Iran

Nations to unite to counter U.S. threats

Iran and Syria, who both are facing pressure from the United States, said Wednesday they would form a “united front” to confront possible threats against them, state-run television reported.

“In view of the special conditions faced by Syria, Iran will transfer its experience, especially concerning sanctions, to Syria,” Mohammad Reza Aref, Iran’s first vice president, was quoted as saying after meeting Syrian Prime Minister Mohammad Naji Otari.

“At this sensitive point, the two countries require a united front due to numerous challenges.”

Otari concurred, saying, “The challenges we face in Syria and Iran require us to be in one front to confront all the challenges imposed (on us) by others.”

The report did not specifically mention the challenges, but both countries are under U.S. economic sanctions and the targets of intense American pressure.

Jerusalem

Parliament approves Gaza withdrawal plan

Israel’s parliament agreed Wednesday to pay nearly $900 million in compensation to 9,000 Jewish settlers who will be uprooted when Israel pulls out of the Gaza Strip and part of the West Bank.

The package, part of a bill authorizing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s pullout plan, will result in payments of hundreds of thousands of dollars to each settler family forced to leave.

The compensation for settlers depends on the size of a family, whether it owns or rents, what it owns and how long it has lived in the settlement.

Under the plan, a couple with two children who have rented a home in a settlement for the past 15 years would receive just over $230,000. A similar family who owned a home would get about 30 percent more, or about $300,000. Families who own farmland or businesses in an affected settlement or who agree to move to development zones in the Negev desert or the Galilee would receive extra money.

Hong Kong

Boat collision injures at least 94

A China-bound hovercraft carrying more than 160 people collided with a Chinese freight boat in Hong Kong waters early today, injuring 94, with four people in serious condition, the government said.

The remaining injured were either stable or still being assessed, said a government spokeswoman who only gave her surname, Kan.

She said the nature of their injuries wasn’t immediately known. It also wasn’t clear how many people were hurt on each vessel.

The two boats collided in waters northwest of the Hong Kong island of Tsing Yi, Kan said. The passenger boat, which was carrying 156 passengers and nine crew members, was traveling to China’s Nansha Island and the city of Panyu, she said.

The cause of the accident wasn’t immediately known, Kan said.

Germany

Organ transplants give recipients rabies

Three hospital patients in Germany appear to have been infected with rabies through organ transplants and are in critical condition, a medical foundation said Wednesday.

Three others who received transplants from the same donor, a woman who died of a heart attack late last year, are doing fine, the German Foundation for Organ Transplants said.

The donor showed no rabies symptoms at the time of her death, although a recent examination of her brain showed typical signs of the disease, the group said. How the woman may have contracted rabies was unclear, but the group noted that she had been in India in October. Although rare in developed countries, rabies kills thousands of people each year in developing nations.

The critically ill patients, hospitalized in the cities of Hanover and Marburg, received the donor’s lungs, kidneys and a pancreas. All showed rabies symptoms, the group said. A patient in Heidelberg who received the liver, as well as two patients in Mainz who received her corneas, were in good health.