World Briefs

A massive print designed by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso has gone on show as part of a new exhibition.

The cloth, which measures 10.4 metres by 11.7 metres, is hanging in the Victoria & Albert Museum, central London. It was designed for a performance by the Ballet Russes in 1924 and will form part of an exhibition about the dance company.

It was designed by Picasso and bears his signature but was completed by a team of seven different painters.

The cloth was bought at auction in 1968 but this is the first time it has been displayed at the V&A. (PA)

Historic pass

An extremely rare ship’s pass signed by King James II and diarist Samuel Pepys will go on public display in Ireland, it was revealed.

The 323-year-old document, which has been in the hands of the Dublin Port Company since 1924, was designed to secure safe passage for a merchant ship.

Researchers believe it is the only known example of a ship’s pass from the 17th century signed by King James II. (PA)

Double trouble

Police trying to solve a shooting in the US have narrowed their suspects to identical twin brothers - but do not know which one to accuse.

Edward and Raymond Nickens, from Niagra, wore matching clothes and goatees in court. But tattoos visible on their arms were different.

The pair will now be photographed with their shirts off in an attempt to help witnesses tell them apart. (PA)

Mineshaft holds medicine scam secret

Officials investigating health scams that have cost debt-hit Greece millions of euros have come close to the bottom of one case after finding a large medicine haul dumped in a disused mineshaft.

“A large amount of medicine whose registration codes had been tampered with was found in a 100-metre shaft,”, deputy labour and social security minister George Koutroumanis said.

The discovery outside Lavrio, southeast of Athens, was made by accident by a team of cave experts.

It is suspected that the codes on the medicine boxes had been used as proof of sale to claim compensation from social security funds while the drugs themselves were kept back for resale. It is a common scam in Greece where shoddy accounts have enabled doctors and pharmacists to write false prescriptions to patients – some of them long dead – and skim off proceeds from health organisations for years. (AFP)

Naked truth

A woman who was being paid compensation for injuring her back at work is facing trial for fraud after working as a stripper.

Christina Gamble, 43, from Pennsylvania, was awarded £280 a week after claiming she was injured during a job as a waitress.

But private insurance investigators taped her dancing at a club. (PA)

Stages kidnapping to pocket ransom

A young Brazilian woman staged her own kidnapping with the help of her boyfriend and a friend in order to pocket the $57,000 ransom paid out by her panicked parents.

Investigators uncovered the scam less than a day after the parents paid the cash after receiving a call on Monday from her supposed captors threatening to kill their cherished daughter.

“We discovered that it was an extortion attempt by the young woman to her family,” police chief Joao Manoel Garcia Alonso said in Parana where the fake abduction took place.

The trio involved, aged between 21 and 26, face between four and 10 years in prison if convicted. (AFP)

S. Korea in war against foul language

Apart from keeping a wary eye on North Korea, South Korea’s military is planning a new campaign – against the use of foul language by young soldiers.

A defence ministry spokesman confirmed yesterday reports of the campaign against cursing. Defence Minister Kim Tae-Young ordered his staff to increase education on the use of proper language and an unidentified senior ministry official was quoted as saying, “When discharged (in their early 20s), they will go back to society where they cannot continue cursing their way through their entire life. That’s why they have to clean up their language.”

All able-bodied South Korean men must serve two years in the 655,000-strong military. (AFP)