HANOI, Vietnam

Scavenged artillery shell explodes, killing two men

A Vietnam War-era artillery shell has exploded in central Vietnam, killing two people who were cutting it up for scrap metal.

Police officer Nguyen Thanh Phong says the men died at the scene following Sunday’s incident in central Da Nang city.

Phong said on Monday that the men, age 44 and 52, had scavenged the 175-millimeter shell and tried to cut it up at an industrial park that was a former American base during the Vietnam War.

Their deaths bring the number of people killed by deadly war leftovers to five in the past 10 days.

Vietnamese government figures show unexploded ordnance have killed more than 42,000 people since the war ended in 1975.

TOKYO

U.N.: Japan to share lessons learned from triple disaster

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Japan promised Monday to share lessons of disaster management and nuclear safety that it learned from March’s disasters.

“The Japanese government will share invaluable experiences learned from this tragedy with the international community, particularly in area of disaster reduction and preparedness and also strengthening nuclear safety and standards,” Ban told reporters after talking with Prime Minister Naoto Kan.

Ban earlier visited a shelter in Fukushima to offer support to people forced to evacuate their homes near the tsunami-crippled nuclear plant due to radiation leaks.

Some 80,000 Japanese left their homes after meltdowns, fires and radiation leaks occurred at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant in the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl. The March 11 quake and tsunami left 23,000 others dead or missing along Japan’s northern coast.

In Fukushima, Ban also met with the prefectural governor and with a group of high school students affected by the nuclear crisis.

Japan’s government has been hit by allegations that it had been too friendly with the nuclear industry and tried to secretly manipulate public discussions in favor of nuclear power before the tsunami struck. Kan’s government fired three senior nuclear policy officials last week in an apparent move to calm the uproar.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand

Engineer dies after being sucked into airplane engine

A 51-year-old engineer working at an airplane testing facility has been sucked into an engine and killed.

Domestic carrier Air New Zealand confirmed the man was performing routine maintenance on a Lockheed C-130 Hercules airplane engine just after 8 a.m. Monday at the Woodbourne air field in Blenheim when he was sucked into the engine.

An Air New Zealand spokeswoman said the engine was sitting on a stand without propellers attached and was not affixed to a plane at the time of the accident.

Tasman Police communications manager Barbara Dunn said emergency services personnel performed CPR but couldn’t revive the man.

The man worked for Safe Air, a subsidiary of Air New Zealand. He has not been named pending notification of his family.

JERUSALEM

Artifacts date from revolt in 70 A.D., scientists believe

Archaeologists say artifacts discovered in an ancient drainage tunnel under Jerusalem are left over from war 2,000 years ago.

On Monday archaeologists presented a Roman legionnaire’s sword and sheath found in the tunnel late last month. They believe it dates to around 70 A.D., when Rome put down a Jewish revolt, razing the second biblical Jewish Temple and much of the city.

Accounts of the battle say Jewish rebels fled to tunnels in a futile attempt to escape the Romans.

Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologist Eli Shukron says diggers also found clay lamps, pots, and a bronze key. He thinks rebels left many of those items.

The newly excavated tunnel is part of a growing network of subterranean passages under the city.