World Briefs

AFP– US Navy picture shows Somali pirates in October 2008. Somali pirates were engaged in talks over ransoms ? NAIROBI, Kenya – Somali pirates seized control of a chemical tanker in the Gulf of Aden on Friday and a NATO helicopter gunship, too late to prevent the hijacking, picked up three security guards who jumped into the sea.

Both France and Germany, which have ships in the area as part of an international anti-piracy coalition, sent the aircraft after receiving a distress call just after dawn, French military spokesman Cmdr. Christophe Prazuck said. But in the 15 minutes it took to get to the site, the pirates had already boarded and had taken the crew of 25 Indians and two Bangladeshis hostage. The two British guards who leapt overboard with their Irish colleague were safe onboard a French warship, he said.

MADRID, Spain – A Peruvian immigrant who found $20,000 (16,000 euros) while cleaning an airliner and turned it in to the police can now call the booty her own.

Marisol Aguirre, 47, said the airline Iberia contacted her last week to say no one had claimed the cash and that under Spanish law it belongs to her.

"Just imagine! I could hardly believe it," Aguirre told The Associated Press Thursday.

Aguirre found the money in 2005 while working for a company that cleans planes at Madrid's Barajas airport.

She had almost forgotten about the find — $20,000 in cash in a plastic bag in the first-class section of the plane she had been cleaning. Under Spanish law, someone who finds an abandoned object, no matter what the value, gets to keep it if the owner does not come forward within two years and one day.

BANGKOK, Thailand – The severing of air links with Thailand's capital — a vital air hub that handles 3 percent of world air cargo and 100,000 travelers a day — rippled through the region with airlines scrambling to reroute passengers and freight as hopes for a quick resolution to the crisis faded.

Thailand's embattled government Friday backed away from a threat to use force to disperse the protesters who have shut down Bangkok's two commercial airports, setting the scene for a prolonged disruption to transport across the region and a massive blow to the kingdom's economy.

Since Tuesday, dozens of airlines have canceled all flights to and from Bangkok until further notice while others made special arrangements to rescue passengers stranded in Thailand by using a tiny airport southeast of the capital. "What's happening in Bangkok is going to be very damaging to our business," said Tony Tyler, chief executive of Hong Kong-based carrier Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd.