 South Africa election: Polls open
Polls have opened in South Africa's fifth general election since the end of apartheid 20 years ago.
The governing African National Congress (ANC) is tipped to win, returning President Jacob Zuma for a second five-year term.
However, it is expected to lose ground amid concern over high unemployment and a number of corruption scandals.
The run-up to the vote has been marked by protests and troops have been deployed to boost security.
Wednesday's election is the first time that those born after the end of apartheid are able to take part and commentators say much will depend on how they cast their ballots.
Polls show many are disaffected with the country's leadership and are willing to support the opposition Democratic Alliance, led by anti-apartheid activist Helen Zille, or the Economic Freedom Fighters, headed by former ANC youth leader Julius Malema.
he ANC's campaign has drawn heavily on past glories and on the outpouring of grief over the death of its former leader, Nelson Mandela.
"Do it for Madiba, Vote ANC!" campaign posters read, referring to Mr Mandela by his clan name.
But many commentators say this election could be the last to be dominated by South Africa's post-apartheid legacy.
About a quarter of South Africa's workforce is jobless and a BBC poll suggests unemployment is the major issue among young voters, followed by education.
 Blast from the past: Monica Lewinsky revisits her Bill Clinton affair
Washington - Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern whose affair with Bill Clinton nearly brought down the then US president, is back in the news saying "It's time to burn the beret and bury the blue dress." Breaking her silence over the scandalous affair in the 1990s with Clinton - which led to the then president's impeachment by US Congress - with an unmistakable reference to the dress stained by presidential indiscretion, she also says: "I, myself, deeply regret what happened between me and President Clinton."
Lewinsky has been "So silent, in fact," she writes in an upcoming issue of Vanity Fair, "that the buzz in some circles has been that the Clintons must have paid me off; why else would I have refrained from speaking out?" "I can assure you that nothing could be further from the truth," she says. "Sure, my boss took advantage of me, but I will always remain firm on this point: it was a consensual relationship. "Any 'abuse' came in the aftermath, when I was made a scapegoat in order to protect his powerful position. . . .
"The Clinton administration, the special prosecutor's minions, the political operatives on both sides of the aisle, and the media were able to brand me. And that brand stuck, in part because it was imbued with power." Lewinsky, 40, says it is time to stop "tiptoeing around my past-and other people's futures. I am determined to have a different ending to my story." "I've decided, finally, to stick my head above the parapet so that I can take back my narrative and give a purpose to my past.
(What this will cost me, I will soon find out.)" After the scandal, writes Lewinsky, "I turned down offers that would have earned me more than $10 million, because they didn't feel like the right thing to do." Lewinsky also responds to reports made public in February that Hillary Clinton, during the 1990s, had characterized her as a "narcissistic loony toon" in correspondence with close friend Diane Blair. "My first thought," Lewinsky writes, "as I was getting up to speed: If that's the worst thing she said, I should be so lucky." Commenting on the disclosure, Washington Post opinion writer Ruth Marcus suggested that Lewinsky "may not have intended it this way, but she just did Hillary Clinton a big favour." The "timing of Lewinsky's Vanity Fair piece - as the political world awaits Hillary Clinton's presidential determination, as Chelsea Clinton prepares to have the first grandchild - would seem not exactly fortuitous for the Clintons," she says.
But in Marcus' view Lewinsky's piece defuses Republican senator Rand Paul's line of attack-whether Democrats in general, and Hillary Clinton in particular, should consort with a "sexual predator" like Bill Clinton. "And it does so before any Clinton presidential announcement," she says. So "If and when a Clinton presidential announcement comes, Lewinsky will be old news."
 Thai court ruling could force PM from office
Thailand's Constitutional Court rules on Wednesday whether to remove the prime minister from office for abuse of power, with an expected guilty verdict likely to bring her supporters into the street and plunge the country into a political vacuum.
Yingluck Shinawatra has faced six months of protests in the capital, Bangkok, aimed at toppling her government. The protesters have failed to achieve their aim in the street and are now looking to legal challenges to remove her.
"It is almost certain the court will rule against Yingluck.
Her party will not accept that decision," said political analyst Kan Yuenyong at the Siam Intelligence Unit think tank.
"What is unclear is whether the whole cabinet will go with her. If it does, we will be left without a prime minister, a cabinet and a lower house. In short, Thailand will enter a void, a constitutional crisis."
The ruling is expected sometime after mid-day (0500 GMT).
The charges relate to Yingluck's transfer of National Security Council chief Thawil Pliensri in 2011, which opponents say was designed to benefit her Puea Thai Party and a family member.
Yingluck defended herself in court on Tuesday and denied benefiting from the transfer.
Some legal experts say the court may rule to remove ministers involved in that transfer decision or that her entire government will have to go if she is forced to step down.
Her party rejects that and says if Yingluck goes, an interim prime minister can be chosen from among her five deputies.
It remains unclear how a new premier would be appointed if Yingluck and her entire cabinet are forced to step down. There has been no lower house of parliament since December so it could fall to the Senate upper house.
"That prime minister would probably come from the opposition side which is another problem because the Puea Thai Party and its supporters will never accept that," said Kan.
The 150-seat Senate includes 77 elected members. The other 73 are appointed and are largely seen as opponents of Yingluck and her brother, former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who is seen as the power behind her government.
The crisis broadly pits Bangkok's middle class and royalist establishment against the mainly poor, rural supporters of Yingluck and Thaksin, who was ousted by the military in 2006 and lives in exile abroad to avoid a jail sentence handed down in 2008 for abuse of power.
Yingluck's supporters accuse the Constitutional Court of bias in frequently ruling against the government. In 2008, the court forced two Thaksin-linked prime ministers from office.
Tensions between pro and anti-government supporters could come to a head if Yingluck is removed by the court.
Anti-government protesters are still massed in a central Bangkok park, albeit in diminished numbers. Yingluck's "red shirt" supporters plan a large rally near the capital this weekend, or earlier if she is forced to step down.
A group of red shirts plans a rally on Wednesday in the northeastern city of Khon Kaen in support of Yingluck.
The protesters disrupted a Feb. 2 election that Yingluck's party looked set to win. A court ruled the election void in March because voting was not possible in 28 southern constituencies where candidates were stopped from registering.
The government and the Election Commission have agreed to hold a new vote on July 20, but the cabinet has yet to draw up a draft decree for endorsement by Thailand's king.
Even if it goes ahead, it could again face disruption by the protesters, who are demanding political and electoral reforms before any vote in order to eliminate the influence of Thaksin.
Twenty-five people have been killed and scores wounded since the protests began in November.
 Monitors Charge President Meddled in Panama Vote
Panama City: International monitors voiced concern Monday at "interference" by Panama's presidential office in weekend elections.
Conservative Juan Carlos Varela easily defeated President Ricardo Martinelli's hand-picked successor, Jose Domingo Arias, whose runningmate was Martinelli's wife.
Varela, Panama's vice-president and a former Martinelli supporter, won a clear majority - 39 percent - of the vote, according to the Electoral Tribunal.
"With special concern the (OAS electoral monitoring) mission has witnessed visible interference by the executive branch in the vote, in several ways," Organization of American States monitoring mission spokeswoman Lourdes Flores said in reading out a statement.
Martinelli's party's supporters "benefited throughout the campaign by using public funds," she added.
While the OAS mission acknowledged the election was "carried out successfully," it stressed that there were issues "that cannot be ignored, and that need to be addressed urgently."
Government interference, it charged, created "deeply unequal conditions in the race."
And the mission "has witnessed with concern the barely regulated campaign finance area," where there are "no limits on donations and no monitoring of private donations."
 Pakistan army wants dialogue with India but with all options open
As part of its change in strategy, a major section of Pakistan's army wants to give dialogue with India a chance, but wants to retain all other options including sub-conventional warfare, according to a new book.
"As one major general put it, 'We should give talking to India a chance, but retail all options, including sub-conventional warfare, to deal with India'," said Aqil Shah, author of the latest book 'Democracy: Military Politics in Pakistan'.
Described by Harvard University, which has published the book released in the US over the weekend, as the first comprehensive, historical study of the behaviour of Pakistan's military relative to India, Shah, however, does not identify the major general who he interviewed.
In his book, Shah, a lecturer in the Department of Politics at the prestigious Princeton University, notes that the change in the stance of Pakistan Army favouring dialogue with India is a tactical stance so as to gain time and space to put its house in order.
"Giving the multiplicity of perceived threats Pakistan and its material weakness, many officers reluctantly admit that Islamabad's traditional Indian policy – namely, unconditional support of the Kashmiri right of self-determination in line with the UN resolutions – may not be yielding the desired dividend and needs to be carefully re-evaluated," he wrote.
"Hence some advocate giving dialogue a chance and approaching all issues with an open mind. Several officers see dialogue with India as an opportunity to engage in the management of regional conflicts to enhance Pakistani security without compromising the basic stance on Kashmir," wrote Shah, who among others interviewed four service chiefs and three heads of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) for the book.
"Despite disagreement on the best way to proceed, there is a consensus that protecting the national interest on Kashmir will require negotiating from a position of strength that can be achieved only by putting Pakistan's internal house in order," the author said.
According to the book, another senior Pakistani army officer said the military's capability to take "proxy wars to enemy territory and a likely fillip to already activated fissiparous tendencies, nuclear deterrence and strong diplomatic efforts are needed to secure" Pakistan.
The book said that the dangerous presence of both lethal terrorist groups and atomic weapons on Pakistani territory has raised the catastrophic possibility that Pakistan could become the world's first failed nuclear armed-state, but the military continues to believe that the short-term costs of these policies are lower than their long-term benefits in achieving Pakistan's security against India.
Referring to the recent moves by the Nawaz Sharif government to improve relations with India, Shah notes that if the past is any guide, it seems unlikely that the government can succeed in actually brokering a meaningful peace with India without the blessing of the military.
 Barack Obama's brother-in-law sacked as coach of university basketball team
The brother-in-law of US President Barack Obama has reportedly been fired from his position of coach of the men's basketball team at the Oregon State University.
Robinson, who had three years remaining on his contract, failed to lead his team to the NCAA tournament or even the NIT in his tenure.
According to ABC News, thanking Robinson and his family for their contributions to the university, their athletic director Bob De Carolis however, stated that the decision was taken in the best interests of their student-athletes, basketball program and the university.
Robinson will receive a buyout of four million dollars, which is ten times Obama's salary of 400,000 dollars, the report added.
 Germany presents five-point plan to ease Ukraine crisis
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier has presented a five-point plan to solve the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, a German daily reported Monday.
In an article for the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Steinmeier called on Ukraine, Russia, the US and the European Union (EU) to meet again in Geneva and send on this occasion a "strong political message" that agreements reached at the first Geneva conference would actually be put into practice, Xinhua reported.
The minister wrote about the importance to ensure that the presidential election in Ukraine, slated for May 25, could be held properly, as this will allow the leadership in Kiev to "get new legitimacy".
All sides to the conflict in Ukraine should rapidly conduct negotiations on a constitutional reform, which includes all parts of the country and aims at achieving national consensus, proposed Steinmeier. Also, all non-governmental groups should be disarmed and occupied public buildings are to be vacated.
As another point of his plan, the minister expressed hope that the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) could play a key role in settling the crisis in Ukraine. The OSCE, he wrote, should provide help in establishing dialogue forums at all levels.
Ukraine has been plunged into a chaotic violence since November 2013 following the government's backtrack on European integration which angered many in the west of Ukraine.
On April 17, representatives from the US, Russia, Ukraine, and the EU met in Geneva and signed a statement on the de-escalation of tensions in Ukraine. The accord says all sides must refrain from any violence, intimidation or provocative actions as part of initial steps to restore order in the country.
Ukraine was hit by a fresh wave of unrest in the past few days. In the east part of the country, government troops took actions against militants with combat helicopters and armored vehicles Sunday, after violent clashes occurred Friday between pro- and anti-government protesters in the port city of Odessa, leaving at least 43 people killed and 174 others injured.
 Experts to re-examine all gathered data on MH370
A panel of experts will re-examine all data gathered in the nearly two-month-old hunt for the missing Malaysia jet to ensure search crews who have been scouring a desolate patch of ocean for the plane have been looking in the right place.
Officials from Malaysia, Australia and China met in Canberra on Monday to work out the next steps in the search for Flight 370, which will centre around on a patch of seafloor in the Indian Ocean off Western Australia. The area became the focus of the hunt after a team of analysts calculated the plane’s likeliest flight path based on satellite and radar data.
Angus Houston, head of the search operation, said that data will be re-analysed and combined with all information gathered in the search.
 3 killed, 60 injured in bus blasts on second day of violence in Kenya
At least three people were killed when two buses driving on a busy highway in the Kenyan capital Nairobi were struck by explosive devices on Sunday, the day after attacks in Mombasa killed four people.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility but Kenya has blamed similar attacks on the al Qaeda-linked Somali group al Shabaab, which killed at least 67 people at the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi last September.
"So far three people have been confirmed dead, one was killed at the scene and two died in hospital," Moses Ombati, the deputy police commander for Nairobi told Reuters. "The final report will be known later tonight or tomorrow, once we check with all the hospitals."
More than 60 wounded – at least 20 of them in critical condition – were taken to various hospitals with shrapnel injuries and torn limbs, medical officials said.
Somali Islamist militants have been carrying out such attacks in retaliation for Kenya's intervention in neighbouring Somalia in October 2011. The militants want Kenya to withdraw its troops, but Kenya has rejected their demand.
Sunday's blasts came a day after twin explosions in the port city of Mombasa on the Indian Ocean, a tourist magnet. Four people were killed in the Mombasa attacks when attackers threw an explosive device at passengers at a bus station, and also targeted a luxury hotel in the coastal city.
On Sunday, blood and broken glass littered the road where the two buses stood about one km from each other. Both were heading out of town along Thika Super Highway, which connects the capital to the outskirts of the city.
Police believed that the attackers had planted improvised explosive devices inside the buses, posing as passengers. One of the buses, painted green, had its rear window blown off and all windows shattered, while the other bus, red in colour, had a huge hole ripped out of its side. Several passengers from the buses were being treated on the road, while the severely wounded were rushed to hospitals.
Kenyans took to Twitter to express their anger over the attacks, demanding that police be more vigilant and telling al Shabaab that there would be no compromise.
 NATO containers attacked in Pakistan
At least two people were killed Monday when unidentified militants attacked NATO containers in Pakistan's Khyber tribal region.
The gunmen opened fire at three NATO containers in the Wazir Dhand area of Jamrud tehsil, the Dawn online reported.
The containers were set ablaze.
Khyber is one of the country's seven semi-autonomous tribal districts near the Afghan border, rife with homegrown insurgents and home to a number of militant organisations.
The bulk of supplies and equipment required by foreign troops stationed in Afghanistan are transported through Khyber, although the US troops are increasingly using alternative routes through central Asia, the report said.
 Juan Carlos Varela wins presidential election in Panama
Juan Carlos Varela from the opposition Panamenista Party won Panama's presidential election, Supreme Electoral Court President Erasmo Pinilla said on Sunday.
With 60% of the ballots counted, incumbent Vice President Varela garnered 39.2% of vote, followed by Jose Domingo Arias from the ruling Democratic Change Party with 32%, and Juan Carlos Navarro from the opposition Democratic Revolutionary Party with 27%, Xinhua reported. The electoral court chief had notified Varela of his victory by phone which was broadcast live.
Some 2.4 million Panamanians went to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president and a vice-president, 71 members of parliament, 77 mayors, 648 district representatives, seven councilors and 20 members of the Central American Parliament.
 Recovery of bodies from South Korean ferry suspended
SEOUL: The operation to recover bodies from the ferry that sank off South Korea last month has been suspended due to heavy seas, a spokesman said on Saturday, amid concern that many of the missing may never be found.
Seventeen days after the 6,825-tonne Sewol capsized and sank, 228 people have been confirmed dead with 74 still unaccounted for.
"Divers were unable to dive late Friday and early today due to fast currents and high waves whipped up by gusty winds", Coastguard spokesman Ko Myung-Suk told journalists.
More than 100 divers were on standby, waiting for the waves to die down, he said.
Dive teams have been working in challenging and sometimes hazardous conditions.
They have to grope their way down guiding ropes to the sunken ship, laying on its side on the seabed at a depth of 40 meters (132 feet).
They have to struggle through narrow passageways and rooms littered with floating debris in silty water.
Park Seung-Ki, spokesman for the ministry of oceans and fisheries, said bedding materials from the ship were found as far as 30 kilometers (around 20 miles) from the disaster site on Friday.
As days go by, personal belongings and debris from the ship have been spotted further and further away, fuelling concerns that strong currents may have swept some bodies into the open sea.
As a precaution, recovery workers put rings of netting around the site days ago.
The relatives of those still missing are insisting that all the bodies be recovered before efforts begin to raise the sunken ferry.
The Sewol capsized on April 16 with 476 people on board — more than 300 of them from the same Danwon High School in Ansan city, just south of Seoul.
It is one of South Korea's worst peacetime disasters but public anger and frustration has been amplified due to greed and irresponsibility being blamed for the poor handling of the catastrophe.
The captain and 14 of his crew have been arrested for being the first to leave the ship without helping all passengers to safety.
The Sewol's regular captain, who was off duty on the day of the accident, has told prosecutors that the ferry operator — Chonghaejin Marine Co — "brushed aside" repeated warnings that the 20-year-old ship had stability issues following a renovation in 2012.
Two Chonghaejin officials were arrested on Friday on charges of having the ferry overloaded well beyond its legal limit.
The ferry owners have also become the focus of an ever-widening probe. The government has come under strong criticism over the initially slow rescue response as well as lax safety standards and collusion between industry and regulators, which were partly blamed for the scale of the disaster.
 Pakistan voices disappointment as India cancels pilgrim visas
In a last minute decision, India cancelled the visit of a group of 500 Pakistani pilgrims to the Ajmer shrine for Urs, citing the ongoing general elections. An upset Pakistan summoned the Indian deputy high commissioner in Islamabad on Friday to lodge a protest.
In a statement in New Delhi, India on Friday expressed disappointment at having to cancel the visit of Pakistani pilgrims to attend the annual Urs of Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti at Ajmer May 1-12 this year, saying the visit of a large group of pilgrims at the time of the general elections would have required much more elaborate arrangements than what is usually done for such events.
External Affairs ministry spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin said the move to cancel the visit was "a last moment decision". He expressed his regret, saying, "We are most certainly disappointed that this year pilgrims from Pakistan were unable to attend the Urs at what is one of the holiest shrines of our region." He added, "But this was a measure of abundant precaution, aimed at ensuring safety and welfare of the pilgrims which, I think, should always be our priority... A visit of such large group of saireens from Pakistan would have required much more elaborate arrangements than what is usually done for such events."
Akbarrudin said all government agencies, including railway authorities, had made full arrangements to transport over 500 pilgrims from Pakistan from Attari railway station to Ajmer and back. He said India has always cherished age-old cultural and civilisational links that exist across "our borders amongst all countries of our unique sub continent" and will always nurture these links for the benefit of future generations.
In Islamabad, Indian Deputy High Commissioner Gopal Baglay was summoned to Pakistan's foreign office and conveyed Islamabad's deep disappointment and concern" over the denial of visas by India – the fourth time in the last one year, according to a Pakistan foreign office statement.
Pakistan said the "visits to religious shrines in Pakistan and India were governed under the Bilateral Protocol on Visits to the Religious Shrines, 1974". "The foreign office conveyed its deep disappointment and concern over the denial of visas by the Indian government. This is the fourth time that visas have been denied to Pakistani pilgrims in the last one year."
Pakistan said that the move "was not only against the bilateral agreement, but also runs contrary to the efforts towards normalising ties between the two countries and the spirit of people-to-people contacts".
 19 hurt in New York subway derailment
A New York City subway train carrying 1,000 riders derailed on Friday morning while traveling through a tunnel in the borough of Queens, injuring 19 people, city fire officials said.
Fifteen people escaped with minor injuries while four more were transported to a hospital with potentially serious injuries, officials said. The incident, at 10:24 a.m. (1424 GMT), involved six cars in an eight-car Manhattan-bound 'F' line subway, they said.
The cause of the derailment was not immediately known but MTA Chairman Thomas Prendergast said the mass-transit agency will begin a full inspection of signals and tracks. NY1 television broadcast video of fire officials evacuating throngs of people in darkness, some through subway grates.
"I saw everyone jerk forward. My car went dark," said Connie Wang, 24, a freelance photographer who was riding in a car in the middle of the train. "There were sparks flying." Wang, who was traveling from her home in Queens to a job in lower Manhattan, said her fellow passengers mostly waited in silence during the hour it took before they were evacuated.
 Ukraine AT LEAST 350 DEAD AS LANDSLIDE HITS AFGHAN VILLAGES
A landslide in northern Afghanistan killed at least 350 people on Friday, officials said, with hundreds also feared missing as a major rescue operation was launched to find survivors in villages buried under mud.
The first emergency teams on the scene in Badakhshan province started digging through rocks and dirt as local authorities, the United Nations and the NATO-led military force raced to assess the damage and provide help.
“The number of deceased has increased to 350,” the UN mission in Afghanistan said in a statement. “A response is being mobilised for those who survived but were displaced, with some partners already on the ground.
“(NATO’s) Regional Command in the north in contact with the Afghan National Army in regards to search and rescue efforts.” Badakhshan is a remote province in northeast Afghanistan bordering Tajikistan, China and Pakistan.
“It is a disaster. The landslide has affected around 1,000 families,” Sayed Abdullah Homayun Dehqan, provincial director of the Afghan National Disaster Management Authority, told AFP. “Around 300 families are missing, that could involve around 2,000 people. The people are working to remove the rocks, so far three bodies have been recovered.
 Ukraine Reinstates Conscription as Security Deteriorates in Eastern Region
Ukraine's acting President Olexander Turchynov has reinstated military conscription to deal with deteriorating security in the east of the country.
Turchynov signed the decree on Thursday, the same day pro-Russian militants seized the regional prosecutor’s office in the eastern city of Donetsk.
The decree reinstates the draft for non-exempt Ukrainian men between 18 and 25 years old and cites what it describes as "the further aggravation of the socio-politcal situation" in eastern and southern Ukraine, as well as "blatant aggression" by "illegal" armed pro-Russian groups.
The move comes a day after Turchynov said that his government was "helpless" to quell the growing pro-Russian separatist movement in two eastern regions and could not control its own troops.
Earlier Thursday, pro-Russian protesters stormed the prosecutor's office in the separatist-held city of Donetsk, lobbing stones and smashing windows after accusing the office of working for the Western-backed government in Kyiv.
To shouts of "Fascists", a refrain Moscow uses to describe Ukraine's new government, hundreds of people pelted the police with paving stones and then cornered some, dragging them to the ground and beating them. The police soon surrendered.
Donetsk, a city of about one million people in Ukraine's industrial east, is at the center of an armed uprising across the steel and coal belt by mainly Russian-speakers threatening to secede from Ukraine.
The violence, in a city already largely under the control of separatists, underscored the shifting security situation and suspicions in the region.
"The prosecutor's office was issuing criminal orders from Kyiv against its own people, charging them with separatism and other fake crimes," said one protester, a 43-year-old man from Donetsk who gave his name as Igor.
Pro-Russian separatists in the city have declared a "People's Republic of Donetsk" and say they will hold a referendum on secession on May 11.
IMF loan has tough requirements
The director of the IMF's European department, Reza Moghadam, told reporters Thursday that the Washington-based agency expects Ukraine to meet all its financial obligations, even as it teeters on the brink of bankruptcy. That includes $2.2 billion it owes Russia for natural gas purchases.
The IMF announced a $17 billion loan package for Ukraine over the next two years, and the World Bank, the European Union, Japan , Canada and the United States have pledged another $15 billion. The loans come with a requirement that Kyiv undertake economic reforms, including tax hikes, wage freezes and cuts in social aid.
But Moghadam acknowledged that the $17 billion IMF loan is not as big as it appears. He said $5 billion of the figure is meant for Ukraine to pay back money it already owes the IMF from a previous loan.
 Car Bomb in Nigeria Capital Kills 15
A car bomb killed at least 15 people late Thursday at a bus terminal on the outskirts of the Nigerian capital, Abuja.
The blast in the town of Nyanya was near the site of an April 14 bombing at a bus station that killed at least 75 people.
The Islamic extremist group Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the April blast. No one has claimed the latest attack.
Nigeria is planning to host the World Economic Forum on Africa next week. President Goodluck Jonathan has promised extraordinary security measures for the meeting.
He said Nigeria will triumph over what he calls the evil that wants to debase humanity.
Boko Haram has killed thousands in a five-year insurgency to set up a hardline Muslim state in northern Nigeria.
Militants from the group are suspected in the kidnapping of more 250 schoolgirls in northern Nigeria more than two weeks ago. Some reports say the militants are forcing the girls into marriage.
 Red herring in hunt for MH370 highlights air traffic flaws
Fresh questions have been raised over air traffic co-ordination after a preliminary report on the Malaysia Airlines plane that disappeared almost two months ago revealed 90 minutes of wasted effort while controllers looked in the wrong country.
While Flight MH370's disappearance has led to calls for real-time tracking, it has also re-focused attention on the gap between what controllers sometimes think and see, which complicated early efforts to find Air France 447 in 2009.
Some 25 minutes after the Malaysian jet was first reported missing over the Gulf of Thailand on March 8, the airline told controllers that it had flown onto Cambodian airspace. It later added it had been able to exchange signals, the report said.
Half an hour later, the airline reassured controllers that the Boeing 777 was in a "normal condition" based on a signal placing it even further east, on the other side of Vietnam.
In fact, by then it had flown back west across Malaysia and was already on a new southerly course thought to have taken it across the tip of Indonesia and towards the Indian Ocean, where investigators believe it crashed with 239 people on board.
The false trail appears to have cost controllers time, according to maps and a chronology released on Thursday.
Unnoticed by civil controllers because its transponder was switched off, and deemed no threat by a military radar controller, the aircraft flew back across Malaysia and the Malacca Straits for an hour while the airline believed it was in Cambodian and then Vietnamese airspace.
The airline later told controllers the information had been based on a "projection" and was not reliable, according to the report.
Malaysia Airlines could not be reached for comment.
The confusion echoes a fumble when Air France 447 vanished over the Atlantic five years ago. Controllers at first mistook a virtual flight path for the plane's actual course, according to an official report, which may have delayed a search operation.
In both cases, people on the ground were looking only at projections when they thought they were looking at real data.
HIGH TRAFFIC
Both events illustrate the problems in handling a growing amount of air traffic crossing through remote areas, where controllers and dispatchers sometimes have to fill in the blanks by anticipating where an aircraft should be.
"It is a natural consequence of the old traditional industry ways, which are limited by communications capability," said air traffic control expert Hans Weber, president of U.S.-based consultancy TECOP International.
Experts say such methods are not necessarily unsafe because controllers simply compensate for uncertainty by leaving a bigger "bubble" of vacant space around a jet to avoid collision. But that can also lead to delays and greater congestion.
"Controllers anticipate where a plane's next call should come from: that is what they do because that is all they have to work with," said Weber.
Many private satellite firms are offering flight tracking services, but analysts say they face problems of capacity due to sharp rises in global air traffic expected over coming years.
Such issues could be overtaken by broader plans for a radical overhaul of air traffic control in the next decade in the United States and Europe, using satellites. But the schemes are costly and have not yet been widely adopted elsewhere
 A Turkish premier consolidating his power orders Taksim empty on May Day
The picture of a young woman with a head covering tries to breathe through a half lemon that a man is putting to her face is just one of the dramatic photographs published today in the Turkish media. The woman could not withstand any longer the harsh tear gas fired by the large numbers of police deployed all over Istanbul, and she looked like she was about to faint.
Other pictures showed little children carried by their fathers struggling to breathe through makeshift face masks. But the police were also photographed helping a little girl get away from the “battlefield.” And there was a picture of someone's hand palming marbles, a stone and a large bolt — all intended to be thrown at the police. These last two were probably meant to balance out the hoard of shots of police repression showcasing the security force's determination to squash the demonstrations.
Taksim Square, which was expected to be the center of the May Day demonstrations, remained empty. Thousands of police officers equipped with armored cars and heavy barricades prevented the protestors from reaching the square and closed off the roads a few blocks away. The protestors were met with water cannons as usual and the rubber bullets as well. Public transportation was partially shut down and dozens were arrested. Police forces endured a barrage of rocks and Molotov cocktails. But with all said and done, this year's May Day in Turkey could have been much worse.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s decision to thwart the protests in Taksim Square on May Day was based, Erdogan said, on intelligence there was a plan to use weapons during the demonstrations. A court ruled against a challenge to the ban and it appears that the judiciary, which has come under a harsh attack by Erdogan, was convinced of the validity of threat and the risk of violence spreading.
But the ban on the demonstration at Taksim Square actually reminds Turks of the 33 years during which such protests in the square were entirely prohibited — from 1977 until May 2010. The horrible events of 1977, which ended in the death of 34 people by police and also involved citizens taking up arms against law enforcement, have earned the name "May Massacre." In 2010, Erdogan allowed demonstrations once again, and even branded it a historic occasion.
The reinstatement of the ban on Taksim Square demonstrations is only one in a series of steps Erdogan has taken to curb his rivals. “Whoever was against us will pay the price,” he promised — or, rather, threatened — after his successful local election campaign that handed his party over 40 percent of the electorate. Erdogan does not consider his blocking of Twitter and Youtube, starting a short while before the elections, as a settling of accounts. But when Turkey's constitutional court lifted the Twitter ban, this honorable institution also made it onto the list of enemies Erdogan will be gunning for after his presidential run in August.
Erdogan has a number of tools at his disposable. There's the new intelligence law that went into effect a week ago for one. The law grants the intelligence agencies and their representatives broad powers. For example, it is now impossible to put on trial intelligence agents who infiltrated terrorist organizations and committed crimes in the course duty. Intelligence authorities can request and receive material on citizens form all government archives. Private companies must provide all information on citizens and organizations that is requested, including their consumption habits or a list of products they have purchased. It is now possible to eavesdrop on Turkish citizens outside of the country without a court order, and anyone who leaks documents or confidential information can be sentenced to up to 12 years in prison.
Erdogan has meanwhile declared he will demand that the United States extradite the cleric Fethulleh Gulen. A world war broke out between Gulen and Erdogan a few months ago because of Erdogan’s suspicions that Gulen supporters are working to bring down his government. But to give the extradition request a legal basis, the prosecution in Turkey has opened an official investigation into Gulen’s involvement in espionage. The investigation rests on the allegations that Gulen's supporters in the communications authority leaked confidential information and secret recordings that were later published in the media. Turkish authorities can now request Gulen’s extradition from the United States.
The surprising thing is that all this is happening in a year Erdogan has demonstrated political strength, which has only been boosted after the local elections — yet he still feels persecuted and threatened. “He is not persecuted and certainly not threatened,” a senior member of the opposition Republican party told Haaretz. “He aspires to be a sole ruler, a modern dictator, who, like Napoleon, thinks he is the state.” But this explanation still does not answer the question of where the 60 percent who did not vote for Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party are — the 60 percent that possibly views Erdogan as a threat to democracy. The opposition to Erdogan is not capable of fielding even a single appropriate candidate to run against him.
 China railway station blast injures 79
China has experienced its fourth terrorist attack in seven months, after an explosion and knife attack at a railway station in the Province of Xinjiang killed three people and injured 79.
The attack came just as President Xi Jinping wrapped up a four day tour of the restive Province.
Police said a bomb was detonated at the Urumqi south station at 7:10pm local time just as a train was arriving.
At the same time a group wielding knives attacked those at the station.
The death toll is likely to rise as authorities said four people are in a serious condition.
The mainly Muslim province has seen more than 100.
deaths over the last year as authorities crack down on ethnic Uighur groups which oppose Beijing’s increasingly tight controlThe deadly incident is eerily similar to the knife attack at the Kunming Railway station in March which left 33 people dead including four of the assailants.
The attacks mark a sharp escalation of violence and are a significant challenge to the Communist Party, which often claims only its firm hand can maintain order in the country of 1.3 billion people.
The escalation of violence began on October 28 with a car bombing near Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
The attack, which killed five people and injured a further 38, led to a crackdown by security forces in Xinjiang.
Ethnic Uighur groups have long complained about discrimination and repression at the hands of China’s dominant Han majority.
On November 6, a blast outside the Communist Party’s head office in Shaanxi Province left two people dead and injured 14. It was not blamed on Uighur separatists but a disgruntled local citizen.
 Russia FM: OSCE can oversee Ukraine dialogue
LIMA, Peru — Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov suggested on Wednesday that a dialogue be launched between Ukraine’s government and its “opponents” under the auspices of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Lavrov made the comment during a statement to reporters after meeting with Peru’s president, Ollanta Humala, and foreign minister, Eda Rivas.
The 57-nation OSCE was tasked earlier this month with helping to ease tensions in eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russian separatists have seized government buildings in at least 10 tons and cities.
The OSCE special mission to Ukraine has no muscle, however, to enforce its vague mandate and seven of its observers, including three German officers, were being held by separatists.
“We hope that our partners, our Western colleagues will let the Ukrainians establish this dialogue without major impediments,” Lavrov said through a translator. He did not take questions.
“The authorities in Kiev most take into account the responsibility they have, of the necessity for them to establish dialogue with our regions of the country, in particular the southeast,” Lavrov added. That region has a large Russian-speaking population.
The Russian envoy made the statement at the end of a quick swing through Latin America that included visits to Cuba, Nicaragua and Chile.
In Chile, he called U.S. and European Union sanctions against top officials allied with Russian President Vladimir Putin “totally without sense” but said his country would not rush into doing “stupid things” in response to them.
“We want to give our partners the possibility to calm themselves.”
The sanctions followed Russia’s annexing in March of the Crimea region after a referendum. The U.S. and European Union deemed the annexation illegal.
Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 Killer tornadoes in US leave 20 dead
A new round of twister tornadoes ripped through South US killing five people in Mississippi and Alabama a day after another storm left a trail of destruction in Arkansas.
At least 15 people were killed by Sunday’s storms in Arkansas where emergency officials searched for survivors in the debris left by a powerful tornado that carved in 80-mile path of destruction through suburban Little Rock, media reports said.
As Alabama Governor Robert Bentley on Monday declared a state of emergency for all counties, Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe said the storm was one of the worst to hit the state in recent memory.
Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant said the twisters inflicted “severe damage” around the town of Louisville, about 90 miles northeast of Jackson, and more around Tupelo, CNN reported.
Winston Medical Centre, Louisville’s major hospital, was among the buildings hit, Bryant told reporters.
The National Weather Service issued a tornado emergency warning for the area around Athens, Alabama, near the Tennessee state line, on Monday evening, CNN said.
A tornado emergency also was declared in south-eastern Tennessee for east central Lincoln, Moore and northwest Franklin counties.
Storm spotters were tracking a large and extremely dangerous tornado seven miles east of Fayetteville, Tennessee, the weather service said.
The National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Centre declared tornado emergencies for several counties in northern Mississippi on Monday afternoon as the line of storms moved through the state from south-west to north-east.
Nearly 5 million people were at moderate risk of severe weather on late Monday, while 31 million people were at slight risk, including those in Atlanta and Nashville, CNN said.
The Arkansas tornado was the largest of several produced by a powerful storm system that rumbled through the central and southern US, according to CBSNews.
 Exploration firm claims to have sighted MH370 wreckage
An Australian exploration firm has claimed sighting wreckage from the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, a media report said Tuesday.
"We identified chemical elements and materials that make up a Boeing 777. These are aluminium, titanium, copper, steel alloys and other materials," Pavel Kursa, spokesman for Adelaide-based exploration company GeoResonance, told 7News.
The company surveyed over 2,000,000 sq.km of the probable crash zone, using images obtained from satellites and aircraft.
The possible wreckage was found in the Bay of Bengal, 5,000 km away from the current search location in the southern Indian Ocean off Perth.
GeoResonance started its own search March 10 by using top technologies.
"The technology that we use was originally designed to find nuclear warheads and submarines. Our team in Ukraine decided we should try and help," another company spokesman, David Pope, was quoted as saying.
Pope said they had on March 5 taken images of the site they are searching now and what they are claiming to have found now wasn't there earlier. The MH370 diappeared March 8.
"We're not trying to say that it definitely is MH370. However, it is a lead we feel should be followed up," Pope added.
New York pilot Michael Hoebel, 60, believes that he has also found an image of the wreckage.
After spending hours looking at images on TomNod, a crowd-sourcing website that has been sharing online satellite imagery in the hope of finding clues, he found an image spotting debris he believes perfectly matched the dimensions of the missing plane.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said Monday that the seabed search would be expanded to a much larger area and would involve commercial contractors specialised in deep ocean search and may take six to eight months if weather conditions permit.
Autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) Bluefin-21 would continue its mission in adjacent areas.
Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 vanished mysteriously about an hour after taking off for Beijing from Kuala Lumpur shortly after midnight March 8.
The Boeing 777-200ER was scheduled to land in Beijing the same morning. The 227 passengers on board included five Indians, 154 Chinese and 38 Malaysians.
 9 killed as tornadoes strike central, southern U.S.
A tornado system ripped through the central U.S. and left at least nine dead, officials said.
Matt DeCample, a spokesman for Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe, said eight in his state were killed on Sunday when a tornado carved through several Little Rock suburbs.
A separate tornado from the same storm system killed one person in Oklahoma.
The large tornado outside Little Rock, Arkansas, stayed on the ground as it moved northeastward for at least 30 miles (48 kilometres). Television footage showed badly damaged buildings and vehicles.
Tornadoes also touched down in Nebraska, Iowa and Missouri.
Tornado watches which means twisters could develop but aren’t an immediate threat were in effect for states as far west as New Mexico and as far east as Tennessee, and the system produced storms that were moving through the region in waves. Watches were also issued for Kansas, Missouri, Mississippi, Nebraska, Iowa, Texas and Louisiana.
In Oklahoma, Ottawa County Emergency Management director Joe Dan Morgan said Quapaw, which has about 900 residents, was heavily damaged.
“Looks like about half of town got extensive damage as well as the fire department,” Mr. Morgan said.
Authorities earlier had said two were killed in Quapaw. Sheriff’s dispatcher Kelli Soechs declined to explain the discrepancy.
Six people were treated for tornado-related injuries at Baptist Regional Health Centre, said hospital spokeswoman Kristie Wallace.
The Missouri Highway Patrol reported a tractor-trailer was blown onto its side on Interstate 70. No one was injured.
 Search for missing Malaysia plane enters new phase
The chance of finding floating debris from a missing Malaysia Airlines jetliner has become highly unlikely, and a new phase of the search would focus on a far larger area of the Indian Ocean floor, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said on Monday.
The international search effort for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, which vanished on March 8 with 239 people on board, has so far failed to turn up any trace of wreckage from the plane.
Given the amount of time that has elapsed, Abbott said that efforts would now shift away from the visual searches conducted by planes and ships and towards underwater equipment capable of scouring the ocean floor with sophisticated sensors.
Abbott admitted, however, that it was possible nothing would ever be found of the jetliner.
"We will do everything we humanly can, everything we reasonably can, to solve this mystery," he told reporters in Canberra.
Authorities had focused their search on a 10 square km (6.2 square mile) stretch of seabed about 2,000 miles northwest of Perth after detecting what they suspected was a signal from the plane's black box recorder on April 4.
But Abbott's comments appeared to be an acknowledgement that the search by a U.S. Navy Bluefin-21 underwater drone in that refined area had failed find any sign of the jetliner.
Abbott said that the new search area, which spans 700 km by 80 km, could take between 6-8 months to completely examine.
 In Pakistan, signs praise spies as nation changes
On city streets in Pakistan, a curious sight has appeared in recent days: posters bearing the faces of the country's two most powerful generals that profess love for the military and its spying arm.
Lamp posts, street signs and cars carry the banners, which bear mottos like: "A traitor of Pakistan army is a traitor of the country" and "We love Pakistan army and ISI," referring to its Inter-Services Intelligence wing.
The mystery signs arrived in Pakistan as its powerful military faces off with the country's largest private television station over allegations that its forces were behind a shooting that seriously wounded one of its top anchors. But behind the chanting demonstrations and garish loyalty posters lies the deep challenge confronting Pakistan: Where does power lie in this country that's undergone three military coups since independence, with its army or its nascent civilian government?
The controversy started last Saturday when gunmen opened fire on Hamid Mir, an anchor for Geo News, wounding him six times. After the shooting, his journalist brother appeared on Geo and blamed the ISI for the shooting while the station showed a photo of its chief, Lt. Gen. Zaheerul Islam. The station repeatedly aired the accusations and blamed the ISI for the "assassination attempt" against Mir.
The Defense Ministry then petitioned government regulators to remove Geo from the air - a decision that's likely to come in early May. The station then reported that it's signal was blocked in areas of the country as small rallies supporting the military began. Last week, the posters began appearing, some with the ISI leader on them.
Their origin is a mystery. Some said they were from the people of Islamabad, the capital. Others mentioned a Pakistani religious figure. Some listed the All Traders Welfare Association, a little-known trade group in the capital, headed by a man named Furqan Murtaza.
When reached by The Associated Press, Murtaza denied that any government or military agency encouraged his campaign.
"This is an expression of public sentiment," he said.
Generally, people have to get permission before hanging posters and banners in the capital and pay a fee. An official from the Capital Development Authority, which manages Islamabad, said the agency did not receive any requests to hang the posters, though it's common for people to do it without permission. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak to journalists.
The military did not respond to requests for comment. An ISI official, speaking on condition of anonymity as he wasn't authorized to discuss the agency publicly, said it was not responsible for the campaign.
The poster push comes as Pakistan, a country of 180 million that was carved out of India in 1947, last year saw its first civilian government finish a full five-year term and transfer power in democratic elections. Previously, military coups and other political turmoil prevented that.
But even now, journalists face dangers reporting stories, the Taliban continue to be a threat and the military remains a powerful institution in nuclear-armed Pakistan.
Rasul Baksh Rais, who heads the Islamabad-based Institute for Strategic Studies, said the posters reflect a larger sentiment in a society where many people still respect the military and feel Geo went too far in their criticism. He compared it to the same nationalist pride that sees images of Field Marshal Ayub Khan, who took power in a 1958 coup, or air force jets decorate the sides of cargo trucks in the country.
But on the streets, the posters seemed to do little to sway public opinion.
"I don't have time to read these banners and listen to radio and TV," said Ghulam Hasan, 46. "No common man has time to pay attention to these things. They are always worried about how to meet their expenses."
Hasan added: Those in charge "have no time to solve people's problems."
 In Malaysia, Obama Works to Mend Troubled Ties
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — The last time a top American official visited this Southeast Asian nation was in 1998, when Vice President Al Gore publicly rebuked its leaders for suppressing freedom and embraced “reformasi,” the rallying cry of the student-led protest movement.
On Sunday, President Obama visited Malaysia to underscore how much has changed in the last 16 years — not least in this country’s attitude toward the United States, which has evolved from deep-seated suspicion to a cautious desire for cooperation.
Citing negotiations for a trans-Pacific trade accord, a formal agreement to cooperate in halting the spread of nuclear equipment, and the international search for the missing Malaysia Airlines jet, Mr. Obama said, “We’re working more closely together than ever before.”
White House officials liken Malaysia to a “swing state” in Southeast Asia, falling somewhere between the freewheeling democracy of the Philippines and the rigid, one-party authoritarianism of Laos. Encouraging Malaysia’s evolution into a more open society, these officials said, could make the country a model for the rest of the region.
In many ways, though, Malaysia remains the same work-in-progress it was in 1998, blessed with an industrious, multiethnic population but burdened by a corrupt political system, with a Malay elite that does not hesitate to vilify its opponents with trumped-up charges.
Speaking at a news conference with Prime Minister Najib Razak, Mr. Obama treaded gingerly on these issues. He said he pressed Mr. Najib during their meeting about Malaysia’s human rights record, which has come under new scrutiny in recent weeks because of the legal travails of an opposition leader, Anwar Ibrahim.
“The prime minister is the first to acknowledge that Malaysia has still got some work to do on these issues, just like the United States, by the way, has some work to do,” the president said.
“Prime Minister Najib came in as a reformer, and one who is committed to it,” he said, “and I am going to continue to encourage him as a friend and as a partner to make sure we’re making progress on that front.”
Still, Mr. Obama declined to meet Mr. Anwar, a former deputy prime minister whose 2012 acquittal on sodomy charges was thrown out by a court last month, putting his political comeback in jeopardy. Mr. Anwar’s original conviction in 1999, which led to a six-year prison term, was widely condemned as politically motivated.
Mr. Obama did not offer a reason, but said his decision was “not indicative of a lack of concern, given the fact that there are a lot of people I don’t meet with, and opposition leaders I don’t meet with, but that doesn’t mean I’m not concerned about them.” Mr. Anwar will instead get a meeting with the national security adviser, Susan E. Rice.
For some human rights activists, that was not enough. “Anwar, to Malaysia, is almost as important a figure as Aung San Suu Kyi is in Burma,” said Andrew Khoo, a prominent human rights lawyer here. “If President Obama took the time to meet with Aung San Suu Kyi, it is a little odd that he wouldn’t meet with Anwar.”
Mr. Obama, who is the first president to visit Malaysia since Lyndon B. Johnson in 1966, was keen to keep the spotlight on the country’s high-tech future. He dropped in at a science center, where he was shown an electric go-cart and a wristband for diabetics that transmits a distress signal if it detects a cold sweat.
Later, he conducted a town-hall-style meeting with young people from around the region, in which he shared stories about his own political development and offered advice on how countries emerging from repression, like Myanmar, should deal with ethnic and religious strife.
As such societies open up, Mr. Obama said, conflicts inevitably bubble to the surface. He cited the legacy of ethnic strife in Malaysia, with its Muslim majority and Chinese and Indian minorities, and Myanmar, where the Rohingya minority currently faces persecution.
“Malaysia won’t succeed if non-Muslims don’t have opportunity,” the president said at the forum, which was interrupted briefly by protesters holding up signs opposing the trans-Pacific trade deal. “Myanmar won’t succeed if the Muslim population is repressed.”
Malaysia has been tranquil for several years, in stark contrast to the tension during Mr. Gore’s visit. Mr. Najib is a far less authoritarian figure than Mahathir Mohamed, the prime minister who dominated Malaysian politics for a quarter century, often railing against the United States.
“President Obama and I are both equally concerned about civil liberties as a principle,” Mr. Najib said. The case against Mr. Anwar, he insisted, was not a matter of the “government against him,” but a complaint brought against him by a former employee.
Human rights activists credit Mr. Najib with reformist instincts early in his tenure. More recently, though, they say he has been pulled back from a moderate path by reactionary elements in the governing party.
But Mr. Obama has clearly developed a level of trust in the prime minister. After their meeting, the president went out of his way to express sympathy for the government’s fruitless search for the Malaysian plane, which has also exposed Mr. Najib to criticism.
“Obviously, we don’t know all the details of what happened,” Mr. Obama said, “but we do know that if, in fact, the plane went down in the ocean in this part of the world, that is a big, big place.”
 Tornadoes slam several states; multiple deaths reported
Mayflower, Arkansas (CNN) -- A brutal band of severe weather battered the central Plains and mid-South late Sunday, killing at least 11 people in Arkansas and Oklahoma.
Some of the worst damage was north of Little Rock, Arkansas, where reported tornadoes devastated the towns of Mayflower and Vilonia.
Emergency officials confirmed 10 fatalities in the state.
"It's chaos here," said Vilonia Mayor James Firestone. "Our downtown area seems like it's completely leveled."
The nightmare is all too familiar for the community of about 3,800 people. Another storm ransacked the town almost three years ago to the day and followed essentially the same path, the mayor said.
"There's a few buildings partially standing, but the amount of damage is tremendous," Firestone said Sunday. "There's gas lines spewing, of course, power lines down. Houses are just a pile of brick."
A subdivision has been leveled, he said.
In Mayflower, authorities shut down Interstate 40 as search and rescue teams combed the area.
Emergency crews tended to crushed and overturned semi-trucks and passenger vehicles along the roadway.
As the storm unfolded, the National Weather Service's Little Rock office tweeted a series of messages warning of tornadoes, reporting damage and telling residents to take cover.
A tornado crossing I-40 "was reported to be as much as a half-mile wide," the weather service said.
It caused extensive damage in the town of 1,600.
Video from CNN affiliate KARK showed widespread damage across the community. Emergency workers tended to the scene. Shelters have been set up at the high school and a local church.
The city's official website said schools would be closed on Monday.
CNN meteorologist Chad Myers, who is in Mayflower, estimated the winds from the storm at 130-150 mph.
Six deaths were reported in Faulkner County, where Mayflower and Vilonia are located, the Arkansas Department of Emergency Management said. The agency confirmed three additional deaths in Pulaski County and another death in White County.
Earlier, witnesses spotted a twister in the Oklahoma town of Quapaw, where one person died, according to the Ottawa County Sheriff's Office
Joe Dan Morgan, the county's emergency manager, said ambulances had deployed after reports of a funnel cloud on the ground in Quapaw, and rescuers were working in an area where a concrete wall crashed onto a car. There were other reports of damage in the community.
"Search and rescue is under way involving several agencies," county emergency dispatcher Kelly Flecks said. "Please tell the public to stay away so they can do their jobs. We can't confirm anything else at the moment."
Quapaw is in the northeastern part of the state, near the border with Kansas and Missouri.
The same line of storms appeared to hit Baxter Spring, Kansas, just a few miles to the north.
"Sixty to 70 homes and 20 to 5 businesses are reported destroyed," according to Cherokee County emergency manager Jason Allison, who said a tornado estimated to be three blocks wide rumbled through the town of 4,200.
Search and rescue efforts are underway, Allison said.
Storm chasers and witnesses posted images of twisters in several states on social media.
Mike Smith from TeamBCX shared a picture of white funnel cloud spinning against a dark sky near a field in Baxter Springs.
Another posted video clearly shows a funnel cloud in the Baxter Springs-Quapaw area.
 Barack Obama in Seoul as North Korea nuclear test fears grow
US President Barack Obama arrived in Seoul on Friday amid mounting fears that North Korea is planning to carry out further nuclear tests.
Mr Obama, who flew in from Japan, was due to hold talks with South Korea’s President Park Geun-hye – but security concerns were overshadowed by the aftermath of the country’s ferry disaster.
The US president expressed his condolences over the tragedy, which left over 300 people either dead or missing presumed dead.
“As allies, but also friends, we join you in mourning the missing, and especially the young people,” Mr Obama said.
Accepting an American flag, which flew over the White House on 16 April when the disaster occurred, Ms Park drew a parallel between the way Americans pulled together after 9/11 and the resilience of South Koreans in the aftermath of their own tragedy.
“The Korean people draw great strength from your kindness,” she said.
The vast majority of the ferry victims attended a high school near Seoul. Most of the ferry’s 29-person crew survived, but 11, including the captain, have been arrested on suspicion negligence or abandoning people in need as the ferry sank. Ms Park recently blasted their actions as “tantamount to murder.”
But concerns about nuclear testing in the North were still high on the agenda with Mr Obama due to receive a military briefing at Yongdsan Garrison, where US operations in South Korea are headquartered.
Pyongyang threatened last month to conduct a fourth nuclear test, possibly while the US leader is in the region. The White House said it was keeping close tabs on activity at the North's nuclear test site, where commercial satellite imagery this week showed increased activity.
White House officials said the president did not plan to alter his itinerary because of the ferry disaster, but would probably soften warnings he had been expected to deliver about North Korea and tensions in the region with words of condolence.
In an interview with the South Korean newspaper JoongAng Ilbo, Mr Obama acknowledged that his arrival comes at a difficult time for the country.
He went on to say that another nuclear test would gain North Korea “absolutely nothing” but deeper isolation from the world. He said such a test would meet a “firm response” from the international community, without specifying the response.
Mr Obama was also due to renew his plea for countries in the region to de-escalate multiple territorial disputes with China, officials said. Seoul's key concern is about an area in the East China Sea that is effectively controlled by South Korea but falls within a controversial air defence zone that China created last year.
The US President’s overnight stay is his second stop on a four-country Asia tour that also includes visits to Malaysia and the Philippines. Mr Obama flew to Seoul from Japan, a major US ally whose relationship with South Korea has deteriorated over historical resentments stemming from World War Two.
Last month, Mr Obama brought Ms Park and her Japanese counterpart together for a trilateral meeting - he was expected to follow up on those discussions while in South Korea.
 Palestinians criticise Israel’s decision to suspend peace talks
Palestinian leaders responded on Thursday to Israel’s decision to break off US-brokered peace talks, criticising the move.
Israel decided to pull out came after the two rival Palestinian groups Hamas and Fatah signed an accord on Wednesday agreeing to work together to create a coalition government. After seven years of division, the two factions say they now intend to hold elections later in the year and form a unity government for Gaza and the West Bank.
Gaza’s Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, said Israel’s response was disappointing but no surprise:
“The Israeli position was expected. This is occupation, and absolutely they do not want the Palestinian people to be united and want the division to continue,” Haniyeh said.
Palestinian legislator, Mustafa Barghouti, who had helped broker a deal between the two Palestinian factions accused Israel of being inconsistent.
“The Israeli statement against this unity agreement is very strange, when we are divided Mr. Netanyahu claims that he can not find a Palestinian that can represent all Palestinians and thus he cannot make peace and when we are united he claims that he cannot make peace with a unified Palestinian front, “ said Barghouti.
US Secretary of State John Kerry, who has been leading the Palestinian-Israeli peace negotiations, said both sides needed to make compromises.
“Well, there is always a way forward but the leaders have to make a compromise necessary to do that, We may see a way forward but if they are not willing to make the compromises necessary to make peace it will be elusive”.
A deadline for an Israeli-Palestinian agreement had been set for April 29 after nine months of negotiations,
 IGAD strongly condemns killing of civilians in South Sudane
Nairobi, Kenya: The IGAD Executive Secretary, Ambassador (Eng.) Mahboub Maalim expresses deep concern over the spiraling violence across South Sudan and the worsening humanitarian situation in the country. He also strongly condemns the deliberate targeting of civilians in the conflict as evidenced during the recent fighting in Bentiu (Unity State), as well as the April 17 attack of the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) compound in Bor. These incidents constitute a grave violation of the commitment by the Government of the Republic of South Sudan (GRSS) and the SPLM/A (in Opposition) to the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement that was signed on January 23 2014 under the auspices of the IGAD-led Mediation Process, and can only serve to undermine the ongoing peace process. These recent killings of 200 civilians in a mosque in Bentiu are of massacre proportions, with over 400 injuries. The April 17 attack on unarmed civilians in the UNMISS compound in Bor has also resulted in over 40 deaths and injury to more than 70.marked the Executive Secretary. Ambassador (Eng.) Mahboub Maalim urged the Parties to demonstrate their commitment to the IGAD-led Mediation Process as the only viable means of resolving the conflict. He further called on the Parties to cooperate with the ongoing investigation into these incidents by the IGAD Monitoring and Verification Mechanism (MVM). See also: Bomb kills police general in Cairo The effects of the five-month long violent conflict in South Sudan have already proved catastrophic with thousands of lives lost and more than a million people displaced. The conflict has also seriously disrupted economic activities and food production with imminent risk of serious famine. In this respect, the Executive Secretary calls on the international community to act now to put pressure on both parties to stop the war and prevent a deeper catastrophe from unfolding in South Sudan.
 US to reassess aid to Palestinians if unity government deal reached
Senior official reaffirms that any new government formed as result of reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas will need to adhere to US terms, including recognizing Israel.
The United States would have to reconsider its assistance to the Palestinians if Islamist group Hamas and the Palestinian Liberation Organization form a government together, a senior US administration official said on Thursday.
"Any Palestinian government must unambiguously and explicitly commit to nonviolence, recognition of the state of Israel, and acceptance of previous agreements and obligations between the parties," the official said, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity.
"If a new Palestinian government is formed, we will assess it based on its adherence to the stipulations above, its policies and actions, and will determine any implications for our assistance based on US law," the official said.
The United States said on Wednesday it was disappointed by a unity pact agreed between the Hamas and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas's Palestine Liberation Organization and said it could seriously complicate peace efforts.
"The timing was troubling and we were certainly disappointed in the announcement," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told a regular news briefing.
"This could seriously complicate our efforts. Not just our efforts but the efforts of the parties to extend their negotiations."
Abbas said on Wednesday that the unity pact did not contradict peace talks he is pursuing with Israel.
 Japanese lawmakers visit Yasukuni Shrine
Almost 150 Japanese lawmakers have visited the Yasukuni Shrine, in a move likely to further sour ties with regional neighbours.The controversial shrine commemorates Japan's war dead, including convicted war criminals from World War Two.
The visit, marking a spring festival, comes a day before US President Barack Obama arrives in Tokyo.
It also comes amid strained relations between Japan and its neighbours over geopolitical and historical tensions.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was not among those who visited the shrine, but he sent a traditional offering on Monday.
'Negative asset'
The Chinese foreign ministry denounced Mr Abe's offering as a "negative asset for Japan", saying that both it and visits by Japanese cabinet ministers reflected "the erroneous attitude towards history adopted by Japan's incumbent cabinet".
South Korea's foreign ministry said that Mr Abe had "romanticised Japanese colonialism and its war of aggression" by paying tribute to the shrine.
Japanese officials visit the shrine during seasonal festivals and on the anniversary of Japan's surrender in World War II.
Japanese lawmaker Hidehisa Otsuji told the Associated Press news agency that he visited the shrine "with a calm mind" and that there was "no further meaning" to the visit. "I have been visiting here for decades," he said.
Internal Affairs and Communications Minister Yoshitaka Shindo, meanwhile, said: "As this visit was my own personal visit, I don't believe that it will have any effect on the US president's visit."
Anything related to the Yasukuni Shrine will always be highly political, however, reports the BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hayes in Tokyo.
China and South Korea view the shrine as a symbol of Japan's wartime aggression and have accused Tokyo of failing to show the necessary remorse for wartime atrocities.
When Mr Abe visited the shrine on 26 December 2013, the US embassy in Tokyo expressed disappointment and said Mr Abe's actions would "exacerbate tensions" with neighbours.
Washington has also been trying to get Japan and South Korea to set aside their differences and work more closely together, both on North Korea and in terms of counter-balancing China's growing power in the region.
Cargo ship dispute
Ties between China and Japan meanwhile, remain severely strained, over historical tensions and a territorial dispute in the East China Sea.
In a move that heightened concern, the Shanghai Maritime Court said on Saturday that it had seized a Japanese cargo ship because of an unpaid pre-war debt.
Tokyo lodged a formal protest on Tuesday, saying it remained "deeply worried" about the ongoing situation.
"We have told the Chinese side through diplomatic channels that we regret its seizure of the vessel," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters. "We demand China take appropriate measures."
 'More activity' at North Korea nuclear test site
Activity has increased at North Korea's nuclear test site, South Korea says, ahead of a visit by US President Barack Obama to the region.
The military was "currently detecting a lot of activity in and around the Punggye-ri nuclear test site", a South Korean defence ministry spokesman said.
North Korea could be planning to hold a "surprise nuclear test or just pretend to stage a nuclear test", he said.
North Korea has carried out three nuclear tests in the past.
Its most recent test was in February 2013 - an incident that triggered several months of severe tension on the Korean peninsula.
It also carried out tests in 2006 and 2009.
All of the tests - which were signposted well in advance - resulted in the imposition of UN sanctions on Pyongyang.
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff on Monday set up a special task force to monitor the situation, the spokesman said.
Multinational talks aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear ambitions have been stalled for years.
Late last month, North Korea threatened to carry out a "new form" of nuclear test. It is not clear what that means.
While Pyongyang has tested devices, it is not yet believed to have mastered the process of making a nuclear warhead small enough to deliver via a missile.
Mr Obama is due to arrive in South Korea on Friday, after a three-day visit to Japan.
 Hamid Mir shooting: Pakistan's Geo TV calls for inquiry
Pakistan's largest private news channel, Geo TV, has called for a robust investigation into the assassination attempt on one of its leading talk show hosts, Hamid Mir.
Mr Mir was shot and wounded on Saturday in a gun attack his family alleges was orchestrated by Pakistan's main intelligence agency, the ISI. The Pakistani army has denied the charges as misleading.
In a BBC interview, the President of Geo TV, Imran Aslam, said the alleged role of the ISI in targeting journalists needs to be probed and debated openly.
He was speaking to the BBC's Shahzeb Jillani in Karachi.
 Security experts are troubled by stowaway aboard Hawaii flight
The dark of night still draped Mineta San Jose International Airport when a 15-year-old boy from nearby Santa Clara wandered onto a secure airport ramp and toward a Hawaiian Airlines Boeing 767.
Then he disappeared.
The slight teenager, first seen on a security camera video, would not appear again until later Sunday morning, when airline workers spotted him 2,350 miles to the west, walking on the tarmac at Kahului Airport on the island of Maui.
In the interim, authorities say, the boy survived a perilous, 5 1/2 -hour odyssey — enduring frigid temperatures, oxygen deprivation and a compartment unfit for human habitation — as he traveled over the Pacific Ocean in the jet's wheel well.
The incident prompted authorities to question both how the teen so easily gained access to the jumbo jet and how he survived with so little apparent trauma.
Aviation security experts said it was troubling that the teenage had been able to bypass security and get to the plane undetected. U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin), a member of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he wanted more answers, adding that the incident "demonstrates vulnerabilities that need to be addressed."
The Transportation Security Administration planned to meet with law enforcement and airport officials to review security after the incident, which experts noted could have been catastrophic had the stowaway been armed with explosives.
Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, an estimated $57 billion has been spent on airport security improvements, including new passenger screening measures and additional security both in airports and on airplanes.
Brian Jenkins, an aviation security expert at Rand Corp., said he expected the incident to prompt airport security reviews beyond San Jose. "Everyone will tighten up. I suspect everyone will be going up a notch just as a consequence of this," he said.
The airport, which serves Silicon Valley, is located on the north side of San Jose, near the junction of the 101 and 880 freeways. A chain-link fence covered with wood slats and topped with three strands of razor wire surround parts of the airport. San Jose is the 44th largest airport in the nation, according to an Federal Aviation Administration report, with about 8 million passengers a year.
It remains unclear how the teen got onto the tarmac. The FBI originally said video showed him scaling a fence. But late Monday, airport officials only mentioned a video that showed him walking on the ramp.
Authorities said the teenager apparently had no malicious intent. The flight, carrying 212 passengers and 10 crew members, took off at 7:55 a.m. Sunday.
Shortly after the plane landed at 10:31 a.m., airline workers spotted the stowaway and reported him to airport security. A Maui News photo showed him some time later sitting upright on a gurney, attended by paramedics, apparently alert and showing no obvious signs of his ordeal. He wore a sweat shirt with an orange hood.
Authorities said the temperature at the jet's cruising altitude of 38,000 feet could have dropped to 50 degrees below zero or less. Oxygen would have also been in painfully short supply at that altitude, about 9,000 feet higher than the summit of Mt. Everest.
FBI spokesman Tom Simon said the boy apparently had been unconscious for the "lion's share of the flight."
Such ordeals do not usually end well. Those who do not fall to their death can be crushed by landing gear or succumb to cold and lack of oxygen. FAA records show that of the 105 people who stowed away on flights around the world over the last 67 years, 25 lived through the ordeal, a survival rate of 23.8%.
"He must have had the four-leaf clover in his hand or something," said Jeff Price, an aviation security expert at Metropolitan State University in Denver.
Armand Dorian, a Los Angeles doctor who treated a high-altitude stowaway survivor in 2000, said the teen's survival over the weekend was not as surprising as the fact that he appeared unruffled.
For the minority of stowaways who survive, "the planets align," said Dorian, an associate clinical professor of emergency medicine at USC Verdugo Hills Hospital. For the lucky few, "the need for oxygen declines as the body cools. It's exactly like the concept of cryogenic freezing.... The boy's body went into a frozen state."
When Dorian treated another wheel-well stowaway in 2000, the patient suffered much more obvious trauma. That victim, in his 20s, crumpled on to the tarmac at Los Angeles International Airport after a 7 1/2 hour flight from Tahiti. His body core temperature had dropped to 79 degrees, which would normally be fatal, according to accounts at the time.
 Malaysia MH370: No trace yet after two-thirds of sub's scan
A submarine scanning the ocean floor for signs of a missing Malaysian airliner is two-thirds of the way through its search but has yet to find the plane, officials say.
The Bluefin-21 submarine was to embark on its ninth search mission on Monday.
Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing in March as it flew from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing carrying 239 people.
On Monday another Malaysia Airlines flight was forced to land after one of its tyres burst on take-off.
Sonar map
Up to 10 military aircraft and 11 ships were to take part in Monday's search for MH370, Australia's Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) said in a statement.
JACC said that the Bluefin submarine was searching a circular area with a 10km (six miles) radius where underwater signals were detected earlier this month.
The Bluefin-21, operated by the US Navy off the Australian vessel Ocean Shield, is an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) that can identify objects by creating a sonar map of the sea floor.
So far the submarine had scanned two-thirds of the area with "no contacts of interest", JACC said.
It is operating at a depth of more than 4,000m (13,000 feet).
Planes and ships will continue to scan the ocean for visible debris in an area spanning almost 50,000 sq km (20,000 sq miles), JACC said.
Authorities warned that weather conditions in the search area were deteriorating as tropical cyclone Jack approached.
Tyre burst
In a separate incident, it has emerged that a Malaysia Airlines flight from Kuala Lumpur to Bangalore, India, was forced to turn back after one of its tyres burst.
The plane circled Kuala Lumpur for four hours to burn off fuel before landing.
The plane was carrying 159 passengers and seven crew members. There were no reported injuries.
The airline initially said the landing gear of the Boeing 737-800 had "malfunctioned upon take-off", but later said that a burst tyre was at fault.
It follows another incident in March when a Malaysia Airlines flight to Seoul was diverted to Hong Kong because of an electrical fault.
The incidents will increase scrutiny of Malaysia Airlines, which is facing heavy criticism by families of those on board flight MH370 for its handling of the disappearance.
Authorities still do not know why the plane flew so far off course and finding the plane's flight recorders is seen as key to understanding what happened.
Using satellite data, officials have concluded that MH370 ended its journey in seas west of the Australian city of Perth.
 Ukraine conflict: Fatal Sloviansk attack to be investigated
Ukraine says it will launch an investigation into a fatal shooting in the east of the country which has raised tension with Russia further.
At least three people died in the raid on a checkpoint manned by pro-Russian separatists near the town of Sloviansk.
The incident came as pro-Russian groups continued to occupy government buildings, defying a deal to leave.
 50% of votes counted in Afganistan poll, Abdullah extends lead
KABUL: New partial results in Afghanistan's presidential election released on Sunday show candidate Abdullah Abdullah is still the frontrunner, though a runoff election looks likely.
The winner will replace Hamid Karzai, the only president the country has known since the 2001 US-led invasion ousted the Taliban, and will oversee a tumultuous period during which the US and Nato forces are expected to withdraw most of their troops from the country. Both Abdullah, and his closest competitor, Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, have promised a fresh start with the West and have vowed to sign a security pact with the US that Karzai had refused to sign.
The chairman of Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission, Ahmad Yousuf Nouristani, announced the results on Sunday. They represent about half of the estimated 7 million ballots cast in the April 5 poll, though varying levels of votes have been counted in the country's 34 provinces.
Abdullah, Karzai's top rival in the country's last election, has 44% of the votes tallied. Ghani, a former finance minister and World Bank official, has received 33.2% of the total votes. Abdullah said he still thinks it's possible for him to avoid a run-off altogether but said he was ready for a second round. "For us, we will accept the outcome of a fair and transparent process. Anything short of that will be problematic," he said.
 US Vice-President Joe Biden heads to Ukraine after violence erupts
WASHINGTON: US Vice-President Joe Biden is heading to Ukraine to meet with leaders of the turbulent country.
Biden's visit comes a day after violence erupted in eastern Ukraine, despite an agreement last week aimed at easing tensions. A shootout at a checkpoint manned by pro-Russia insurgents left at least three dead and Ukrainian and Russian officials trading accusations of blame.
Biden expects to arrive on Monday in Kiev. On Tuesday he plans to meet with the acting Ukrainian prime minister and president. He also is scheduled to meet with legislators and democracy activists before returning to Washington on Tuesday night.
Biden's office says discussions will cover international efforts to strengthen Ukraine's economy and energy security and help with constitutional reforms, including next month's presidential election.
 Obama signs law to block Iranian envoy to U.N.
President Barack Obama signed a law Friday that allows Washington to deny visas to anyone — including United Nations envoys — who has engaged in terrorist acts against the United States.
Under the law, which passed Congress on April 10, the US already notified the UN that it would not issue a visa to Iran’s designated ambassador to the New York-based world body.
Hamid Abutalebi was a member of an Iranian student group that seized the US embassy in 1979 in Tehran and held 52 US citizens hostage for 444 days. He is effectively prevented from becoming Iran’s ambassador to the UN.
Tehran has already said it will not name a substitute.
As UN host country, the US is normally obligated to issue visas to foreign diplomats and heads of state attending the annual General Assembly, no matter how antagonistic their government’s relations with Washington.
There was no immediate reaction Friday from the United Nations.
The new US law adds language to the Foreign Relations Authorization Act giving the president specific authority to reject UN-connected visas.
In signing the measure, Obama said Friday that he would treat it “as advisory in circumstances in which it would interfere” with his exercise of presidential discretion in diplomacy and foreign affairs, in which the US Constitution gives the executive branch wide powers, according to a White House statement.
 South Korean ferry captain says evacuation delayed for safety
JINDO: The arrested captain of the South Korean ferry that capsized with 476 people on board said on Saturday he had delayed evacuating the ship because of the sea conditions and the absence of rescue ships.
Lee Joon-Seok and two of his crew were taken into police custody in the early hours of the morning, charged with negligence and failing to secure the safety of passengers in violation of maritime law.
During his police arraignment, during which he stood, head bowed, in a hooded raincoat, Lee was asked by TV reporters why passengers had been ordered to remain in their seats and cabins for more than 40 minutes after the ferry first sent a distress signal just before 9:00am on Wednesday.
"At the time a rescue ship had not arrived. There were also no fishing boats around there for rescues or other ships to help," Lee said.
"The currents were very strong and water was cold at that time in the area.
"I thought that passengers would be swept far away and fall into trouble if they evacuated thoughtlessly without wearing lifejackets.
"It would have been the same even if they did wear lifejackets," he said.
Furious relatives of the hundreds of passengers still missing — most of them schoolchildren — believe many more would have escaped if they had moved to reach evacuation points before the ship listed sharply and water started flooding in.
Twenty-nine people have been confirmed dead in the disaster, but 273 are still missing.
Lee, 69, confirmed statements on Friday by investigative prosecutors that he was not at the helm of the ferry when it first ran into trouble.
"It happened as I was coming back after a quick visit to the bedroom for personal reasons," he said, denying any suggesting that he had been intoxicated.
"I did not drink," he said. His comments offered no fresh insight into the chain of events that caused the 6,825-tonne Sewol to sink.
Tracking data from the Maritime Ministry showed the vessel made a sharp turn just before sending its first distress signal.
Some experts believe a tight turn could have dislodged the heavy cargo manifest — including more than 150 vehicles — and destabilised the vessel, causing it to list heavily and then capsize.
But others suggested the turn might have been caused by a collision with a rock or other submerged object.
Investigators said the third officer was steering when the accident happened.
Lee acknowledged the charges brought against him and apologised to the victims of the disaster and their relatives.
"I sincerely apologise to people and the bereaved families for stirring up trouble," he said.
 Drone diving to record level in MH370 search
A US Navy deep-sea drone is diving to unprecedented depths to scour a remote stretch of the Indian Ocean floor for a missing Malaysian jetliner as the Malaysian government said it may use more remote control submarines to help with the search.
The Bluefin-21 and its "side scan" sonar has become the focal point of the search 2,000 km (1,200 miles) west of the Australian city of Perth, where authorities believe Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 hit the ocean after disappearing from radars on March 8 with 239 people on board.
Now in its seventh week, the search has centred on a city-sized area where a series of "pings" led authorities to believe the plane's black box may be located. But after almost two weeks without a signal, and long past the black box battery's 30-day life expectancy, authorities have turned to the Bluefin-21.
After the $4 million Bluefin-21's searches were frustrated by an automatic safety mechanism which returns it to the surface when it exceeds a depth of 4.5 km (14,763 feet), authorities have adjusted the mechanism and have sent it as deep as 4,695 metres (15,403 feet), a record.
But hopes that the Bluefin might soon guide searchers to wreckage are dwindling with no sign of the plane after six deployments spanning 133 square kilometres (83 square miles). Footage from the Bluefin's sixth mission was still being analysed, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre said on Saturday.
Malaysian acting Transport Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein said in a Twitter post that the government's Deployment of Assets Committee was considering using more autonomous underwater vehicles. He did not elaborate.
On Monday, the search coordinator, retired Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, said the air and surface search for debris would likely end by midweek as the operation shifted its focus to the ocean floor.
But the air and surface searches have continued daily, and on Saturday the Joint Agency Coordination Centre said up to 11 military aircraft and 12 ships would help with the day's search covering about 50,200 square kilometres (31,000 square miles) across three areas.
 Mexico earthquake causes panic but little damage in the capital
MEXICO CITY — A powerful earthquake shook a wide area of Mexico on Friday, terrifying residents and sending many fleeing into the streets.
There were no initial reports of serious injuries or major damage in the capital.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake, which occurred about 9:30 a.m., had a preliminary magnitude of 7.2, which would make it one of the stronger temblors registered in Mexico City in several years. It was 14 miles deep and was felt in nine of Mexico's 31 states, in addition to the capital, according to the agency, with the epicenter in the coastal state of Guerrero about 200 miles southwest of the capital.
In Mexico City, buildings, statues and lampposts swayed and windows shattered during the quake, which lasted nearly a full minute. Civil protection authorities said at least 48 buildings had new cracks and that 15 retaining walls had collapsed.
Some residents fled their houses barefoot and carrying pillows. The quake temporarily knocked out electricity, traffic lights and cellphone service in some parts of the capital.
Mexico City Mayor Miguel Angel Mancera, who was at a Good Friday news conference when the quake hit, later flew over the city in a helicopter to inspect the damage. He urged residents to remain calm and brace for aftershocks.
"The important part is that we have no reports of injured people," he told reporters. "We did see that many buildings were evacuated of their people, and we are continuing to survey the capital."
Ricardo de la Cruz, civil protection chief for the Interior Ministry, said, "We have only gotten reports of minor damage."
Good Friday is an important holiday in largely Roman Catholic Mexico, and most businesses were closed and people were home or attending religious services. The elaborate, annual reenactment of the Passion of Christ in the capital's congested Iztapalapa neighborhood went ahead on schedule, and life seemed to be quickly returning to normal.
However, Guerrero, where the Mexican seismological service placed the epicenter south of Petatlan between Acapulco and Zihuatanejo, is a heavily seismic region and is often slow to report damage because of the remoteness of some communities. A 7.4 temblor there in 2012 killed two people and damaged thousands of buildings.
Guerrero Gov. Angel Aguirre tweeted that so far he had received reports only of "minor and isolated" damage.
A bridge on the highway between Acapulco and Zihuatanejo, crowded with holiday tourists, cracked and traffic was halted.
Luis Felipe Puente, another civil protection official, said a tsunami warning for the Pacific Coast was not necessary because waves had risen by only about 15 inches. Still, Guerrero urged tourists to take precautions on the beaches, which are traditionally packed this time of year.
In Mexico City, Puente said, authorities had checked the subway, hospitals and the international airport, and all were operating normally.
Much of Mexico City was destroyed and more than 10,000 people were killed in a magnitude 8.1 earthquake in 1985, but officials say they have put more safeguards into place since then.
 Everest disaster: avalanche kills six, nine are missing
SIX Nepalese guides have been killed and nine more are missing after an avalanche swept a route used to ascend Everest, says a tourism official.
Nepal Tourism Ministry official Krishna Lamsal says the avalanche hit just below camp 2 on the world’s highest peak around 6.30am local time today.
He says four bodies have been recovered and rescuers are digging two more out of the snow.
Nine other Sherpa guides are still unaccounted for and are believed to be buried in the snow.
All those killed and missing had gone early in the morning to the area to fix the ropes for climbers along the route to the 8,850-metre summit.
Earlier, Ang Tshering of the Nepal Mountaineering Association, said the area where the avalanche occurred is nicknamed the “popcorn field’’, which is just below camp 2 at 6400 metres.
Hundreds of climbers, their guides and support guides have gathered at Everest’s base camp, gearing up for their final attempt to scale the 8,850-metre peak early next month when weather conditions are favourable.
Guides and climbers have been setting up their camps at higher altitudes as well as fixing routes and ropes on the slopes ahead of the final ascent to the summit in May.
Nepal this year announced several steps to better manage the flow of climbers, minimise congestion and speed up rescue operations. The preparations included the dispatch of officials and security personnel to the base camp located at 5300 metres, where they would stay throughout the spring climbing season that ends in May.
 Gunmen kill 20 in attack on South Sudan UN base
JUBA: At least 20 people were killed and another 70 injured by gunmen posing as peaceful protestors who stormed a UN base in South Sudan, the US ambassador to the world body said.
Samantha Power strongly condemned Thursday's "brazen, inhuman attack on unarmed civilians" where 5,000 people are sheltering inside the base of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), in the war-ravaged town of Bor.
The attackers used rocket-propelled grenades to breach the compound then fired on those sheltering inside, in one of the most bitterly contested regions in the four-month-long conflict splitting the country.
Initial reports suggested that people inside the compound had been injured but Power said there had been many deaths.
She called the latest attack "particularly egregious," noting that the heavily armed group of attackers used rocket-propelled grenades to breach the compound and fire on the internally displaced persons there.
"This latest outrage against the people of South Sudan is an affront to the international community and violates fundamental principles of civilian protection," Power said, adding that UNMISS sites should be considered "inviolable".
The United States, she said, will collaborate with its allies to determine who was responsible for the "horrific attack" and bring its perpetrators to justice.
Power also urged countries that have committed additional forces to UNMISS to speed up their deployment.
"The people of South Sudan deserve the opportunity to begin rebuilding their country, and to develop the national and local institutions they need to put South Sudan back on a path toward stability and democracy," she added.
Earlier, the attack was condemned by UN chief Ban Ki-moon. His spokesman Stephane Dujarric said it was a "serious escalation" in the crisis, ripping apart the world's youngest country.
"The Secretary-General reminds all parties that any attack on United Nations Peacekeepers is unacceptable and constitutes a war crime," he added.
UNMISS said in a statement that "the armed mob forced entry into the site and opened fire on the internally displaced persons sheltering inside the base".
Its forces returned fire -- first firing warning shots and then taking part in a ferocious gun battle -- before the fighters retreated, it added.
The civilians had fled into the base weeks ago amid brutal ethnic massacres in the world's newest nation.
Information Minister Michael Makuei said that a "huge number" of gunmen had come seeking revenge for the rebel capture of the oil town of Bentiu two days ago hoping to kill the trapped civilians, many of them children.
The conflict in South Sudan has left thousands dead and forced around a million people to flee their homes since fighting broke out on December 15 in the capital Juba before spreading to other states in the oil-rich nation.
Bor, the capital of Jonglei state, has swapped hands several times during the conflict.
The latest clashes in Bor echo an attack by gunmen in December on a UN base in Akobo, also in Jonglei, killing at least 11 civilians and two Indian UN peacekeepers.
More than 67,000 civilians across the country are sheltering inside UN bases for protection from ethnic attacks, with heavy fighting ongoing as the rebels say they are targeting key oil fields.
Information Minister Makuei insisted all oil fields were under government control, but that production had stalled in Unity -- a key oil zone -- as facilities were damaged in fighting.
UN peacekeepers reported dozens of corpses littering the streets of Bentiu, the state capital of Unity, which rebels had previously seized in December at the beginning of the conflict.
The fighting is between soldiers loyal to President Salva Kiir and mutinous troops who have sided with his former vice president Machar, whom Kiir sacked in 2013.
The conflict has taken on an ethnic dimension, pitting Kiir's Dinka tribe against militia forces from Machar's Nuer.
Ban has warned that more than one million people are at risk of famine in the troubled country.
More than 3.7 million people are in dire need of food aid, many of them being forced to eat "famine foods" such as grasses and leaves, UN children's agency UNICEF said Thursday.
"Worse is yet to come," said UNICEF chief in South Sudan Jonathan Veitch in a statement.
 Hotelier Chatwal pleads guilty to election finance violations
Even when your best friends are Bill and Hillary Clinton, you cannot escape the net of a high-profile FBI investigation.
This would appear to be the key lesson learnt by Sant Singh Chatwal, the wealthy hotel magnate who on Thursday pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate the Federal Election Campaign Act by making more than $180,000 in federal campaign donations to three candidates through “straw donors” who were reimbursed, and to witness tampering.
In doing so Mr. Chatwal, who has often been described as a “bundler,” or large-scale campaign finance contributor to Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign among others, flouted spending limits aimed at limiting financial influence in federal elections and to ensure transparency as to the identity of donors.
As part of the plea bargain Mr. Chatwal has struck with federal authorities here he has also agreed to “forfeit” $1 million.
Mr. Chatwal, who made his name in the restaurant industry for founding the Bombay Palace restaurant chain and then achieved notoriety in the 1990s for being pursued by U.S. and Indian authorities for unpaid taxes linked to high-end real estate, apparently “used his employees, business associates, and contractors who performed work on his hotels to solicit campaign contributions on Mr. Chatwal’s behalf in support of various candidates for federal office and PACs, collect these contributions, and pay reimbursements for these contributions.”
A second component of the scheme that Mr. Chatwal allegedly ran saw him and his agents at Chatwal Associates induce straw donors, or false donors masking real donations from Mr. Chatwal, to make approximately $188,000 in campaign contributions to three candidates for “federal office,” while he often arranged for them to be reimbursed with his own funds or those of one of Mr. Chatwal’s companies.
While Mr. Chatwal ran this “scheme… to subvert the very purpose of the Election Act,” between 2007 and 2011, U.S. federal authorities began to close the noose around his operations by 2010, when an “informant” supplied law enforcement with a recorded conversation that he had with Mr. Chatwal.
In that discussion, the U.S. Department of Justice explained, Mr. Chatwal underscored his view as to the importance of political campaign contributions, stating that without campaign contributions, “nobody will even talk to you…That’s the only way to buy them, get into the system… What, what else is there? That’s the only thing.”
Similarly there appears to be recorded conversations indicating that Mr. Chatwal “sought to obstruct the grand jury investigation into his Election Act scheme by tampering with a witness, a person whose business performed construction work for Chatwal and Chatwal’s companies and who had recruited straw donors at Chatwal’s direction.”
In a June 2012 recorded conversation, Mr. Chatwal reportedly told this individual that if FBI and IRS agents approached him or his family, they should not speak with the agents and should instead refer them to a lawyer that Mr. Chatwal would provide.
In a July 2012 recorded conversation, Mr. Chatwal was then said to have directed the same individual to “lie to agents about the Election Act scheme,” adding that he would pay for the individual’s legal fees in connection with the investigation and offered to conceal the money within a payment for work the individual’s company had performed for Mr. Chatwal.
 South Korea ferry disaster: parents' anguish as rescue operation halted
Parents of missing children on board a capsized South Korean ferry cling to hope their children remain alive after bad weather prevents divers from entering the ship.
The parents stood vigil on the jetty, wrapped in disposable plastic cagoules, clinging to hope as the wind and rain swirled around them.
Twelve miles away, their 250 teenage children were underwater, trapped inside the Sewol, the 7,000-ton South Korean ferry which was carrying them to a four-day field trip on the holiday island of Jeju when it sank on Wednesday morning.
The 69-year-old Captain Lee Joon-seok was facing uncomfortable questions at the investigation headquarters in Mokpo on Thursday night about why he had been among the first to evacuate from the sinking ship, leaving his post while high-school students were drowning beneath him.
The situation for the parents appeared hopeless. On the second day of the rescue mission, visibility underwater was less than a foot and vicious currents stopped navy divers from even entering the submerged hull of the ship, the coastguard said. All efforts were abandoned in the early afternoon.
"There are 160 divers from the special forces but the current is so strong that they are being swept away when they enter the water," said Kim Dohyun, a 52-year-old veteran of the Korean Special Forces who was acting as a liaison with the parents.
"Right now, the teams are tapping on the outside of the ship with hammers to listen for any survivors inside. When they can go in, only two divers at a time can fit because the corridors are so narrow," he added.
For officials, the goal now is to raise the ferry and three huge cranes are expected to reach the site, off the southernmost tip of the Korean peninsula, on Friday.
But many anguished parents continued to cling to the hope that their children remain alive and lashed out at what they said was official inertia and a government cover-up.
"We have received at least 20 text messages from children on the boat who are still alive," said one 42-year-old mother on the jetty, who gave her name as Mrs Jung.
 South Korea ferry rescue under way
Two people have died and more than 100 remain unaccounted for after a ferry carrying 476 people capsized and sank off South Korea.
So far, 368 people have been rescued, local reports say.
A major rescue operation is under way, involving 34 naval, coastguard and civilian ships, and 18 helicopters.
The ferry, carrying mainly school students, was travelling from the port of Incheon, in the north-west, to the southern resort island of Jeju.
Images showed the ferry listing at a severe angle and then later largely submerged, with only a small part of its hull visible.
Cause unclear
Balanced on the sinking hull, rescue teams pulled the teenagers from cabin windows. Some of their classmates jumped into the sea as the ship went down.
South Korean President Park Geun-hye had ordered coast guard commandos to search the ship so that no-one was left behind, Yonhap news agency reported. Navy divers were also reportedly on scene.
One body, of a female crew member, had been recovered from the ship, the coastguard said. Another person is reported to have died after being rescued.
It is not yet clear what caused the incident, but witnesses described hearing an impact, before the ship listed and quickly sank.
One passenger told the YTN news channel: "We heard a big thumping sound and the boat stopped.
"The boat is tilting and we have to hold on to something to stay seated," the passenger said.
Another passenger said the ship was "shaking and tilting", with people tripping and bumping into each other.
News agencies said the ferry had sent out a distress signal about 20km (12 miles) off the island of Byungpoong at about 09:00 local time (00:00 GMT).
Angry parents have gathered at the school in Incheon to demand answers, reports the BBC's Lucy Williamson in Seoul.
Earlier reports put the number of passengers on the ferry at about 350. The vessel is reported to have a capacity of up to 900 people.
 Japan official heads to Seoul for 'comfort women' talks
Tokyo: A senior Japanese official left for Seoul on Wednesday to discuss the extremely thorny issue of wartime sex slavery, in a move Tokyo hopes will lead to a diplomatic thaw.
Junichi Ihara, head of the Japanese foreign ministry's Asia and Oceania affairs bureau, is expected to tell his South Korean counterpart that Tokyo is mulling an offer of an official apology and money for the women, Kyodo News said, citing an unnamed government official.
Relations between Tokyo and Seoul are at their lowest ebb in years, mired in emotive disputes linked to Japan's 1910-45 colonial rule over Korea -- particularly its use of so-called "comfort women" from Korea and other Asian nations as sex slaves in wartime brothels.
But as President Barack Obama heads to both Japan and South Korea next week there is renewed impetus for the two key US allies to heal their fractured relationship, despite domestic pressures on both sides not to bend.
The comfort women issue has deeply divided the neighbours -- frustrating Washington at a time of growing regional instability, with China's military build-up snowballing and North Korea warning that it may carry out another nuclear test.
Japan has long maintained that all issues relating to the colonial period were settled under a 1965 bilateral treaty that normalised diplomatic ties with South Korea, and has rejected calls to compensate individuals, including former comfort women.
But Tokyo is now considering fresh measures including a direct apology by its ambassador to South Korea, Koro Bessho, a letter bearing the name of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and disbursement of Japanese government-funded financial aid, Kyodo said.
Japan would implement the measures after confirming with South Korea that the issue "has been completely settled," so that South Korea will never bring it up again, Kyodo said.
Japan's government made a landmark apology in 1993 to the comfort women, offering money to former sex slaves through the Asian Women's Fund, a private body set up at Tokyo's initiative in 1995 and run until 2007.
Some survivors refused the cash because it did not come directly from the government.
Repeated wavering since the apology among senior right-wing politicians has contributed to a feeling in South Korea that Japan is in denial and is not sufficiently remorseful.
 Man arrested for leaving a ‘hoax device’ at Boston Marathon finish line
Two blasts near the Boston Marathon finish line on Tuesday were an eerie reminder of last year’s terror attacks.
A barefoot man wearing a black hat and a black veil toted a backpack down Boylston Street, chanting “Boston strong, Boston strong,” eyewitnesses told The Boston Herald. He left two packs near the site where three people died last year from two rice cooker bombs.
About 9 p.m. the Massachusetts State Police bomb squad detonated one bag, which turned out to be carrying a rice cooker filled with confetti, sources told CBS News. The second bag, destroyed about 40 minutes later, may have contained photo equipment, sources said.
Boston police said the bags were “disrupted for precautionary reasons.”
The suspect was taken into custody and is charged with possession of a hoax device, The Associated Press reported. Police said the man also faces charges of disturbing the peace and disorderly conduct.
A law enforcement official said the suspect, who has been identified by several news outlets as Kevin Edson, 25, will be arraigned Wednesday morning in Boston Municipal Court.
 Gunmen kidnap Jordan's ambassador to Libya
Libyan authorities scrambled on Tuesday to identify the armed assailants behind the kidnapping of Jordan's ambassador, the latest in a string of attacks against foreign diplomats in the lawless North African nation.
"We're trying to understand what the group's conditions are..," said Libyan Foreign Minister Mohamed Abdelaziz. "We have not yet received a formal demand."
Ambassador Fawaz al-Itan was on his way to work in Tripoli on Tuesday morning, when his car was intercepted by masked gunmen. The assailants shot and wounded the Moroccan driver and abducted the ambassador.
The gunmen reportedly left a message on the ambassador's cell phone, which was left behind in his car, in which they demanded the release of Mohamed Dersi. A Libyan Islamist militant, Dersi was sentenced to life in prison for a 2007 plot to blow up Jordan's main airport.
Dangerous precedent
In an address to the Jordanian parliament, Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour said that Amman would take "all necessary measures" to protect the ambassador's life and secure his release.
A senior Jordanian intelligence official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the Reuters news agency that releasing Dersi from prison could set a dangerous precedent.
"Jordan has currently locked up some of the top global al Qaeda scholars and jihadists like Mohammad al Makdisi and Abu Qatada," the official said. "A deal over Dersi may encourage other jihadists to follow suit, so, very tricky."
Diplomats targeted
Attacks against foreign diplomats have become a regular occurrence in Libya. Five Egyptian diplomats, a Tunisian diplomat and South Korean trade official have been kidnapped since the beginning of the year.
Last October, two protesters were killed after they attacked the Russian embassy. A car bomb attack wounded two guards outside of the French embassy in April of 2013.
In September of 2012, Islamist militants laid siege to a US consular office in the eastern city of Benghazi, killing US Ambassador Christopher Stevens.
On Sunday, Libyan Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thani resigned his post after his family came under attack by Islamist militants. He had assumed the position only a week prior, taking over from Ali Zidan, who had been sacked for failing to bring the country's security situation under control.
Militants also blocked oil ports in eastern Libya for more than eight months. The blockade was lifted a little over a week ago.
Libya, flush with weapons and militias, has been gripped by lawlessness since the 2011 overthrew and execution of former dictator Moammar Gadhafi at the hands of NATO-backed rebels.
 Oscar Pistorius trial: Prosecutor Gerrie Nel queries tears
The prosecutor at the Oscar Pistorius murder trial has suggested the South African athlete is using his emotions "as an escape".
He broke down in tears four times on Monday and has also vomited in court.
"Now you trying to be emotional and it's not working," said prosecutor Gerrie Nel.
Mr Pistorius admits killing girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in February last year, but says he fired his gun after mistaking her for an intruder.
Mr Nel said the Olympic sprinter, 27, had deliberately shot Ms Steenkamp, a model, after the couple had had an argument.
As the prosecutor resumed his cross-examination on Monday, he accused Mr Pistorius of "tailoring his evidence" as he went along to suit the defence case, which had been "concocted".
"Your version of events is untrue," Mr Nel said.
Shortly before the case adjourned for the day, Mr Nel said: "You're getting emotional now because you're getting frustrated because your version [of events] is improbable.
The prosecutor, known as "bull terrier" for his fierce style of questioning, then asked: "You're not using your emotional state as an escape are you?"
The BBC's Pumza Fihlani in the South Africa capital Pretoria says Mr Nel spent much of the day trying to highlight apparent inconsistencies between Mr Pistorius' bail application and his evidence in court.
On one occasion, when Mr Pistorius corrected Mr Nel, the prosecutor said this showed Mr Pistorius was a "stickler for detail" and yet on many aspects of the case, the athlete was being vague.
'Changed aim'
Earlier, Mr Nel again pressed Mr Pistorius on the moment he shot Ms Steenkamp.
The athlete, a double amputee, said he had not intended to kill anyone.
"I fired out of fear," he said.
This prompted Mr Nel to say Mr Pistorius was changing his story from self-defence to saying he shot by accident.
The prosecutor said this was because the truth was: "You fired at Reeva."
"It's not true," Mr Pistorius replied, breaking into tears and prompting the court to briefly adjourn.
After the break, Mr Nel said that, as Mr Pistorius was trained to use firearms, the court could not accept he had fired by "mistake".
He also said that the athlete had changed his aim to hit Ms Steenkamp after she had fallen down when she was hit by the first bullet. This was denied by Mr Pistorius.
 Bluefin-21 returns after six-hour search for MH370
The underwater drone hunting for clues to the fate of flight MH370 returned six hours into a planned 16-hour mission because it was out of its depth, officials said on Tuesday.
The submersible is programmed to resurface rather than go beyond its safe maximum operating limit of 4,500 metres.
“The six hours of data gathered by the Autonomous Underwater Vehicle is currently being extracted and analysed,” searchers said.
The Bluefin-21 vehicle was sent down for the first time on Monday to scour a 40 sqkm patch of the Indian Ocean about 2,170 kilometres north-west of Perth, the search team said.
A week has gone by without any signals being picked up that could be from the flight recorders on the missing Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777.
Search leader Angus Houston said “aircraft wreckage needs to be visually identified before we can say with certainty that this is the final resting place of MH370.” The plane vanished an hour into a night flight March 8 from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.
In a downbeat assessment of search results, Mr. Houston said it would “be appropriate to consult with Australia’s partners to decide the way ahead later this week.” The search for aeroplane wreckage has been assessed as the most costly ever mounted.
Mr. Houston said “it’s very expensive and all the countries contributing to this are running up big costs.” No debris has been recovered and the chances of wreckage still remaining on the surface are slim. It is also likely that any wreckage could be submerged in the silt on the ocean floor.
 Huge bomb explosion at busy Nigerian bus station kills at least 71
Abuja, Nigeria: Police say an explosion that ripped through a busy bus station in Nigeria's capital has killed at least 71 people and wounded 124.
Police spokesman Frank Mba says Monday's blast destroyed 16 luxury coaches and 24 minibuses.
There was only believed to be one blast with secondary explosions as vehicle fuel tanks ignited and burned.
Reporters saw rescue workers and police gathering body parts as ambulances rushed the wounded to the hospitals.
There was no immediate claim for the rush-hour blast, though the Boko Haram terrorist network has been threatening to attack the capital.
The Islamic extremists, based in northeast Nigeria, carried out a 2011 suicide car bombing at the United Nations office building in Abuja that killed at least 21 people and wounded 60.
 Ukraine crisis: Obama urges Putin to rein in separatists
US President Barack Obama has urged his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to use his influence to make separatists in eastern Ukraine stand down.
The phone call between the two leaders came as pro-Russian activists continued to occupy buildings in eastern towns.
For his part, Mr Putin rejected accusations of Russian interference, calling the reports "unreliable".
EU foreign ministers said on Monday they would expand a list of names targeted by sanctions.
Tension has been steadily rising since Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula, formerly part of Ukraine, last month.
The move, condemned as illegal by Kiev and the West, followed the ousting of Ukraine's pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovych in February.
'Grave concern'
The White House said the "frank and direct" conversation between the two presidents was made at Russia's request.
"The president expressed grave concern about Russian government support for the actions of armed, pro-Russian separatists who threaten to undermine and destabilise the government of Ukraine," a statement said.
"The president emphasised that all irregular forces in the country need to lay down their arms, and he urged President Putin to use his influence with these armed, pro-Russian groups to convince them to depart the buildings they have seized."
The statement also threatened Moscow with wider sanctions, saying "the costs Russia already has incurred will increase if those actions persist".
The Kremlin said recent unrest in Ukraine's south-east was "the result of the unwillingness and inability of the leadership in Kiev to take into account the interests of Russia and the Russian-speaking population".
It said Mr Putin had urged Mr Obama to "use the resources at the disposal of the American side" to help prevent any bloodshed.
It dismissed claims that Russia was interfering in Ukraine, saying the accusations were based on "questionable information".
Thousands of Russian troops are reported to be deployed along the border between Ukraine and Russia. Kiev fears any crackdown on pro-Russian groups could trigger an invasion.
Ukraine's interim President Olexander Turchynov said on Monday an "anti-terrorist operation" would be launched against gunmen occupying government buildings, but a deadline passed with no large-scale action from Kiev.
 Kansas Shootings: Three Die in Attacks in Two Locations
A man and his grandson were among three people who were fatally shot Sunday at a Jewish community center and a retirement home in a Kansas City suburb, authorities said.
Police arrested a suspect in the shootings, which occurred at the two locations in Overland Park, Kan., said Jason Rhodes, the Overland Park Fire Department media manager.
The victims shot outside the Jewish Community Center of Greater Kansas City were Dr. William Lewis Corporon, 69 years old, and his 14-year-old grandson Reat Griffin Underwood Losen, according to a statement from their family. The name of a woman or girl who was fatally shot minutes later at the Village Shalom senior-living community a few blocks away hasn't been released.
The shootings were reported at about 1 p.m., when Overland Park police received calls regarding the incidents at the community center and the retirement facility, according to Gary Mason, a spokesman for the Overland Park Police Department.
Witnesses reported a white male with gray hair and a long beard with a long gun was seen leaving the community center in a white sedan.
A Johnson County jail official said the man accused in the shooting is Frazier Glenn Cross, the Associated Press reported. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to discuss the case publicly.
Public records show that the 73-year-old Mr. Cross also goes by the last name Miller, the AP reported. The Southern Poverty Law Center said he has long been an outspoken white supremacist and was once a "grand dragon" of the Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the AP said.
Overland Park Police Chief John Douglass told reporters that a total of five people were fired on during the incident, which began at the community center. The suspect later walked up to a person outside the retirement community and asked if the individual was Jewish. When the person said yes, the suspect shot the individual, law-enforcement officials said.
Shortly afterward, police arrested the suspected shooter outside an elementary school, Mr. Douglass said. "I believe two of our officials found him in the school parking lot," he said.
A shotgun was used in the attack and police are investigating whether a handgun or a rifle also was used, he said. Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation were responding to the incidents, a bureau spokesman said.
Mr. Douglass said the alleged shooter isn't from Overland Park and officials have no indication that he knew the victims. The suspect didn't have a prior record with local law-enforcement authorities, Mr. Douglass said.
"Of course we are investigating it as a hate crime," said Mr. Douglass. "We are investigating it as a criminal act—I don't want to rule anything out."
Dr. Corporon and his wife moved to the Kansas City area in 2003 to be closer to their grandchildren, the family said in a statement. The grandson was an Eagle Scout and a freshman at Blue Valley High School.
"We would like to thank our friends, family and our church, the United Methodist Church of the Resurrection, and school community for the outpouring of love and support during this very difficult time," the family statement said.
A spokeswoman for Overland Park Regional Medical Center, where Reat died, said family members said the grandfather and the boy were at the community center so the teen could try out for KC SuperStar, a singing competition for students, the Associated Press reported.
President Barack Obama said in a statement: "I want to offer my condolences to all the families trying to make sense of this difficult situation and pledge the full support from the federal government as we heal and cope during this trying time."
When notified of the shootings, the police dispatched patrols to other Jewish-affiliated locations and initiated their "active shooter" protocols, Mr. Douglass said.
An official at Village Shalom didn't immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday.
Monday marks the beginning of Passover, the Jewish holiday that begins at sunset and extends until April 22.
 Oil slick detected in flight MH370 search area, mini-sub to be deployed soon: Official
PERTH, Australia: An Australian ship leading the hunt for missing Malaysian jet flight MH370 will deploy a mini-sub "as soon as possible", the head of the search said on Monday.
"Ocean Shield will cease searching with the towed pinger locator later today and deploy the autonomous underwater vehicle Bluefin-21 as soon as possible," said Angus Houston, who fronts the Joint Agency Coordination Centre.
Houston said that in the hunt for the plane's black box transmissions the last signal was logged six days ago.
"We haven't had a single detection in six days so I guess it's time to go underwater," he said at a press conference in Perth.
An oil slick had also been spotted in the search area, Houston said, with around two litres of fuel collected for testing.
"I stress the source of the oil is yet to be determined but the oil slick is approximately 5,500 metres downwind ... from the vicinity of the detections picked up by the towed pinger locator on Ocean Shield," he said.
It would be a number of days before the oil could be conclusively tested ashore, but Houston said he did not think it was from a search vessel.
He emphasised that it was 38 days since the Boeing 777 vanished on March 8 and the black box batteries had a shelf life of only 30 days.
The US-made Bluefin-21, a 4.93-metre (16.2 feet) long sonar device will now scour the seabed.
The sonar device, which weighs 750 kilograms, can operate at a depth of up to 4,500 metres — roughly the depth of the ocean floor where the pings were detected.
 Defying Russia, Ukraine forces clash with militants
SLOVYANSK, Ukraine: The Ukrainian government on Sunday for the first time sent its security services to confront armed pro-Russian militants in the country's east, defying warnings from Russia. Commandos engaged in gunfights with men who had set up roadblocks and stormed a Ukrainian police station in Slovyansk, and at least one officer was killed, Ukrainian officials said.
Several officers were injured in the operation, as were four locals, the officials said. Russian news media and residents here disputed that account, saying the Ukrainian forces had only briefly engaged one checkpoint.
In either case, the central government in Kiev has turned to force to try to restore its authority in the east, a course of action that the Russian government has repeatedly warned against.
With tens of thousands of Russian troops massed along Ukraine's eastern border near Donetsk, Western leaders have worried that Moscow might use unrest in Ukraine's mainly Russian-speaking areas as a pretext for an invasion.
Both governments intensified their statements on Sunday. Ukraine's interim president, Oleksandr V Turchynov, issued another ultimatum, saying separatists should vacate occupied buildings by Monday or face a "large-scale antiterrorist operation" that would include the Ukrainian military. And Russia claimed that the Ukrainian government was cracking down at the behest of American and European officials.
Ukraine's ousted president, Viktor F Yanukovych, speaking late Sunday in Rostov-on-Don, in Russia, echoed Moscow's charges of American meddling.
Insisting that he remained Ukraine's commander in chief despite having fled to Russia more than a month ago, he ordered Ukrainian troops to defy what he called "criminal orders" for a crackdown and said the country stood "on the brink of civil war."
The police station contested by Ukrainian forces was one of several security centers in the eastern region of Donetsk that were seized on Saturday by masked gunmen in coordinated raids that the Ukrainian authorities denounced as Russian "aggression."
By Sunday afternoon, the government's push to reassert its authority in a vitally important industrial and coal-mining region appeared to have made little headway. Pro-Russian protesters appeared to control not only the police station but also the entire town of Slovyansk, having set up checkpoints at major streets leading into town.
The protesters blocked a major highway in the east, and flags of Russia and their newly declared and unrecognized People's Republic of Donetsk flew over administrative buildings in several other midsize towns. These included Mariupol, where protesters seized a building Sunday.
Roman Svitan, a security adviser to the Ukrainian authorities in Donetsk, said the operation on Sunday was carried out by Alfa, a special services unit of Ukraine's state security service. He gave an upbeat assessment of its progress, saying Ukrainian forces had evicted gunmen from the Slovyansk Police Headquarters, though protesters there said nothing of the sort had happened.
Svitan said most of the expelled gunmen were local pro-Russian extremists, but they had also included Russian operatives.
Residents and men standing by barricades in Slovyansk denied that Ukrainian forces had even entered the town on Sunday. They said one local man who had been out fishing was in a hospital with a wound from a shooting on a highway outside town. Russian television and some locals said the Ukrainian nationalist group Right Sector had attacked protesters at a checkpoint, injuring the fisherman.
Requests to speak to a leader of the armed men produced a man wearing a ski mask who introduced himself as Aleksandr and described himself as a deputy commander of the city of Slovyansk after its merger with the People's Republic of Donetsk.
He gave a different account of the circumstances behind the wounding of the fisherman, saying he was struck by Ukrainian armored personnel carriers that opened fire on a barrier made from a pile of tires on the edge of town, then drove away. "Our guys took cover, and the shooting stopped," he said.
Ukrainian helicopters buzzed over the town around noon, but no soldiers were seen. At one barrier, pro-Russian protesters felled trees across a road into town, guarded by men in ski masks carrying military rifles.
Russia's foreign ministry issued a blistering denunciation of the Ukrainian government. In a statement on the ministry's Facebook page, the Russian government accused the Kiev authorities of threatening violence "against anyone who does not agree with the nationalist-radicals, chauvinistic and anti-Semitic actions" in Kiev that, it said, were being carried out "with direct support from the United States and Europe."
At Russia's request, an emergency meeting of the United Nations security council was held Sunday night. UN security council members traded competing narratives of what was happening in eastern Ukraine, as Russia's envoy, Vitaly I Churkin, echoed the views of the Kremlin and his Western rivals deplored what they called Russian propaganda. Churkin called on world leaders to condemn the "henchmen of the Maidan," a reference to Independence Square in Kiev, where the uprising that led to the president's ouster unfolded. The British ambassador, Mark Lyall Grant, pointed the finger at Moscow. "What we are witnessing is a well-orchestrated campaign to destabilize the country," he said.
In Washington, the US state department took the unusual step of issuing a "fact sheet" alleging that Russian officials had made 10 false claims about the crisis in Ukraine.
"Russia continues to spin a false and dangerous narrative to justify its illegal actions in Ukraine," the US state department said. "We would not be seeing the violence and sad events that we've witnessed this weekend without this relentless stream of disinformation and Russian provocateurs fostering unrest in eastern Ukraine."
According to the state department, more than a dozen Russian intelligence agents have been arrested by the Ukrainian government in recent weeks, contradicting Moscow's assertion that its agents are not active in Ukraine.
 Afghanistan election's partial results show split race
Afghan workers count ballots in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Sunday. Former Afghan foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah was in the lead in the partial vote count for the presidential elections.
Two clear front-runners emerged in Afghanistan’s presidential election as partial results released Sunday showed a tight race that increasingly appears destined for a runoff vote.
With 10% of the ballots counted, Abdullah Abdullah, who was outgoing leader Hamid Karzai’s main rival in his fraud-marred reelection in 2009, had 41.9% of the vote.
Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a former finance minister and World Bank official, followed with 37.6%.
Zalmai Rassoul, another former foreign minister widely considered as Karzai’s pick, was a distant third with 9.8%.
 3 LTTE suspects shot dead in northern Sri Lanka
Sri Lankan armed forces on Friday shot dead three men who allegedly tried to revive the rebel Tiger movement in the country’s Northern Province.
According to military spokesman Brigadier Ruwan Wanigasooriya, in the early hours of Friday three armed suspects who attempted to escape the area confronted the troops in the cordon. All three were killed in the clash that followed, he said.Two of the dead were identified as Sundaralingam Kajeepan alias Thevihan and Selvanayagam Kajeepan alias Gobi, who had escaped last month after reportedly opening fire at a police officer.
Police had launched a massive search operation then, even announcing a million (LKR) to anyone giving information leading to his arrest.
The third man is yet to be identified but is believed to be Navaratnam Navaneethan alias Appan, according to army officials. The military’s operation in the jungles of Nedunkerni, in Vavuniya was based on information from the police Terrorist Investigation Department (TID), which was looking for the three men believed to be remnants of the Tamil Tigers.
Revival fears
Sri Lanka’s Defence establishment has — over the last few months — expressed concerns over possible regrouping of the LTTE, five years after its armed forces defeated them. To prevent such an eventuality, Sri Lankan police arrested 60 persons, largely from the island’s Tamil-speaking north, over the last two months.
Fears of an LTTE revival came at a time when the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva adopted a U.S.-sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka, calling for an international probe into its alleged war crimes and rights abuse.
Around the same time, the Sri Lankan military raised surveillance in its Northern Province, where residents have been raising concerns about heavy militarisation post-war.
According to U.N. estimates, at least 100,000 people were killed in Sri Lanka’s ethnic conflict that spanned over three decades.
 Fading signals add urgency to search for missing Malaysian jet
PERTH/BEIJING: The search for a missing Malaysia Airlines jetliner resumed on Saturday, five weeks after the plane disappeared from radar screens, amid fears that batteries powering signals from the black box recorder on board were about to die.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said signals picked up during the search in the remote southern Indian Ocean, believed to be "pings" from the black box recorders, were "rapidly fading".
"While we do have a high degree of confidence that the transmissions that we've been picking up are from flight MH370's black box recorder, no one would underestimate the difficulties of the task still ahead of us," Abbott told a news conference in Beijing.
Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 disappeared soon after taking off on March 8 from Kuala Lumpur bound for Beijing with 227 passengers and 12 crew on board, triggering a multinational search that is now focused on the Indian Ocean.
Search officials say they are confident they know the approximate position of the black box recorder, although they have determined that the latest "ping", picked up by searchers on Thursday, was not from the missing aircraft.
Batteries in the black box recorder are already past their normal 30-day life, making the search to find it on the murky sea bed all the more urgent. Once searchers are confident they have located it, they then plan to deploy a small unmanned "robot" known as an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle.
"There have been no confirmed acoustic detections over the past 24 hours," it said in a statement.
The black box records data from the cockpit and conversations among flight crew and may provide answers about what happened to the plane, which flew thousands of kilometres off course after taking off.
The mystery has sparked the most expensive search and rescue operation in aviation history.
Malaysia's government has begun investigating civil aviation and military authorities to determine why opportunities to identify and track the flight were missed in the chaotic hours after it vanished.
 Ukraine offers more powers to woo east
DONETSK: Ukraine's prime minister on Friday told leaders in the country's restive east that he is committed to allowing regions to have more powers, but left it unclear how his ideas differed from the demands of protesters now occupying government buildings or Russia's advocacy of federalization.
The officials whom Arseniy Yatsenyuk met in Donetsk did not include representatives of the protesters. The officials asked Yatsenyuk to allow referenda on autonomy for their regions, not on secession.
"There are no separatists among us," said Gennady Kernes, mayor of the Kharkiv region where protesters had occupied a government building earlier in the week.
Ukraine's eastern industrial heartland was the support base for Kremlin friendly president Viktor Yanukovich , who was ousted in February after months of protests. Last month, the Crimea region voted to secede and was annexed by Russia. Russia ratcheted up the pressure on Ukraine on Thursday when President Vladimir Putin warned European leaders of a risk to the gas supplies going through Ukraine. He has threatened that Russia could shut off shipments to Ukraine if it fails to pay its mammoth debts. Protesters in the eastern cities of Donetsk and Luhansk are occupying government buildings and calling for referenda on regional autonomy that could prefigure seeking annexation by Russia.
Before leaving Donetsk, Yatsenyuk said that he favours a peaceful solution to the stand-off . However, he left the door open for storming the buildings occupied by armed men, though a two-day deadline announced earlier this week has passed.
Yatsenyuk said grievances of eastern Ukraine would be appeased by the upcoming constitutional reform that will "satisfy people who want to see more powers given to regions." He mentioned abolishing Kievcontrolled local administration as one of the steps to decentralize the country.
Nato: Russia must withdraw troops
Russia must withdraw its troops from the Ukrainian border and enter into sincere dialogue with the West, Nato secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen said on a visit to Bulgaria on Friday. Nato presented satellite photos it said showed Russian deployments of 40,000 troops near the Ukrainian frontier along with tanks, armoured vehicles, artillery and aircraft ready for action. REUTERS
Moscow faces new US sanctions
US President Obama threatened fresh sanctions against Moscow if it escalates the crisis over Ukraine, as pro-Russia separatists faced Friday's deadline from Kiev to lay down their arms. The president stressed that the US, the EU and other global partners must "be prepared to meet further Russian escalation with additional sanctions," the White House said in a statement. AFP
 Searchers scramble to find missing jet after no new signals heard
PERTH, Australia – With no new underwater signals detected, the search for the missing Malaysian passenger jet resumed Saturday in a race against time to find its dying black boxes five weeks after families first learned their loved ones never arrived at their destination.
The ocean search area has been condensed, as ships and planes hunted for any clue that could help find Flight 370, which disappeared en route from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Beijing with 239 people on board, mostly Chinese.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott told Chinese President Xi Jinping that he was confident signals heard by an Australian ship towing a U.S. Navy device that detects flight recorder pings are coming from the Boeing 777. Officials believe the plane flew off course for an unknown reason and went down in the southern Indian Ocean off the west coast of Australia.
"We're getting into the stage where the signal from what we are very confident is the black box is starting to fade," Abbott told reporters Friday in Shanghai, referring to the plane's flight data and cockpit recorders. "We are hoping to get as much information as we can before the signal finally expires."
Search crews are running out of time because the batteries powering the recorders' locator beacons last only about a month, and that window has already passed. Finding the devices after the batteries fail will be extremely difficult because the water in the area is 4,500 meters (15,000 feet) deep.
Two sounds heard a week ago by the Australian ship Ocean Shield, towing the ping locator, were determined to be consistent with the signals emitted from the black boxes. Two more pings were detected in the same general area Tuesday.
"We are confident that we know the position of the black box flight recorder to within some kilometers," Abbott said. "But confidence in the approximate position of the black box is not the same as recovering wreckage from almost 4 1/2 kilometers beneath the sea or finally determining all that happened on that flight."
Abbott told the Chinese leader that the next steps will be a "very long, slow and painstaking process."
An Australian air force P-3 Orion, which has been dropping sonar buoys into the water near where the Ocean Shield picked up the sounds, detected another possible signal Thursday, but Angus Houston, who is coordinating the search, said in a statement that an initial assessment had determined it was not related to an aircraft black box.
The Ocean Shield continued to search for additional signals, while the Orions were going on with their hunt, Houston said. The underwater search zone is currently a 500-square-mile patch of the seabed, about the size of the city of Los Angeles.
"It is vital to glean as much information as possible while the batteries on the underwater locator beacons may still be active," Houston said.
The searchers want to pinpoint the exact location of the source of the signals so they can send down a robotic submersible to look for wreckage. A decision to use the sub could be "some days away," Houston said.
The Bluefin 21 submersible takes six times longer to cover the same area as the ping locator -- about six weeks to two months to canvass the current underwater zone.
Complicating matters is the depth of the seabed in that area. The signals are emanating from 15,000 feet below the surface, which is the deepest the Bluefin can dive. The search coordination center said it was considering options in case a deeper-diving sub is needed.
The surface area to be searched for floating debris had been narrowed to 15 982 square miles of ocean extending from about 1,400 miles northwest of Perth. Up to 10 planes and 14 ships were searching Saturday.
 Australia's northeast coast braces for strongest cyclone in three years
Sydney: Residents and tourists on Friday were evacuating parts of Australia's northeast coast, home to the Great Barrier Reef, as the strongest cyclone in three years was poised to hit land later in the day, bringing destructive winds and flash floods.
Cyclone Ita, a category five storm, is expected to make landfall north of the tropical city of Cairns, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) said.
Wind gusts of up to 300 kmh (186 mph) and torrential rains are forecast, posing a threat to about 9,000 inhabitants, said Campbell Newman, premier of Queensland state, where the storm is expected to hit land.
"Severe tropical cyclone Ita...poses a serious threat to communities along the far north Queensland coast," the weather bureau said.
The storm's projected course should carry it to land on Friday evening, spreading over an area of about 400 km (250 miles), Queensland emergency officials said.
The storm was still classified as a tropical depression when it barrelled across the Solomon Islands late last week, killing at least 23 people near Honiara, the capital, according to the United Nations.
Sugar farmers in Queensland, who grow about 95 percent of the sweetener produced in Australia, are bracing for potential damage to up to 7 million tonnes of cane, industry groups said.
Australia, the world's third largest exporter of raw sugar, has seen production devastated by cyclones in the past, most recently in 2011, when cyclone Yasi ripped through Queensland, causing estimated losses of A$3.5 billion from damage to property and reduced tourism earnings.
Sugar production in 2014/15 is forecast to total 4.4 million tonnes, the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics and Sciences said in March, up from 4.2 million harvested in the previous year.
While the cyclone poses a threat to Australian sugar output, beleaguered cattle farmers may benefit from widespread rain after prolonged drought forced farmers to send record numbers of animals to slaughter as grazing land wilted.
The Great Barrier Reef, one of Australia's most visited tourist attractions, stretches more than 2,000 km along the Queensland coast and is the world's largest coral reef system.
The Great Barrier Reef has lost half its coral cover in the last 27 years, the Australian government said in a 2012 report, with storms responsible for nearly half of that damage.
 Australian PM confident sounds are from Flight MH370
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said Friday he was "very confident" that signals detected in the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 were from the aircraft's black box.
"We have very much narrowed down the search area and we are very confident that the signals that we are detecting are from the black box," Abbott said from China.
Australia has been leading the search for the Boeing 777 aircraft, which went missing on March 8 en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, ever since the operation was moved to the Indian Ocean.
More than 100 flights over the remote area off western Australia have so far failed to return a single piece of debris from the plane, but four signals or "pings" linked aircraft beacons have been detected by an Australian ship.
The first two of these, which were picked up by the Australian vessel Ocean Shield using US equipment, have been analysed as being consistent with those from black box data recorders.
Speaking in Shanghai, Abbott said the search area had now been "very much narrowed down because we've now had a series of detections, some for quite a long period of time".
"Nevertheless, we're getting to the stage where the signal from what we are very confident is the black box is starting to fade," he said in comments broadcast on Sky News.
"We are hoping to get as much information as we can before the signal finally expires."
Abbott said he did not want to go into any further detail until he had briefed Chinese President Xi Jinping on the investigation. Some two-thirds of the 239 people onboard Flight MH370 were Chinese.
 Twin car bombs kill 25 in Syria's Homs
Two car bombs have killed at least 25 people, including women and children, in a government-held neighbourhood of Syria's central city of Homs.
DAMASCUS: Two car bombs killed at least 25 people, including women and children, in a government-held neighbourhood of Syria's central city of Homs Wednesday, state news agency SANA reported.
Another 100 people were wounded in Karam al-Luz, in attacks SANA blamed on "terrorists," the government's term for people fighting to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.
"Twenty-five people fell as martyrs, including women and children, and more than 107 others were wounded after the explosion of the two car bombs" a half-hour apart, SANA said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the bombings killed 21 people in a mostly Alawite neighbourhood, referring to the Shiite Muslim offshoot sect to which the Assad family belongs.
Videos posted online by activists showed destroyed shopfronts and people panicking and running in all directions as rescuers struggled to extinguish a fire.
Syria's uprising began as a series of peaceful protests against the Assad family's four-decade rule but escalated into a full-scale insurgency after the regime launched a devastating crackdown on dissent.
More than 150,000 people have been killed since the revolt began in March 2011 and nine million have been driven from their homes, including 2.6 million international refugees.
Homs was an epicentre of the revolt but is now almost entirely in regime hands, with small pockets of rebels holding out in besieged areas in and around the devastated Old City.
Earlier Wednesday, troops fighting in the Qalamun region seized the town of Rankus, tightening their grip on the strategic region along the Lebanese border.
"Units of the Syrian army have now accomplished their operation in the Rankus area and restored security and stability after eliminating a large number of terrorists," state media said.
The Britain-based Observatory had earlier confirmed that "the army entered the area and is engaged in fierce fighting and heavy shelling."
The group, with a network of sources inside Syria, said 28 rebels had been killed in Qalamun area as well as in Eastern Ghouta, elsewhere in Damascus province, in fighting between Tuesday and Wednesday.
Troops backed by pro-regime militiamen and Lebanon's Shiite movement Hezbollah have captured most of Qalamun, through which a key highway runs between Damascus and Homs.
Last month, the regime dealt a major blow to the opposition by seizing its last key bastion in the region, the town of Yabrud.
The rebels still control a few smaller villages in Qalamun, but have seen their supply lines across the border with Lebanon largely severed.
 School stabbing in Pennsylvania renews fears
MURRYSVILLE, Pa. — The hallways were buzzing with pupils arriving for classes at Franklin Regional Senior High School when screams, shouts and the thunder of running feet broke the morning routine.
"Run, run! He has a knife!" a teacher yelled Wednesday as a boy charged through the first-floor corridor, slashing and stabbing anyone who got in his way in a melee that unfolded like a scene from a horror film.
He fought off a group of boys who tried to pin him down. By the time he was tackled by a security guard and vice principal, he had wounded at least 19 classmates, including three who underwent surgery for what doctors called deep, life-threatening puncture wounds. Two adults also were injured, including the security guard who helped subdue the assailant.
All of the victims were expected to survive, but school officials, students and parents were left shaken by the latest bloody rampage at what should be a safe haven: a public school.
"This is a very difficult day for this community … but also for the country," said Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett, who called the attack "one horrific five-minute period."
The suspect, 16-year-old sophomore Alex Hribal, was charged as an adult Wednesday night with four counts of attempted homicide, 21 counts of aggravated assault and one count of bringing a weapon onto school property, said his attorney, Patrick Thomassey. Hribal was being held without bail at the county juvenile detention center.
The teen, who was treated for a minor hand wound, appeared in court in shackles and a hospital gown, Thomassey said, adding that Hribal's parents found out about the attack on the news and were "devastated."
"There was no indication there was any reason for this to occur, no sense of trouble about anything," Thomassey said. "He's a good student; he interacted well with other students.... They didn't see this coming; they're mystified and mortified."
Thomassey declined to talk about a motive or whether Hribal had been bullied. Franklin is the only public high school in this Pittsburgh suburb of about 20,000 people.
"He's frightened," Thomassey said. "He's a 16-year-old kid who looks like he's 10."
Police converged on his family's home in Heritage Estates, a hilly community of spacious homes.
Michelle Kresak, who lives nearby, was stunned by news that the boy she remembered as a "super-nice kid" who came trick-or-treating on Halloween could do such a thing, or that it could happen in their quiet suburb. "Oh my God, he was so normal," she said while out walking her dog.
But she added: "Sometimes you don't know. A lot of kids keep it all inside."
 Pistorius faces aggressive questioning from prosecutor
After two tumultuous days in which he gave his account of the night he shot and killed Reeva Steenkamp, the Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius on Wednesday was confronted by the man whose mission is to dismantle his story, piece by piece – the state prosecutor, Gerrie Nel.
Combative, dogged and pugnacious, Mr Nel is known here as “the pit bull” and he wasted no time in trying to rattle Pistorius, who had already appeared considerably shaken by the proceedings in his murder trial. “You killed Reeva Steenkamp, didn’t you?” Mr Nel snapped at Pistorius. “Say it. Say ‘yes, I shot and killed Reeva Steenkamp’.”
In a shocking move that brought gasps from the courtroom, Mr Nel suddenly displayed a photograph of Steenkamp’s head after the shooting, with blood and brains spilling from it and all but ordered Pistorius to look at it.
“Take responsibility for what you’ve done!” he snapped. Pistorius refused, saying he was “tormented” by the memories of what Steenkamp’s head felt like after she died, when he cradled her in his arms and sobbed over her lifeless body.
Pistorius wept, as he has on numerous occasions since his trial began, and the court took a break while he composed himself. “I’m fighting for my life,” he said at one point.
Nel repeatedly asked Pistorius about the location of two ventilation fans in his bedroom on the night of the killing, seeking to undermine the defence’s contention that the crime scene was contaminated by clumsy police work and other factors.
The detail was important, Mr Nel told the athlete, because “it will show that you are lying”. Pistorius said his memory was not good “but I’m not trying to lie. I can’t change the truth.”
Pistorius (27) maintains that the killing was a tragic mistake and that he fired four rounds through a locked bathroom door on the morning of February 14th, 2013, because he was convinced an intruder had broken into his house.
The prosecution says he deliberately killed Steenkamp (29) in a fit of rage as the two argued. Earlier, he had told the court he did not intend to kill her “or anybody else”.
Describing the scene when he broke down the bathroom door with a cricket bat after having tried to kick it open, he said: “I could see she was breathing, struggling to breathe.”
Pausing between sentences and coaxed gently by his lawyer, Pistorius struggled to hold back sobs as he described carrying Steenkamp’s bleeding body down the stairs of his house. He tried to help Steenkamp breathe by putting his fingers in her mouth, he said, and tried fruitlessly to staunch the bleeding from her hip.
“I just sat there with her and waited for the ambulance to arrive,” he said, but when an ambulance got there, a paramedic informed him “that Reeva has passed”, he said. “Reeva had already died whilst I was holding her.”
Police officers at the scene took photographs of him for several hours and finally told him he was under arrest and took him into custody.
Then the cross-examination began. The court adjourned briefly after Mr Nel asked Pistorius if he had heard the term “zombie-stopper,” apparently referring to a type of gun or ammunition, and the defence and the prosecution tussled over whether Mr Nel could show a video in which Pistorius used the expression while at a shooting range.
After their argument, the video was broadcast to the court. It showed Pistorius firing several weapons, including a handgun and a shotgun, and using a watermelon as a target. When the melon was hit and exploded, a voice off camera said the gun had functioned as a “zombie-stopper” and that the watermelon was “softer than brains.”
“I was shooting at a watermelon with a handgun,” Pistorius testified. “That was my voice saying those words,” he said, adding that he was “very upset” to hear himself.
 Kerry says Israel to blame for talks crisis
Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu has ordered government ministries to cut off high-level contacts with the Palestinians on non-security related issues, as the crisis in Middle East peace talks worsens.
Israel’s move was a response to the recent Palestinian decision to submit applications to join 15 international organisations and conventions, which itself came after Israel failed to carry out the fourth and final release of Palestinian prisoners agreed to when peace talks resumed last July, under American auspices.
Security co-operation
The latest Israeli move does not apply to security co-operation or to the ongoing discussions aimed at breaking the diplomatic impasse and reaching a formula to extend the talks beyond the nine-month deadline, which expires at the end of this month.
Palestinians said the Israeli move undermined efforts to revive the peace talks. Fatah official Jibril Rajoub described the action as “state terror”.
Arab League foreign ministers, meeting in Cairo, blamed Israel for the diplomatic deadlock and promised a financial safety net if Israel imposed economic sanctions on the Palestinians.
Negotiators are expected to meet again today but a senior Palestinian source said recent meetings had failed to bridge the gaps on a package deal to keep the talks alive.
Settlements issue
He said the main obstacle was Israel’s refusal to present a map with borders and settlement construction.
US secretary of state John Kerry, although criticising both sides for taking “unhelpful” steps, indicated that Israel was responsible for the current deadlock.
“Unfortunately, the [Palestinian] prisoners weren’t released when they were supposed to be, and when they were about to maybe get there, 700 settlement units were announced in Jerusalem, and poof, that was sort of the moment,” he told the Senate foreign relations committee.
However, Mr Kerry said he still hadn’t given up on the talks.
“The truth is the parties say they want to continue these talks,” he said.
 Bomb kills 15, wounds 35 in Islamabad
ISLAMABAD: A bomb explosion Wednesday killed at least 15 people and wounded 35 others in Islamabad's bustling fruit and vegetable market, police and hospital officials said.
The blast took place in the busy morning hours when dozen of people, mostly grocers and sellers, gather at the market.
"We have received 15 dead bodies and 35 injured people," Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) spokeswoman Ayesha Isani told reporters in Islamabad.
She said the condition of two patients was very critical.
 Missing MH370: More underwater pings heard in hunt for missing Malaysian Airlines aircraft
A ship searching for the missing Malaysian jet has detected two more underwater signals, raising hopes the wreckage of the plane will be spotted soon, the Australian official in charge of the search said Wednesday.
Angus Houston, the head of a joint agency coordinating the search for the missing plane in the southern Indian Ocean, said that the Australian navy’s Ocean Shield picked up the two signals in a sweep on Tuesday.
“I think we are looking in the right area but I am not prepared to confirm anything until such time someone lays eyes on the wreckage,” he said.
The Ocean Shield first detected the sounds late Saturday and early Sunday before losing them, but managed to find them again on Tuesday, Houston said. The ship is equipped with a U.S. Navy towed pinger locator that is designed to pick up signals from a plane’s black boxes _ the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder.
“Hopefully in a matter of days, we will be able to find something on the bottom that might confirm that this is the last resting place of MH370,” Houston said at a news conference in Perth, the starting point for the search in the southern Indian Ocean.
“I’m now optimistic that we will find the aircraft, or what is left of the aircraft, in the not too distant future _ but we haven’t found it yet, because this is a very challenging business,” he said.
“And I would just like to have that hard evidence … photograph evidence (before saying). that this is the final resting place of MH370,” Houston said.
Finding the sound again is crucial to narrowing the search area so a small submarine can be deployed to chart a potential debris field on the seafloor, which is about 4,500 meters (14,800 feet) deep. If the autonomous sub was used now with the sparse data collected so far, covering all the potential places from which the pings might have come would take many days.
“The better Ocean Shield can define the area, the easier it will be for the autonomous underwater vehicle to subsequently search for aircraft wreckage,” Houston said.
Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 carrying 239 people went missing March 8 on a trip from Kuala Lumpur, setting off one of aviation’s biggest mysteries. The search has shifted from waters off of Vietnam, to the Strait of Malacca and then finally to waters in the southern Indian Ocean as data from radar and satellites was further analyzed.
The locator beacons on the black boxes have a battery life of only about a month and Tuesday marked exactly one month since the plane vanished. Once the beacons blink off, locating the black boxes in such deep water would be an immensely difficult, if not impossible, task.
 Ukraine crisis: It’s not just the Russians spoiling for a fight
"Here we go again” has been the reaction of most Western observers to the new crisis in Ukraine. Demands for a referendum on the status of largely Russian-speaking areas along the frontier have ominous echoes of the events leading to the Kremlin’s annexation of Crimea last month. Is Vladimir Putin replaying that scenario? Or is something more combustible gathering pace?
Unlike in Crimea, there is no clear demarcation between any would-be “Russian” republics in south-east Ukraine and the Ukrainian-speaking rest of the country. Nor are any Russian troops in place to back up separatists. Despite Western fears, Putin has shown a reluctance to move beyond taking easily digested chunks. He did that in 2008, when he sponsored the independence of tiny South Ossetia and Abkhazia after the five-day war with Georgia.
Despite its immense military value to Russia, Crimea, too, is small and clearly defined. The trouble is, by posing as the champion of discontented Russians there, Mr Putin has risked igniting uncontrollable aspirations elsewhere in Ukraine. Poking the West in the eye was wildly popular in Russia. But for a president whose domestic appeal is built on a tough-guy approach, Putin may alienate supporters if he now allows Ukraine’s pro-Russian demonstrators to be suppressed. His problem is that the Kremlin has little to gain from being drawn into an open-ended conflict in Ukraine. Even if Russia’s forces could quickly disperse resistance, guerrilla fighting would continue, because drawing up a neat boundary where Russians end and Ukrainians begin is impossible.
Even in the rust-belt south-east of Ukraine, the economic pressures that pull coal- and steel-workers towards Russia are why the region’s oligarchs still cling to Kiev: they fear being swallowed up by the big beasts of Russia’s economy. Although the terms of the EU Association Agreement were demanding enough, the oligarchs could see that integration into a Russian customs union would be curtains for them. Strikingly, Putin referred to his emasculation of Russia’s new rich in his first public comments after the revolution in Kiev. He blamed ousted president Yanukovych for failing to rein in his over-mighty economic subjects, as Putin had done in Russia. In fact, the new regime in Kiev appointed oligarchs as governors in restive regions, hoping they could pay for security forces, which a bankrupt Kiev could not. Since Ukraine’s police forces are still the ones who performed so woefully under Yanukovich, with their divided loyalties and an eye to who can pay most, effective crowd control is virtually impossible.
If Kiev were to assert its authority by deploying troops or the new paramilitary National Guard (necessarily drawn from western Ukraine) it could look like a “foreign” occupation to local Russians who have not taken part in the protests. And the pro-Western oligarchs are treading on egg-shells as they try to assert the nominal authority of Kiev and protect their business interests. It would be easy for Russia to stir up anti-oligarchic sentiment, since that is what the new rulers in Kiev were doing until a month ago. The oligarchs’ employees are not necessarily loyal to them. That may be why the country’s richest man, Donetsk-based Rinat Akhmetov, has been trying to calm both sides.
 US TO ALLOW SPOUSES OF H-1B VISA HOLDERS TO WORK
In a move that will benefit spouses of the large number of Indian techies working in the United States on H-1B visas, the Obama administration proposes to modify shortly some of the present regulations so as to allow spouses of the high-skilled foreign workers to work in the US.
Touted as a part of the USA’s new push to attract the world’s best and brightest talents, the move will fulfil a long-standing demand for work authorisation for the spouses. Owing to a host of stringent conditions, including work restrictions for spouses, many talented people are thought to be shunning America.
The White House announced on Monday that the Department of Homeland Security “will soon publish several proposed rules that will make the US more attractive to talented foreign entrepreneurs and other high-skill immigrants who will contribute substantially to the US economy, create jobs, and enhance American innovative competitiveness”.
“These proposed regulations include rules authorising employment for spouses of certain high-skill workers on H-1B visas, as well as enhancing opportunities for outstanding professors and researchers,” it said.
However, it is unlikely to be a blanket work approval for spouses of all H-1B visa holders, given that the statement speaks only of employment authorisation for spouses of “certain high-skill immigrants”.
The measures are said to build on other administrative efforts such as the launch of “Entrepreneur Pathways”, an online resource centre that gives immigrant entrepreneurs “an intuitive way to navigate opportunities to start and grow a business in the United States”.
The White House announcement came on a day when the US, as expected, ran out within a week its annual quota of 85,000 H-1B visas for the next American fiscal year, beginning October 1, 2014.
The US Citizenship and Immigration Services announced that it has received a sufficient number of H-1B petitions to reach the statutory cap for the 2015 fiscal year, including the 20,000 reserved for those with US Master’s or higher degrees.
The agency will run a random selection process from among the petitions received from April 1 to 7.
“A computer-generated process will randomly select the number of petitions needed to meet the caps of 65,000 visas for the general category and 20,000 under the advanced degree exemption,” the USCIS said, adding it will return filing fees of all those petitions that are not selected. The agency is still to determine a date for the random selection of petitions.
Over the years, Indian techies have been the predominant beneficiaries of the H-1B visa programme, accounting for more than 50 per cent of these visas. Indian IT giants with US subsidiaries such as Infosys, TCS and Wipro have garnered a large percentage of these visas, but have lately been subjected by the US Congress to closer scrutiny and higher visa fee in comparison to American firms.
 Ship hunting for more 'pings' in missing Malaysian plane search
Search crews were for the first time sending a sub deep into the Indian Ocean to try and determine whether faint sounds detected by equipment on board an Australian ship are from the missing Malaysia Airlines plane's black boxes, Australia's acting prime minister said Tuesday.
Warren Truss, Australia's acting prime minister while Tony Abbott is overseas, said the crew on board the Ocean Shield will launch the underwater vehicle, the Bluefin 21 autonomous sub, on Tuesday. The unmanned miniature sub can create a sonar map of the area to chart any debris on the sea floor. If it maps out a debris field, the crew will replace the sonar system with a camera unit to photograph any wreckage.
Angus Houston, who is heading the search, said Monday that the Ocean Shield, which is towing sophisticated US Navy listening equipment, detected late Saturday and early Sunday two distinct, long-lasting sounds underwater that are consistent with the pings from an aircraft's "black boxes" - the flight data and cockpit voice recorders. Houston dubbed the find "a most promising lead" in the monthlong hunt for clues to the plane's fate, but warned it could take days to determine whether the sounds were connected to Flight 370.
Crews have been trying to re-locate the sounds since Sunday, but have thus far had no luck, Truss said.
"Today is another critical day as we try and reconnect with the signals that perhaps have been emanating from the black box flight recorder of the MH370," he said. "The connections two days ago were obviously a time of great hope that there had been a significant breakthrough and it was disappointing that we were unable to repeat that experience yesterday."
Truss said the crew would use the sub Tuesday to examine the water in the search area in the hopes of another breakthrough.
Finding the black boxes is key to unraveling what happened to Flight 370, because they contain flight data and cockpit voice recordings that could explain why the plane veered so far off-course during its flight from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing on March 8.
But time was running out to find the devices, whose locator beacons have a battery life of about a month. Tuesday marks exactly one month since the plane vanished.
"Everyone's anxious about the life of the batteries on the black box flight recorders," Truss said. "Sometimes they go on for many, many weeks longer than they're mandated to operate for - we hope that'll be the case in this instance. But clearly there is an aura of urgency about the investigation."
 Stop pointing to Russia for troubles of Ukraine
Washington: After pro-Russian activists stormed government buildings in eastern Ukraine, the US has warned Russia that any further efforts to destabilise the ex-Soviet bloc would invite repercussions.
The warning for Russia came as USD Secretary of State John Kerry called up his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov and told him to “publicly disavow the activities of separatists, saboteurs and provocateurs".
US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said that Kerry in the phone call warned Russia of costs in case it continued further efforts to destabilise Ukraine.
Reacting to the warning, Lavrov sought to defend Moscow in a Guardian article titled, “It's not Russia that is destabilising Ukraine”.
Furthe mocking the warning issued by the US and NATO members, Lavrov wrote in the article, “The world of today is not a junior school where teachers assign punishments at will. Belligerent statements such as those heard at the Nato foreign ministers meeting in Brussels on 1 April do not match demands for a de-escalation”.
“It is time to stop the groundless whipping-up of tension, and to return to serious common work,” he said.
Kerry's warning came a day after pro-Russian separatists had occupied the government buildings in three eastern Ukraine cities of Donetsk, Kharkiv and Luhansk on Sunday night.
In Donetsk, the separatists on Monday claimed the region as "people's republic" and declared a referendum call for secession from Ukraine on 11 May.
Crimea, the Black Sea Peninsula has undergone a similar referendum on March 16, and has now been annexed by Russia.
The recent tension in eastern Ukraine have reignited the concerns about Russian aggression with Ukrainian PM Arseniy Yatsenyuk accusing Moscow of plotting to destabilise the situation. The plan is for foreign troops to cross the border and seize the country, said Arseniy Yatsenyuk at an emergency cabinet meeting.
Ukrainian President Oleksandr Turchynov called the latest moves as a “Second wave” of Russian operation aimed at toppling the government in Ukraine.
He further blamed the unrest on Russia, accusing it of trying to “dismember” Russia.
Russian reacted saying it was closely monitoring the events in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk, Luhansk and Kharkiv regions, but rubbished the accusations of Russia being behind the unrest.
"Stop pointing to Russia, blaming it for all of the troubles of today's Ukraine," said the statement issued by Russian foreign ministry.
Russia had last month annexed the black sea peninsula ODF Crimea fter more than 97 percent people voted in favour of reuniting with the Russian Federation in a referendum called illegal by the West.
After Crimea takeover, there had been concerns about similar action in eastern Ukraine, which is also considered pro-Russian region.
 Prince William, Kate show off royal baby on trip to New Zealand
SYDNEY – Britain's Prince William and his wife, Kate, have arrived in New Zealand's capital to cheers from locals who braved windy, rainy weather to catch a glimpse of the royal couple.
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge landed in the fog-shrouded city of Wellington on Monday along with their baby son, George, to kick off a three-week tour of New Zealand and Australia.
Prime Minister John Key greeted the couple before they were whisked off to Government House where they received a traditional Maori welcome.
William and Kate plan to spend the next few weeks enjoying a wine tasting at a local vineyard, meeting with "The Lord of the Rings" director Peter Jackson, going on a jet boat ride and visiting Christchurch, which was devastated by an earthquake in 2011.
 Oscar Pistorius apologises for killing Reeva Steenkamp
An emotional Oscar Pistorius has apologised to the family of girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp, on the first day of his evidence at his murder trial.
In a trembling voice, he said he was "trying to protect" her and said he could not imagine the family's pain.Mr Pistorius said he suffered "terrible nightmares" and often woke up smelling Ms Steenkamp's blood.
Prosecutors say he killed her in February 2013 after an argument. He says he mistook her for an intruder.The athlete told Ms Steenkamp's relatives that there "hasn't been a moment since this tragedy happened that I haven't thought about your family".
"I wake up every morning and you're the first people I think of, the first people I pray for. I can't imagine the pain and the sorrow and the emptiness that I've caused you and your family.
"I was simply trying to protect Reeva. I can promise that when she went to bed that night she felt loved.
"I've tried to put my words on paper many, many times to write to you. But no words will ever suffice."
In the packed Pretoria courtroom, Ms Steenkamp's mother, June, sat stony-faced while he spoke.Mr Pistorius said he was taking anti-depressants and sleeping pills."I'm scared to sleep, I have terrible nightmares, I can smell blood and wake up terrified," he said.
He added that he never wanted to handle a gun again.The athlete, 27, told the court about his difficult childhood after being born with parts of both legs missing and needing to wear prosthetic limbs.
After a recess, Mr Pistorius was asked whether he and his family had been exposed to criminal acts.He said there had been many break-ins while he was growing up.
Mr Pistorius said on one occasion he was followed by a car into his gated community. He said he had his gun with him and the two men in the car had sped off.
On another occasion, he said he had drawn his firearm as he tried to protect a taxi driver who was being assaulted.
Mr Pistorius testified: "They started beating him with rocks in his face and in his head. At that point I jumped the lights. I hooted until I pulled up. I drew my firearm. I pointed it at the three people. They jumped in the taxi. They sped off."
Mr Pistorius said he was also attacked at a party in December 2012, and had to have stitches in the head.
Mr Pistorius then detailed how important religion was to him, saying: "When I met Reeva, I think it was just a blessing. I've always wanted to have a partner that was a Christian. She was a very strong Christian."
He then became emotional again as he said "my God's a God of refuge" and his counsel, Barry Roux, asked for an adjournment.
 LIVE | BJP manifesto: economy focus, Ram Mandir according to constitution
The Election Commission has blocked the release of the BJP's manifesto in Assam and Tripura as the first phase of polling is underway in these two northeastern states.
Senior leader LK Advani and Sushma Swaraj, party president Rajnath Singh, prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi and others were present during the release of the document at its headquarters in New Delhi.
Senior party leader Murli Manohar Joshi, who headed the BJP Manifesto Committee, told reporters that the focus is on five Ts in the party's manifesto - talent, tourism, trade, tradition and technology."Our country has moved backwards in the last 10 years. The BJP manifesto focusses on things that will help the country bounce back," Joshi said.
He added it also focuses on education, jobs, women empowerment and infrastructure saying it has been prepared after discussions with various stakeholders.
The BJP brought its focus back on the Ram Temple in Ayodhya with its "commitment to explore all possibilities to facilitate its construction".
"We will construct the Ram temple within the Constitutional framework," Joshi said.
It also called for a discussion on Article 370 with all stakeholders and said it will ensure return of Kashmiri Pandits with full dignity in the state.
He said except for multi-brand retail sector, FDI will be allowed in sectors wherever needed for job and asset creation.
"We need to create India as a brand because if India innovates, India leads," Joshi said.The BJP manifesto promised to put in place strict measures and special courts to stop hoarding and black marketing, said Joshi.
It also promised a national health insurance mission for accessible, affordable and effective health care for all in its poll document.
In the field of foreign policy, the BJP promised to pursue friendly relations with neighbours but said "won't hesitate from taking strong stand and steps when required".
It said the nuclear doctrine will be studied in detail and will be revised and updated to make it relevant to challenges of current times, Joshi said.
Joshi said BJP in its manifesto promises a uniform civil code for gender equality in the country.The BJP, in its manifesto, also assured effective implementation of UPA's pet projects - food security scheme and right to education.
 Sun Pharma-Ranbaxy deal to create a synergy of US$ 250 million in 3 years
Under the Sun PharmaBSE 1.59 % and RanbaxyBSE -4.61 % US$ 4 billion deal agreement, Ranbaxy shareholders will receive 0.8 share of Sun Pharma for each share of Ranbaxy. This exchange ratio represents an implied value of Rs 457 for each Ranbaxy share. There may not be much upside in the near-term as Ranbaxy's share is already trading at around Rs 450.
The company's share is trading at Rs 449, 2.2% down from its previous day's close. While Sun Pharma's stock is up 1.2%, and is trading at Rs 579, given the company past track record of acquiring and turning around businesses. However, in the long term, this is a win-win situation for the shareholders of both the companies. The acquisition is likely to create a synergy of more than US$ 250 million in 3 year according to Dilip Sanghvi promoter of Sun Pharma.
The combined entity will become bigger with stronger attention from the pharma industries including regulatory bodies, doctors and hospitals, especially in the US, which has been the focus of both the companies.
"If we look at the overall business it has a huge underlying potential and we believe that the valuation is justified." said Dilip Sanghvi, promoter of Sun Pharma. "We have to look at the overall business and not look at the temporary cost. I am confident of creating value for all shareholders."
Although, loss making for the last few years, Ranbaxy's major losses have been due to forex loss. The $ 4 billion deal includes the equity as well as debt on Ranbaxy's book which is around US$800 million.
Sun Pharma will benefit from the strong OTC counter of Ranbaxy, its presence in acute therapy segment and its strong presence in the emerging market, where Sun does not have a significant present as of now. Besides, Ranbaxy has a strong drug pipeline, especially in the US markets, awaiting approvals, which also includes first to file drugs, which enjoy exclusivity for a certain time frame.
 MH370 SKIRTED INDONESIA TO AVOID RADARS: REPORT
Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 flew around Indonesian airspace apparently to avoid detection after vanishing from radar screens on March 8, a media report said on Sunday, suggesting the possibility of a more sinister reason behind the jet’s disappearance.
Malaysian authorities, citing expert analysis of satellite, radar and other data available, concluded earlier that the ill-fated flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing ended in the southern Indian Ocean.According to previous information, the Boeing 777-200 aircraft turned back after disappearing from civilian radar in Vietnamese airspace, and was detected by Malaysian military radar in the northern Strait of Malacca before vanishing from all radar screens.
After reviewing radar data provided by neighbouring countries, investigators have now found that the jetliner curved north of Indonesia before turning south toward the southern Indian Ocean, CNN quoted a Malaysian official as saying.The official also suggested the possibility of a more sinister reason behind MH370’s disappearance a month ago.
 SHIPS TRYING TO VERIFY POTENTIAL ‘PINGS’
A number of ‘encouraging leads’ of electronic pulse detected in the southern Indian Ocean on Sunday prompted multi-national search teams to rush their hi-tech ships to the area to determine if these signals came from the black box of the crashed Malaysian plane.
In the search for the plane in the Indian Ocean, a Chinese patrol ship Haixun 01 picked up two signals, one on Friday and another on Saturday, that were only 2 kilometers apart, authorities said.Two naval ships carrying sophisticated deep-sea black box detectors are being sent to the area off western Australia where the pulses were reported to try to confirm or rule out whether they were from the missing plane’s flight recorders, Retired Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston told reporters.
“This is an important and encouraging lead,” said Houston, the head of the Joint Agency Coordination Centre (JACC) which is leading the search.The electronic pulses were consistent with those emitted by the pingers on an aircraft’s flight data and voice recorders, he said, but haven’t been verified as coming from Flight MH370.
Search teams are running against time as the batteries of the black box flight recorders have a life of about 30 days, meaning they will shut down in the next two days.The black box can provide audio record of what happened on March 8 before the Beijing-bound Malaysia Airlines jet with 239 people, including five Indians, crashed in the southern Indian Ocean.
Sounds also travel long distances underwater, Houston said, making it difficult to ascertain their sources. If detectors were near a pinger, it would also pick up the signal for a more sustained period.Houston also said that search authorities were informed today that Ocean Shield, an Australian naval vessel equipped with sophisticated listening equipment, has detected “an acoustic noise” in another area of the ocean.
The search co-ordinator insisted the latest developments should be treated as unverified “until such time as we can provide an unequivocal determination”.“We are working in a very big ocean and within a very large search area, and so far since the aircraft went missing we have had very few leads which allow us to narrow the search area,” he said.
HMS Echo, a British Navy ship equipped with advanced detection gear, is on its way to the area where the Chinese ship picked up the signals, Houston said. It is likely to arrive tonight. Australian planes are also headed to the area.
Ocean Shield, which has a high-tech pinger locator borrowed from the US Navy, will continue to pursue the sound it heard. If that lead turns cold, it will move to the other detection area, a journey that will take at least a day, Houston said.The signals are the latest leads in a huge, multinational hunt for Flight 370. Investigators have so far been unable to say why the plane flew far off course or where exactly it ended up.
Also on Saturday, a Chinese Air Force plane spotted a number of white floating objects in the search area. The plane photographed the objects over a period of 20 minutes after spotting them. The detection has been reported to the JACC.br />
 Biggest search yet for missing MH370 jet launched
Four weeks after the disappearance of a Malaysia Airlines jetliner, searchers on Saturday launched the most intensive hunt yet in the southern Indian Ocean, trying to find the plane's black box recorders before their batteries run out.
Up to 10 military planes, three civilian jets and 11 ships will scour a 217,000-sq-km (88,000-sq-mile) patch of desolate ocean some 1,700 km (1,060 miles) northwest of Perth near where investigators believe the plane went down on March 8 with the loss of all 239 people on board.
"If we haven't found anything in six weeks we will continue because there are a lot of things in the aircraft that will float," retired Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, the head of the Australian agency coordinating the operation, told reporters.
"Eventually I think something will be found that will help us narrow the search area."
Authorities have not ruled out mechanical problems as a cause but say the evidence, including the loss of communications, suggests Flight MH370 was deliberately diverted thousands of kilometres from its scheduled route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.
Dozens of flights by a multinational taskforce have so far failed to turn up any trace of the plane, and investigators concede the task has been made more difficult by the lack of data.
The Boeing 777 was briefly picked up on military radar on the other side of Malaysia and analysis of subsequent hourly electronic "handshakes" exchanged with a satellite led investigators to conclude the plane crashed far off the west Australian coast hours later.
 Afghanistan Votes in Presidential Election
Afghans began voting in Saturday's presidential election, torn between fears of Taliban violence and hopes for a cleaner government after what would be the first democratic transition in the country's bloody history.
An hour after voting opened at 7 a.m., long lines started forming at polling stations in Kabul, where voters were frisked by police before dipping their fingers in indelible ink and casting ballots.
"I am not afraid. We only die once," said hotel worker Jamil, 51, as he stood behind dozens of men at a mosque that served as a polling station in Kabul's Wazir Akbar Khan district. "We are voting to make clear our future, to choose a next leader who will bring us peace and security," echoed Mohammed Yussef, a 32-year-old hotel worker.
Saturday's election will pick a successor to President Hamid Karzai, who isn't allowed to run again. The Afghan president cast his ballot at a high school near his palace early in the morning, saying he hoped for a high turnout "despite the chilly weather and rain, and all the threats from the enemies of Afghanistan."
Though the Taliban have pledged to disrupt the vote, there were no reports of major violence in the initial hour of the election.
Over the past two weeks, the Taliban, who consider the election illegitimate because U.S. troops still remain in the country, have launched a series of deadly attacks, especially in Kabul. They've hit the national and provincial offices of the Independent Election Commission, the Ministry of Interior headquarters, a U.S. charity compound and the luxurious Serena Hotel, where many foreign election observers were based.
None of the three leading presidential candidates- former World Bank executive Ashraf Ghani and two former foreign ministers, Zalmai Rassoul and Abdullah Abdullah —are expected to win a majority Saturday, making a runoff between the two top vote-getters necessary in late May or early June.
Mr. Karzai is widely believed to be supporting Mr. Rassoul, whose campaign includes two of the president's brothers. Many Afghans fear widespread fraud during Saturday's vote—something that marred the 2009 presidential race.
 RUSSIA SAYS ALL UKRAINIAN SERVICEMEN LEFT CRIMEA
All the Ukrainian servicemen stationed in Crimea were allowed to leave for mainland Ukraine but 8,000 military men stayed and applied for permission to join the Russian army, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said in televised comments on Friday.
Russia annexed the Black Sea peninsula in March after Crimea residents voted overwhelmingly to seek to join Russia. The referendum was called two weeks earlier, coinciding with the military occupation of the region by armed men in unmarked uniforms.
Shoigu described claims that the Russian army has mistreated Ukrainian servicemen as “improper and provocative.”
Several senior Ukrainian officers including a military base commander were briefly detained by the Russian forces and kept in custody for several days. Moscow has never admitted that the thousands of troops roaming the peninsula, seizing the airports and putting up road blocks were in fact Russian. They wore no markings but some of them drove APCs with Russian number plates.
In what seems to be a cautious acknowledgement of the Russian military involvement in the peninsula, Shoigu said that Crimea faced “a threat to civilian lives and the threat of a seizure of the Russian military infrastructure by extremist organisations,” so Russia “took decisive actions” and “beefed up security of Russian military infrastructure in Crimea.”
He stopped short, however, of giving details but said the military “managed to prevent bloodshed.” Shoigu said Russia’s actions did not violate any international laws because Russia never exceeded the agreed amount of troops stationed on the peninsula.
 US INDICTS CONGRESS MP, FIVE OTHERS IN MAJOR BRIBERY CASE
Jury terms it $18.5 mn conspiracy to secure mining licences
In a new embarrassment to the Congress on the eve of general elections, a US grand jury has indicted a party MP from Andhra Pradesh and five others for an alleged international conspiracy to pay at least $18.5 million in bribes to State and Central Government officials to allow the mining of titanium minerals in Andhra Pradesh.
A federal indictment, returned under seal in June 2013 and unsealed on Wednesday in Chicago, charges KVP Ramachandra Rao, a Congress member of Rajya Sabha and close advisor to the late Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy, and five others with one count each of racketeering and money laundering conspiracy, and two counts of inter-state travel in aid of racketeering.
Apart from the 65-year-old Rao, others charged include Ukrainian gas tycoon Dmitry Firtash, aka DF, 48, US-based Indian national Gajendra Lal, 50, Hungarian businessman Andras Knopp, 75, Sri Lankan national Periyasamy Sunderalingam, 60, and Ukrainian national Suren Gevorgyan, 40. While Firtash, dubbed the leader of the enterprise, was arrested in Vienna, Austria last month and then released on bail, the other five defendants remain at large.
“Firtash allegedly met with Indian Government officials, including Chief Minister (YS Rajaeskara) Reddy, to discuss the project and its progress, and authorised payment of at least $18.5 million in bribes to both State and Central Government officials in India to secure the approval of licenses for the project,” charges the indictment.
Rao, it alleges, solicited bribes for himself and others in return for approving licences for the project, and that he warned other defendants concerning the threat of a possible law enforcement investigation of the project. It further alleges that Sunderalingam met with Rao to determine the total amount of bribes and advised others on the results of the meeting, and he identified various foreign bank accounts held in the names of nominees outside India that could be used to funnel bribes to Rao.
Noting that the alleged conspiracy by the six defendants began in 2006, the indictment goes on to list 57 transfers of funds between various entities in various amounts totalling more than $10.59 million beginning April 28, 2006 through July 13, 2010. Some of the entities were controlled by Group DF, belonging to Ukrainian industrialist.
Overall, the indictment estimates that the mining project was expected to generate more than $500 million annually from the sale of titanium products, including sales to an unnamed “Company A,” headquartered in Chicago.
“The defendants used US financial institutions to engage in the international transmission of millions of dollars for the purpose of bribing Indian public officials to obtain approval of the necessary licenses for the project,” the indictment alleges, adding: “They allegedly financed the project and transferred and concealed bribe payments through Group DF, and used threats and intimidation to advance the interests of the enterprise’s illegal activities.”
It said Firtash also directed his subordinates to create documents to make it falsely appear that money transferred for the purpose of paying the bribes was transferred for legitimate commercial purposes, and he appointed various subordinates to oversee efforts to obtain the licenses through bribery.
As for Lal, an Indian national with permanent residence in the US, the indictment alleges that he reported to Firtash and Knopp on the status of obtaining licenses, and recommended whether, and in what manner, to pay certain bribes to Government officials.
“Fighting global corruption is part of the fabric of the Department of Justice,” said Acting US Assistant Attorney General O’Neil, adding: “The charges against six foreign nationals announced today send the unmistakable message that we will root out and attack foreign bribery and bring to justice those who improperly influence foreign officials, wherever we find them.”
Firtash’s Group DF is described as an international conglomerate of companies owned by Group DF Limited, a British Virgin Islands company. Its companies include Ostchem Holding AG in Austria engaged in mining and processing minerals, including titanium; Global Energy Mining and Minerals Limited, a Hungarian company, and Bothli Trade AG, a Swiss company, for which Global Energy Mining and Minerals was the majority shareholder.
In April 2006, Bothli Trade and the Andhra Pradesh Government agreed to set up a joint venture to mine various minerals, including ilmenite, a mineral which may be processed into various titanium-based products such as titanium sponge, a porous form of the mineral that occurs in the processing of titanium ore.
In February 2007, Company A entered into an agreement with Ostchem Holding, through Bothli Trade, to work toward a further agreement that would allow Bothli Trade the ability to supply 5 million to 12 million pounds of titanium sponge from the Indian project to Company A on an annual basis, the indictment says, noting that the mining project required licences and approval of both the Andhra Pradesh state government and the central government of India before the licenses could be issued.
 4 DEAD, 16 HURT IN US MILITARY BASE SHOOTING
A US soldier on Thursday went on a shooting spree killing three colleagues and wounding 16 others at a major army base in Texas that was the scene of a deadly rampage in 2009.
The gunman, identified as Ivan Lopez (34) opened fire at two locations in Fort Hood —inside a building housing a medical brigade and in a facility belonging to a transportation battalion — prompting authorities to order a lockdown. The suspect, who had served in Iraq, "had behavioural health and mental health" issues, the Army post's commander Lt General Mark Milley said. He said there was no known motive for the shooting. "There is no indication that this incident is related to terrorism, although we are not ruling anything out," he said.
Milley said the incident began at the administration building for the medical brigade. The suspect then moved by car to the transport battalion. "He was confronted by a military police officer and died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head in a parking lot," he said.
Milley said the suspect was carrying a .45 calibre Smith and Wesson semi-automatic pistol bought recently in the local area and not registered with the base, as is required.
Another US official said the shooter was wearing combat fatigues. The lockdown was lifted at the base about five hours later.Army Secretary John McHugh testified that the soldier appeared to have no connections to extremist groups.
He said Lopez was deployed in Iraq in the final months of the war but did not see combat. Lopez enlisted in the Army in June 2008 as an infantryman and later switched to being a truck driver which was the job he had in Iraq.
US President Barack Obama expressed sorrow that tragedy had once again struck the base. "We're heartbroken that something like this might have happened again," the president said. He promised to "get to the bottom" of the latest incident.
"We are going to do everything we can to make sure that the community at Fort Hood has what it needs to deal with the current situation, but also any potential aftermath," he said.The suspect, who served in Iraq for four months in 2011, had arrived in Fort Hood only in February, having moved from another installation in Texas.
In 2009, Fort Hood was the scene of the worst mass shooting ever to take place at a military base in the US. It left 13 people dead and more than 30 injured. The gunman, Major Nidal Hasan, a former army psychiatrist, was convicted by a military court and sentenced to death in August last year.
 Malaysia missing plane: China widens ship search
China has deployed ships to search new areas for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, as Thailand said its radars may have tracked the flight shortly after it lost contact.
China has sent nine ships to waters south-east of the Bay of Bengal and west of Indonesia.
Teams from 26 countries are trying to find flight MH370, which went missing on 8 March with 239 people on board.
The entire search area is now roughly the size of Australia.
Malaysia says the plane, which was flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing, was intentionally diverted and could have flown on either a northern or southern arc from its last known position in the Malacca Straits.
Investigators are looking into the possibility that the aircraft's crew - or other individuals on the plane - were involved in its disappearance.
'Low-flying airplane'
The Chinese vessels set off from Singapore early on Wednesday, to search an area of around 300,000 sq km (116,000 sq miles), state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
The ships would focus on waters near Sumatra, away from regions being searched by other countries, it added.
A sailor prepares to launch a P-3C Orion before its mission to assist in search and rescue operations for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 in Kuala Lumpur March 17, 2014,
On Tuesday, China began searching its territory along the northern arc for the aircraft, following a request from the Malaysian authorities.
Meanwhile, Thailand's air force said on Tuesday a re-examination of its radar data found what may have been the plane travelling west towards the Malacca Straits shortly after it lost contact with air traffic controllers.
This would be consistent with Malaysia's military radar, which spotted the plane over the Malacca Straits - the opposite direction from its planned flight path - early on 8 March.
The Thai military had previously said it had not detected any sign of the aircraft.
Thai officials said they did not report the radar data earlier because they "did not pay attention to it".
In another development, police in the Maldives are investigating reports that residents saw a "low-flying airplane" above Kuda Huvadhoo island the day the plane vanished, AFP news agency reports.
Many leads and sightings of possible debris pursued so far have proven not to be linked to the plane.
The entire search area is now 2.24m square nautical miles (7.68m sq km), Malaysian authorities said.
Several countries, including Australia, the US, New Zealand, Korea, Japan and the UAE have committed planes and ships to the search and rescue effort.
On Tuesday, relatives of the 153 Chinese passengers on board the plane threatened a hunger strike if they did not receive better information from the authorities.
 U.S., allies order Russia sanctions over Crimea referendum
The United States and its European allies stepped up their pressure on Russia to end its intervention in Ukraine by imposing the most comprehensive sanctions against Russian officials since the Cold War.
Acting in concert with Europe, the Obama administration on Monday froze the U.S. assets of seven Russian officials, including top advisers to President Vladimir Putin, for their support of Crimea’s vote to secede from Ukraine, while similar sanctions were imposed on four Ukrainian officials for instigating Sunday’s Crimean referendum.
Although the threat of sanctions has failed thus far to persuade Mr. Putin to drop support for Crimea’s secession and potential entry into the Russian Federation or to pull back from threatening military moves near Ukraine’s south and east President Barack Obama said failure to step back now would draw more severe consequences.
“If Russia continues to interfere in Ukraine, we stand ready to impose further sanctions,” Mr. Obama declared at the White House shortly after the penalties were announced. He noted that Vice President Joe Biden would be travelling to Europe late Monday to reassure Eastern European leaders of America’s commitment to them and that he himself would be going next week on a previously planned trip to make a similar point. Secretary of State John Kerry also is expected in Europe in the coming days.
“We’ll continue to make clear to Russia that further provocations will achieve nothing except to further isolate Russia and diminish its place in the world,” he said. “The international community will continue to stand together to oppose any violations of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity, and continued Russian military intervention in Ukraine will only deepen Russia’s diplomatic isolation and exact a greater toll on the Russian economy.”
Putin recognises Crimea
But administration critics said Mr. Obama’s actions were too little to convince Mr. Putin of anything. “I think Vladimir Putin must be encouraged by the absolute timidity,” said Republican Sen. John McCain, who had just returned from a weekend trip to Kiev, the Ukrainian capital.
Shortly after Mr. Obama’s comments, Mr. Putin recognized Crimea as a “sovereign and independent country.”
Residents in Crimea, a strategic Black Sea peninsula, voted overwhelmingly on Sunday in favour of the split, and Crimea’s parliament declared the region an independent state on Monday.
The United States, European Union and others say that splitting off Crimea from Ukraine violates the Ukrainian constitution and international law and has taken place under duress from the Russian military. Mr. Putin maintains that the vote was legal and consistent with the right of self-determination.
The U.S. announcement of sanctions came shortly after the European Union (EU) announced travel bans and asset freezes on 21 people the EU has linked to the unrest in Crimea. U.S. officials say there is some overlap between the U.S. list and that of the Europeans, which wasn’t immediately made public.
The sanctions freeze any assets the targeted individuals have under U.S. jurisdiction, make it illegal for Americans to do business with them and discourage international banks and financial institutions from having relationships with them, administration officials said. The officials, however, would or could not say if those targeted actually have assets in U.S. jurisdictions.
Japan imposes sanctions
Japan has announced a set of sanctions against Russia for its recognition of Crimea as an independent state.
Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida said in a statement that Japan does not recognize the outcome of Crimea’s referendum to split from Ukraine, saying it violates the Ukrainian constitution.
Japan’s sanctions involve suspension of talks on relaxing visa requirements between Japan and Russia as well as planned talks on investment, space and military.
The moves are seen as modest compared to sanctions by the U.S. and European Union, which have frozen the assets of individuals linked to the unrest in Crimea or who support the region’s vote to secede from Ukraine.
Mr. Kishida also urged Russia to comply with international laws, withdraw the recognition of Crimea’s independence and not move further toward its annexation.
 UN underscores importance of protection, promotion of human rights in Sri Lanka
Mar 18, New York: The United Nations Monday said that it is aware of the reports on the arrests of two human right defenders in Sri Lanka.
When asked about the reported arrest of two human rights activists in Sri Lanka, the Spokesman for the UN Secretary-General Stéphane Dujarric at the Monday media briefing said Sri Lanka's situation is being constantly looked at and evaluated.
The Spokesperson recalled that the Secretary-General and the President of Sri Lanka in their 2009 joint statement emphasized the importance of protection and promotion of human rights in keeping with international human rights standards and Sri Lanka's international obligation.
"On the arrests, yes, we've seen the reports, we are aware of them. And as you will recall, the Secretary-General and the President of Sri Lanka, in their 2009 joint statement, emphasized the importance of protection and promotion of human rights in keeping with international human rights standards and Sri Lanka's international obligation," Dujarric said.
"On Sri Lanka...the situation is being constantly looked at and evaluated," the Spokesman said.
The arrests of two human rights activists Ruki Fernando and Father Praveen in Kilinochchi Sunday night by the Terrorism Investigation Division (TID) of Sri Lankan police under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) has raised concern among the international human right organizations as well as in the US and UK.
Earlier the police arrested an activist for missing persons in the North, Balendran Jayakumari for sheltering a former LTTE cadre who shot and injured a police officer on March 13.
Issuing a statement, the US Embassy in Colombo urged the Sri Lankan government to follow due legal process over the arrests of the activists.
"We urge Sri Lankan government authorities to ensure that all those detained are given transparent and due legal process, including full access to legal counsel," the Embassy said.
The US said the arrests have convinced the US and the international community that an international investigation into Sri Lanka's alleged human rights violations by UN the Human Rights Council (UNHRC) is necessary.
 Deadly clashes in east Ukraine ahead of Crimea vote
Two people have been killed in clashes between pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian activists in Ukraine's eastern city of Kharkiv, officials say.
Five people were injured overnight, as gunshots were fired. Rival groups blamed each other for the violence.
Earlier, Russia and the US failed to agree on how to resolve the crisis in Ukraine's Crimea region, ahead of a secession referendum there.
Russia vowed to respect Sunday's vote - but the US said it was illegitimate.
Moscow has been tightening its military grip on Crimea - the southern autonomous republic in Ukraine - where voters are to decide on whether to re-join Russia or stay with Kiev.
In other developments:
the UN Security Council is to vote on Saturday on a US-drafted resolution that defines Crimea's referendum as illegal
US Vice-President Joe Biden will travel to Poland and Lithuania early next week to discuss ways to support Ukraine's sovereignty, as well as Nato members' reciprocal defence commitments
The Pentagon says it will keep its aircraft carrier battle group in the Mediterranean Sea for several days longer than planned because of the Ukraine crisis
Russia has moved a column of army trucks and a number of artillery pieces into northern Crimea, eyewitnesses say
Ukrainian border guards begin checks on trains coming from Crimea into the rest of Ukraine
'Provocation'
The violence reportedly began on Kharkiv's Svoboda Square on Friday evening and later moved to an office of a pro-Ukrainian group in the city.
John Kerry: "There will be consequences if Russia does not find a way to change course"
Eyewitnesses said that pro-Russian activists tried to storm the rival protesters, who had barricaded themselves in.
The witnesses said that shots had been fired and Molotov cocktails thrown in.
Kharkiv Mayor Hennadiy Kernes was later quoted by Ukrainian media as saying that two people people were killed and five injured.
Meanwhile, Kharkiv Governor Ihor Baluta called the incident "a provocation".
Both rival groups blame each other for starting the clashes. A criminal investigation is now under way.
This follows Thursday night's violence in Donetsk, also in the east, where at least one person died in fighting between a pro-Russian crowd and supporters of the new government in Kiev.
Ukraine accuses Russia of using provocateurs to stoke unrest on the eastern border. Moscow denies this, vowing to protect its "compatriots" from far-right radicals.
'Consequences'
Earlier on Friday, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov failed to reach agreement on how to resolve the Ukraine crisis.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov: "We will respect the will of [the] people of Crimea"
After six hours of talks in London, Mr Lavrov said both sides had "no common vision" on the issue.
However, he described the meeting as "constructive".
And Mr Lavrov stressed that Moscow would "respect the will of the people of Crimea".
Meanwhile, Mr Kerry, who described the talks as "direct and candid", said the US acknowledged Russia's "legitimate interests" in Ukraine.
But he stressed that Washington had not changed its position on the "illegitimate" referendum in Crimea and would not recognise its outcome.
He also said that his Russian counterpart had made it clear that President Vladimir Putin was not prepared to make any decision until after the vote.
And Mr Kerry added that he had told Mr Lavrov that there would be consequences if Russia "does not find a way to change course".
Both the US and EU have threatened tough sanctions against Moscow.
Russia's military intervention in the Crimean peninsula - part of Russia until 1954 and host to its Black Sea fleet - followed the fall of Ukraine's pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovych on 22 February.
 At least 17 killed in Pakistan bombings
Two bombings in separate parts of Pakistan have killed 17 people and left dozens of others injured.
In the south-western city of Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province, 10 people died and 37 were injured when a bomb went off near a passenger bus.
Four were in a critical condition.
The bomb was planted on a bicycle and exploded when the bus drove by, police said. Two vehicles carrying Pakistan troops had just passed the site when the bomb exploded.
In north-western Pakistan, a suicide attacker blew himself up near a police armoured vehicle about 12 miles south of the city of Peshawar, killing seven people.
Police said most of the dead were civilians but many police officers were among the 45 people left injured.
They said police had recently stepped up patrols in the area due to threats from militants from the nearby Khyber tribal region. The Pakistani army has carried out several operations in Khyber, in an effort to rid the area of militants.
No one claimed responsibility for either incident.
The Pakistani Taliban, which operates in the north-west, is currently engaged in peace talks with the government. The group has announced a ceasefire but attacks claimed by its splinter groups have continued during the negotiations.
 Navy may press P-8I aircraft into service to search for missing Malaysian Airlines plane
KOLKATA: The Indian Navy is likely to press its state-of-the-art P-8I aircraft into service to search for the Malaysia Airlines aircraft that has been missing for nearly five days with 239 people on board. Malaysian authorities are not ruling out the possibility of the aircraft having crashed somewhere over the Andamans Sea. Indian Navy ships have already been deployed to search the area.
"The possible area that has been marked out by Malaysian authorities includes part of the Andamans Sea. We have already deployed two ships to carry out Search and Rescue (SAR) operations there. We are also prepared to launch aircraft to participate in the search. Naval headquarters are monitoring the activities and the Commander-in-Chief, Andaman & Nicobar Command (CinCAN) is in charge of operations here," said Rear Admiral Sudhir Pillai, chief of staff, A&N Command.
Indian Navy ships deployed for anti-piracy patrolling the Malacca Straits have already joined hands with navies of other countries to search for the missing plane. The deployment of aircraft by India will depend upon coordination between the nations involved in the search, Pillai said. He said that even the Indian Air Force and Coast Guard may participate in the SAR operations.
"We are ready to use our air assets but this can be done only after complete understanding has been reached between all the countries participating in the search. We have come to know that some ships from the Australian and New Zealand navies have also started SAR operations in the Andamans Sea. Air operations can be carried out after better coordination. We may also press our P8I Poseidon aircraft into service," the CoS added.
The movement of ships, particularly in international waters, is one thing. However, better coordination and understanding is required for use of aircraft as foreign navies wouldn't take too kindly to Indian military aircraft, with sophisticated surveillance equipment, flying too close to their vessels. Aircraft involved in SAR operations may also cross over into another country's air space and this may lead to unnecessary complications.
The P-8I is Boeing's Indian Navy variant of the US Navy's P-8A Posidon. It is a long-range maritime reconnaissance anti-submarine warfare aircraft. The first one joined the Indian Navy May 15, 2013. Several more of there aircraft are to join service. The IAF may also pitch in with the Su-30 MKI aircraft that have superior surveillance equipment attached. These are known as Synthetic Aperture Radars. The Sukhois were engaged to locate the wreckage of YSR Reddy's chopper after it crashed in September, 2009. The Su-30 MKIs had then been deployed from Bareilly and mid-air refuellers had flown in from Agra to increase their endurance.
 Ukraine crisis: US and Russia set for key London talks
US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov are preparing for key talks on Ukraine in London, as a disputed referendum in Crimea looms on Sunday.
Mr Kerry is expected to warn Mr Lavrov that the referendum and Russia's military intervention in Crimea could trigger concerted US and EU sanctions.
He has warned of "very serious steps" if Russia annexes the region.
Russia insisted at the UN on Thursday it did "not want war" with Ukraine.
During an emergency meeting of the Security Council, Moscow's ambassador to the UN Vitaly Churkin defended the right of Crimea, which is predominantly ethnic Russian, to decide whether or not to join the Russian Federation.
Russia's military intervention followed the fall of Ukraine's pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovych on 22 February.
'Serious steps'
BBC diplomatic correspondent James Robbins says that London is now the stage for a revival of Cold War tensions.
Continue reading the main story
18th Century map of Crimea
The American and Russian foreign ministers will meet at the US ambassador's residence in central London.
Our correspondent says they will have very different accounts of events in Ukraine.
Mr Kerry will try to persuade Russia that it risks paying a heavy price in political and economic damage from American and European measures which could be triggered by Sunday's referendum.
"If there is no sign of any capacity to be able to move forward and resolve this issue, there will be a very serious series of steps on Monday in Europe and here [in Washington] with respect to the options that are available to us," Mr Kerry said prior to leaving for London.
Our correspondent says that while Mr Kerry seems to think the referendum itself may be all but unstoppable, he insists that it is what Russia does after that vote which counts - and Ukraine's territorial integrity must not be permanently violated.
The talks are the last opportunity for face-to-face dialogue at such a senior level before the likely vote in Crimea, our correspondent says, which could determine whether what happens next edges Ukraine away from, or deeper into, a dangerous crisis.
Russia's ambassador to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin (R) responds to Ukraine's PM Arseniy Yatsenyuk in New York
Mr Kerry told lawmakers before his departure to London that the US was not eager to impose further sanctions on Russia.
"Our choice is not to be put in the position of having to do that. Our choice is to have a respect for the sovereignty and independence and territorial integrity of Ukraine," he said.
The secretary of state said that he had spoken again by telephone with Mr Lavrov on Thursday ahead of their Friday meeting, and that he and his Russian counterpart had been in almost daily contact over the past two weeks.
Mr Kerry has hinted at a possible compromise to the crisis by which the Ukrainian parliament would allow Crimea to hold a referendum on self-determination - similar to Scotland's forthcoming vote in September on whether to bring an end to its 300-year old union with England.
"The constitution of Ukraine requires that any effort by any entity within Ukraine to secede be done through the constitutional process," Mr Kerry said.
The BBC's John Simpson is amid a "potentially explosive" stand-off at a Ukrainian military base in Bakhchisaray
He said that at the moment Russia did not "have the assets... necessary to be able to march in and take over Ukraine", although he conceded that could change in future.
But correspondents say that the signs are not good for Friday's talks, as both men have clashed in recent weeks and failed to agree on a number of US proposals.
'Legal vacuum'
In his appearance before the UN on Thursday, Mr Churkin said that it was Kiev that was "splitting its country into two parts", not Moscow.
The referendum in Crimea, he said, had come about because of a "legal vacuum" in the country, and questioned why Crimeans should not be "afforded the opportunity" to decide on their future.
Ukraine's interim Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk told the UN Security Council that his country was a victim of Russian aggression, producing a copy of the UN Charter to make his point that Moscow was violating it and several other international treaties.
The BBC's Nick Bryant, in New York, says the US is circulating a resolution stating that Sunday's referendum in Crimea has no validity.
He says it knows that Russia will exercise its veto, but hopes that China will not block it, thus underscoring Russia's diplomatic isolation.
In other developments:
Russia launched new military exercises near its border with Ukraine on Thursday involving more than 8,000 troops and large artillery units such as rocket launchers and anti-tank weapons
A young man was stabbed to death and more than a dozen people were in hospital after pro-Russian and pro-European demonstrators clashed in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk
In what it called a "positive development", the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) on Thursday said that Russia had now given its support to a possible long-term monitoring mission in Ukraine
 Obama rejects Crimea referendum, backs new Ukrainian government
U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday rejected the legitimacy of a referendum on the future of Ukraine’s Crimea region and expressed strong support for the new government in Kiev.
“We reject a referendum patched together in a few weeks with Russian military personnel taking over Crimea,” Xinhua quoted Mr. Obama as telling reporters after meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk at the White House.
Mr. Obama said he hoped diplomatic efforts over the next several days can cause a “rethinking” of plans for the referendum, which is slated for Sunday.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will travel to London to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov Friday. The top U.S. diplomat told lawmakers on Wednesday morning that the U.S. will offer “certain choices” to Russia in hopes of finding a way forward.
Last Thursday, the Crimean parliament voted to join Russia and for a referendum March 16 on Crimea’s future. On Tuesday, it adopted a declaration of independence, which specifies that Crimea will become independent if its residents vote in favour of splitting from Kiev to join Moscow in Sunday’s referendum.
Mr. Obama said the idea that Ukraine is forced to choose between good relations with the West or economic ties with Russia is a ” zero sum formulation” that doesn’t make any sense in the 21st century with a highly integrated global economy.
“I actually think that in the end it’s not in the interests of Russia either,” he added.
Mr. Obama also warned Russia that if it continues on the current path, the U.S., together with the international community, will ” be forced to apply a cost to Russia’s violations of international law and its encroachments on Ukraine”.
 Children return to school in Sderot this morning
Children of the southern town of Sderot returned to school this morning after a tense night.
The return to class comes after Israeli jets pummeled targets in Gaza, as a response to the volley of at least 40 rockets fired by Islamic Jihad; no casualties reported on Israeli side.
Class was was taught as usual this Thursday morning while the sound of military helicopters could be heard outside, according to Israel Radio, a part of increased defense measures in Israel's south.
 Malaysia says not sure which way jet was headed
More than four days after a Malaysian jetliner went missing on route to Beijing, authorities acknowledged on Wednesday they didn’t know in which direction the plane and its 239 passengers was heading when it disappeared, vastly complicating efforts to find it.
Amid intensifying confusion and occasionally contradictory statements, the country’s civil aviation authorities and the military both said the plane may have turned back from its original route toward Vietnam, possibly as far as the Strait of Malacca on the eastern side of the country.
Authorities have not ruled out any possible cause, including mechanical failure, pilot error, sabotage or terrorism in the disappearance of the plane. The 777 is a modern aircraft with an excellent safety record, as does Malaysia Airlines.
Authorities began their search for the missing aircraft at the position it was last reported to be at over the sea between Malaysia and Vietnam. But they have also said search operations were ongoing in the Malacca strait. Scores of planes and aircraft have been scouring both locations.
The country’s air force chief, Gen. Rodzali Daud, released a statement denying remarks attributed to him in a local media report saying that military radar had managed to track the aircraft turning back from its original course, crossing the country and making it to the Malacca strait to the west of Malaysia. The Associated Press contacted a high-level military official, who confirmed the remarks.
Gen Rodzali referred to a statement he said he made March 9 in which he said the air force has “not ruled out the possibility of an air turn back” and said search and rescue efforts had been expanded to the waters around Penang Island, in the northern section of the strait.
It is possible that the radar readings are not definitive or subject to interpretation, especially if a plane is malfunctioning.
The country’s civilian aviation chief Azharuddin Abdul Rahman said he could neither confirm nor deny military’s remarks. That suggests disagreement or confusion at the highest level over where the plane is most likely to have ended up.
“There is a possibility of an air turn back. We are still investigating and looking at the radar readings,” he said Wednesday
The strait is a busy shipping lane that separates Malaysian from Indonesia’s Sumatra Island.
Adding to the confusion, Indonesia air force Col. Umar Fathur said the country had received official information from Malaysian authorities that the plane was above the South China Sea, about 10 nautical miles from Kota Bharu, Malaysia, when it turned back toward the strait and then disappeared. That would place its last confirmed position closer to Malaysia than has previously been publicly disclosed.
Fathur said Malaysia authorities have determined four blocks to be searched in the strait, which Indonesia was assisting in.
Vietnamese military authorities said they were searching for the plane on land sea.
Lt. Gen. Vo Van Tuan, deputy chief of staff of Vietnamese People’s Army, said there were 22 aircraft and 31 ships from Vietnam and other countries involved in the hunt in its area of responsibility.
Flight MH370 took off from Kuala Lumpur at 12-41 a.m. on Saturday, bound for Beijing. Authorities initially said its last contact with ground controllers was less than an hour into the flight at a height of 35,000 feet, when the plane was somewhere between the east coast of Malaysia and southern Vietnam.
Malaysian police chief Khalid Abu Bakar, who has been ordered to look at possible criminal aspects in the disappearance of Flight MH370, said hijacking, sabotage and issues related to the pilots’ psychological health were being considered.
An Australian TV station reported that the first officer on the missing plane, Fariq Abdul Hamid, had invited two women into the cockpit during a flight two years ago. One of the women, Jonti Roos, described the encounter on Australia’s “A Current Affair.”
Roos said she and a friend were allowed to stay in the cockpit during the entire one-hour flight on Dec. 14, 2011, from Phuket, Thailand, to Kuala Lumpur. She said the arrangement did not seem unusual to the plane’s crew.
“Throughout the entire flight, they were talking to us and they were actually smoking throughout the flight,” said Roos, who didn’t immediately reply to a message sent to her via Facebook. The second pilot on the 2011 flight was not identified
Malaysia Airlines said they took the allegations seriously.
Searching the sea from space
Five days after Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 disappeared off radar, and with the search area widening, attention is focussing on how satellites can help scan large areas of the sea.
China was the first to say this week that it had reconfigured 10 satellites to search for the missing plane.
Vietnam has used a satellite to survey the seas around Tho Chu Island, one of the possible crash areas.
The sensors on the Chinese satellites include high-resolution optical telescopes, infrared cameras, and microwave detectors, according to Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post.
One of the highest-resolution commercial satellites, the GeoEye-1, used by Google for its maps service, has a resolution of around half a metre.
However, ocean waves can make detection from space difficult.
“If the object is non-metallic, such as plastic, it would be very difficult to spot with radar,” Professor Xie Tao at Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology told the newspaper.
Military satellites with more sophisticated equipment have also been involved in the search, the report said.
Analysing the satellite images is another challenge.
US satellite company DigitalGlobe has uploaded satellite images of over 3,200 square kilometres of the South China Sea and Gulf of Thailand to its crowdsourcing website Tomnod.
It asks users to scan the images and tag anything that could be wreckage, a life raft, or oil.
Some have questioned however whether the satellite search effort has come too late.
Dr Chi Tianhe, a satellite imaging researcher who took part in the Chinese search, told the South China Morning Post that a lack of staff monitoring data around the clock, and poor coordination with international agencies had reduced the chances of success.
In the days since the plane went missing, any debris is likely to have floated far from the crash site, experts say, also meaning that the most likely period for finding something from MH370 may have passed.
 Ukraine president Oleksander Turchynov refuses to bow to 'Kremlin scenario' in Crimea
Ukraine refuses to follow "a scenario written by the Kremlin" but will not intervene militarily in Crimea, acting president Oleksander Turchynov has told the AFP news agency, as his country sank deeper into crisis.
With the strategic Black Sea peninsula threatening to secede from Ukraine, Turchynov said Kiev would not launch a military operation in the southeastern region, where Russian-backed forces have seized de facto control, because it would risk exposing its eastern border.
The president, who came to power last month after violent protests brought down the previous pro-Moscow government, also condemned an forthcoming referendum in Crimea as a "sham", the results of which will be fixed in Moscow.
"We cannot launch a military operation in Crimea, as we would expose the eastern border (close to Russia) and Ukraine would not be protected," Turchynov said as the worst East-West crisis since the Cold War continued to escalate.
"Significant tank units are massed near Ukraine's eastern border," he added, referring to Russian forces.
"They're provoking us to have a pretext to intervene on the Ukrainian mainland ... (but) we cannot follow the scenario written by the Kremlin."
The tensions have led to mass protests in parts of southern and eastern Ukraine – mostly Russian-speaking regions – with protesters storming the regional government buildings in the cities of Donetsk and Lugansk.
While he shied away from going on the offensive in Crimea, Turchynov insisted Ukraine would "not be inactive in the face of continued aggression".
"They (Russia) can attack our military units in Crimea, spread their aggression on the continent. The army will react," he vowed.
Crimea is due to hold a referendum Sunday on joining Russia, and on Tuesday, the pro-Moscow authorities in the autonomous Black Sea peninsula took the additional step of voting for full independence from Ukraine.
Turchynov however dismissed Sunday's secession vote, saying: "It's a sham, most of the people of Crimea will boycott this provocation.
"What they call the referendum will not happen in Crimea but in the offices of the Kremlin," he said.
"The Russian forces don't intend to hold a referendum, they're just going to falsify the results," he added, saying "no civilised country will recognise these results."
The referendum is being organised by Crimea's self-appointed leaders, who are not recognised by the new pro-European government in Kiev, installed following three months of protests that resulted in 100 deaths and the ouster of pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovych.
Conversely, Turchynov is not recognised by Moscow, which still sees Yanukovych as Ukraine's legitimate president.
World powers have repeatedly called for Moscow and Kiev to come together to seek a solution to the escalating crisis in Crimea, but Turchynov said Russia's leaders were refusing any dialogue with their Ukrainian counterparts.
"Unfortunately, for now Russia is rejecting a diplomatic solution to the conflict," he told AFP.
"They are refusing all contact at foreign ministry and top government level," he added, as Western powers, led by the US and Germany, continued to push for the creation of a contact group to avert full-fledged war.
With interim Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk due to meet US President Barack Obama in Washington on Wednesday, Turchynov said Kiev was counting on Western help "to stop Russian aggression".
Russia, which guaranteed Ukraine's safety in a 1994 deal along with Britain and the United States in return for Kiev giving up its nuclear weapons, now "is acting like an aggressor instead of fulfilling its duty", Turchynov said.
"The US and the European Union must force Russia to stop this military aggression and these provocations against Ukraine," he added.
He also rubbished claims that Russian-speakers in Ukraine faced discrimination as "madness". Russian President Vladimir Putin had justified Moscow's incursion into Crimea with the need to protect "Russian-speaking populations", who make up the majority there.
Turchynov, who was speaking to AFP after a meeting of the national security and defence council in Kiev, will have a brief mandate, with snap presidential elections scheduled on May 25 in which he does not plan to stand.
 Search widened as Malaysia air probe finds scant evidence of attack
nvestigators in Malaysia are voicing skepticism that the airliner that disappeared early Saturday with 239 people on board was the target of an attack, US and European government sources close to the probe said.
The fate of the Malaysian airliner that vanished about an hour into a flight to Beijing remained a mystery, as a massive air and sea search, now in its third day, failed to turn up any trace of the Boeing 777 plane.
Neither Malaysia's Special Branch, the agency leading the investigation locally, nor spy agencies in the United States and Europe have ruled out the possibility that militants may have been involved in downing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370.
But Malaysian authorities have indicated that the evidence so far does not strongly back an attack as a cause for the aircraft's disappearance, and that mechanical or pilot problems could have led to the apparent crash, the US sources said.
"There is no evidence to suggest an act of terror," said a European security source, who added that there was also "no explanation what's happened to it or where it is."
Nuclear test experts to check if plane exploded
Meanwhile, dozens of ships and aircraft from 10 countries were still scouring the seas around Malaysia and south of Vietnam as questions mounted over possible security lapses that could have led to a downing of the Boeing 777-200ER after it climbed to an altitude of 35,000 feet (10,670 meters).
Interpol confirmed on Sunday at least two passengers used stolen passports and said it was checking whether others aboard had used false identity documents.
Even so, one U.S. source said Malaysian authorities were leaning away from the theory that the plane was attacked. Their view was mostly based on electronic evidence that indicates the flight may have turned back toward the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur before disappearing.
Even that information has not been clearly confirmed, and investigators and intelligence sources say the fate of the Flight MH370 is still shrouded in mystery.
One reason was that the aircraft had failed to make automatic contact with a flight data-monitoring system after vanishing from radar screens, two people familiar with the matter said on Monday. Such contact could have helped investigators determine what happened.
The aircraft was equipped with a maintenance computer capable of talking to the ground automatically through short messages known as ACARS. "There were no signals from ACARS from the time the aircraft disappeared," a source involved in the investigations said.
Also raising doubts about the possibility of an attack, the United States extensively reviewed imagery taken by spy satellites for evidence of a mid-air explosion, but saw none, a U.S. government source said. The source described US satellite coverage of the region as thorough.
With no success so far, authorities were planning to widen the search from Tuesday, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, the head of Malaysia's Civil Aviation Authority, told reporters on Monday.
"Unfortunately we have not found anything that appears to be objects from the aircraft, let alone the aircraft," he said. "As far as we are concerned, we have to find the aircraft. We have to find a piece of the aircraft if possible."
Azharuddin said a hijacking attempt could not be ruled out as investigators explore all theories.
A senior police official told Reuters that people armed with explosives and carrying false identity papers had tried to fly out of Kuala Lumpur in the past, and that current investigations were focused on two passengers who were on the missing plane with stolen passports.
"We have stopped men with false or stolen passports and carrying explosives, who have tried to get past KLIA (airport) security and get on to a plane," he said. "There have been two or three incidents, but I will not divulge the details."
Azharuddin also said the two men with stolen passports did not look like Asians, but he did not elaborate. Airport CCTV footage showed they completed all security procedures, he said.
"We are looking at the possibility of a stolen passport syndicate," he said.
About two-thirds of the 227 passengers and 12 crew now presumed to have died aboard the plane were Chinese. The airline said other nationalities included 38 Malaysians, seven Indonesians, six Australians, five Indians, four French and three Americans.
In pictures: The mystery of the missing jet
A senior source involved in preliminary investigations in Malaysia said the failure to find any debris indicated the plane may have broken up mid-flight, which could disperse wreckage over a very wide area.
"The fact that we are unable to find any debris so far appears to indicate that the aircraft is likely to have disintegrated at around 35,000 feet," said the source.
Asked about the possibility of an explosion, the source said there was no evidence of foul play and that the aircraft could have broken up due to mechanical causes.
Still, the source said the closest parallels were the bomb explosions on board an Air India jetliner in 1985 when it was over the Atlantic Ocean and a Pan Am aircraft over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988. Both planes were cruising at around 31,000 feet at the time.
Underlining the lack of hard information about the Malaysian plane's fate, a U.S. Navy P-3 aircraft capable of covering 1,500 square miles (3,900 square km) every hour was sweeping the northern part of the Strait of Malacca, on the other side of the Malaysian peninsula from where the last contact with MH370 was made.
No distress signal was sent from the lost plane, which experts said suggested a sudden catastrophic failure or explosion, but Malaysia's air force chief said radar tracking showed it may have turned back from its scheduled route before it disappeared.
Superior safety record
The Boeing 777 has one of the best safety records of any commercial aircraft in service. Its only previous fatal crash came on July 6 last year when Asiana Airlines Flight 214 struck a seawall on landing in San Francisco, killing three people.
Timeline: Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 to Beijing missing from the radar
US planemaker Boeing declined to comment.
The passenger manifest issued by the airline included the names of two Europeans who were not on the plane. Their passports had been stolen in Thailand during the past two years.
An Interpol spokeswoman said a check of all documents used to board the plane had revealed more "suspect passports", which were being investigated.
"Whilst it is too soon to speculate about any connection between these stolen passports and the missing plane, it is clearly of great concern that any passenger was able to board an international flight using a stolen passport listed in Interpol's databases," Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble said.
A Thai travel agent who arranged the tickets for the two passengers using the stolen passports said she had booked them on the flight via Beijing because they were the cheapest tickets, the Financial Times reported.
The travel agent in the resort of Pattaya said an Iranian business contact she knew only as "Mr. Ali" had asked her to book tickets for the two men on March 1.
She had initially booked them on other airlines but those reservations expired and on March 6, Mr. Ali had asked her to book them again. She told the newspaper she did not think Mr. Ali, who paid her in cash and booked tickets with her regularly, was linked to terrorism.
 Edward Snowden warns of personal data vulnerability
AUSTIN, Texas — Edward Snowden brought no bombshells when he arrived to an excited round of applause Monday, his stubbled face relaxed as it was beamed in from across the continents for a "virtual conversation" about the vulnerability of personal data. His presence was event enough.
Public appearances by the former National Security Agency contractor and U.S. exile are rare, and this one was beamed in from an undisclosed location in Russia via several online proxies for his own security, a bit of technological cloak-and-dagger that could only add to his mystique for the three roomfuls of international tech specialists struggling to hear his words in video that was choppy and often inaudible.
His message still got through: Personal information is vulnerable not only to government prying but to growing numbers of outside infiltrators because companies have failed to adequately protect the data of their customers. His own exile after leaking to reporters secret information he had gathered while an NSA consultant has made him a central figure in that conversation, and he says he has no regrets.
"Would I do it again? Absolutely," Snowden said into the camera, in response to one of several questions submitted to him via Twitter (#AskSnowden) and screened backstage at the South by Southwest Interactive conference. "I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution. And I saw the Constitution was being violated on a massive scale."
He warned, "If we allow the NSA to continue unrestrained, every other government will accept that as a green light to do the same."
The chosen Twitter questions were notably nonconfrontational for a figure often the subject of heated debate even among supporters. One asked whether the mass surveillance was driven by privatization. Another wondered about the potential for society to "reap benefits" from the "big data." None asked about his life in Russia, or what further revelations might be coming.
The first question came from Timothy John Berners-Lee, a British scientist known as the inventor of the World Wide Web, who asked Snowden how he would create an accountability system for governance.
"We have an oversight model that could work. The problem is when the overseers are not interested in oversight," Snowden said. "The key factor is accountability."
Onstage in Austin, lawyer Ben Wizner and ACLU principal technologist Chris Soghoian conversed with Snowden as he appeared on a big screen, an image of the U.S. Constitution superimposed behind him. The three agreed that an easier means for citizens to encrypt their data was a pressing need.
"Most regular people are not going to download an obscure encryption app," Soghoian said. He also noted that "without Ed's disclosures, a lot of tech companies would not have improved cybersecurity."
Snowden said, "We need to think of encryption not as a dark art," and warned that the NSA was "setting fire to the future of the Internet. And the people in this room, you guys, are the firefighters."
For his audience, Snowden's choice of the SXSW conference to directly address his peers in data technology was easy to understand.
"You have people from every major media company, every major brand, every major agency," Ryan Kite, a director of digital strategy for Los Angeles-based marketing agency TVGla, said after Snowden's hourlong talk. "Where else would you get a message like that out there to people who actually move and control the data?
"He was insightful," Kite added. "He made me think about privacy versus functionality. He was a good predictor about what's happening. We have a choice — which path do we go down? Do we go down that path of free and easy with no liberty and complete openness to all of our data? Or do we switch and take preventative measures and secure everything?"
While not as excited a crowd as that gathered this week to hear Lena Dunham's keynote speech at the SXSW Film conference — that line was much longer — Snowden's audience was a nearly full house of 3,000. Tech registrants steadily entered the hall to hushed electronic music. In front of the stage, an artist drew a running comic on the issues being discussed.
Hans Meier, a teacher of interactive design at Oslo School of Architecture and Design in Norway, said Snowden seemed "like a sympathetic person. Maybe not as a leader. What he's done is such a breakthrough thing, and he's got so many enemies, so for him there will always be this buzz whenever he comes on. But he's broken ground for a lot of other people to speak out. He's made these companies actually tighten up the security."
Snowden has kept a low profile of late — he faces felony charges of espionage and theft of government property — and has said he won't return until the United States changes its whistle-blower protection laws.
Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. has taken a strong stand against granting amnesty to Snowden, saying he caused harm to national security and should be held accountable. Holder has described him as a defendant, not a whistle-blower.
Barton Gellman, a Washington Post reporter who has worked with Snowden, released a video of his own ahead of Snowden's appearance. He said Snowden wanted to speak with "the people who are building and creating the next generation of the Internet" because "technologists" are "a group he wants to influence."
"He's looking for places where there can be reform" to "practices that he regards as overbroad and overly intrusive," Gellman said.
 Vietnam probes possible debris from missing Malaysia plane
Vietnamese navy planes have spotted what could be fragments from the missing Malaysia Airlines jet that disappeared almost two days ago.
Officials said it was too dark to be certain the objects were from Flight MH370, which had 239 people on board.
A multinational team is searching for wreckage and ships will try to confirm the find after dawn.
Investigators are also checking CCTV footage of two passengers who were travelling on stolen passports.
Malaysian military officials said on Sunday that the plane may have turned back from its scheduled route shortly before vanishing from radar screens, further deepening the mystery surrounding its fate.
Relatives of the missing passengers have been told to prepare for the worst.
Contact lost
Flight MH730 left Kuala Lumpur, bound for Beijing, at 00:41 local time on Saturday (16:41 GMT on Friday). But radio contact was lost at 17:30 GMT, somewhere between Malaysia and Vietnam.
Late on Sunday, the Vietnamese authorities said possible debris from the plane had been spotted in the sea off south Vietnam.
"We received information from a Vietnamese plane saying that they found two broken objects, which seem like those of an aircraft, located about 50 miles to the south-west of Tho Chu Island," an unnamed official from the National Committee for Search and Rescue told AFP news agency.
"As it is night they cannot fish them out for proper identification. They have located the position of the areas and flown back to the land," he added.
 Obama meet with Ukraine prime minister wednesday
President Barack Obama will meet this week with Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk at the White House in a prominent show of U.S. support for Ukraine's fledgling new government.
Vice President Joe Biden cut short his trip to Latin America, nixing a planned stop in the Dominican Republic so he can attend Wednesday's meeting, an aide to Biden said.
Biden had been the White House's prime point of contact with Ukraine's president, Viktor Yanukovich, before he fled to Russia last month following violent clashes in Kiev.
Obama's White House meeting with Yatsenyuk will focus on options to peacefully resolve Russia's military intervention in the Ukrainian region of Crimea, the White House said, adding that the resolution must respect Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity.
By inviting Yatsenyuk, whose government Russian President Vladimir Putin alleged took power by way of an unconstitutional coup, the U.S. is also sending a clear signal to Moscow that the U.S. considers Yatsenyuk to be Ukraine's legitimate leader — at least for the time being.
'What we've seen is the president mobilizing the international community in support of Ukraine to isolate Russia for its actions in Ukraine, and to reassure our allies and partners,' said Tony Blinken, Obama's deputy national security adviser, as he announced the meeting Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press.
The announcement came as the Kremlin was beefing up its military presence in Crimea ahead of a planned March 16 referendum on whether Crimea should break way from Ukraine and join Russia.
Putin defended the separatist drive as in keeping with international law, but Yatsenyuk vowed not to relinquish 'a single centimeter' of his country's territory.
Obama has warned that the vote would violate international law.
Biden, who was traveling Sunday to Chile to attend the swearing-in of the country's new president, had been expected to travel later in the week to the Dominican Republican to meet with President Danilo Medina.
But Biden has canceled that stop and will return to Washington on Tuesday, in time for Obama's meeting with Yatsenyuk on Wednesday, the vice president's office said.
The White House said Biden planned to reschedule his trip to the Dominican Republic.
Vacationing with his family over the weekend in Key Largo, Fla., Obama on Saturday spoke individually with British Prime Minister David Cameron, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and French President Francois Hollande, and collectively with the presidents of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
 Ukraine crisis: Russia warns US against 'hasty' sanctions
Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has warned the US not to take "hasty and reckless steps" in response to the crisis in Ukraine's Crimea region.
In a phone call with his US counterpart John Kerry, Mr Lavrov said imposing sanctions on Moscow would harm the US.
Pro-Russian troops have been in control of Crimea for the last week.
Earlier, a stand-off involving pro-Russian soldiers at a Ukrainian military base outside Sevastopol reportedly ended without incident.
Crimea's parliament announced on Thursday it would hold a referendum on 16 March on whether to join Russia or remain part of Ukraine.
Russia's parliament has promised to support Crimea if it chooses to become part of Russia.
The vote has been denounced as "illegitimate" by the interim government in Kiev, which took power after President Viktor Yanukovych fled to Russia last month in the wake of mass protests against his government and deadly clashes with security forces.
In their telephone conversation on Friday, Mr Lavrov warned Mr Kerry against taking "hasty and unthought-through steps capable of causing harm to Russian-US relations", Russia's foreign ministry reports.
Mr Lavrov said imposing sanctions on Russia in response to its involvement in Ukraine "will inevitably have a boomerang effect against the US itself".
The US State Department said Mr Kerry had "underscored the importance of finding a constructive way to resolve the situation diplomatically, which would address the interests of the people of Ukraine, Russia and the international community".
"Secretary Kerry and Foreign Minister Lavrov agreed to continue to consult in the days ahead on the way forward," said the US statement.
Members of pro-Russian armed units stand in front of the local parliament in the Crimean capital of Simferopol 7 March 2014.
Pro-Russian troops have been blockading key installations in Crimea for a number of days
People, including a woman waving Crimean flags, attend an outdoor performance of Russian Crimean folk music on 7 March 2014 in Simferopol, Ukraine
The majority Russian-speaking Crimea region is of political and strategic significance to both Russia and Ukraine
On Friday evening, the Interfax-Ukraine news agency cited Ukraine's defence ministry as saying a lorry had rammed open the gates of the missile defence base A2355 outside the Crimean city of Sevastopol and that about 20 "attackers" had entered, throwing stun grenades.
The Ukrainian troops barricaded themselves inside a building and their commander began negotiations before any shots were fired, it added.
The BBC's Christian Fraser, who visited the scene, said the gates did not appear to have been driven through, and there was no sign that the base had been seized.
There were two military lorries with Russian number plates outside the gates, surrounded by irregular soldiers and a very hostile crowd of pro-Russian demonstrators, our correspondent adds.
Two journalists who attempted to take photographs were beaten badly.
Later, a Ukrainian officer told a Daily Telegraph journalist that the stand-off had ended after the "talks", and that the Russian lorries and about 30 to 60 Russians troops had withdrawn. No shots are believed to have been fired.
 International Women's Day marked with Google Doodle
Celebration: The doodle created to mark International Women's Day
Google has created a doodle to celebrate International Women's Day.
The American internet giant has devised one of its iconic moving illustrations to mark the event, which has been observed since the early 1900s.
The doodle features 27 female chromosomes and a video of women from around the world including education rights campaigner Malala Yousafzai and British charity worker Camila Batmanghelidjh.
The President of Lithuania, Dalia Grybauskait, also makes an appearance.
The video is accompanied with a soundtrack from the Belgian-Congolese vocal group Zap Mama.
 UPDATE 6-Obama warns on Crimea, orders sanctions over Russian moves in Ukraine
(Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Thursday ordered sanctions on people responsible for Moscow's military intervention in Ukraine's Crimea Peninsula, including travel bans and freezing of their U.S. assets, and said a referendum by the region to join Russia would violate international law.
U.S. officials said a list of people targeted by the sanctions had not yet been drawn up but that Russian President Vladimir Putin was not going to be one of them. White House spokesman Jay Carney said he was not aware of a limit on the number of people listed.
Obama spoke to Putin for an hour on Thursday and said the situation could be solved diplomatically in a way that addressed the interests of Russia, Ukraine and the international community, the White House said.
It said Obama spoke later with Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the two men agreed Russia's actions were a "threat to international peace and security."
Separately, the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bill backing loan guarantees for the new government in Kiev. The U.S. Senate is expected to consider a similar bill backing $1 billion in loan guarantees next week.
Obama signed an executive order aimed at punishing those Russians and Ukrainians responsible for the Russian military incursion into Crimea, which has triggered the worst crisis in U.S.-Russian relations since the end of the Cold War.
Escalating the crisis, Crimea's parliament on Thursday voted to join Russia and its Moscow-backed government set a referendum on the decision in 10 days.
Obama, appearing in the White House press room hours after signing the order, said the U.S. sanctions were meant to impose costs on Russia for its actions. He said the international community was acting together and warned that a referendum in Crimea would violate international law as well as the Ukrainian constitution.
"Any discussion about the future of Ukraine must include the legitimate government of Ukraine," Obama said. "In 2014, we are well beyond the days when borders can be redrawn over the heads of democratic leaders."
Obama and administration officials emphasized that the U.S. sanctions could be adjusted or additional steps taken as Russian behavior changed.
"While we take these steps, I want to be clear that there is also a way to resolve this crisis that respects the interests of the Russian Federation, as well as the Ukrainian people," the president said, calling for international monitors to be allowed into Ukraine as well as direct talks between Moscow and Kiev.
"Russia would maintain its (military) basing rights in Crimea, provided that it abides by its agreements and respects Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. And the world should support the people of Ukraine as they move to elections in May," he said, calling that the "path to de-escalation."
Obama made the same argument in his call with Putin.
"President Obama emphasized that Russia's actions are in violation of Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity, which has led us to take several steps in response, in coordination with our European partners," the White House said in a description of the call.
FLEXIBLE TOOL, ROOM FOR DIALOGUE
The White House called the order a "flexible tool" aimed at those directly involved in destabilizing Ukraine, noting that additional steps could be taken if necessary. Any Russian actions in eastern Ukraine would be a potential reason for further measures, a senior U.S. official said.
The State Department is also putting visa bans in place on a number of officials and individuals responsible for, or complicit in, threatening the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.
But Putin is not one of those to be singled out, a senior administration official said.
"It is an unusual and extraordinary circumstance to sanction a head of state, and we would not begin our designations by doing so," the official said.
The Crimean Peninsula in the Black Sea has an ethnic Russian majority and is home to a Russian naval base in Sevastopol.
Obama is attempting to rally global opinion against the Russian move, which Putin says was aimed at protecting ethnic Russians in Crimea. The intervention followed the ouster of Ukraine's pro-Russian president last month.
Several hundred chanting demonstrators, many waving blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flags, gathered outside the White House on Thursday to protest Russia's intervention in Crimea.
They carried signs that read: "Putin Sucks," and "Putin is a war criminal," and chanted: "Russia, hands off Ukraine!" and in Ukrainian: "Glory to Ukraine, glory to the heroes of Ukraine!"
The United States wants Russian troops to return to their bases in Crimea and for Moscow to allow international monitors into the region to ensure the human rights of ethnic Russians there are protected.
Obama's order was announced as U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry began a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Rome. Kerry noted that the sanctions were designed to allow talks to go forward.
"We want to be able to continue the intense discussions with both sides in order to try to normalize and end this crisis," he said. "We will absolutely consider if we have to take additional steps beyond what we've done, but our preference ... is to emphasize the possibilities for the dialogue that can lead to the normalization and defusing of this crisis."
The Obama order targets any assets held in the United States by "individuals and entities" responsible for the Russian military intervention in Ukraine, threatening its territorial integrity or seeking to assert governmental authority over any part of Ukraine without authorization from the government in Kiev.
 Venezuela expels Panama ambassador over 'conspiracy'
Venezuela has expelled Panama's ambassador and three other diplomats amid growing tensions over opposition protests.
The officials were given 48 hours to leave the country.
It comes a day after Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro broke diplomatic relations and froze economic ties with Panama.
At least 20 people have died in anti-government protests in Venezuela in the last month.
Mr Maduro has accused Panama of conspiring to bring down his government.
The latest fallout comes after the Central American nation requested a meeting at the Organization of American States (OAS) to discuss Venezuela's crisis.
"There are moves by the United States government in accord with a lackey government of a right-wing president which has been creating the conditions for the OAS and other bodies to step towards an intervention in our country," Mr Maduro said earlier this week.
Barricades
Four diplomats working at Panama's embassy, including ambassador Pedro Pereira, were declared "persona non grata" on Thursday, according to Panama's Deputy Foreign Minister Mayra Arosemena.
Venezuelan Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said Venezuela also had suspended debt negotiations over $1bn (£600,000) owed to Panamanian exporters, according to reports.
Meanwhile a member of Venezuela's National Guard and a motorcyclist became the latest victims of the unrest in the country on Thursday.
The pair were shot dead during clashes that broke out when a group of men of motorcycles tried to clear opposition barricades in a street in Caracas.
Anti-government protesters run from tear gas during clashes with police at Altamira square in Caracas 6 March 2014.
The unrest has continued in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas
The opposition accuses the government of using armed civilian groups on motorcycles to break up demonstrations.
Thousands of government supporters and troops took part in a huge parade through the centre of the capital, commemorating the first anniversary of former President Hugo Chavez's death on 5 March.
In other parts of the city, anti-government protesters kept up their barricades, despite an appeal made by opposition leaders to "respect" the anniversary.
Venezuelans have long been complaining about high levels of crime, record inflation and shortages of some staple items.
But in the last three weeks marches initially started by disgruntled students in the western states of Tachira and Merida spread to other areas and gained support.
Panama said it was "astonished" by Venezuela's decision to break diplomatic relations and called Mr Maduro's words "unacceptable".
 Ukraine crisis: US and Russia to hold key talks
US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov are due to hold crucial talks to try to ease tensions over the Ukraine crisis.
The US accuses Moscow of deploying troops in Ukraine's Crimea region, describing it as an "act of aggression" - a claim denied by the Kremlin.
Despite the sharp differences, both sides have hinted they would prefer to start a dialogue.
Moscow remains in de facto control of Ukraine's southern autonomous region.
The tense stand-off continued overnight in Crimea, but there were no reports of any violence.
Earlier this week tensions escalated further over Russia's warnings that it could also move into eastern Ukraine to protect Russians and Russian-speakers there.
The move has triggered wide condemnation across the globe.
In other developments:
Nato and Russia will hold talks in Brussels. Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen earlier said Russia continued to "violate Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity"
EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton will travel to Kiev for talks with the new government
Russia said it successfully tested an intercontinental ballistic missile on Tuesday
 China targets 7.5% GDP growth for 2014
China on Tuesday targeted a modest 7.5 per cent GDP growth in 2014, unchanged from last year, as the government looks to steer the economy onto a more sustainable and balanced path.
The new target was announced in the first work report by Premier Li Keqiang at the annual session of the National People’s Congress.
Comprising about 3000 deputies, the NPC began its eight-day session in the backdrop of last Saturday’s horrific knife attacks by a group of militants from Xinjiang at Kunming railway station in which 33 people were killed and 143 injured in what the official media called as China’s 9/11.
The NPC session began by silent tribute to the victims of the Kunming attack.
Presenting his first work report after completing one year in the office, Mr. Li set this year’s economic growth target at 7.5 per cent, the same as last year’s target and slightly lower than the 7.7 per cent actual growth in 2013.
Other key economic goals, such as consumer price index and unemployment rate, remain generally the same as those of last year.
Mr. Li said the reform will focus on the most wanted areas, the most pressing problems and the sections having the biggest consensus.
China faces great challenges and complex problems in pushing forward economic and social development, he said.
“The foundation for sustaining steady economic growth is not yet firm, and the internal impetus driving growth needs to be increased,” Mr. Li said.
The world economic recovery still faces instability and uncertainties, as macro-policy adjustments made by some countries introduce new variables and emerging economies are facing new difficulties and challenges, he said.
Domestically, Mr. Li cited risks from public finance and banking; overcapacity, difficulties in exercising macro-controls and increasing agricultural output and rural incomes, as major challenges.
Deep-seated problems are surfacing while painful adjustments need to be made, he said.
“The pace of economic growth is changing and downward pressure on the economy remains great,” he said.
China, however, is able to maintain a moderate and even high economic growth for some time to come as industrialisation and urbanisation are continuing and there is considerable potential for regional development, he said.
Tasks of tackling air, water and soil pollution, as well as conserving energy and reducing emissions remain arduous, Mr. Li said adding that there were major structural problems constraining employment, Mr. Li said.
Other problems include public dissatisfaction in housing, food and drug safety, medical services, old-age services, education, income distribution, land expropriation and resettlement, public order, frequent industrial accidents and the social credibility system, Mr. Li said.
Some government employees are prone to corruption and some still do not perform their duties with integrity and diligence, he said.
Mr. Li said China will speed up the development of mixed-ownership economy by letting non-state capital into more state projects, including those in oil, railways and telecoms.
“We will formulate measures for non-state capital to participate in investment projects of central government enterprises,” he said.
Non-state capital will be allowed to participate in a number of projects in areas such as banking, oil, electricity, railway, telecommunications, resources development and public utilities, he said, according to the report.
The government pledged to reform the railway investment and financing system, and to open competitive operations in more areas to encourage full participation of private capital.
The government also announced some reform moves targeted at the country’s state-owned enterprises.
“We will improve the system for managing state-owned assets, clearly define the functions of different SOEs, and carry out trials of investing state capital in corporate operations,” Mr. Li said.
A reform master plan released after a key plenum of the Communist Party of China in 2012 pledged to let market play a decisive role and recognised the private sector’s role in fostering growth and creating jobs.
The document said China shall actively develop a mixed ownership economy, allowing more SOEs and other firms to develop into mixed-ownership companies.
China’s top oil refiner Sinopec announced in mid-February that it would bring in social and private capital to jointly market and sell its oil products, the first opening up of the largely monopolised sector.
 Analysis: Putting it all on Netanyahu’s shoulders
The first words out of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s mouth when he landed in Washington late Sunday evening were pretty innocuous.
“The tango in the Middle East needs at least three,” he said, using this particular dance metaphor for the umpteenth time.
Taken on their own, these words were unremarkable; rather bland stuff. But they cannot be taken on their own.
No, they must be seen in the context of the interview US President Barack Obama gave Bloomberg’s Jeffrey Goldberg that was published as Netanyahu was flying somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean on his way to Washington.
In that interview Obama seemed to place the entire onus of responsibility for making a deal with the Palestinians on Netanyahu’s shoulders. In this construct, if Netanyahu would just make the tough decisions, then peace would flow through the region like the Jordan River in the middle of a rainy winter.
In looking at the situation, Obama cited some homespun wisdom imparted to him by his mother: “If there’s something you know you have to do, even if it’s difficult or unpleasant, you might as well just go ahead and do it, because waiting isn’t going to help. When I have a conversation with Bibi, that’s the essence of my conversation: If not now, when? And if not you, Mr. Prime Minister, then who? How does this get resolved?” To which Netanyahu, when he landed, essentially replied, “Mr. President, it takes three to dance. We’re there; are the Palestinians?” What was striking about Obama’s construct was that it appeared just a few hours after US Secretary of State John Kerry made a point, in an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press, to stress that there are indeed expectations of the Palestinians.
Asked whether Monday’s meeting with Obama was Netanyahu’s moment of truth, whether he has “to act for the peace process to be successful,” Kerry responded – in stark contrast to Obama’s theme – that “everybody has to act.”
“This isn’t just a question or a series of questions for Prime Minister Netanyahu,” Kerry said. “He’s been very courageous and he’s made tough decisions with respect to entering into these negotiations and some of the things that he’s indicated he’s willing to do in the negotiations. It’s also up to [Palestinian Authority] President [Mahmoud] Abbas. The Palestinians need to decide whether or not they’re prepared to compromise, whether or not they’re willing to do some of the things necessary. This is not a burden exclusive to one party or the other.”
While Obama said that Kerry briefed him almost every week on the Middle East process, apparently one briefing point that he missed – or did not accept – was that it is not all up to Netanyahu, and that whether this current stab at an agreement has any more chance of success than previous tries depends not only on what Netanyahu is willing to give, but also – to the same degree – on what Abbas is willing to give.
Netanyahu was not the only one who read with great interest Obama’s interview, and responded to it immediately.
So did Abbas.
Abbas had to like what he heard, especially about the settlements and the likelihood of international pressure on Israel if the process falls apart.
“If you see no peace deal and continued aggressive settlement construction – and we have seen more aggressive settlement construction over the last couple years than we’ve seen in a very long time – if Palestinians come to believe that the possibility of a contiguous sovereign Palestinian state is no longer within reach, then our ability to manage the international fallout is going to be limited,” Obama said.
“In today’s world,” he continued, “where power is much more diffuse, where the threats that any state or peoples face can come from non-state actors and asymmetrical threats, and where international cooperation is needed in order to deal with those threats, the absence of international goodwill makes you less safe. The condemnation of the international community can translate into a lack of cooperation when it comes to key security interests. It means reduced influence for us, the United States, in issues that are of interest to Israel. It’s survivable, but it is not preferable.”
Obama, in his first meeting with Netanyahu in the Oval Office in May 2009, made settlements the issue and called for a settlement freeze. The Palestinians, who until that point had never made a total settlement freeze – including in areas beyond the Green Line in Jerusalem – a condition for negotiations, heard Obama and pounced. If this was what the American president was saying, how could they ask for anything less? This essentially killed negotiations for four years.
Now, again, Obama struck the settlement chord, and not only did he hit it, but he coupled this with hints of serious trouble for Israel in the international arena – in international organizations – if Israel does not concede this point.
Abbas got the message, and it didn’t take him 12 hours before he pounced, telling Meretz head Zehava Gal-On, with whom he met in Ramallah, “If the American framework does not resolve fundamental principles on core issues, we will not permit extending the talks, and we will turn to international organizations.”
He also heard what Obama said about the settlements, throwing into the mix new conditions for extending negotiations after Kerry presents a framework agreement.
“The only way we would agree to extend the talks would be if Netanyahu declares a settlement freeze and agrees to free more prisoners beyond the next round, including women, young people, and administrative detainees,” he said.
Obama’s interview, as Goldberg said in a Channel 2 interview Monday night, might have been aimed at showing the Palestinians, who believe Kerry is giving too much to Israel in the framework document, that he is willing to pressure Israel.
Abbas is coming to Washington next week for his own talks with Obama. What will be telling is whether that meeting will be preceded by another Obama interview, only this time one in which Obama publicly takes Abbas to task over issues such as incitement and refusal to recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.
What will be telling is whether in that interview Obama will say, “When I have a conversation with Abu Mazen, that’s the essence of my conversation: If not now, when? And if not you, Mr. President, then who? How does this get resolved?
 Putin Might Face G-8 Boycott as Obama Warns on Ukraine
Pretoria, South Africa -- The drama in the murder trial of South Africa's one-time golden boy Oscar Pistorius promises to be as intense Tuesday as it was on its opening day.
The trial started Monday with riveting testimony about a woman's terrified screams followed by gunshots.
The first witness in the hotly anticipated case testified to having been awakened by the screaming on the night that Pistorius shot and killed his girlfriend, model Reeva Steenkamp, last year.
"Something terrible was happening at that house," neighbor Michelle Burger testified, calling the shouts and screams "petrifying."
Pistorius admits he killed Steenkamp but pleaded not guilty on Monday, saying that he believed he was shooting a burglar in the early hours of Valentine's Day last year. He only realized after firing four shots that his girlfriend was not in bed but in the bathroom he was firing at, his defense team said on his behalf Monday.
The case has fascinated South Africa and much of the world, with its high-profile defendant, the double-amputee track star so talented that he competed not only in the Paralympics but against able-bodied runners in the Olympics two years ago.
 Putin Might Face G-8 Boycott as Obama Warns on Ukraine
President Barack Obama warned that Russia would face “costs” if it intervenes in Ukraine, and an American official said the U.S. was consulting with European allies on boycotting a planned G-8 meeting in Russia in June.
“We are now deeply concerned about reports of military movements taken by the Russian Federation inside of Ukraine,” Obama said at the White House yesterday. “The United States will stand with the international community in affirming there will be costs” for violating Ukraine’s sovereignty.
The U.S. and allies may find it difficult to attend the Group of Eight meeting in Sochi, Russia, in June if Russia violates its commitments to a sovereign Ukraine, according to an Obama administration official who asked for anonymity to describe the discussions. Russia’s desire for improved trade and commercial ties may also be put at risk, the official said.
Obama decided to speak publicly after U.S. intelligence confirmed that a number of Russian troops had entered Ukraine in vehicles, transport planes and helicopters without the permission of the country’s new interim government, said two U.S. officials briefed on the matter. Both requested anonymity to discuss classified reports.
The officials said the Russian forces’ mission, at least initially, appeared to be securing airfields near the region’s capital of Simferopol and reinforcing a small contingent of Russian marines stationed at the home base of the Russian Black Sea fleet in Sevastopol.
Escalate Crisis
While they declined to discuss the nature, number or weaponry of the Russian forces, the officials said two concerns are that the airfields might be used to bring additional Russian forces into Crimea and that resistance from Ukrainian forces or civilian protesters could cause the crisis to escalate.
The president, who spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin for more than an hour last week, didn’t confirm in his White House appearance statements by Ukrainian officials who accused Russia of invading the southern Crimea region, where unidentified gunmen seized airports, government buildings and other facilities.
“Right now the situation remains very fluid,” Obama said, adding that Vice President Joe Biden spoke yesterday with the new Ukrainian prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk.
Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Nations, Yuriy Sergeyev, said in New York that Russia illegally flew military transport aircraft and helicopters across Ukrainian borders.
No Questions
Obama didn’t say what the U.S. might do if Russia moved its military into Ukraine, and he took no questions after making his statement.
Russia’s ambassador to the UN, Vitaly Churkin, speaking yesterday in New York, said he had no information on his country’s military presence in Crimea.
Senator Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican, said Russia committed, along with the U.S. and the U.K., to honor Ukraine’s sovereignty under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum.
“Russia, which has begun to experience the benefits of expanded trade with World Trade Organization accession, should think long and hard about honoring their treaty obligations and fostering the stability that creates prosperity for its citizens,” he said.
 Anti-government protests continue in Venezuela
Scattered barricades blocked streets in some Caracas neighbourhoods on Friday even while life went on as usual in others as a political standoff persisted through the second day of national holidays.
In spite of the long weekend heading into three days of Carnaval, student-led demonstrations have so far maintained a street presence, not just in the capital, but also in cities including Valencia, Merida and San Cristobal.
In that context President Nicolas Maduro forged ahead with a new round of televised peace meetings on Friday. He announced his intention to establish similar conferences in all states. Absent were members of the opposition, who refuse to open a dialogue until Mr. Maduro releases protesters from jail and stops harsh crackdowns on protests.
“I believe the country would win if we see each other face to face and talk,” Mr. Maduro said. He also announced that national guardsman Giovanny Jose Hernandez Pantoja died on Friday after being shot in the eye while he and others removed debris from a street in Valencia.
But that appears unlikely to happen with one opposition leader in jail and an arrest order out for another.
About two weeks of student-led protests mostly in middle-class neighbourhoods have left 18 dead. Venezuelans face inflation that hit 56 per cent last year, scarcity of basic necessities and runaway violent crime.
At a human rights demonstration in a well-off part of east Caracas, several hundred protesters waved Venezuelan flags and held signs with the photos of those killed during demonstrations. “There’s not going to be peace until there’s justice,” said 32-year-old hairdresser Amanda Valero.
But in the massive slum of Petare life marched on normally with hundreds of street vendors pushing their wares at its central circle.
“The people of Petare are warriors, the people of Petare don’t stop for anything,” said Yuly Chacon, a 27-year-old teacher. “Those (protests) are the things of the wealthy areas.”
Mildri Villegas, a 29-year-old homemaker there, said the protests were a waste of time. “If you don’t work, you don’t eat. You have to work to survive.”
Venezuela’s chief prosecutor Luisa Ortega Dtaz announced on Friday the shooting death of a youth who was cleaning a street in Carabobo state one day earlier.
The United Nations human rights chief called on Friday for the Venezuelan government to respect peaceful assemblies and expressed concern about the use of excessive force against protesters. And U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Washington would consider its options in light of a Senate proposal to deny and revoke visas and freeze assets of Venezuelans linked to government repression.
Venezuelan authorities say they have arrested eight members of the domestic spy agency on murder charges, as well as three national guard soldiers and three police officers.
“The Venezuelan state has acted to punish, to sanction those persons who appear responsible for human rights violations,” Ortega Diaz, the chief prosecutor said.
 Ukraine crisis: Vladimir Putin's silence adds to the confusion
MOSCOW: Despite repeated vows not to interfere or intervene, President Vladimir V. Putin's Russia has now found itself more deeply ensnared than ever in Ukraine's worsening political crisis, facing appeals to support the country's ethnic Russians, provide haven for its deposed president and perhaps even undertake a military response. The question is whether he intended it that way.
Putin himself has made no public remarks on the turmoil in Ukraine since President Viktor F. Yanukovych's flight from Kiev six days ago. That coincided with the end of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, which officials here have celebrated as proof of the emergence of a new, powerful and proud Russia nearly a quarter-century after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Putin's silence has resulted in confusion over Russia's policy, even as the crisis in Ukraine has moved closer to Russia's own border and raised concerns about Ukraine's geopolitical and economic effect on Russia, which could stand to lose what it considers a place that is not only within its sphere of influence but part of its political and social identity.
For now, Putin's strategy for retaining Russia's influence in a country where the Kremlin has profound interests - from its largest foreign military base to gas pipelines that fuel its economy - remains unknown and full of risks. Even so, events are subtly forcing Moscow's hand.
Yanukovych's appeal for Russia "to secure my personal safety" - and reports that he will hold a news conference in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don on Friday have made it clear that the Kremlin has quietly provided at least tacit assistance to a humiliated leader who has been abandoned even by his own political supporters.
The seizure of the regional Parliament building in Crimea by masked gunmen vowing loyalty to Russia, and not Ukraine, has renewed fears that Putin could be provoked into a military intervention like the one in 2008 when Russian troops poured into Georgia to defend a breakaway region, South Ossetia, that it now recognizes as an independent country.
Russian officials have dismissed such fears as absurd, but at the same time, Putin ordered a surprise military exercise involving 150,000 troops on Ukraine's doorstep that was clearly intended as a palpable warning about Russia's preparedness. It prompted warnings in return from NATO and the United States that Russia should do nothing provocative and respect Ukraine's territorial integrity.
Putin has a number of options to influence affairs in Ukraine short of an armed intervention. Ukraine's economy is entwined with that of Russia, which is by far its greatest trading partner, and Ukraine's heavy industry is hugely dependent on Russian gas. And the Kremlin can inflame separatist tensions almost at will, if it so desires, destabilizing the country.
Perhaps Putin's most effective weapon though is time, sitting back and watching as the West takes ownership of an economy on the brink of collapse.
 US Vice President Joe Biden calls Ukraine PM Arseny Yatseniuk, pledges support
US Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday welcomed the formation of a new government in Ukraine in a phone call with Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk and pledged US support for reforms, the White House said.
"The vice president reassured the prime minister that the United States will offer its full support as Ukraine undertakes the reforms necessary to return to economic health, pursue reconciliation, uphold its international obligations, and seek open and constructive relationships with all its neighbors," the White House said.
 Nigeria midnight school massacre: Boko Haram kill 43 students, abduct 16 girls
Lagos: The militant outfit Boko Haram staged yet another brutal show of terror when dozens of them attacked a boarding school in Nigeria's Yobe state after midnight, shooting and burning to death at least 43 students, who were asleep in their dormitories, unmindful of the onslaught.
Besides killing 43 students, they also abducted 16 girls, reports from Nigeria said.
The school targeted by the militants - the Federal Government college of Buni Yadi – is a secondary boarding school located near Damaturu, the capital of Yobe state.
The militants numbering 50, went on an unabated killing spree, shooting at students and burning classrooms and dormitories, and also not sparing the government and private establishment, reducing them to ashes.
The militants suffered no resistance as there were no security officials to combat them.
According to the local Nigerian media reports, the attack took place within 24 hours of withdrawing the soldiers manning the check point close to the school.
Just hours before the attack, the “soldiers stationed close to the school were redeployed without any cogent reason,” a Nigerian news website the Vanguard quoted the Yobe State's Governor’s media aide, Alhaji Abdullahi Bego as saying.
The Governor of the Yobe state, Ibrahim Gaidam himself regretted the lack of security men near the school at the time of the attack.
"It is unfortunate that up to five hours when this massacre took place, there were no security agents around to stop or contain the situation," he said in a statement, according to the BBC.
Expressing his regret at the massacre, President Goodluck Jonathan paid condolences to the families of the murdered students and condemned the "heinous, brutal and mindless killing of the guiltless students by deranged terrorists and fanatics who have clearly lost all human morality and descended to bestiality".
Meanwhile, the Nigerian military in a statement assured the citizens that they will pursue the attackers and do their best to ensure their safety.
Similar attacks have been staged by the Boko Haram earlir and this is the fourth ssuch attack in last months.
Last year in September, the militant outfit had targeted the College of Agriculture in Gujba town in a similar midnight raid, killing 40 students while they were asleep.
Boko Haram, which means western education is sin, is an extremist group that plans to establish a strict Sharia establishment in the country.
 US and Britain say Ukraine is not a battleground between East and West
The United States and Britain have said Ukraine should not be a battleground between East and West and voiced support for the country after protests that ousted pro-Moscow president Viktor Yanukovych.
World powers are seeking to ease tensions over Ukraine as the interim authorities in Kiev grapple with the threat of economic collapse and separatism.
William Hague, the foreign secretary, after talks with his American counterpart John Kerry, backed Ukraine's territorial integrity, with fears the nation - which has strong links to Russia - could be torn apart.
"This is not a zero-sum game, it is not a West versus East," said Mr Kerry after the two men met at the State Department.
"This is about the people of Ukraine and Ukrainians making their choice about their future."
Mr Hague, who is planning to visit Kiev shortly, was equally emphatic, saying: "This is a country that needs financial assistance from many sources, including from Russia.
"It's not about pulling them away from Russia. It's about enabling them to make their own choices."
Ukraine will have to be "able to meet the conditions for that and it is important for economic reforms to take place," he said.
A "pervasive culture of corruption" must also be tackled for the international community to feel that it can support Ukraine.
"It is obviously not in the interests of Russia for Ukraine to face economic collapse," Mr Hague added. "It isn't in the interests of Russia for the world to turn away."
And Mr Hague urged Ukraine's interim leaders "to form an inclusive government, involve people from different parts of Ukraine including from the east and the south of Ukraine. It's important for Ukrainians to be able to make these decisions together after the terrible divisions of recent months."
"We want to send our strong support for the territorial integrity and unity of Ukraine," he added.
Mr Kerry said Washington also wanted to work with Moscow "and with everybody available, to make sure that this is peaceful from this day forward," after almost 100 people died in days of unrest that culminated in the toppling of Mr Yanukovych, a Russian ally.
Mr Kerry's former US Senate colleagues, after a classified briefing by a senior State Department official, also expressed concerns about Ukraine's territorial pressures.
"We have to be very strong about our views as to keeping the territorial integrity together," Senator Robert Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told reporters after the briefing.
Mr Menendez also said MPs could begin looking at "potential sanctions" as a way to ensure a stable transition to a new government.
Several MPs emerged from the briefing stressing that Washington needed to keep a watchful eye on Russian President Vladimir Putin's intentions regarding Ukraine.
"I'm always mindful that Russia, that Mr. Putin, has his own priorities and that could be inconsistent" with Ukraine's decision-making, which "needs to be independent of outside influence," Senator Ben Cardin told reporters.
Senator John McCain, who has openly expressed suspicion of Putin for years, warned that the Russian leader has long had his eye on Ukraine as the "crown jewel" of the former Soviet states.
"I know that Putin believes that Ukraine is part of Russia. He is committed to that," Mr McCain said.
 New Italy PM wins confidence vote, vows ‘radical change’
ROME: Prime Minister Matteo Renzi called for a "radical and immediate change" in recession-hit Italy as he outlined his new government´s reform agenda before winning a crucial confidence vote in the Senate early Tuesday.
In an energetic and impassioned speech to parliament, Italy´s youngest-ever premier reiterated plans for rapidly overhauling the tax system, jobs market and public administration in a bid to tackle the country´s ailing economy.
"If we lose this challenge the fault will be mine alone. No-one has an alibi anymore," the 39-year-old said as his fiery speech prompted jeers and insults from opposition benches.
"This is an Italy of possibilities, an Italy of fundamental change," he said, stressing the "urgency" of implementing reforms in "a rusty country... gripped by anxiety".
Renzi, who grasped power after helping oust his predecessor Enrico Letta over failures to do enough to boost a flagging economy, later won the vote of confidence, with 169 votes in favour and 139 against, according to Senate speaker Pietro Grasso.
In his speech, he pledged to review unemployment benefits, establish a guarantee fund for small companies and comprehensively reform the justice system.
He also promised to cut the tax burden by a double-digit figure within months and pay off public administration debts.
The initial reaction from investors appeared positive, with Milan´s FTSE stock market closing up 0.48 percent after Renzi´s speech.
But small business association Confartigianato wondered where the prime minister hoped to find the money for the reforms, with its head Giorgio Merletti saying "a couple of quick sums show that there is 100 billion euros ($137 billion) to find immediately".
 Ukraine crisis: Russia steps up Ukraine rhetoric
Russia has stepped up its rhetoric against Ukraine's new Western-leaning leadership as tensions rise over the ousting of President Viktor Yanukovych.
Russian PM Dmitry Medvedev said interim authorities in Kiev had conducted an "armed mutiny".
And the Russian foreign ministry said dissenters in mainly Russian-speaking regions faced suppression.
Earlier, Ukraine's interim interior minister said an arrest warrant had been issued for Mr Yanukovych.
MPs voted to remove Mr Yanukovych on Saturday. His whereabouts are unknown but he was reported to have been in the Crimean peninsula on Sunday.
Russia has already recalled its ambassador to Ukraine for consultation.
Unrest in Ukraine began in November when Mr Yanukovych rejected a landmark association and trade deal with the EU in favour of closer ties with Russia.
Mr Medvedev, quoted by Russian news agencies, suggested that Western countries that accepted Ukraine's new authorities were mistaken.
"The legitimacy of a whole number of organs of power that function there raises great doubts," he said.
"Some of our foreign, Western partners think otherwise. This is some kind of aberration of perception when people call legitimate what is essentially the result of an armed mutiny."
He added: "We do not understand what is going on there. There is a real threat to our interests and to the lives of our citizens."
Ukraine's foreign ministry quickly responded to Mr Medvedev's comments on Russian citizens in Ukraine, saying his concerns were "unfounded".
However, Russia's foreign ministry also issued a strongly worded statement saying a "forced change of power" was taking place in Ukraine and accused interim leaders of passing new laws "aimed at infringing the humanitarian rights of Russians and other ethnic minorities".
Activists are still manning barricades in Kiev
Tensions between pro- and anti-Russian demonstrators are high in Sevastopol, Crimea
"A course has been set towards suppressing dissenters in various regions of Ukraine by dictatorial, and sometimes even terrorist, means," a statement said.
 Thailand crisis: Bangkok blast toll rises to three
A young girl has died from injuries sustained in Sunday's bomb blast in Bangkok, bringing the death toll from the attack to three.
The apparent grenade blast took place near an anti-government protest site in the heart of the capital.
A woman, 59, and a four-year-old boy were confirmed dead on Sunday. Doctors said on Monday that the little boy's sister died later of brain injuries.
Twenty-two people were hurt, including a nine-year-old boy in intensive care.
Sunday's attack came hours after gunmen opened fire on an anti-government rally in eastern Thailand, killing a five-year-old girl.
Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has condemned the attacks, describing them as "terrorist acts for political gain".
UN Secretary Ban Ki-moon has also spoken out, calling for violence "from any quarter" to end immediately.
Tensions across Thailand have escalated since a wave of anti-government protests began in November.
The demonstrators want Ms Yingluck to resign to make way for an appointed interim government, but she has refused.
Last week, several people were killed in clashes that erupted in Bangkok when police began clearing sites blocked by protesters.
No group has so far said they carried out either of the weekend attacks.
But the BBC's Jonathan Head in Bangkok says it appears to be the start of retaliation by the armed wing of the so-called "red-shirt" movement that backs the governing Pheu Thai party.
Ms Yingluck heads a government that won elections in 2011 with broad support from rural areas.
In response to the protests, the prime minister called snap elections on 2 February, which her government was widely expected to win.
However, the polls were boycotted by the opposition and voting was disrupted by protesters at about 10% of polling stations, meaning by-elections are needed before a government can be formed.
Correspondents say red-shirt activists have watched with growing frustration as the protesters - who enjoy the backing of the military and powerful royalists - have been allowed to obstruct the government and sabotage the election.
On Sunday, leaders of the pro-government United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) held a rally attended by thousands of supporters.
"This fight will be harder than any other ... You must think how we can deal with [protest leader] Suthep [Thaugsuban] and those supporting him," UDD leader and Pheu Thai official Jatuporn Prompan said.
 Over 50 killed on bloody day in Afghanistan and Pakistan
It was a bloody day in Af-Pak region with Taliban insurgents killing soldiers in Afghanistan, Pakistani army pounding militants as important talks were being called off across the border, and a blast killing a score of civilians in Pakistan.
Hundreds of heavily armed Taliban insurgents killed 21 soldiers and captured seven others in a pre-dawn attack at army checkpoints in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday, officials said, making it the deadliest single incident for the Afghan army in at least a year.
The Talibans have escalated attacks in recent months as it tries to take advantage of the withdrawal of foreign troops at the end of 2014.
Afghanistan's Taliban also said it has suspended mediation with the US to exchange a captive US soldier for five senior Taliban prisoners held in US custody in Guantanamo Bay.
Across the border, Pakistani military carried out fresh air strikes early morning in Tirah Valley in Khyber Agency in the country's northwest tribal areas on the Afghan border, killing at least 20 terrorists and injuring many others, as peace talks with the Taliban remained suspended.
An improvised explosive devices making factory and huge quantities of explosives were destroyed in strikes, a military source said. The attacks came a day after the air strikes in Hangu district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in which nine terrorists were killed.
The decade-long insurgency has claimed around 40,000 lives
The military has gone on an offensive and has carried out air strikes in North Waziristan and Khyber Agency killing over 40 suspected terrorist in the last one week. The air strikes were carried out following a joint decision taken by the military and civilian leadership.
The government has been trying to engage the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan and others in peace talks to end the decade-long insurgency that has claimed about 40,000 lives.
Government negotiators have set a ceasefire as a precondition for another round of talks but spokesperson for the TTP Shahidullah Shahid has blamed Islamabad for the deadlock and asked the state to declare a ceasefire first.
Hours after the military air strikes, at least 12 people, including a child, were killed and 14 others injured in a bomb blast in northwest Pakistan's Kohat city. Inspector General of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police, Nasir Khan Durrani, said the blast appeared to have been carried out using a planted explosive device.
Durrani said that according to initial reports, five kilograms of explosives were used in the blast which were planted in a wooden crate placed on the roadside.
 China accuses US of meddling after Obama-Dalai Lama meet
China on Saturday accused the United States of meddling in its domestic affairs after President Barack Obama met the Dalai Lama at the White House, and said it is up to Washington to take steps to avoid further damaging ties.
"The US seriously interfered in China's internal affairs by allowing the Dalai's visit to the United States and arranging the meetings with US leaders," Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said in a statement.
"We urge the US to take China's concerns seriously, stop tolerance and support of anti-China separatist forces, cease interfering in China's internal affairs and immediately take measures to eliminate its baneful influence to avoid further impairment to China-US relations."
China had warned on Friday after news broke of the planned meeting that an encounter between Obama and the Dalai Lama would damage relations between Washington and Beijing, and urged the US to cancel it.
Beijing considers Tibet an integral part of its territory and regards the Dalai Lama as a separatist.
The meeting went ahead, however, with Obama on Friday offering his "strong support" for the protection of Tibetans' human rights in China.
Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Yesui late Friday in Beijing summoned the charge d'affaires at the US embassy to protest the meeting, the ministry said in a separate statement.
"China expressed strong indignation and firm opposition" to the "erroneous acts" of the US in interfering in China's internal issues, the ministry quoted Zhang as saying.
The ministry statement identified the US official by a Chinese name, but the official Xinhua news agency in an English-language report gave his name as Daniel Kritenbrink.
"Tibetan issues fall purely into the domestic affairs of China," Zhang said. "The US has no right to interfere."
The meeting with the Dalai Lama "will seriously sabotage China-US relations and surely impair the interests of the US itself," he said.
"The US must take concrete actions to win the trust of the Chinese government and its people."
The Dalai Lama has lived in exile in India since 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule.
 Ukraine president announces early polls
KIEV: President Yanukovich promised a national unity government and constitutional change to reduce his powers as well as presidential polls.
Ukraine’s President Viktor Yanukovich announced concessions to his pro-European opponents on Friday, including a plan to hold early elections, but it was unclear whether the opposition would accept such an EU-mediated deal to end a violent crisis.
Russian-backed Yanukovich, under pressure to quit from mass demonstrations in central Kiev, promised a national unity government and constitutional change to reduce his powers, as well as the presidential polls.
He made the announcement in a statement on the presidential website without waiting for a signed agreement with opposition leaders after at least 77 people were killed in the worst violence since Ukraine became independent 22 years ago.
“There are no steps that we should not take to restore peace in Ukraine,” he said. “I announce that I am initiating early elections.”
EU mediators trying to broker a compromise said the opposition was seeking last minute changes, but they still expected a deal to be signed on Friday. There were fist fights in parliament as the political tension mounted. The sprawling nation of 46 million with a shattered economy and endemic corruption is at the centre of a geopolitical tug-of-war between Russia and the European Union.
The German and Polish foreign ministers were in Kiev to promote a political compromise to end the bloodshed amid a stand-off between riot police and anti-government protesters who have occupied a central square for nearly three months.
Poland’s Radoslaw Sikorski tweeted that he and Germany’s Frank-Walter Steinmeier were going to meet representatives of the street protesters to discuss the draft agreement.
Ukraine was at a “delicate moment”, Sikorski said on his Twitter account, adding in an apparent message to opposition leaders: “All sides need to remember that compromise means getting less than 100 percent.”
A table was set up for a signing ceremony in the presidency building with nameplates for three opposition leaders.
Whether grassroots activists who want Yanukovich out now will accept such a gradual transition was uncertain.
“This is just another piece of paper. We will not leave the barricades until Yanukovich steps down. That’s all people want,” said Anton Solovyov, 28, an IT worker protesting in the central Independence Square.
Earlier, police said in a statement that anti-government militants fired on security forces near the square, scene of a three-month-old protest vigil. However, there was no confirmation of such an incident and no report of casualties.
The square, known as Maidan or “Euro-Maidan”, appeared peaceful, with thousands of demonstrators chanting anti-government slogans interspersed with patriotic singing.
Armed police briefly entered the parliament building while lawmakers were holding an emergency session but they were quickly ejected, opposition leader Arseny Yatsenyuk said.
Ukraine faces the risk of civil war or even a break-up, and rage has spread even into the parliamentary chamber. Members exchanged punches when speaker Volodymyr Rybak tried to adjourn proceedings. Opposition deputies were angered because it would mean delaying a possible vote on a resolution pressing for constitutional changes to restrict the president’s powers. The speaker left the chamber and debate continued.
 Shaky peace reigns after Ukraine rocked by protest
KIEV, Ukraine: Talks between opposition leaders and the embattled Ukrainian president continued early Friday as a shaky peace reigned in the protest camps in downtown Kiev.
President Viktor Yanukovych, who was still engaged in talks with opposition leaders and foreign officials, was "going to make concessions in order to restore peace," Interfax Ukraine quoted his spokeswoman Anna German as saying.
Support for the president appeared to be weakening, as reports said the army's deputy chief of staff, Yury Dumansky, was resigning in "disagreement with the politics of pulling the armed forces into an internal civil conflict."
Late on Thursday, the Ukrainian parliament passed a measure that would prohibit an "anti-terrorist operation" threatened by Yanukovych to restore order, and called for all interior ministry troops to return to their bases.
But it was unclear how binding the move would be, as the mechanism for carrying it out would have to be developed by the president's office and the interior ministry.
On Friday morning, several thousand protesters milled around Independence Square, known as the Maidan, which earlier this week was rocked by street battles between protesters and police that have left at least 101 dead.
No visible police forces remained on the square, and volunteers walked freely to the protest camps to donate food and other packages.
Yanukovych and the opposition protesters are locked in a battle over the identity of Ukraine, a nation of 46 million that has divided loyalties between Russia and the West. Parts of the country — mostly in its western cities — are in open revolt against Yanukovych's central government, while many in eastern Ukraine back the president and favor strong ties with Russia, their former Soviet ruler.
Protesters across the country are also upset over corruption in Ukraine, the lack of democratic rights and the country's ailing economy, which just barely avoided bankruptcy with a $15 billion aid infusion from Russia.
Despite the violence, defiant protesters seemed determined to continue their push for Yanukovych's resignation and early presidential and parliamentary elections.
"The price of freedom is too high. But Ukrainians are paying it," Viktor Danilyuk, a 30-year-old protester, said Thursday. "We have no choice. The government isn't hearing us."
Thursday was the deadliest day yet at the sprawling protest camp in Kiev. Snipers were seen shooting at protesters there, and video footage showed at least one sniper wearing a Ukraine riot police uniform.
One of the wounded, volunteer medic Olesya Zhukovskaya, sent out a brief Twitter message — "I'm dying" — after she was shot in the neck. Dr. Oleh Musiy, the medical coordinator for the protesters, said she was in serious condition after undergoing surgery.
Musiy said that at least 70 protesters were killed Thursday and over 500 were wounded in the clashes.
In addition, three policemen were killed on Thursday and 28 suffered gunshot wounds, interior ministry spokesman Serhiy Burlakov said.
A statement on the website of the health ministry said 77 people had been killed between Tuesday morning and on Friday morning.
There was no way to immediately verify any of the death tolls.
French foreign minister Laurent Fabius, along with his German and Polish counterparts, said after a five-hour meeting with Yanukovych and another with opposition leaders that they discussed new elections and a new government, but gave no details. The three resumed meeting with Yanukovych late Thursday.
"For now, there are no results," said an opposition leader, Vitali Klitschko.
Video footage on Ukrainian television showed shocking scenes on Thursday of protesters being cut down by gunfire, lying on the pavement as comrades rushed to their aid.
Protesters were also seen leading policemen, their hands held high, around the sprawling protest camp in central Kiev. The interior ministry said 67 police were captured in all. An opposition lawmaker said they were being held in Kiev's occupied city hall.
In Brussels, the 28-nation European Union decided in an emergency meeting Thursday to impose sanctions against those behind the violence in Ukraine, including a travel ban and an asset freeze against some government officials. It was unclear whether the EU would consider any of the opposition figures to also have a share of responsibility in the bloodshed.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke with Russia's President Vladimir Putin and President Barack Obama about the crisis on Thursday evening. All three leaders agreed that a political solution needs to be found as soon as possible to prevent further bloodshed.
Saying the US was outraged by the violence, Obama urged Yanukovych in a statement to withdraw his forces from downtown Kiev immediately. He also said Ukraine should respect the right of protest and that protesters must be peaceful.
The White House said US Vice-President Joe Biden spoke by telephone with Yanukovych on Thursday afternoon and made clear that the US is prepared to sanction those officials responsible for the violence.
The Kremlin issued a statement with Putin blaming radical protesters and voicing "extreme concern about the escalation of armed confrontation in Ukraine."
The Russian leader called for an immediate end to bloodshed and for steps "to stabilize the situation and stop extremist and terrorist actions." He also sent former Russian ombudsman Vladimir Lukin to Ukraine to act as a mediator.
Although the first weeks of the protests were determinedly peaceful, radical elements have become more influential as impatience with the lack of progress grows.
The interior ministry warned Kiev residents to stay indoors because of the "armed and aggressive mood of the people."
Yanukovych claimed that police were not armed and "all measures to stop bloodshed and confrontation are being taken." But the Interior Ministry later contradicted that, saying law enforcers were armed as part of an "anti-terrorist" operation.
Russia appeared increasingly frustrated with Yanukovych's inability to find a way out of the crisis.
Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said Russia will "try to do our best" to fulfill its financial obligations to Ukraine, but indicated Moscow would hold back on further bailout installments until the crisis is resolved.
"We need partners that are in good shape and a Ukrainian government that is legitimate and effective," he said.
 China calls on U.S. to scrap meeting between Obama and Dalai Lama
Hong Kong (CNN) -- China has urged U.S. President Barack Obama to call off a meeting at the White House with Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama that's scheduled to take place Friday.
Dalai Lama: China belongs to the people
"By arranging a meeting between the President and the Dalai Lama, the U.S. side will grossly interfere in the internal affairs of China, seriously violate norms governing
international relations and severely impair China-U.S. relations," Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in a statement Friday.
The White House on Thursday announced the planned meeting between Obama and the Dalai Lama, who lives in exile.
Obama has met with the Dalai Lama twice before, in February 2010 and July 2011. China responded to those meetings with similarly angry comments.
Beijing accuses the Dalai Lama of being a separatist who foments unrest in Tibet, a region it claims has been part of China since "ancient times."
The Dalai Lama, who fled to India in 1959 after a failed uprising, has long denied China's assertion that he's seeking Tibetan independence. He says he wants only enough autonomy to protect its traditional Buddhist culture.
The Obama administration says it supports the Dalai Lama's "Middle Way" approach to the political tensions over protests for Tibetan independence.
"The United States recognizes Tibet to be a part of the People's Republic of China and we do not support Tibetan independence," said National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden. "The United States strongly supports human rights and religious freedom in China."
Concerns over human rights
Over the past five years, at least 125 Tibetans have set themselves on fire, most of them fatally, to protest Chinese rule, according to Tibetan advocacy groups.
Beijing has taken a tough line on Tibetan self-immolators, their associates and other forms of protest. Tibetans have been convicted of murder in Chinese courts for "inciting"
people to set themselves on fire.
The frequency of self-immolations declined during 2013, according to the London-based advocacy group Free Tibet.
"We are concerned about continuing tensions and the deteriorating human rights situation in Tibetan areas of China," Hayden said. "We will continue to urge the Chinese government to resume dialogue with the Dalai Lama or his representatives, without preconditions, as a means to reduce tensions."
China rejects accusations of oppression, saying that under its rule, living standards have greatly improved for the Tibetan people.
Beijing has "lodged solemn representations" with the United States over the planned meeting Friday, saying "Tibet-related affairs fall entirely within the internal affairs of China which allow no foreign interference," Hua of the Chinese foreign ministry said.
A meeting between British Prime Minister David Cameron and the Dalai Lama last year cast a chill over relations between London and Beijing, delaying a visit to China by Cameron.
 Several protesters dead in new Kiev clashes
28 people have died and 287 have been hospitalized during the two days of street violence
An Associated Press reporter has seen the bodies of several protesters at the edge of the protest encampment in downtown Kiev, hours after the country’s embattled president and top opposition leaders met and called for a truce and negotiations.
A medic for the protesters, Bohdan Soloviy, says eight protesters were killed by gunfire on Thursday as demonstrators tried to take control of a building near the encampment that has becoming a focal point of protests against President Viktor Yanukovych and his decision to shun closer ties with the EU and tilt toward Moscow.
The two sides are locked in a battle over the identity of this nation of 46 million, whose loyalties are divided between Russia and the West, and parts of the country are in open revolt against the central government.
The latest bout of street violence began Tuesday when protesters attacked police lines and set fires outside parliament, accusing Yanukovych of ignoring their demands to enact constitutional reforms that would limit the president’s power a key opposition demand. Parliament, dominated by his supporters, was stalling on taking up a constitutional reform to limit presidential powers.
In a statement published early on Thursday, the Ukrainian Health Ministry said 28 people have died and 287 have been hospitalized during the two days of street violence. Protesters, who have set up a medical care facility in a downtown cathedral, say the numbers are significantly higher.
Ukrainian police said Thursday that more than 20 officers have been wounded by gunfire in the capital. A statement from the Interior Ministry on Thursday said the gunfire appeared to be coming from the national music conservatory, which is on the edge of the downtown square housing an extensive protest tent camp. It did not say when the officers were wounded, but added that they were receiving treatment on Thursday.
Also Thursday, the parliament building was evacuated because of fears protesters were preparing to storm it, said parliament spokeswoman Irina Karnelyuk.
The renewed clashes despite the declaration of truce follow days of violence, the most deadly since protests kicked off three months ago after Yanukovych shelved an association agreement with the European Union in favor of closer ties with Russia. After Yanukovych shelved the agreement with the EU, Russia announced a $15 billion bailout for Ukraine, whose economy is in tatters
The ongoing violence on the square Thursday indicates that more radical elements among the protesters may be unwilling to observe the truce and may not be mollified by the prospects of negotiations. Although the initial weeks of protests were determinedly peaceful, radicals helped drive an outburst of clashes with police in January in which at least three people died, and the day of violence on Tuesday may have radicalized many more.
Political and diplomatic maneuvering has continued, with both Moscow and the West eager to gain influence over this former Soviet republic. Three EU foreign ministers from Germany, France and Poland are in Kiev Thursday to speak with both sides before an emergency EU meeting in Brussels to consider sanctions against those responsible for the recent violence in Ukraine
President Barack Obama also stepped in to condemn the violence, warning Wednesday “there will be consequences” for Ukraine if it continues. The U.S. has raised the prospect of joining with the EU to impose sanctions against Ukraine.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, described the violence as an attempted coup and even used the phrase “brown revolution,” an allusion to the Nazi rise to power in Germany in 1933. The ministry said Russia would use “all our influence to restore peace and calm.”
Neither side had appeared willing to compromise, with the opposition insisting on Yanukovych’s resignation and an early election and the president apparently prepared to fight until the end.
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