place.

The wife of the transsexual also did not want the marriage to be dissolved.

Nero's race track

German archaeologists using radar technology believe they may have discovered the ancient horse racing track at Olympia where Roman Emperor Nero bribed his way to Olympic laurels.

The whereabouts of the racecourse is one of the last remaining mysteries of Olympia, the holy site where the ancient Greeks founded the Olympic Games in the eighth century BC.

The one-kilometre-long course, the largest structure of ancient Olympia, has been lost for more than 1,600-years since the Christian Emperor Theodosius abolished the games because of their pagan past.

German archaeological teams have been excavating at Olympia since 1875 but the race-course has remained hidden by several metres of silt on the floodplain of the Alfeios river.

Nero, a capricious ruler, broke with tradition in AD 67 when he took part in the Olympic games. A lover of Greek culture, Nero bribed Olympic officials to have the games postponed by two years to coincide with his tour of Greece. The emperor took part in the four-horse chariot race and was declared the winner despite falling from his chariot.

Honoured for diving on grenade

A British marine who survived after diving on a live grenade to shield his comrades while on a mission in Afghanistan is to receive the George Cross, Britain's highest bravery award.

Lance-Corporal Matthew Croucher, 24, a Royal Marine reservist, threw himself on the grenade after he triggered a booby trap in a compound where Taliban fighters were suspected of making bombs. Despite the lack of regard for his own safety, Lance-Corporal Croucher was left almost unscathed after his body armour and rucksack absorbed the explosion.