Chinese airliner ordered out of Russia

A Chinese passenger plane which landed in Russia has been ordered to return to China immediately.

The airliner carrying some 100 passengers was forced back as part of Russia's emergency action to prevent the spread of the SARS virus.

Authorities in the Russian city of Khabarovsk banned all air travel between the region and SARS-stricken southeast Asia last week.

Meanwhile police in northern China have detained at least nine people for taking part in violent protests against plans to build a SARS clinic in their neighbourhood.

The official Chinese news agency reports that the nine were suspected of assaulting police, destroying property or looting during a series of riots in the northern coastal city of Tianjin.

Tianjin, with seven deaths and 149 cases of the flu-like disease, is the latest city in China where residents have overturned cars, raided hospitals or blocked roads to prevent the building of SARS clinics or stop the return of migrant workers.

The World Health Organisation has advised against travel to the industrial city, which is located about one hour's drive from Beijing, the city with the world's highest number of SARS cases.

It is reported that three suspects incited more than 300 residents to gather at a medical unit construction site in the Hongqiao district in early May. They used telephone poles and bricks to block the road leading to the clinic.

They also forced the driver of a truck piled with building materials to dump his load, causing a severe traffic jam.

Dozens of protests have broken out across China in the past two weeks in cities and villages where people fear the spread of Severe Acute Respiratory Disease to their neighbourhoods.