Lima - Peru's health authorities on Wednesday confirmed the country's first case of swine flu.

The victim was an Argentinian woman who was in Mexico only for a few hours on a layover when travelling from the United States to Argentina, Peru's Health Minister Oscar Ugarte said.

The 27-year-old was hospitalized with high fever, nosebleeds and a cough at a quarantine ward in Callao province near the capital Lima, he said.

Lima - Peruvian authorities were Monday investigating a suspected case of swine flu - a traveller who arrived in the country from Mexico, Peruvian Health Minister Oscar Ugarte said. Ugarte told Peruvian radio station RPP that the patient - whose identity and gender was withheld - was taken to a special wing of the Daniel Alcides Carrion Hospital in Callao, near Lima, and was under observation.

The minister said the person was feeling ill and had a high fever.

Lima - Seven children aged between 11 and 14 years and two teachers died when a bridge they were crossing collapsed in the Andean district of Cora Cora, in Ayacucho province, officials said. The tragedy left 53 other people injured, 14 of them in critical condition.

The 100-metre bridge was said to be poorly maintained, and collapsed as children and teachers from three schools were crossing. The victims fell as far as 80 metres down into a precipice, officials said.

Authorities acknowledged that many of the mountainous country's bridges are in states of disrepair.

Washington, April 14 : The National Institute of Culture (INC) is currently preparing a preservation project to prevent damaged caused by weather on the enigmatic Nazca Lines in Peru.

“It’s a project that will serve the whole area in general, to avoid events such like the one last January, when rainwater accumulated and drained, covering with layers of clay the geoglyph called La Mano (The Hand),” Mario Olaechea, resident archaeologist, INC, told LivingInPeru. com.

Washington, April 12 : A 1,500-year-old tomb of the Moche Indian "king of bling", found in Peru at the base of an eroded mud-brick pyramid, has yield a treasure trove of artifacts, which are shedding light on ancient times in the country.

According to a report in National Geographic News, the finds include 19 golden headdresses, various pieces of jewelry, and two funerary masks, as well as skeletons of two other men and a pregnant woman.

Lima  - Peruvian legislator Keiko Fujimori launched Wednesday a national crusade for her father, former Peruvian president Alberto Fujimori, after he was sentenced to 25 years in jail for human rights violations.

"We want to go to the furthermost villages in the country, where people suffered the evil of terrorism, to publicize this most unfair sentence," Keiko Fujimori said in a meeting with foreign correspondents in Lima.