Briefs

A second earthquake

hits Indonesia islands

PADANG, Indonesia - The second powerful earthquake in as many days shook western Indonesia today, collapsing buildings in a coastal city and triggering tsunami alerts around the region.

The latest quake was also felt in Malaysia and in Singapore where tall buildings swayed.

Rafael Abreu, a geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Colorado, said the magnitude-7.8 quake did not appear to be an aftershock to Wednesday's 8.4-magnitude temblor.

"We are not calling it an aftershock at this point," Abreu said. "It's fairly large itself. It seems to be a different earthquake."

He said a tsunami watch was in effect for Australia and Indonesia. Indonesia later lifted its alert with no tsunamis detected.

"The quake seems to be pretty shallow," he said. "These are the quakes that can produce tsunamis."

The USGS said the new quake was centered about 125 miles from Bengkulu, a city on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, which was ravaged by the 2004 tsunami. It occurred at a shallow depth of about six miles.

Yesterday a strong earthquake shook Southeast Asia, collapsing buildings, killing at least five people and injuring dozens in Indonesia. That tremor triggered small waves off the coastal city of Padang in Sumatra, the island ravaged by the 2004 tsunami disaster.

Gunmen dressed as police

rob armored car in Baghdad

BAGHDAD - Gunmen wearing police commando uniforms waylaid an armored truck yesterday on a major Baghdad street, overpowered the guards and made off with about a half-million dollars in Iraqi currency, police said.

The robbers set up a fake checkpoint with two police vehicles along the Mohammed al-Qassim highway in eastern Baghdad, the police said, flagged down the armored truck and offered to escort it to its destination in downtown Baghdad.

Along the way, the estimated 10 gunmen forced the driver to pull over near a university campus, police said. There they handcuffed and gagged the truck's occupants - five guards, one accountant and a driver - and stole the money.

Elsewhere, gunmen ambushed an Iraqi police checkpoint in northern Iraq, killing six officers in a complex attack. Militants packed into four cars raced up to the checkpoint south of Mosul yesterday afternoon, attacking it from both sides, said police Brig. Abdel-Karim al-Jubouri.

U.S. official offers view

of Israeli airstrike in Syria

DAMASCUS, Syria - Israeli warplanes targeted weapons destined for Hezbollah guerrillas in a strike last week in northeastern Syria, a U.S. government official said yesterday. Syria's envoy to the United Nations called the claim "nonsense." The American official said the target of the Sept. 6 attack was a site where Israel believed Syria stored weapons being sent from Iran to the militant Islamic group in Lebanon.

_ In Jerusalem, the Israeli army said ground troops entered the central Gaza Strip last night, a day after rocket fire from the Palestinian territory wounded dozens of Israeli soldiers. But the military described the incursion as routine and said it was not part of a large-scale mission.

The army gave no further information.

Britain faces a new

outbreak of foot-and-mouth

EGHAM, England - Authorities confirmed a new foot-and-mouth outbreak on the outskirts of London yesterday, just days after the government lifted livestock restrictions following the appearance of the devastating disease last month.

The highly contagious disease was found in cattle grazing in Surrey, a county that borders London, and close to a laboratory that was linked to the August outbreak. The discovery created panic in farming communities that lost millions of dollars last month.

"I'm really worried because I've got loads of pigs, a few cattle and horses, and we were getting the pigs ready for slaughter tomorrow," said Andrew Parsons, a Surrey farmer.

The government imposed a nationwide ban on all livestock movement, while scientists tried to identify the strain and origin of the disease. Authorities also ordered the slaughter of about 300 cattle and pigs in the affected area, said Britain's chief veterinary officer, Debby Reynolds.

The European Union banned livestock from Britain. *

-Daily News wire services