India looking for "Mr Condom"

India, struggling to promote greater condom use among its population, is looking to hire its own "condom man" to follow the example of a former Thai cabinet minister who successfully pushed for safer sex, the Times of India reported. National AIDS Control Organization (NACO) chief Sujatha Rao said that India needed to find someone like Mechai Viravaidya, famous for getting Thais to talk about sex, condoms and AIDS. "We are serious about finding India's very own Mr Condom," Rao was quoted as saying after visiting Thailand to study its dramatic increase in condom use over the past decade, which contributed to a sharp fall in new HIV infections. "He has to feel passionately about the cause as Mechai does ... have a dynamic personality to change both government policy and public perceptions about HIV/AIDS, sex and condoms," Rao said. Viravaidya became famous in Thailand as the "Condom King" for actions such as taking condoms to World Bank talks as well as for the name of his Bangkok restaurant "Cabbages and Condoms," where condoms are a major part of the decor. Authorities in India, where many people are hesitant to talk about sex and condoms openly, are trying to push condom use through television, radio and newspapers and by targeting high-risk groups. India has millions of people who are HIV-positive and many of them face discrimination and prejudice. In Thailand, Viravaidya's organization -- the Population and Community Development Association of Thailand -- won the $1-million Gates Award for Global Health this year that is awarded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Court acquits teacher in "retard" case

A teacher who forced a pupil to write "I am a retard" 100 times was acquitted by an Italian court on Wednesday of abuse charges. The teacher, whose identity was withheld to protect her privacy, forced the punishment on the 12-year-old boy after he blocked a fellow pupil from going to the toilet and called him "gay" and "girly." The parents had sought 25,000 euros ($33,580) in damages and a public prosecutor had called for a two-month prison sentence, but the court cleared the teacher, a court source said. The teacher said her punishment of the boy had been appropriate, particularly after a widely publicized case of an adolescent who committed suicide in Italy, apparently after receiving taunts at school about being homosexual. Gay rights groups had called for the charges to be dropped. "I never intended to humiliate the boy," the teacher told journalists after she was cleared. In Italian, she made the boy write: "Io sono deficiente," which literally means "deficient" but is more commonly used as a disparaging term meaning "moron" or "mentally retarded." "I explained, discussing with him and his classmates, that deficient means 'lacking'. He was 'lacking' sensitivity for one of his classmates," the teacher said.

Added security after peeing incident

Canada will install surveillance cameras around the National War Memorial in Ottawa after three youths urinated on the base of the monument late on the July 1 Canada Day holiday last year. As well as the cameras, the government said on Wednesday there will be more guards at the memorial and the tomb of the unknown soldier, as well as crowd-control equipment at the site during Canada Day and other special events. Veterans Minister Greg Thompson said the measures were designed to "help prevent the unfortunate incidents that occurred on July 1, 2006, from recurring." A 23-year-old man from Montreal was charged with mischief but the case was later dropped after he apologized publicly. He said he was so drunk at the time that he did not realize where he had been urinating. The incident -- in which one teen was photographed relieving himself -- sparked an outcry from the general public as well as from veterans.