<B>PARIS. French TV star forces green pre-election agenda.</B> A leading green campaigner sought to force environmental issues higher up the agenda in France’s presidential campaign, urging potential candidates to back a tax on carbon emissions. Nicolas Hulot, who became a household name as presenter of a popular television nature programme, proposed an ‘ecological pact’ with measures like a tax on carbon emissions and creating the job of deputy prime minister for sustainable development. He hoped candidates for France’s top job would take his proposals on board and said he might otherwise run himself in the presidential election next spring.

<B>VENEZUELA. Chavez has 22-point president lead.</B> Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has a 22-point lead over his rival in his bid for re-election next month, US-based pollster Evans/McDonough Co. said recently. The poll showed 57 percent of the electorate intended to vote for Chavez, compared with 35 percent for Manuel Rosales, the governor of a western oil producing state. Evans/McDonough is one of the few pollsters that has correctly predicted past votes in Venezuelan elections. With a month to go before the first election in years in which Chavez has faced a united opposition, independent polls show a wide lead for the incumbent.

<B>NAIROBI. Five killed in Kenyan slum violence.</B> Five people were killed in a Kenyan slum after fighting broke out between two outlawed groups over extortion, police sources said, adding that two of them were killed by police who tried to quell the violence. The violence in Nairobi’s sprawling Mathare slum was by the rival Mungiki and Taliban groups over protection money levied by one of them on brewers of an illegal drink. In February, police arrested the head of the notorious sect over killings and running extortion rackets among transport operators. Slum dwellers say the sect instils fear and respect by promoting archaic spiritual rituals like swearing tribal oaths

<B>BEIT HANOUN. Israel kills 18 in shelling of Gaza town . </B>Israeli tank shells killed 18 civilians in Gaza yesterday including 13 members of one family, Palestinian officials and residents said, in one of Israel’s deadliest strikes in the territory in months. Witnesses said shells struck at least seven houses in the northern town of Beit Hanoun, killing people as they slept. Seven children and four women were among those killed, said Palestinian Health Ministry spokesman Khaled Rabi. The ministry said 54 people had been wounded.

<B>ISLAMABAD. Suicide bomber kills 35 soldiers in Pakistan. </B>A suicide bomber killed 35 Pakistani soldiers yesterday at an army training ground in a northwestern area known to be a stronghold of a pro-Taliban Islamist militant group. The blast, the most serious militant attack against the Pakistani military, took place in the town of Dargai, in North West Frontier Province. The suicide attack came nine days after security forces attacked a madrasa, or religious school, in a nearby tribal area, killing 80 people. The militant group that is strong in the area ran the school.

<B>LONDON. Non-religious Christmas stamps criticised. </B>Royal Mail has been criticised for taking “Christ out of Christmas” with this year’s collection of festive stamps. Instead of religious images adorning the Christmas stamps – which went on sale Tuesday – they have pictures of Santa, a snowman, a Christmas tree and a reindeer. Religious groups say they are concerned the stamps have no connection with the real meaning of Christmas. Royal Mail said it alternates its stamps between religious and non-faith themes each year.

<B>RESEARCH. Stem cell jabs for heart patients.</B> A pioneering cardiac trial is to see patients who suffer heart attacks given injections of their own stem cells within the following five hours. Preliminary evidence has suggested that bone marrow stem cells can be used to repair the damage to the heart muscle inflicted during a heart attack. And that could help prevent subsequent heart failure, which is more of a threat than the initial attack itself. The trial, run by St Barts Hospital in London, will involve up to 100 people. The project is the first to be funded by the UK Stem Cell Foundation.