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Hanoi  - Vietnam defended the arrest last weekend of a lawyer who had represented democracy activists, state media reported Thursday.

The arrest of lawyer Le Cong Dinh, 41, in Ho Chi Minh City was denounced by international human rights groups including Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Reporters Without Borders. The US State Department called Tuesday for Dinh's immediate release.

Beijing  - The World Bank on Thursday raised its forecast for China's annual economic growth to 7.2 per cent, saying the country is posting "respectable" growth fuelled by the government's 4-trillion-yuan (590 billion dollars) spending package.

"While China's economy has continued to feel the brunt of the global crisis, very expansionary fiscal and monetary policies have kept the economy growing respectably," the bank said in a quarterly report on China.

Managua - Exiled Amazon indigenous leader Alberto Pizango arrived in Nicaragua after being allowed to leave Peru to avoid prosecution on charges of inciting violent protests that left 34 people dead.

Pizango made brief statements to Nicaraguan state-run media saying he lamented the violence, but blamed Peruvian President Alan Garcia and demanded respect for indigenous land and water rights.

Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad has given his nod to 150 educational institutions, which includes medical, dental, ayurveda and yunani colleges.

Azad cleared the permissions, which had been pending from last several years, within a week’s time after taking over the charge of the ministry.

According to reports, these pending cases comes after several public complaints that unnecessary postponement in processing cases with regard to authorization of different medical educational institutions were threatening future of students aiming to get admission in these colleges.

Berlin - Adventurous shirt colours even in the office are completely acceptable, a Berlin-based men's fashion expert says.

Bernhard Roetzel said although white and light blue are the classic colours in business dress shirts, pink is OK and can look very well on older men with thick hair that has grey mixed in.

Lilac is also especially popular this season and can look well, but not on everyone.

Wiesbaden, Germany  Everyone knows that smoking is unhealthy for you. Nonetheless, reports the German Centre for Addiction Questions, one in every four German adults continues to smoke.

Quitting is easier said than done. The problems are often underestimated, says Rainer Mathias Dunkel, a doctor of psychosomatic medicine and psychotherapy in Wiesbaden. The danger of relapse is very high.

Men aged 35 to 45 are the most likely to smoke. In general, people have their first puff at age 13. But the number of young smokers is on the decline.

"In 2001, about a third of all 12 to 17-year-olds smoked. In 2008, it was 15 per cent," says Marita Volker-Albert of the German Federal Centre for Health Questions in Cologne.