AUSTRALIA. Underwear chicken dare puts man in hospital.

An Australian man?s dare went horribly wrong when he tried to play chicken with cars on a freeway wearing only his underwear.

The 18 year old was critically injured after being hit by a four-wheel drive on a freeway in the southern city of Melbourne in the early hours of Wednesday, police said in a statement.

«Police are dismayed at the utter stupidity of a man who decided to play chicken on the Tullamarine Freeway», the statement said. «It was lucky nobody was killed as a result and police couldn?t believe anybody would be foolish enough to take such grave risks with their personal safety and that of other road users.» The driver and passenger in the car were unhurt, though the vehicle was a write-off.

HONG KONG. Three children jailed for armed hold-up. Three Hong Kong children have been sentenced to more than three years for the armed hold-up of a jewellery shop, a newspaper said on Thursday, with the court saying the stiff sentence was in the public interest.

Disguised with masks and caps, the two boys and one girl, all aged 14, threatened staff at the shop with knives in last year, grabbing gold necklaces, bracelets and pendants valued at more than HK$1 million ($128,200). Sentencing the three, now aged 15, the judge said the offence was too serious to warrant a training centre term despite the age of the three, the South China Morning Post said.

One boy, an apprentice to the mastermind goldsmith who had earlier been jailed for seven years, was sentenced to three years and seven months, while the other two, who are cousins, were jailed for three years and five months.

Earlier this week, a court heard that a nine-year-old Hong Kong girl traveled alone into mainland China to collect heroin and bring it back in her rucksack for a drug trafficker who paid her HK$1,200.