Oscar Pistorius will be sent to a facility for a month-long psychiatric test – An explorer urges action before an important historic site is looted and ruined forever – A hero cat lays down the claw when a mean old dog attacks a little boy – And a lot more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

Trade unions in Turkey announced a one-day general strike in protest of the coalmine disaster that killed at least 274 miners.  Leaders say the privatization of mines has made working conditions even worse.  The country will begin three days of mourning for the workers beginning on Thursday, even though scores of miners are still missing and the death toll hasn’t been finalized.

A giant crocodile killed and ate an 11-year-old boy in Papua New Guinea.  The boy was fishing with his parents on the Siloura River in Gulf Province in PNG’s south last week, when the croc attacked.  This is PNG’s second crocodile fatality this year.

Yemen’s army killed some 30 al Qaeda militants in the southeastern Shabwa Province, part of that country’s big offensive on the terrorist group in recent days.  At least 12 government troops died in the fighting.  Dozens got away, and the General in command says there’s evidence that al Qaeda is recruiting and deploying child soldiers. 

Over the objections from the defense, the judge in the Oscar Pistorius murder trial ordered the Olympic athlete to undergo a month-long mental health evaluation at a psychiatric facility.  Prosecutors insisted on the tests, and Judge Thokozile Masipa agreed that the defense’s assertions that Pistorius suffers from “generalized anxiety disorder” (GAD) could not replace a “proper inquiry”. 

Tanzania has arrested two “witch doctors” in the murder and dismemberment of an albino woman.  Spiritualists in the East African nation believe albino’s body parts have magical or medicinal powers, a superstition that amazingly only festered in recent decades, even though Tanzania has traditionally had Africa’s biggest population of albinos.  More than 70 albinos have been killed there since 2000.

Two young boys aged 5 and 6 were seriously hurt when a strong gust of wind picked up their inflatable “bounce house” playhouse and carried it off more than 15 meters into the air.  This happened in South Glens Falls in New York State in America’s northeast.  The thing was as high as a two-story building when one of the boys spilled out and crashed into the pavement, suffering a serious head injury.  The other landed on a parked car and suffered broken bones and internal injuries.  The investigation will look at whether the plastic spikes used to secure the thing to the ground are strong enough.

The explorer who says he found what he believes is the wreck of Christopher Columbus’ flagship Santa Maria says the underwater site off Haiti’s north coast has already been looted.  Barry Clifford told New York’s Explorers Club that, “I think the ship needs to be excavated as quick as possible and then conserved and then displayed to the world.”  The Santa Maria ran aground on Christmas Day 1492.

Everyone’s talking about the Hero Cat!  It’s all caught on video:  A toddler was riding his training bike around the house in Bakersfield, California when the neighbor’s aggressive dog stalked and attacked the boy, shaking him viciously.  Hero Cat – her name is Tara – bolts out of the house, takes down the big bully, and chases him off.  Hero cat then keeps herself in between the boy and the direction in which the bad dog ran.  The kid needed stitches but is okay.  Animal Control caught the dog, but concluded he was beyond hope – it’ll be put him down.  And Tara deserves a medal.