India bans smoking in public places

Update

No smoking

India banned smoking in public places on Thursday, meaning the nation's estimated 120 million smokers will get a $5 fine for lighting up at playgrounds, railway stations, sidewalk cafes and hospitals. Anti-smoking laws in this nation of nearly 1.2 billion people have been widely ignored but officials hope an extensive anti-smoking campaign and tighter enforcement will make the ban successful.

Found

Older than they thought

Turkish archaeologists have found artifacts showing that Istanbul, earlier believed to be founded 2,700 years ago by the Greeks as Byzantium, is 8,500 years old, the Al-Watan newspaper said.

In the Courts

Butler pleads guilty

Paul Kidd, 55, a former butler who once served Queen Elizabeth II, faces sentencing next month for multiple child-sex offenses after pleading guilty in London on Wednesday. Kidd was a butler to the queen from 1977 to 1979, then was senior footman to the late Queen Mother until 1984. One of Kidd's victims contacted police after reading a newspaper interview with the ex-butler on the 10th anniversary of the death of Princess Diana.

Novel fallout

Three men have been charged with plotting to attack the publisher of Spokane author Sherry Jones' controversial novel dealing with the Prophet Muhammad. The suspects — salesman Abrar Mizra, 22; cabdriver Abbas Taj, 30; and Ali Beheshti, 40 — were arrested Saturday near the north London home and office of Martin Rynja, who plans to publish "The Jewel of Medina," police said. They were arrested after a fire broke out at Rynja's building.

Oops

Too-true statue moved

Officials at Edge of the Cedars State Park in Blanding, Utah, moved an American Indian-inspired statue of a humpback flute player Thursday after objections that it was offensive because the male figure is anatomically correct. Park officials moved the sticklike figure from in front of its museum to a spot behind it so it can't been seen from the street, park manager Teri Paul said. The sculpture, which has welcomed visitors to the park for 19 years, is a modern interpretation of a Hopi symbol of a flute player. It raised objections only recently, Paul said.

Passages

House Peters Jr., 92, an actor who became the original Mr. Clean in Procter & Gamble's commercials for household cleaners, died Wednesday of pneumonia at the Motion Picture and Television Fund Hospital in Los Angeles.

Today in History

1863: President Lincoln proclaimed the last Thursday in November Thanksgiving Day.

1952: Britain conducted its first atomic test as it detonated a 25-kiloton device in the Monte Bello Islands off Australia.

1995: The jury in the O.J. Simpson murder trial found the former football star not guilty of the 1994 slayings of his former wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. (However, Simpson was later found liable in a civil trial).

Today's Birthdays

Author Gore Vidal, 83. Rock 'n' roll star Chubby Checker, 67. Rock musician Tommy Lee, 46. Actor Clive Owen, 44. Singer Gwen Stefani, 39. Pop singer Kevin Richardson, 37. Actress Neve Campbell, 35. Singer India.Arie, 33. Rapper Talib Kweli, 33. Actor Seann William Scott, 32. Actress-singer Ashlee Simpson-Wentz, 24.

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