Pupils suspended over airgun attack

Four boys have been suspended after a fellow pupil was shot in the head with an air rifle at school. The incident reportedly took place at lunchtime. Police are to question the four boys, aged 13 and 14, over the shooting at Olchfa Comprehensive School in Swansea. Officers were called in after a teacher found out about the attack.

The pupil was reported to have been hit in the head and lower back by pellets from an air gun. He was not injured, but shocked. A police spokeswoman said: "Even though the

pellets didn't pierce his skin, it was obviously a distressing incident and he was suffering from shock." Two guns were believed to have been smuggled into school by the suspended pupils.

Swansea Council's education department issued a statement which said: "Following a recent incident four pupils have been excluded from school. The police are currently investigating the matter." This is the second incident involving children and airguns within a month in the area. In September, a boy of 11 fired at a passing motorist two miles away from the school. He also pointed the airgun at a police officer before it was taken off him.

R E U T E R S , 5.11.04.

Singapore to protect schools with guards

Singapore, which sees itself as a prime target of a terror attack, will soon deploy guards and closed circuit cameras at all schools to protect students from potential hostage-takers. Tightly-controlled Singapore, a staunch U.S. ally, already boasts Southeast Asia's most advanced security apparatus but has braced itself for an attack since foiling bomb plots by militants in 2001 and 2002.

This week special operations forces, armed with machine guns, began patrolling residential and busy shopping districts. Minister of Education told a students' forum on Friday that all schools

would have two security guards and 10 to 12 closed circuit cameras installed in the next six to eight months. Heightened security at more than 360 schools will cost the government S$15 million (4.8 million pounds) to S$20 million a year.

The minister said the move was prompted by September's Beslan hostage incident in Russia that left 330 dead after gunmen seized more than 1,000 people, including schoolchildren.

STATE, 4 . 11 . 04 .

Naked man climbs into la jet

A Canadian man, angry that he was refused a plane ticket to Australia at Los Angeles International Airport, stripped naked, sprinted across the tarmac and climbed into the wheel well of a moving jumbo jet, officials say. Pilots of the Qantas Airways flight stopped the plane. The man was coaxed out of the wheel well and arrested for trespassing, said airport spokeswoman Nancy Castles.

"This was an extremely dangerous thing for him to do. If he had continued to cling in there with the aircraft taking off at over 200 miles per hour, he might have fallen out and could

have been sucked up by an engine," she said. "If he had survived that and was in the wheel well when the landing gear was retracted, he could have been crushed by the mechanism. And if not he very likely would have frozen to death during the 15 1/2 hour flight at 9,150 metres while wearing no clothes."The man, Neil Melly, 31, tried to buy a one-way ticket on the Qantas flight on Monday evening, but was turned down because he could not supply a valid credit card. Later, he managed to climb over an airport fence, topped by three strands of barbed wire, without injury and was spotted by a ramp worker "running, naked, full-speed" toward the plane.

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BBC N E W S , 26 . 10 . 04 .