In the World

BEIJING - China is experiencing unusual chills this winter with its national average temperature hitting the lowest in 28 years, and snow and ice have closed highways, canceled flights, stranded tourists, and knocked out power in several provinces.

The China Meteorological Administration on Friday said the national average was minus 3.8 degrees Celsius (25 degrees F) since late November, the coldest in nearly three decades.

In some areas - northeastern China, eastern Inner Mongolia, and north part of far-western Xinjiang province - the low has hit minus 40 degrees C (minus 40 degrees F), the administration said.

The state-run, English-language China Daily reported Friday that about 1,000 ships were stuck in ice in Laizhou Bay in eastern China's Bohai Sea. In southwest China's Sichuan province, more than 1,000 tourists were stranded Wednesday in a scenic mountainous area because of icy roads, the state-run Beijing News reported.

- AP

TRIPOLI, Libya - A security official in the Libyan city of Benghazi said Saturday that police were searching for a senior official who was abducted while investigating the recent assassination of the city's police chief.

The official said that Lt. Col. Abdel-Salam al-Mahdawi was abducted from a Benghazi street late Wednesday when assailants pulled him from a vehicle. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.

Mahdawi heads Benghazi's criminal-investigations unit tasked with looking into the November killing of the national security chief, Col. Farag el-Dersi, in the city.

Security has deteriorated over the last year in Benghazi, the birthplace of the revolt that unseated longtime ruler Moammar Gadhafi. An attack in September on the U.S. Consulate there killed the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.

- AP

SAO PAULO, Brazil - Guards thought there was something suspicious about a little white cat slipping through a prison gate in northeastern Brazil. A prison official said that when they caught the animal, they found a cellphone, drills, small saws, and other contraband taped to its body.

Alagoas state prisons spokeswoman Cinthya Moreno said that the cat was caught New Year's Eve at the medium-security prison in the city of Arapiraca.

The O Estado de S. Paulo newspaper reported Saturday that all of the prison's 263 inmates were suspects in the smuggling attempt, though it says a prison spokesman noted: "It will be hard to discover who is responsible since the cat does not speak."

- AP