New Delhi - Bahrain Telecommunications Company Batelco has signed a deal to buy 49 per cent in Indian mobile telephone operator S-Tel for 225 million dollars, news reports said Monday.

Batelco partnered with Millennium Private Equity, a Dubai Financial Services firm, to purchase the shares in S-Tel, the Times of India daily reported.

S-tel director Santosh Robert told the newspaper the deal would enable his Chennai-based company to partner with an experienced operator for the new GSM rollout scheduled mid-2009.

New York, Jan 19 : Peaches Geldof, it seems, has given up on men. The socialite was recently spotted at a loft party "getting very cozy with another girl."

Hobart, Jan. 19 : Young Australian opener Shaun Marsh has said that while he is satisfied with the fact that he has scored five half-centuries in ten one-day internationals, he is unhappy about not batting through an innings like his dad Geoff did for the country in the 1980s and 1990s.

Marsh, who scored a 103-ball 78 to earn the man of the match award in Australia''s five-run victory over South Africa in Hobart on Sunday, left the ground disappointed.

His father, Geoff, was one of the rocks around which Australian cricket rebuilt itself, especially in the one-day arena - in which he made nine centuries opening the batting.

Seoul - South Korean President Lee Myung Bak on Monday named new ministers for finance and North Korean policy as his country has been hit hard by the global economic crisis and has seen tensions rise with its northern neighbour.

The cabinet shake-up came nearly 11 months into Lee's administration as his government has been criticized in the wake of the economic downturn and worsening relations with North Korea.

Manila - Muslim militants holding captive three staff of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on a southern Philippine island have demanded that the military halt rescue operations, a Philippine Red Cross official said Monday.

Senator Richard Gordon, chairman of the Philippine National Red Cross, said the hostages - Swiss Andreas Notter, Italian Eugenio Vagni and Filipino Mary Jean Lacaba - relayed their captor's demand in telephone calls.

"They (the abducted ICRC staff) called up this morning and said they are okay," Gordon told a local radio station. "They said their abductors want the military to call off the pursuit operations."

Gordon said the ICRC staff also said they were unharmed.

London - The British government Monday launched a second multibillion-pound package to stabilize banks aimed at unfreezing credit markets and softening the blow of a deepening recession.

Among the measures set out by Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling is a massive insurance scheme to protect banks from so-called toxic assets, a move it is hoped will encourage institutions to restart lending to businesses and households.

It is the second bail-out for the banks in the space of just three months. A banking recapitalization programme announced in October had failed to provide a sufficient platform for normal lending to resume.