MANILA, The Philippines (AP) — U.S. carmaker Ford Motor Co. says it will close its 13-year-old assembly plant in the Philippines at the end of the year. Ford Group Philippines president Randy Krieger said the company "could not make a strong enough business case for future manufacturing" in the Philippines. The plant has exported more than 80,000 vehicles since 2002. About 250 workers will be affected. The plant will close after the last Ford Escape SUV rolls out in December. Ford closed its original Philippine assembly plant in 1983 and reopened a new plant in 1999 citing improved political stability.

GAUHATI, India (AP) — Officials in northeastern India have been on alert for poachers after surging flood waters forced endangered rhinos, Asiatic elephants, a variety of deer, and other animals to leave a game reserve. At least 29 people have been killed in the flooding and more than a million others have been displaced from their homes. The director of Assam’s Kaziranga National Park, S. K. Bora, said 14 one-horned rhinoceros have died from drowning and more than 400 deer have been killed by the floods or vehicles on a highway. The park is 135 miles from the state capital of Gauhati. More than 2,000 of the estimated 3,000 one-horn rhinos left in the wild live in the 170-square-mile park.

PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — North Korea is tapping into some American-style movie inspiration by showing the film icon Rocky Balboa pounding his Soviet rival. State TV this month aired taped footage of young leader Kim Jong Un at a concert that played a rendition of the famous Rocky theme song and showed clips of the pumped-up American film character boxing against his Cold War rival Ivan Drago. Appearing to glorify a popular American entertainment icon is an unusual move for Pyongyang, which regularly unleashes invective at its former wartime enemy. The band also played "My Way" popularized by Frank Sinatra. In addition, the concert featured Disney characters in a performance not authorized by the Walt Disney Co. Kim was accompanied at the concert by a woman who has not been identified.

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — Myanmar, also known as Burma, has signed an agreement with the United Nations (U.N.) to ban the recruitment of child soldiers and demobilize those already serving. The Southeast Asian nation is one of about two dozen countries worldwide found by the U.N. to violate international law on the rights of children in armed conflicts. The U.N. office in Yangon said in a press release that the agreement was the result of years of negotiations with a task force on child soldiers comprising U.N. agencies along with the private groups World Vision and Save the Children. Task force co-chairman Ramesh Shrestha of UNICEF said at a signing that supporting the demobilized youth with education and jobs is a key task. The U.N. says seven ethnic guerrilla armies in the country also use child soldiers.