Austrian

Iraqi forces backed by U.S. helicopters swept through a Shiite slum in the capital Saturday, searching for Iraqis seized in kidnappings that have shaken confidence in Iraq's government and security forces. Search efforts were also underway in southern Iraq for five private security guards, four Americans and one Austrian, seized Thursday when the supply convoy they were protecting was ambushed by gunmen in Iraqi police uniforms near the border with Kuwait, British and Iraqi officials said.

U.S. and British troops clashed with gunmen Friday in southern Iraq, a day after the kidnapping of four Americans and an Austrian near the site of the battle. Iraqi authorities reported that at least two Iraqis were killed in the crossfire. Reports conflicted about whether the gunfight was connected with the Thursday abduction and about the fate of the five men, private security guards who were seized with nine other people near the border with Kuwait.

Holocaust survivors and their heirs now have a powerful new tool to look for art and other belongings looted by the Nazis in Austria. It's an online database of thousands of objects -- such as paintings, books, medals, photographs, furniture, jewelry and sculptures -- that may have been expropriated from 1938 to 1945, when the Alpine country was a part of Nazi Germany. The items are now in museums and collections owned by the Austrian government or the city of Vienna.

A thief who carried out Austria's most spectacular art heist three years ago of a $65-million Renaissance figurine was sentenced Thursday to four years in prison. Robert Mang, an alarm systems expert who said he stole the prized work from Vienna's Art History Museum as a prank and described the caper as "child's play," had faced up to 10 years' imprisonment. The case triggered months of heated debate over whether the Austrian capital's famed museums had proper security.

A young woman who had been kidnapped at age 10 escaped a cellar where she was imprisoned for eight years, and her suspected abductor killed himself by jumping in front of a train soon afterward, authorities said Thursday. Natascha Kampusch, last seen walking to school in Vienna in 1998, was found Wednesday in a yard in Strasshof, northeast of Vienna. She was identified by a scar on her arm from a childhood operation, Austrian authorities said.

The president of the Austrian Chamber of Commerce is hoping that one of the five Gustav Klimt paintings the country recently had to give up can be purchased and returned to a museum there. Christoph Leitl said Wednesday he had found a buyer who would be willing to pay the estimated $25-million price tag for "Haeuser in Unterach am Attersee" ("Houses in Unterach on Lake Atter").

In working-class and student neighborhoods, Austrians from the left and right have painted banners and made buttons to protest President Bush's visit here this week. But after their demonstrations are done, many of those same Austrians will hurry home to catch other American exports: "Desperate Housewives" or "CSI: Miami," prime-time TV hits here this season.

Hubertus Czernin, an Austrian journalist who was a key figure in efforts to return five multimillion-dollar paintings looted by Nazis in World War II to their rightful owner in Los Angeles, has died. He was 50. Czernin, who had been in failing health for several years, died Saturday in Vienna of complications from mastocytosis, a rare cell disorder, said Randol Schoenberg, a Los Angeles attorney who represented Maria Altmann in the art restitution case.

Austria's Bawag bank will pay at least $675 million to avoid prosecution and settle bankruptcy claims after admitting its role in the collapse of commodities brokerage Refco Inc., U.S. authorities announced Monday. The bank and the Austrian Trade Unions Assn., which owns Bawag, will forfeit $337.5 million to the United States to be distributed to victims of the fraud at Refco, prosecutors and the Securities and Exchange Commission said. In return, U.S.

Austrian biathlete Wolfgang Rottmann retired Tuesday, the second team member to quit after Olympic doping raids. Rottmann, 32, fled the Turin Games with teammate Wolfgang Perner after a police search of the team's housing, with both admitting they may have used "illegal methods" during the Olympics. They were kicked off the team for leaving without permission. Perner retired Monday.