South Korea: 15,000 protest U.S. soldiers’ acquittal

About 15,000 people carrying candles Saturday protested across the street from the American Embassy in the largest show of anti-U.S. sentiment in years.

Protesters, upset with what they say is preferential treatment to American soldiers in Korea, booed and chanted “President Bush apologize!” and “Let’s drive out the murderous American GIs!”

Widespread anger in the country followed acquittals of two American soldiers whose armored vehicle struck and killed two 13-year-old South Korean girls in June.

The two soldiers left the country after they were acquitted last month.

“The trial may be over, but the judgment continues,” said Yoon Kyong-hee, a student leader.

Bangladesh: Bombs rip theaters; at least 15 people die

Bombs exploded at four movie theaters Saturday in Mymensingh, killing at least 15 people and wounding more than 200, witnesses and news reports said.

The theaters were crowded with people celebrating Eid-al-Fitr, the Islamic festival marking the end of Ramadan. No one claimed responsibility for the blasts.

About 3,000 people were believed to be inside and around the theaters when the explosions occurred in the town about 70 miles north of the capital, Dhaka, the United News of Bangladesh reported.

Ten people were killed instantly, while five others died on the way to a hospital, a resident quoted doctors as saying.

Italy: Opera season opens away from usual home

For the first time in 224 years, La Scala inaugurated its season Saturday away from its downtown theater near Milan’s gothic cathedral.

The curtain went up on Christoph Gluck’s “Iphigenie en Aulide” in La Scala’s temporary home on the outskirts of Milan.

The newly built, 2,400-seat Arcimboldi Theater will play host to La Scala’s full program of operas, ballets and concerts in a former industrial area through December 2004 while La Scala Theater, the company’s venerable temple of bel canto, undergoes a $56 million renovation.

Paris: Suspect in hijacking commits suicide in jail

A former Italian policeman accused of hijacking two airplanes, including a flight last month that landed safely in France, hanged himself in his jail cell, prosecutors said Saturday.

Stefano Savorani, 29, had a history of mental illness. Guards discovered his body shortly after midnight Friday.

Savorani had been held in the central French city of Lyon since the Nov. 27 hijacking attempt, during which he claimed to be a member of the al-Qaida terrorist network and threatened to blow up an Alitalia flight from Bologna, Italy to Paris.