Germany

Cannibal convicted of manslaughter

A computer expert who killed, dismembered and ate another man was convicted Friday of manslaughter and sentenced to 8 1/2 years in prison after a court rejected a murder charge because the victim had asked to be eaten.

Armin Meiwes was spared a life sentence because he was driven not by “unchecked sexual needs,” as prosecutors alleged, but rather “the fulfillment of his fantasy,” Presiding Judge Volker Muetze ruled.

Prosecutors called Meiwes, 42, a “human butcher” who acted to satisfy a sexual impulse in killing and eating Bernd Juergen Brandes, whom he met over the Internet. They plan to appeal the verdict.

Beijing

Avian flu increase might indicate outbreak

Three more Chinese regions reported avian flu cases Friday, raising concerns that the world’s second-largest poultry producer was on the verge of a major outbreak.

New cases make it imperative that China, the world’s most populous nation, quickly assess the scope of the disease within its borders and the tools available to contain it, the World Health Organization said.

The official New China News Agency reported new avian flu cases affecting bird populations in the eastern province of Anhui, the city of Shanghai and the province of Guangdong besides those already seen in Guangxi, Hubei and Hunan provinces. In response, Hong Kong announced a ban on all live birds and any chicken or duck meat from the mainland.

Afghanistan

Investigators seek deadly blast’s cause

The U.S. military was investigating Friday whether an accident or a booby-trap killed seven of its soldiers and left an eighth missing at a weapons cache — the deadliest day for the Americans since the fall of the Taliban.

Three more soldiers were wounded with their Afghan translator in the blast Thursday near Ghazni city, about 90 miles southwest of Kabul.

Afghan officials called it an accident, but Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, a spokesman at U.S. military headquarters in Kabul, said its investigators still were looking into the explosion.

Ghazni provincial Gov. Haji Asadullah Khan said an American patrol had happened across an arms cache dating from the struggle against Soviet occupation in the 1980s.

Havana

Castro accuses Bush of assassination plot

Fidel Castro accused President Bush on Friday of plotting with Miami exiles to kill him, and said he would die fighting if the United States ever invaded to oust him.

“I don’t care how I die,” Castro said at the end of a 5 1/2-hour speech that began Thursday night and continued into early Friday. “But rest assured, if they invade us, I’ll die in combat.”

The Cuban president didn’t back up his accusations with details.

Castro has insisted in the past year that hard-line Cuban exiles in Miami have been pressuring the Bush administration to invade the island — a charge U.S. officials deny.