Forget tales of astronomical prices for Japanese real estate -- one small farming town is selling plots of land for just $1.50 per square meter (11 square feet).

Yuni, a town of 5,900 people in the middle of the northern island of Hokkaido, is hoping to encourage out-of-towners with the bargain offering, in a bid to boost its dwindling population.

A Japanese schoolgirl was in intensive care Tuesday after being speared in the head by a javelin while taking part in track and field training, an official said.

The 2.6 meter (8 ft 6 inch) javelin became lodged in the 15-year-old's head after being thrown by a student on campus at Fukuyama Heisei University in western Hiroshima prefecture on Monday, the university official said.

Forsaking his annual vacation in Martha's Vineyard to campaign for re-election, U.S. President Barack Obama has admitted to a bit of holiday blues as his daughters head off to summer camp.

Obama said he was going to spend most of the summer campaigning ahead of the November 6 election and to make matters worse his daughters Malia, 14, and Sasha, 11, were soon going to be flying the White House nest.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was taunted by chants of "Monica, Monica" by tomato-throwing demonstrators as she visited the Egyptian port city of Alexandria on Sunday.

The chants, referring to the Monica Lewinsky scandal when her husband, Bill Clinton, was president, were heard outside the U.S. consulate as she visited for its reopening.

Seventeen people were injured and taken to hospital Sunday after lightning struck a tent pole at an outdoor food festival in eastern Canada during a storm, police and officials said.

"There was a strike to one of the tent poles," Whitby Ribfest organizer Colin O'Regan told public broadcaster CBC, adding the injured had been eating inside the tent when the incident occurred.

A bear which became a minor star in Los Angeles, with over 24,000 Twitter followers, was returned to the wild Sunday after being found asleep in a tree, officials said.

The bear was nicknamed "Glen Bearian" after the Glendale neighborhood where he had become a regular visitor, with residents posting pictures taken on cellphones. Others called him Meatball.

Checking into one of Seoul's newest luxury clinics just because your companion needs a shower may seem extravagant, but Cho Hang-Min said he had no other choice.

"Other places won't do it," said Cho, a student, explaining why he and his Border Collie have stopped off at Irion.

New British immigration laws have unleashed a stampede to wed and a frenzy of English lessons for Pakistanis desperate to migrate as new restrictions come into effect.

The boom was particularly marked in Mirpur, where Islamabad estimates 200,000 of Britain's 1.2 million Pakistanis have their family origins.

Animal welfare group Vier Pfoten (Four Paws) urged Spanish authorities Friday to ban the famous Pamplona Bull Run, which left 22 people injured and 42 bulls dead this week.

"Four Paws is demanding an immediate break with this cruel tradition, in which many people get hurt and many bulls suffer a painful death every year," the international organization said in a statement on its Bulgarian website.

More than a decade after Swiss police barred a UFO religious group from putting up posters depicting aliens, Europe's top rights court ruled Friday the sect's free speech had not been violated.

Police in the Swiss canton of Neuchatel in 2001 banned the Raelian group, which claims aliens created life on earth, from putting up the posters.