Funny old world: The week's offbeat news

From a "Mickey Mouse parliament" to the danger of diapers at 30,000 feet...

Your weekly roundup of offbeat stories from around the world.

Boys will be boys 
Turkish archaeologists have made an "astonishing" discovery that throws new light on some of our earliest ancestors -- a statue of a man holding his you-know-what.

The 12,000-year-old figure was found at Karahantepe in the southeast close to the border with Syria, one of humanity's most ancient sacred sites.

Red-blooded Turkish males swelled with pride at the find -- particular when it emerged that he was holding his manhood with both hands.

But the rather chaste picture of the 2.3-metre (7.5-foot) tall statue released by the authorities prompted talk of a cover-up by Turkey's devout Muslim leaders, with the member mysteriously missing.

Archaeologist Necmi Karul laughed off the rumours, telling AFP, "We had not yet found a phallus."

Happily, the broken-off business end has since been found and Karahantepe Man's pride will soon be restored.

 Clever thief was no dummy 
A Polish thief posed as a dummy in the window of a clothes shop so he could steal jewellery from a Warsaw shopping centre.

The 22-year-old entered the store and "put on a new outfit, then stood still in the window like a mannequin in order to fool security guards and surveillance cameras," police said.

When the shop closed he slipped out and swiped jewellery from a stand in the shopping centre.

"We've never seen anything like it," police told AFP. But the thief was not as clever as he thought.

Officers later nabbed him and now he faces up to 10 years in prison.

EU's mystery train 
A special train taking hundreds of European Union lawmakers from Brussels to the parliament in Strasbourg was mistakenly sent to Disneyland Paris instead.

The staggering error by French railways sparked much hilarity online even among MEPs, with the Politico news website the first to get in with the "Mickey Mouse parliament?" line.

It also gave plenty of ammunition to critics of the parliament, that sits both in Brussels and the French city.

"Could a new Disneyland be a suitable use for the Strasbourg buildings?" asked Pelle Geertsen, an aide to a Danish MEP.

 Nappy ending 
A flight from Panama to Tampa in Florida was forced to do a U-turn after a suspicious package was found in the toilet.

But when bomb disposal experts carefully opened the black plastic bag once the plane landed in Panama City, they found a nappy.

Security chief Jose Castro said the "disposable adult diaper" posed no threat. No passenger has yet to own up.

 'Big mistake' 
Police in Bihar, one of India's most lawless and corrupt states, have a novel approach to clearing up crime.

Three officers were filmed near Muzaffarpur throwing the remains of a man killed by a speeding truck over a bridge. Video of their handiwork went viral, causing outrage.

Senior officer Rakesh Kumar told AFP his men "only threw the lower half" of the man into the water.

"The upper half was sent for post-mortem but the lower half was badly mangled so they threw it in the canal," he added. "It was a big mistake."