Athens  - Two policemen were shot and seriously wounded by unknown attackers in central Athens, reports said Friday.

It was not clear whether the shooting of the two policemen, who were on duty in a suburb in central Athens, was politically motivated.

In January, another officer was seriously wounded by a gunshot wounded inflicted while guarding Greece's minister of culture, weeks after the killing of a teenager by police.

Hong Kong - Financial corruption in Hong Kong has rocketed in the first three months of 2009 as the city's economy has deteriorated, officials said Friday.

Corruption cases in the financial and insurance sectors surged 46 per cent in the first quarter, contributing to a
23-per-cent overall rise in corruption.

There were 811 cases reported to the city's Independent Commission Against Corruption between January and March, compared to 659 cases in the same period in 2008.

Taipei - Thousands of taxis in Taipei are now equipped with emergency reporting gear following the grisly killing of a taxi driver by five youths earlier this week, a newspaper said Friday.

The Liberty Times said that several radio taxi companies in Taipei have installed the SOS box beside steering wheels, so that drivers can push the button and call for help if attacked.

London  - Pirates hijacked a British luxury yacht off the Seychelles on Wednesday, the tour group that owns the boat reported Thursday.

The ship's passengers had disembarked shortly before the attack, said a spokeswoman for Aquatours on Thursday. However, the seven- person crew of the Indian Ocean Explorer was taken hostage.

The attack occurred near the Aldabra Atoll in the Indian Ocean. The site, a UNESCO world heritage site, is a favourite for divers and naturalists.

Beirut  - Lebanese police arrested the gang that kidnapped a
14-year-old outside his home in Beirut, Interior Minister Ziad Baroud
said Thursday.

Baroud told journalists that security forces raided a house in the area
Aley, 30 kilometres east of Beirut, and found Amin Khansa with one of
the kidnappers.

Police identified the kidnappers as Abdel Nasser Hassan al-Moqdad,
Khaled Assaad Shaikho, Ahmad Ali al-Ahmad and Ibrahim Ali al-Ahmad.
They were captured and transferred to the Police Directorate General
for questioning.

Vienna  - Julius Meinl V, the owner of Austrian private bank Meinl Bank AG, was detained on charges of defrauding investors, Austrian media said Thursday.

Meinl, 49, was detained Wednesday evening after being interviewed by prosecutors over irregularities regarding three companies set up by the bank, Format, a weekly business magazine, reported.

"Julius Meinl was detained because of the danger of flight" Gerhard Jarosch, the spokesman of Vienna's prosecution office, was quoted as saying.