Fancy dinner plates belonging to the Iraqi royal family and Saddam Hussein before being stolen and sold to a New York restaurant are finally being returned, officials said Wednesday.

Preet Bharara, chief federal prosecutor for the Southern District of New York, announced the return of the stolen china once adorning the tables of the late Saddam Hussein and the family of assassinated king Faisal II, some of them bearing the Iraqi seal.

A remote region of northern China that began growing grapes for fine wine just a decade ago has beaten the centuries-old French wine-producing region of Bordeaux in a blind tasting held in Beijing.

A group of wine experts -- five French and five Chinese -- ranked the bottles from the remote and sparsely populated Ningxia region above those from Bordeaux at the tasting, held on Wednesday in Beijing.

At the foot of the ancient Pyramids, tour guides and vendors are divided over the affects an Islamist-dominated parliament might have on the lucrative tourist industry.

Egyptians are voting Wednesday in the second-phase of three-round parliamentary elections -- the first since president Hosni Mubarak was ousted in February -- that Islamic parties are expected to win hands down.

Hawaiian-born former sumo wrestler Konishiki admitted Thursday to a physical confrontation with a neighbor in a dispute over dog poo.

Konishiki, 47, now a popular television personality in Japan, said on his blog that he was trying to defend his wife over charges she had allowed her dog to foul on private property in Tokyo.

A fire in a French retirement home killed six women Wednesday, after a 75-year-old man tried to open a packet of sweets with his cigarette lighter, officials said.

An investigation has been launched into the blaze, which broke out at around 2:20 am in "Les Anemones", a retirement home for 180 people in the southern port city of Marseille, state prosecutor Christophe Barret told reporters.

Thousands of traffic enforcers struggle grimly to keep the Philippine capital's notoriously gridlocked roads moving every day, but Ramiro Hinojas does it with a smile and a little help from Michael Jackson.

Rain or shine, seven days a week, the diminutive 55-year-old stands in the middle of one of Manila's major intersections, and to the cacophony of roaring engines, puts on an elaborate dance show as he deftly guides traffic flow.

An Australian taxi driver was Wednesday ordered to pay Aus$1,415 (US$1,417) for wearing jeans to work despite insisting they were tailor-made and suitable for the job.

Shahram Forozandeh, 44, was prosecuted by the transport department for wearing the trousers contrary to industry standards when he was stopped during a routine inspection in January, the Adelaide Advertiser reported.

A southern Indian state on Wednesday ordered a vacation for elephants employed by temples as part of an official program to "rejuvenate" the weary creatures, officials said.

State foresters herded 45 domestic pachyderms from Hindu shrines and hermitages in Tamil Nadu to the coastal state's Mudumalai forests for a 48-day break to help them regain lost vigor, they said.

Police in Indonesia's most conservative province raided a punk-rock concert and detained 65 fans, buzzing off their spiky mohawks and stripping away body piercings because of the perceived threat to Islamic values.

Dog-collar necklaces and chains also were taken from the youths before they were thrown in pools of water for "spiritual" cleansing, local police chief Iskandar Hasan said Wednesday.

Girls who attended Silvio Berlsuconi's raunchy parties dressed up as Father Christmas, a policeman testified on Monday at the trial of the ex-premier for allegedly having sex with an underage prostitute.

Investigator Giorgio Bertoli said he had viewed photos featuring "mutual effusions" between the girls, some of whom also dressed up as policewomen.