Middle East peace deadline expires

LONDON, A US deadline for peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians has come to an end without the two side reaching any agreement, BBC reported on Monday.

Direct talks had resumed in July after a three-year hiatus but quickly became strained.

The latest round was halted last week following the main Palestinian factions announcement of a political pact.

US Secretary of State John Kerry, who brokered the talks, has meanwhile issued a statement denying he called Israel "an apartheid state".

On Monday, in comments captured in a recording of a closed-door meeting, he warned that Israel risked becoming "an apartheid state" if a two-state solution was not reached soon.

But in his statement released early on Tuesday, he said: "I do not believe, nor have I ever stated, publicly or privately, that Israel is an apartheid state or that it intends to become one."

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Tornadoes kill 26 in US

TUPELO: Tornadoes flattened homes and businesses, flipped trucks over on highways and bent telephone poles into 45-degree angles as they barreled through Alabama and Mississippi, part of a storm system that killed at least nine people in the South and brought the overall death toll from two days of severe weather in the country to at least 26.

Tens of thousands of customers were without power in Alabama, Kentucky, and Mississippi, and thousands more hunkered down in basements and shelters as The National Weather Service issued watches and warnings for more tornadoes throughout the night in Alabama.

Radar images showed a twister heading toward the city of Birmingham.

Weather satellites from space showed tumultuous clouds arcing across much of the South over the course of the day on Monday.

The system is the latest onslaught of severe weather a day after a half-mile-wide tornado carved a 130-kilometre path of destruction through the suburbs of Little Rock, Arkansas, killing at least 15. Tornadoes or severe storms also killed one person each in Oklahoma and Iowa on Sunday.

Six people died in Winston County, Mississippi, including a woman who died in the day care centre she owned in Louisville, county Coroner Scott Gregory told The Associated Press on Monday. Lousville is the county seat and home to about 6,600 people.

It was unclear if any children were in the day care at the time, said William McCully, acting spokesman for the Winston County Emergency Management Agency.

Earlier on Monday, emergency officials attending a news conference with Mississippi governor Phil Bryant said seven people had been killed statewide.

State director of health protection Jim Craig said officials were working with coroners to confirm the total. It was unclear if the deaths in Winston County were included in that tally.

One of the deaths involved a woman who was killed when her car either hydroplaned or was blown off a road during the storm in Verona, south of Tupelo, said Lee County Coroner Carolyn Gillentine Green.

In northern Alabama, the coroner's office confirmed two deaths on Monday in a twister that caused extensive damage west of the city of Athens, said Limestone county emergency director Rita White.

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Pakistan cuts PM's electricity for not paying bills

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistani government on Tuesday cut off the electricity supply to several major official buildings for non-payment of bills, including parliament, the prime minister's offices and the president's official residence.

Pakistan is blighted by rolling power cuts, caused in part by people not paying their bills, with government offices among the worst offenders.

Ordinary people struggle without electricity for 12 to 18 hours a day in the blistering heat of summer, but up to now little action has been taken against recalcitrant bureaucrats working in air-conditioned offices.

Minister for water and power Abid Sher Ali announced an "indiscriminate drive" to recover unpaid bills and warned that all offices and customers who had defaulted would be cut off.

"I have issued orders that the electricity supply to Parliament Lodges, Parliament House and President's Secretariat should be disconnected immediately for non-payment of millions of rupees of bills," he said.

The Capital Development Authority, Islamabad's civic agency which is responsible for paying government offices' bills, owes the Islamabad Electricity Supply Company (IESCO) 2.36 billion rupees ($24 million).

The President's Secretariat, which is the head of state's office and residence, owes 28 million rupees, while lawmakers' residential block, Parliament Lodges, had to pay 20 million rupees to IESCO, he added.

Power company officials said that electricity supply to more than 100 government offices had been disconnected over non-payment of bills.

Solving Pakistan's energy crisis was a key campaign pledge for Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in the runup to the 2013 general election.

But the daily power cuts, known euphemistically as "load-shedding", have already begun this year, even though there is still at least a month to go before the height of summer, when temperatures in some places top 50 degrees Celsius (120 Fahrenheit).

The disconnections were not limited to electricity. The state-run gas company also disconnected the natural gas supply to the prime minister's offices.

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Video shows S Korea ferry captain escape sinking ship

HONG KONG: South Korea's coastguard on Monday released a video showing the trouserless captain of a sinking ferry scrambling to safety as hundreds remained trapped inside — a move expected to intensify criticism of the crew over the disaster.

The 10-minute video — taken by rescue officials and aired on the YTN news channel — shows 69-year-old captain Lee Joon-seok, wearing a sweater and underpants, hastily escaping from the bridge of the tilting ship before it sank on April 16.

All 15 of the surviving crew responsible for sailing the huge ferry are in custody, facing charges including negligence and abandoning passengers.

Victims' families have bitterly criticised the official response to the disaster, saying delays in accessing the submerged ship may have robbed any survivors of their last chance to make it out alive.

The video attracted caustic online comment. "Look at the captain running out of the ship without his pants on. How pathetic. Can't believe he didn't think about all the children trapped there while he rushed so quickly to save his own life," said one user.

Prosecutors on Monday carried out a series of raids, including on a coastguard office, as part of their widening investigation into the disaster that left 300 dead or missing.

Divers trying to search the wreck of the upturned Sewol, which capsized with 476 people on board, were frustrated for a third straight day by atrocious weather and dangerous conditions.

Despite more than 60 hours of operations since Friday by divers trying to penetrate the flooded interior, only two more bodies have been recovered and 113 are still unaccounted for.

The confirmed death toll from one of the country's worst ever maritime disasters stood on Monday at 189. Most of the missing and dead were high school students.

Strong currents have also worsened fears that bodies could drift free and be scattered.

Nets have been thrown up in seas around the ferry, but no finds have yet been reported.

Park Seung-Gi, a spokesman for the government's Joint Task Force which is co-ordinating actions, vowed Monday to redouble efforts to prevent bodies getting lost at sea.

Special teams have been set up to search underwater around the sunken vessel, as well on the sea surface, nearby islands and shores, he said.

Another official said China and Japan would be asked to contact South Korea if they find any unidentified bodies on their shores.

In deeply Confucian South Korea, the proper burial of bodies — often in the deceased person's home town — is considered a way to show respect for the dead and to allow their soul to rest in peace.

South Korea remains in a state of national mourning, as furious relatives and the public at large cast around for someone to blame for one of the country's worst maritime accidents.

The video released on Monday showed the open decks of the ship nearly empty, as crew repeatedly instructed passengers to stay in their cabins until it became impossible for them to evacuate because the ship was tilting too much.

The delay in the crucial final hours 1 when most crew members fled the ferry — sparked outrage that many lives could have been saved if passengers had received timely instructions.

Prime Minister Chung Hong-Won tendered his resignation on Sunday, admitting he had not been up to the task of overseeing the official response. He was told by President Park Geun-Hye to stay in his post until the recovery has finished.

The probe into the sinking has expanded from the ferry operator, Chonghaejin Marine, and its affiliates, to state ship safety inspectors and even sea traffic controllers amid fury over lax safety oversight and delayed rescue efforts.

On Monday prosecutors raided the coastguard office in the southern port of Mokpo to probe allegations that it had failed to respond quickly enough to a passenger's emergency call.

The office received the call — reportedly from a teenage boy — a few minutes before the ship sent its first distress signal to sea traffic controllers.

During his call, the boy was bombarded with questions about the ferry's coordinates and the number of people on board.

A coastguard official later told reporters they had mistaken him for a crew member after he was transferred from another emergency call centre.

That centre in the southern province of South Jeolla is also being investigated for signs of negligence.

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Newspaper apologizes for 'world is fukt' headline

SYDNEY: The Australian financial newspaper which accidentally published a front-page headline reading "World is Fukt" apologized on Monday to its readers for the error-ridden edition.

The respected Australian Financial Review, in a message from editor in chief Michael Stutchbury, said the mistake was due to a production and printing error.

"The Australian Financial Review apologizes to Western Australian readers for the obviously unacceptable state of the newspaper's front page on Thursday," he said in an apology in Monday's newspaper.

The accidental front page quickly found fans on Twitter, who approved of the headline which read in full: "Arms buildup — Buys planes, World is Fukt".

They also enjoyed the fact that the headline for a story about a major budget speech by Treasurer Joe Hockey was empty of meaning, reading "Three lines to come here".

Using the hashtag #WorldisFukt, readers described the mistakes as a "tremendously great publishing error" and "journalism that tells it like it is".

The unusual edition, which was confined to the 16,000 or so copies printed and circulated in Western Australia, is now attracting interest on ebay, with one specimen attracting a bid of Aus $81 (US $75) — well above the edition's Aus$3.50 cover price.

Stutchbury said the bumper weekend paper beat normal quality control measures and was "an extremely bad result" in Western Australia state.

"It is an extreme one-off and we are going through our processes to make sure it does not happen again," he said in an email.

Stutchbury said an investigation was underway to determine what caused the problem for the newspaper, which is part of the Fairfax Media group.

But he said the initial assessment was that production staff in Sydney had accidentally sent a clearly unfinished version of the front page to print sites around the country.

"This error was quickly recognized and the page was recalled from all the print sites. For whatever reason, the recalling of the unfinished page did not succeed at the Perth plant."

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Syria's Assad to run for presidency again

DAMASCUS: Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has registered to run in next month's presidential vote, which is expected to return him to power despite the grinding conflict, the parliament speaker announced on Monday.

The election will be Syria's first multi-candidate presidential vote, after changes to the constitution, but it has already been criticised by the opposition and much of the international community as a "farce".

The government has not explained how it will hold the vote in a country gripped by a brutal war that has killed more than 150,000 people and left large swathes of territory beyond regime control.

Speaking at a session of parliament, speaker Mohamed al-Lahham read a letter from Assad announcing his candidacy.

"I, citizen Bashar Hafez al-Assad, wish to present my candidacy for the post of president of the republic," the document said.

A posting on the presidency's official Facebook page quoted Assad as calling on supporters of different candidates to express themselves through the ballot box.

"Those who wish to express their joy and support for any candidate for the presidency should do so in a responsible, patriotic way, first, and secondly, through the ballot box in a timely fashion," he said.

"I call on all Syrian citizens to refrain from firing in the air in joy, whatever the occasion might be, especially as Syria will be having its first election in modern history."

In Damascus, as children left school, dozens of young girls and boys chanted their approval of his candidacy, shouting "God, Bashar, and that's all".

Assad is expected to sail to victory against the six other candidates who have so far announced their runs, one of them a woman.

They are all largely unknown, except for one member of parliament, and it remains unclear how they will angle their campaigns against Assad.

Assad became president after his father Hafez died in 2000 and will be competing in the first multi-candidate elections for the post, after a constitutional amendment did away with a referendum system.

Electoral rules prevent those who have lived outside Syria for the past decade from competing, effectively ruling out participation by the opposition-in-exile.

'Parody of democracy'

With nearly half the population displaced, inside and outside the country, it is unclear how many Syrians will be able to vote.

The head of the electoral commission also said Monday that Syrians who left the country "illegally" would not be allowed to vote.

Many of the approximately three million Syrians who have fled the country did so through by being smuggled across the border into neighbouring countries, or crossing through rebel-held border posts.

The main opposition National Coalition has criticised the elections as a "farce" and Washington said the vote would be a "parody of democracy".

Elsewhere in the country, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said opposition fighters had announced they would restore electricity to regime-held parts of Aleppo city.

The western part of the city has been without power for more than a week, after the opposition cut high-tension power lines to try to pressure the regime to end aerial raids on the rebel-held east of the city.

But the Observatory, a Britain-based monitor, said Monday that a statement from the Al-Nusra Front jihadist group promised to "restore electricity to all of Aleppo to end the suffering of our people."

Earlier, the Observatory reported that regime helicopters had dropped barrel bombs on the rebel-held Masaken Hanano district of eastern Aleppo.

Rights group have decried the use of the highly destructive, improvised bombs saying they cause indiscriminate civilian casualties.

The Assad regime has increasingly employed them over rebel-held parts of Aleppo, where fighting between the government and rebels has stepped up in recent weeks.

Hundreds of people, mainly civilians, have been killed in a nearly five-month aerial offensive against Aleppo.

More than 150,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict since March 2011, according to the Observatory.

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South Africa marks 20th anniversary of democracy

JOHANNESBURG: South Africans on Sunday celebrated 20 years of democracy with song, prayer and praise for those who guided their country into a more peaceful, tolerant era, although some noted that economic inequality and other problems have undermined the nation's promise since the first all-race elections ended white rule on April 27, 1994.

The focus of the Freedom Day commemorations was in Pretoria at the Union Buildings, the century-old government offices where President Jacob Zuma and dignitaries, including foreign diplomats, gathered to reflect on the long struggle against apartheid and ensuing efforts to build a better country.

The anniversary precedes elections on May 7 that are likely to see the ruling African National Congress return to power with a smaller majority, reflecting discontent with the movement that opposed white domination before its candidate, Nelson Mandela, became South Africa's first black president.

In a speech, Zuma said South Africa had a good story to tell, referring to its stable electoral system, its constitutional commitment to human rights as well as advancements in health care, welfare grants and water and electricity in the past 20 years. Close to 3 million houses have been built since 1994, women play a far more prominent role in public life, and crime has declined, even it remains an issue of "serious concern," he said.

"We must not deny or downplay these achievements, regardless of our political differences or contestation at any given time, including the election period," said Zuma, who has been criticized because more than $20 million in state funds were spent on upgrading his private rural home. The scandal comes amid a troubling inequality between rich and poor that the government says is partly a legacy of old racial divisions, noting that the income of the average white household is six times that of a black household.

Election candidate Julius Malema, the expelled head of the ruling party's youth league and now leader of an upstart party that wants to redistribute wealth, has told supporters that events surrounding Freedom Day, which is a national holiday, are a sham because many poor South Africans still lack basic services.

"For as long as you don't have your dignity back, you have nothing to celebrate," Malema said this week, according to local media.

The mood was festive at the Pretoria ceremony, where balloons were on display and many people waved small South African flags. Women ululated and the crowd sang the national anthem, which incorporates several of South Africa's official languages in a show of unity. Some spectators wore African National Congress T-shirts, and danced the so-called "Freedom Dance," which features a raised fist associated with Mandela's show of defiance when he was freed in 1990 after 27 years in jail during apartheid.

There was a military gun salute and a fly-over by air force planes.

Messages of congratulations to South Africa for the 20th anniversary of democracy came from around the world.

"My family and I have enjoyed a special and significant relationship with South Africa over the years," Queen Elizabeth II of Britain said in a statement. "The links between our two countries have deepened and matured since South Africa's transition in 1994, and long may that continue."

Many of the messages delivered in South Africa on Sunday reflected the rough-and-tumble of an election season, rather than the lofty rhetoric surrounding the advent of democracy. The South African Press Association quoted prepared remarks from a speech by Bantu Holomisa, head of the opposition United Democratic Movement and a former member of the African National Congress.

"We cannot allow the country to slide further down this slippery slope of corruption, maladministration and ineptitude," Holomisa said.

On Thursday, deputy president Kgalema Motlanthe spoke in London about the 20th anniversary of democracy, noting the challenges that lie ahead as South Africa struggles to overcome unemployment, poverty and inequality. He said: "This celebration does not represent the end of the journey, but the beginning."

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Iran to target decoy US aircraft carrier in drills

TEHRAN: An Iranian newspaper is reporting that the country's military plans to target a mock-up American aircraft carrier during upcoming war games.

Today's report by independent Haft-e Sobh daily quotes Adm Ali Fadavi, navy chief of the powerful Revolutionary Guards as saying Iranian forces should "target the carrier in the trainings, after it is completed."

Adm Fadavi said: "We should learn about weaknesses and strengths of our enemy."

This is the first reaction by Iranian officials to a March report that said Iran is building a simple replica of the USS Nimitz in a shipyard in the southern port of Bandar Abbas. Iranian officials did not comment then but state TV said it would be used in a movie.

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4 dead in crash of Philippine cloud-seeding plane

SANTIAGO: A light plane crashed today while on a cloud-seeding flight over farmlands that have been scorched by the intense summer heat in the northern Philippines, killing all four people on board, officials said.

The plane crashed at a cornfield in a remote mountain village in Bagabag town in Nueva Vizcaya province, killing a woman and three men on board, Bagabag police chief Chevalier Iringan said.

Capt John Andrews, deputy chief of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, said an investigation was underway to determine the cause of the crash in mountainous Nueva Vizcaya, which is about 200 kilometers north of Manila.

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Saudi reports five new MERS deaths, taking toll to 92

RIYADH: The Saudi health ministry on Saturday announced five new deaths from the MERS coronavirus, taking the country's death toll to 92.

A statement released overnight added that 14 new cases of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome were detected in the kingdom, bringing the total to 313 since the virus first emerged there in September 2012.

Among the five who died were two elderly Palestinians and a Bangladeshi woman in her 40s, the statement said. The two other victims were Saudis.

Public concern over the spread of MERS mounted last week after the resignation of at least four doctors at Jeddah's King Fahd Hospital who refused to treat patients for fear of infection.

On Thursday King Abdullah visited the Red Sea city and commercial hub in a bid to reassure the public amid fears the virus had mutated to make it more transmissible from person to person.

National Guard Minister Prince Mitab said his father King Abdullah went to Jeddah "to reassure the public and to prove that the exaggerated and false rumours about coronavirus are not true."

"The MERS situation is reassuring and it has not reached the level of an epidemic," he said.

That did not stop the king from dismissing health minister Abdullah al-Rabiah on Monday without an official explanation.

Labour Minister Adel Fakieh, who has taken over as acting health minister, has promised "transparency and to promptly provide the media and society with the information needed."

The World Health Organization announced Wednesday that it had offered to send international experts to Saudi Arabia to investigate "any evolving risk" associated with the transmission pattern of the virus.

MERS is considered a deadlier but less-transmissible cousin of the SARS virus which erupted in Asia in 2003 and infected 8,273 people, nine percent of whom died.

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Afghan preliminary poll results due as run-off looms

KABUL: Afghanistan is set to announce preliminary presidential election results on Saturday, with former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah ahead in early counting but below the 50-per cent vote required to avoid a run-off.

Abdullah secured 43.8 per cent of the vote, with his main rival Ashraf Ghani on 32.9 per cent, after four-fifths of ballots were counted, according to partial results released on Thursday.

The Independent Election Commission (IEC) said a press conference to release the full preliminary results was scheduled for 6:00pm.

The final official result is set to be announced on May 14 after a period for adjudication of hundreds of complaints over alleged fraud.

If no candidate gains more than 50 per cent, a run-off between the two leading names is scheduled for May 28.

Ahmad Yusuf Nuristani, head of the IEC, has predicted that a second round vote would be likely.

Both Abdullah and Ghani, a former World Bank economist, have vowed to fight on if a run-off is required.

Another expensive and potentially violent election could be avoided by negotiations between the candidates in the coming weeks, but Abdullah has dismissed talks of a possible power-sharing deal.

"We have not talked or negotiated with anyone about forming of a coalition government," he told reporters after Thursday's batch of results.

Eight men ran in the April 5 election, with polling day hailed a success by Afghan officials and foreign allies as the Taliban failed to launch a major attack despite threats to disrupt the vote.

Serious fraud allegations are being investigated after the vote to choose a successor to President Hamid Karzai, who has ruled Afghanistan since the Islamist Taliban regime was ousted in 2001.

The 2009 election, when Karzai retained power, was marred by fraud in a chaotic process that shook confidence in the multinational effort to develop Afghanistan and also marked a sharp decline in relations with the United States.

Votes involved in alleged ballot-box stuffing and other cheating have not been counted, and Saturday's announcement is expected to be followed by fierce debate over disputed voting papers.

Preliminary results were delayed by two days due to fraud investigations, with officials vowing to sift out all suspect votes before they were counted.

Turnout from the election is set to be nearly seven million voters from an estimated electorate of 13.5 million — well above the 2009 figure.

The eventual winner will have to oversee the fight against a resilient Taliban insurgency as 51,000 US-led Nato combat troops leave Afghanistan this year.

Five Nato soldiers died on Saturday in a helicopter crash in the south of the country, officials said, adding that the cause of the incident was being investigated.

Karzai, who is constitutionally barred from serving a third term, has pledged to stay neutral in the election.

But he was widely thought to have backed former foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul, who took just 11 percent of the vote on the partial count.

Rassoul could still play a key role in power-brokering before the next president is chosen, as could former Islamist warlord Abdul Rab Rasoul Sayyaf, who collected a significant seven percent of the vote on the partial count.

All leading candidates have pledged to explore peace talks with the Taliban and sign a deal with the US that could allow 10,000 US troops to stay on after this year on a training and counter-terrorism mission.

Karzai's surprise decision to refuse to sign the bilateral security agreement last year after agreeing to the draft text plunged relations between Afghanistan and its biggest donor to a new low.

The outgoing president has had several public disagreements with Washington in recent years, underlining efforts to establish his reputation as an independent, nationalist leader despite relying on US aid and military power during his reign.

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Qaida urges kidnappings of Americans to free prisoners

DUBAI: Al-Qaida chief Ayman al-Zawahiri has called on Muslims to kidnap westerners, particularly Americans, who could then be exchanged for jailed jihadists including a blind Egyptian cleric convicted in 1995 of conspiring to attack the United Nations and other New York landmarks.

In a wide ranging audio interview, the al-Qaida leader expressed solidarity with the Muslim Brotherhood which is facing a violent crackdown by the army-backed government in Egypt and urged unity among rebels in their fight against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Reuters could not verify the authenticity of the Zawahiri tape, but the voice resembled that of the al-Qaida leader.

"I ask Allah the Glorious to help us set free Dr Omar Abdel-Rahman and the rest of the captive Muslims, and I ask Allah to help us capture from among the Americans and the westerners to enable us to exchange them for our captives," said Zawahiri, according to the SITE website monitoring service.

Abdel-Rahman is serving a life term in the United States for a 1993 attack on New York's World Trade Center.

Zawahiri also urged "jihad and overthrowing the criminal al-Assad regime" in Syria and renewed his call to end infighting among jihadists that increased this year, pitting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) against rival rebels including other hardline Islamists.

"The Ummah (Muslim world) must support this jihad with all that it can, and the mujahideen (Islamist militants) must unite around the word of Tawhid (unity)," said Zawahiri, an Egyptian-born doctor.

"So everyone should prioritize the interest of Islam and the Ummah over his organizational or partisans interest, even if he gives up for his brothers what he sees as right."

The infighting between the different rebel factions has hindered the battle against Assad and pushed rival rebel groups to consolidate power in their respective areas of control.

Al-Qaida said it was breaking with ISIL in February after disputes over the group's refusal to limit itself to fighting in Iraq rather than in Syria, where the Nusra Front is al-Qaida's affiliate.

Asked about the crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Zawahiri answered: "the duty on every Muslims is to deter the aggressor by any means, and especially the oppressed Muslims."

Security forces have killed hundreds of Brotherhood supporters and arrested thousands, including most of its leaders, since the army toppled Islamist President Mohamed Mursi on July 3 following mass protests against his rule.

Egypt designated the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization last year.

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It's official: Would save drowning Putin, Obama says

SEOUL: It's official: even though they are involved in the worst east-west clash since the Cold War, Barack Obama would save Vladimir Putin from drowning.

Obama on Friday delivered his answer to a question posed to Putin during a live television appearance earlier this month — would his US rival come to his rescue?

Putin answered by saying that though he did not have a special personal relationship with Obama he thought the US leader was "a decent and brave person."

"And of course, he would." In a rare moment of humour at an alarming moment of the Ukraine crisis, Obama confirmed he would indeed throw the Russian leader a lifeline, when questioned by a US journalist.

"I absolutely would save Mr Putin if he were drowning," Obama said. "If anybody is out there drowning, I would save them. "I used to be a pretty good swimmer, I grew up in Hawaii," Obama said, before adding with a rueful smile: "I am a little bit out of practice."

South Koreans might have been puzzled by the question — given the national mourning over the loss of a ferry packed with high school children less than two weeks ago and the grim search for bodies in the upturned vessel.

In a news conference with South Korean President Park Geun-Hye, Obama also cast his own judgement on Putin's character.

"Mr Putin is not a stupid man," Obama said, reasoning that the Russian leader had acknowledged that Western sanctions imposed as a result of Russia's annexation of Crimea were having an impact on the Russian economy.

Even before the Ukraine showdown, Putin and Obama had a difficult relationship and had endured several photo-ops after summits noted for stilted body language.

Obama once compared Putin to a "bored kid" slouching at the back of the class, and wondered whether the Kremlin chief's public persona was just a "tough guy" act and a "shtick" to impress his domestic political constituency.

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China offers rewards for tip-offs in restive Xinjiang

BEIJING: Authorities in China are offering cash rewards for everything from "violent terrorism training" to growing long beards, the latest security regulations in the Xinjiang region that critics say target Muslims.

The rewards are part of a social stability campaign in a region beset by violence that the government blames on Islamist militants and separatists who want to establish an independent state called East Turkestan in the far western region.

Uighurs are Turkic-language speaking Muslims. Many of them chafe at Chinese controls on their culture and religion.

Unrest in Xinjiang has killed more than 100 people in the past year.

Uighur exiles and many rights groups trace the cause of unrest to government policies, including curbs on Islam and the Uighur people's culture and language. The government denies those accusations.

Members of the public can earn rewards by reporting on a range of more than 50 activities, according to a notice published on a government website for Shaya county in mid-April and carried in state media this week.

Verified information regarding violations such as "violent terrorism training activities" and behaviour with "separatist aims" can earn an informant up to 50,000 yuan ($8,000).

Information on individuals "growing long beards" and "wearing bizarre clothing" can yield rewards from 50 to 500 yuan, the county government said.

"Timely reporting of social stability information can actively prevent and precisely strike at all kinds of illegal offences," it said in the notice.

Uighurs have traditionally followed a moderate form of Islam but many have begun adopting practices more commonly seen in Saudi Arabia or Pakistan, such as full-face veils for women, as China has intensified a security crackdown in recent years.

Providing information about people who "say things that are not good for ethnic unity" and who "twist facts" about a deadly July 2009 riot in the regional capital Urumqi are also worth up to 500 yuan, the county government said.

Nearly 200 people were killed in the Urumqi riot when Uighurs clashed with members of the majority ethnic Han Chinese community.

It is not the first time authorities have targeted beards and clothing such as burqas and veils.

"Restricting traditional culture, faith and lifestyles, proves the utter failure of China's local governance," Dilxat Raxit, spokesman for the main Uighur exile group, the World Uyghur Congress, said in a emailed statement this week.

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North Korean N-threats useless: Obama

SEOUL: North Korea will gain "nothing" by making threats, US President Barack Obama said on Friday, warning it of sanctions with "more bite" if it went ahead with a fourth nuclear test.

Speaking in South Korea as satellite images revealed the North could be preparing for another test, Obama stressed that Washington and Seoul stood "shoulder to shoulder" in their refusal to accept a nuclear North Korea.

Even China, the North's only major ally, was becoming alienated by its provocative behaviour, he said on the second leg of his Asian tour.

"Threats will get North Korea nothing, other than greater isolation," Obama said at a joint press conference with South Korean President Park Geun-Hye.

"China is beginning to recognise that North Korea is not just a nuisance but a significant problem for their own security," he added.

North Korea-watchers have puzzled over whether the test preparations at the Punggye-ri test site they have seen via satellite images are real, or bravado aimed at stealing the limelight during the US president's tour.

But the latest images suggested increased movement of vehicles and materials near what are believed to be the entrances to two completed test tunnels, the US-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University said on its closely followed 38 North website.

Also visible were probable command and control vehicles intended to provide secure communications between the test site and other facilities.

North Korea has conducted three nuclear tests, in 2006, 2009 and 2013. The 38 North analysis noted that preparations for the test in February last year had peaked two or three days before detonation.

Asked how the international community might react, Obama said it would be necessary to look at "additional ways" to apply pressure, including "further sanctions that have even more bite".

Obama's tough talking on what he called "the most isolated country in the world" stood in marked contrast to the warm words of sympathy he had for his hosts, still racked with grief over the 300 people dead or missing after a ferry full of schoolchildren capsized last week.

"I'm very mindful that my visit comes at a time of mourning for the people of this nation," he said ahead of talks with Park at the presidential Blue House.

"I just want to express, on the part of the American people, condolences for the incredible loss."

While a US presidential visit would normally be expected to command the lion's share of attention in South Korea, the country remains preoccupied with the misery wrought by the sinking of the ferry.

Television coverage of Obama's activities was limited, with the focus still on events in Jindo, where divers were racing against time and tide to recover the 119 bodies still believed trapped in the sunken vessel.

Bad weather was expected to close in on Saturday, hampering the effort.

Obama's four-nation tour of Asia had begun in Japan, where he offered Prime Minister Shinzo Abe assurances that the US was treaty-bound to act if China moved militarily against Japanese-controlled islands at the centre of a bitter territorial dispute.

And in Seoul on Friday he broached another regional faultline when he said Japan's wartime system of sex slavery "was a terrible, egregious violation of human rights."

"Those women were violated in ways that even in the midst of war were shocking," he said. "They deserve to be heard, they deserve to be respected. And there should be an accurate and clear account of what happened."

South Korea and other nations accuse Japan of failing sufficiently to atone for the forced recruitment of so-called "comfort women" to service its troops before and during World War II.

The issue remains a major irritant in relations between Tokyo and Seoul, and a frustration to Washington which wants its two major allies in the region to act together against North Korea and forge a united front against a rising China.

"I think (Japanese) Prime Minister (Shinzo) Abe recognises this and certainly the Japanese people recognise that the past is something that has to be recognised honestly and fairly."

After a formal dinner with Park later in the day, Obama on Saturday will visit some of the 28,500 US troops stationed in South Korea, before heading on to Malaysia and the Philippines.

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Bomb kills 4 in Pak; airstrikes hit militants

KARACHI (Pakistan): A bombing in southern Pakistan killed a police officer known for his anti-militant campaigns and three other people on Thursday while army officials said the Pakistani air force carried out airstrikes against insurgents in a northwestern tribal region, killing 16 militants.

The airstrikes pounded two militant hideouts in a remote area of Tirah Valley in the Khyber tribal region near the Afghan border, three military officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

Two officials said the military acted on intelligence that militants responsible for some of the latest terror attacks in Islamabad and elsewhere were hiding there. They said that apart from the airstrikes, ground troops were also taking part in the operation, which was still underway in Tirah Valley.

On April 9, a bomb had ripped through an outdoor fruit and vegetable market on the outskirts of Islamabad, killing 22 people and wounding dozens others.

An army officer said the strikes carried out after confirmation that terrorists involved the recent bombing in Islamabad and attacks on police and security officers in the northwest were hiding there.

In the attack in the south, a bomb aimed at officer Shafiq Tanoli exploded in downtown Karachi, said police official Pir Mohammad Shah.

The explosion in the port city appeared to be a suicide bombing, Shah said. It killed Tanoli and three other people, the officer's uncle and two friends, while two other people were wounded, Shah added.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack but Shah said Tanoli, who survived several attempts on his life in the past, was targeted for his active campaigning against terrorists. He was advised to take stringent security measures for his own safety.

Tanoli was meeting friends and relatives at a shop close to his home when the bomb went off, said another police officer, Nasir Lodhi. He added that police suspected a teenage boy had detonated the explosives tied to his body.

Pakistani government has been trying to negotiate a peace deal with the Taliban in efforts to end years of fighting that has killed thousands of people. The militants have been fighting to overthrow the government in a bid to install their harsh brand of Islamic Shariah.

The Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, announced a one-month ceasefire on March 1 and then extended it for another 10 days. But last week, they said they will not renew the ceasefire though they will still continue the talks with the government.

On Wednesday, Pakistan's Interior Minister Nisar Ali Khan again met clerics representing the Taliban in a bid to resume the dialogue process.

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Ukraine forces kill up to five rebels

SLAVIANSK (Ukraine)/ST PETERSBURG (Russia): Ukrainian forces killed up to five pro-Moscow separatists in the east of the country, the interior ministry said on Thursday, as Russian President Vladimir Putin warned of "consequences" if Kiev used the army against its own people.

Interior ministry forces backed by the army removed three checkpoints manned by armed groups in the separatist-controlled town of Slaviansk, the ministry said in a statement.

"During the armed clash up to five terrorists were eliminated," it said, adding that one person had been wounded on the side of government forces.

Under an international accord signed in Geneva last week, illegal armed groups, including the rebels occupying about a dozen public buildings in the largely Russian-speaking east, are supposed to disarm and go home.

However, the Kremlin, which has deployed tens of thousands of troops on Ukraine's border, maintains it has the right to protect Russian-speakers if they come under threat, a reason it gave for annexing the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine last month.

In St Petersburg, Putin said that if the authorities in Kiev had used the army in eastern Ukraine, this would be a very serious crime against its own people.

"It is just a punitive operation and it will of course incur consequences for the people making these decisions, including (an effect) on our interstate relations," Putin said in a televised meeting with regional media.

The Geneva agreement, signed by Russia, the United States, Ukraine and the European Union, is already in trouble as Kiev launches its offensive to regain control of the east.

East and West have put the onus on each other to ensure the accord is implemented on the ground. U.S. President Barack Obama said earlier he was poised to impose new sanctions on Moscow if it did not act fast to end the armed stand-off.

Moscow also flexed its economic muscles in its worst stand-off with the West since the Cold War, with the government suggesting foreign firms which pull out of the country may not be able to get back in, and a source at Gazprom saying the gas exporter had slapped an additional $11.4 billion bill on Kiev.

Washington accuses Moscow of fomenting unrest in the east. Russia denies this and counters that Europe and the United States are supporting an illegitimate government in Kiev.

Obama said the Russian leadership was not abiding by the spirit or the letter of the Geneva agreement so far.

"We have prepared for the possibility of applying additional sanctions," he told a news conference on a visit to Japan. "There's always the possibility that Russia, tomorrow, or the next day, reverses its course and takes a different approach."

US troops arrive in Poland

So far, the United States and EU have imposed visa bans and asset freezes on a few Russians in protest at Moscow's annexation last month of Crimea from Ukraine.

In NATO member Poland, the first group of a contingent of around 600 U.S. soldiers arrived on Wednesday. They are part of an effort by Washington to reassure eastern European allies who are worried by the build-up of Russian forces near Ukraine's borders.

Earlier on Thursday, Kiev forces with five light armoured vehicles took control of a checkpoint north of Slaviansk after separatists appeared to abandon the position, Reuters journalists said from the scene.

The government said the city hall in another eastern town, Mariupol, which had been seized by separatists, was now back under central control. Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said the mayor was back in his office.

"In this instance there were no casualties ... The process of getting the situation back to normal in the city will continue," he said in a post on his Facebook page.

Kiev also reported a shootout overnight in another part of the east when a Ukrainian soldier was wounded, while pro-Russian separatists in Slaviansk were holding three journalists, including U.S. citizen Simon Ostrovsky.

Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, slid into unrest late last year when Moscow-backed President Viktor Yanukovich rejected a pact to build closer ties with Europe. Protesters took over central Kiev and he fled in February.

Days later, Russian troops seized control of Crimea. Moscow then annexed the region, saying it was protecting Russian residents, while the West called the action a land grab.

The focus has now shifted to eastern Ukraine, the industrial heartland and home to a large Russian-speaking community.

No way back?

With rhetoric building from the United States about the imposition of a new, tougher round of sanctions, Russia suggested on Thursday that Western firms which pulled out of the country may not be able to get back in.

"It is obvious that they won't return in the near future if they sever investment agreements with us, I mean there are consequences as well," Natural Resources Minister Sergei Donskoy told reporters.

"Russia is one of the most promising countries in terms of hydrocarbons production. If some contracts are severed here, then, colleagues, you lose a serious lump of your future pie," the minister added.

However, Western oil majors BP and Royal Dutch Shell were sticking with their projects in Russia, he noted.

Supplies of Russian gas to Europe are also, potentially, at risk from the crisis over Ukraine. Moscow has threatened to cut Kiev off unless it pays off its debts, and drastically raised this bill this week.

State-controlled Gazprom sent Ukrainian energy firm Naftogaz an additional bill on Wednesday of $11.4 billion, more than five times its previous claim, a source at the company said. This was in addition to the $2.2 billion that Naftogaz already owes for supplies in 2013 and 2014 so far.

Moscow nearly doubled the gas price for Ukraine from April but Kiev, which is in financial trouble, is refusing to pay.

If Moscow cuts off the flow to Kiev, this would have a knock-on effect on European customers further West, because many of the pipelines that deliver their gas run through Ukraine.

European and Ukrainian officials were to meet in Slovakia, which borders Ukraine, on Thursday to try to work out ways to mitigate the impact if Ukraine is cut off.

The options include reversing the usual east-west flow of the pipelines to Europe to pump gas back into Ukraine, but the volumes that could be supplied this way would be only a small fraction of the amount that Ukraine needs.

Unarmed mediators from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe are in eastern Ukraine trying to persuade pro-Russian gunmen to go home, in line with the Geneva accord.

Reuters reporters have not been able to establish that any Russian troops or special forces members are in the region, though Kiev and Western powers say they have growing evidence that Moscow has a covert presence.

Putin has described as "nonsense" allegations that Moscow has its forces in eastern Ukraine. It says the unrest is a spontaneous protest by local people who fear persecution from the government in Kiev which it says is illegitimate and has far-right links.

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US proposes first regulations for e-cigarettes

WASHINGTON: The US government wants to ban sales of electronic cigarettes to minors and require approval for new products and health warning labels under regulations being proposed by the federal Food and Drug Administration.

While the proposal being issued on Thursday won't immediately mean changes for the popular devices, the move is aimed at eventually taming the fast-growing e-cigarette industry.

The industry started on the internet and at shopping-mall kiosks and has rocketed from thousands of users in 2006 to several million worldwide who can choose from more than 200 brands. Sales are estimated to have reached nearly $2 billion in 2013. Tobacco company executives have noted that they are eating into traditional cigarette sales, and their companies have jumped into the business.

The agency said the proposal sets a foundation for regulating the products but the rules don't immediately ban the wide array of flavors of e-cigarettes, curb marketing on places like TV or set product standards.

Any further rules "will have to be grounded in our growing body of knowledge and understanding about the use of e-cigarettes and their potential health risks or public health benefits," commissioner Dr Margaret Hamburg said.

Once finalized, the agency could propose more restrictions on e-cigarettes. Officials didn't provide a timetable for that action.

Members of Congress and public health groups have raised concerns over e-cigarettes and questioned their marketing tactics.

"When finalized (the proposal) would result in significant public health benefits, including through reducing sales to youth, helping to correct consumer misperceptions, preventing misleading health claims and preventing new products from entering the market without scientific review by FDA,"said Mitch Zeller, the director of the FDA's Center for Tobacco Products.

The FDA said the public, members of the industry and others will have 75 days to comment on the proposal. The agency will evaluate those comments before issuing a final rule but there's no timetable for when that will happen. The regulations will be a step in a long process that many believe will ultimately end up being challenged in court.

E-cigarettes are plastic or metal tubes, usually the size of a cigarette, that heat a liquid nicotine solution instead of burning tobacco. That creates vapor that users inhale.

Smokers like e-cigarettes because the nicotine-infused vapor looks like smoke but doesn't contain the thousands of chemicals, tar or odor of regular cigarettes. Some smokers use e-cigarettes as a way to quit smoking tobacco, or to cut down. However, there's not much scientific evidence showing e-cigarettes help smokers quit or smoke less, and it's unclear how safe they are.

Some believe lightly regulating electronic cigarettes might actually be better for public health overall, if smokers switch and e-cigarettes really are safer. Others are raising alarms about the hazards of the products and a litany of questions about whether e-cigarettes will keep smokers addicted or encourage others to start using e-cigarettes, and even eventually tobacco products.

"Right now for something like e-cigarettes, there are far more questions than answers,"Zeller said, adding that the agency is conducting research to better understand the safety of the devices and who is using them.

In addition to prohibiting sales to minors and requiring health labels that warn users that nicotine is an addictive chemical, e-cigarette makers also would be required to register their products with the agency and disclose ingredients. They also would not be allowed to claim their products are safer than other tobacco products.

They also couldn't use words such as "light"or "mild"to describe their products, give out free samples or sell their products in vending machines unless they are in a place open only to adults, such as a bar.

Companies also will be required to submit applications for premarket review within two years. As long as an e-cigarette maker has submitted the application, the FDA said it will allow the products to stay on the market while they are being reviewed. That would mean companies would have to submit an application for all e-cigarettes now being sold.

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Russia issues fresh Ukraine attack threat

SLAVYANSK: Russia issued a blunt warning Wednesday it would respond if its interests are attacked in Ukraine, as pro-Kremlin rebels in the restive east of the country braced for a new military offensive by Kiev.

The threat by Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, recalling the 2008 war with Georgia over breakaway South Ossetia, came as US troops were headed to region in a show of force after Washington again warned Moscow of new sanctions over the escalating crisis.

"If we are attacked, we would certainly respond," Lavrov told state-controlled RT television.

"If our interests, our legitimate interests, the interests of Russians have been attacked directly, like they were in South Ossetia for example, I do not see any other way but to respond in accordance with international law."

He did not elaborate, but the reference to South Ossetia strongly hinted at the possibility of military action.

The United States, meanwhile, said it plans to deploy 600 troops to Poland and the Baltic states starting Wednesday to "reassure our allies and partners".

Ukraine's acting president Oleksandr Turchynov late Tuesday ordered a new "anti-terrorist" operation against separatists holding a string of eastern towns after the discovery of two "brutally tortured" bodies.

One of the dead was a local politician from Turchynov's party who was kidnapped nearly a week ago, the leader said, blaming his death on the rebels.

Kiev's offensive threatens to sound the final death knell for an already tattered agreement struck last week in Geneva between Ukraine, Russia and the West to ease the crisis, which some fear could tip the country into civil war.

"Security agencies are working to liquidate all the groups currently operating in Kramatorsk, Slavyansk and the other towns in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions," said Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Yarema, according to the Interfax Ukraine news agency.

Lavrov charged that the timing of the renewed offensive during US Vice President Joe Biden's visit to Kiev on Tuesday demonstrated that "the Americans are running the show".

In the eastern town of Slavyansk, a tense flashpoint town near where the two bodies were found, the streets were calm, with locals walking about as usual.

A handful of rebels wearing camouflage gear and ski masks but with no apparent weapons stood outside the barricaded town hall they are occupying.

In front of the building were displayed three photos of militants who were killed in a weekend attack on a roadblock the separatists have blamed on pro-Kiev ultra-nationalists.

On Tuesday, a Ukrainian reconnaissance plane was hit by small-arms fire from the town, but the aircraft landed safely with none of its crew hurt.

Pro-Moscow insurgents in Slavyansk are holding two journalists, an American working for the company Vice News, Simon Ostrovsky, and a Ukrainian working for a pro-Kiev outlet, Irma Krat.

Slavyansk's local rebel leader Vyatcheslav Ponomarev told reporters that the American "is not being detained, was not abducted, has not been arrested" and claimed he was "working" in one of the rebel-occupied buildings.

However the Twitter feed of the normally prolific journalist has been inactive for a day.

US Secretary of State John Kerry, in an overnight call to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, "expressed deep concern over the lack of positive Russian steps to de-escalate, cited mounting evidence that separatists continue to increase the number of buildings under occupation and take journalists and other civilians captive," a senior State Department official said.

Kerry also warned that a lack of Russian progress on the Geneva deal struck last week would lead to more sanctions on Moscow.

Washington believes Russian President Vladimir Putin is behind the rebellion in the east and the crisis has created a precarious Cold War-style standoff between the Moscow and the West.

The State Department official said Kerry "reiterated that the absence of measurable progress on implementing the Geneva agreement will result in increased sanctions on Russia".

Those messages were underlined on a visit to Kiev on Tuesday by Biden, who also stressed US support for Ukraine's new leaders — in power since the ouster in February of the pro-Kremlin president after months of pro-EU demonstrations.

Biden called on Russia to pull back its forces from the border, and to reverse its annexation of the strategic Crimea peninsula last month.

Russia has deployed tens of thousands of troops to Ukraine's eastern border, while the United States was sending 600 soldiers to Nato member countries near Ukraine to boost defences in eastern Europe.

A company of 150 troops will arrive in Poland on Wednesday and another 450 are due in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in the coming days.

The move sends a "message to Moscow" that "we take our obligations very, very seriously on the continent of Europe," US Rear Admiral John Kirby told a news conference in Washington.

Russia has dismissed the threat of new sanctions and insists that it has the right to protect the Russian-speaking population in Ukraine, a former Soviet republic.

But Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has acknowledged his nation's economy was facing an "unprecedented challenge" with recession looming.

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Obama arrives in Japan for first leg of tension-filled Asia trip

TOKYO: US President Barack Obama landed in Tokyo on Wednesday to launch an Asian tour dedicated to reinvigorating his policy of "rebalancing" US foreign policy towards a dynamic Asia.

Obama landed aboard Air Force One to begin a state visit to Japan, which comes as regional tensions boil over maritime territorial disputes and fears that North Korea could soon carry out a new nuclear test.

The president touched down a day after nearly 150 lawmakers paid homage at a controversial Tokyo war shrine seen by neighbouring nations as a symbol of Japan's brutal imperialist past, and shortly after the prime minister made a shrine offering.

Days earlier, China seized a huge Japanese freighter over what a Shanghai court says are unpaid bills relating to Japan's 1930s occupation of vast swathes of the country.

In the seas to the southwest, boats from China and Japan spar for ownership of a small chain of islands. And an ever-unpredictable North Korea — which has denounced the presidential tour as "reactionary and dangerous" -- appears to be trying to seize the spotlight with preparations for a fourth nuclear test.

Despite the increasingly tense security situation, getting top regional US allies Japan and South Korea — Obama's next destination — to talk to each other is tricky.

South Korean President Park Geun-Hye and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe have met just once since both came to power over a year ago, and only then when the US leader cajoled them into a choreographed photo op.

East Asia is a tumultuous region with a multitude of fractures that the US has done little to mend over the last half-century, said Christian Wirth, a research fellow at Griffith University in Australia.

"Since the establishment of the post-war regime in San Francisco in 1951 and the onset of the Korean War in 1950, (the US has been) directly and deeply involved in East Asian politics," he told AFP.

"Washington's preference for bilateralism has contributed to the lack of intra-Asian cooperation and historical reconciliation."

That bilateralism begins this evening with a one-on-one dinner between Obama and Abe, reportedly at an exclusive sushi restaurant in the basement of an ageing office building in the glitzy Ginza district of Tokyo.

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Chinese teacher gets death for raping students

BEIJING: A primary school teacher in China has been sentenced to death for raping and molesting about 11 students, the latest in a series of sexual assault convictions involving teachers.

Gao Daosheng, 59, was convicted on Tuesday of raping and molesting first-and second-graders in a school in Wuwei County in the city of Wuhu from the second half of 2011, said a statement issued by the Wuhu City Intermediate People's Court.

Five girls were frequently raped and six others were molested, all of them under 14 years old, it said.

The case was among a series of sexual assaults reported in primary schools across the country last year, prompting public anger over teachers' misconduct and concerns for the safety of students.

On Monday, Yang Shifu, a 56-year-old primary school teacher in Nanyang of central China's Henan province was sentenced to death with two years' reprieve for raping and molesting his pupils from 2012 to 2013.

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Cries of anguish as SKorea ferry toll reaches 113

JINDO (South Korea): For a moment there is silence in the tent where bodies from the ferry disaster are brought for identification. Then the anguished cries begin.
The confirmed death toll from the April 16 disaster off South Korea's southern coast reached 113 on Tuesday, officials said, and about 190 people were still missing. Four crew members accused of abandoning the ship and failing to protect the passengers were arrested, three days after warrants were issued for the captain and two other crew.

The families who line up here to view the decomposing bodies have not known for nearly a week whether they should grieve or not. Now that they know, they sound like they're being torn apart.

"How do I live without you? How will your mother live without you?" a woman cried out Tuesday.

She was with a woman who emerged from the tent crying and fell into a chair where relatives tried to comfort her. One stood above her and cradled her head in her hands, stroking her face.

"Bring back my daughter!" the woman cried, calling out her child's name in agony. A man rushed over, lifted her on his back and carried her away.

The victims are overwhelmingly students of a single high school in Ansan, near Seoul. More than three-quarters of the 323 students are dead or missing, while nearly two-thirds of the other 153 people on board the ferry Sewol survived.

The number of corpses recovered has risen sharply since the weekend, when divers battling strong currents and low visibility were finally able to enter the submerged vessel.

Emergency task force spokesman Koh Myung-seok said bodies have mostly been found on the third and fourth floors of the ferry, where many passengers seemed to have gathered. Many students were housed in cabins on the fourth floor, near the stern of the ship, Koh said.

One by one, coast guard officers carried the newly arrived bodies covered in white sheets from a boat to a tent on the dock of Jindo island Tuesday.

The bodies are then driven in ambulances to two tents: one for men and boys, the other for women and girls. Families listen quietly outside as an official briefs them, then line up and file in. Only relatives are allowed inside.

Bodies are being identified visually, but family members have been providing DNA samples in case decomposition makes that impossible.

Twenty-two of the 29 members of the ferry's crew survived, and nine of them have been arrested or detained in connection with the investigation.

The captain, Lee Joon-seok, and two crew members were arrested Saturday on suspicion of negligence and abandoning people in need. Prosecutor Yang Jung-jin said a court issued arrest warrants Tuesday for four other crew members authorities had detained a day earlier. Two additional crew members were detained Tuesday.

The four crew members arrested Tuesday talked to reporters after a court hearing, their faces hidden with caps, hooded sweatshirts and masks.

One said they tried to correct the ferry's listing early on but "various devices, such as the balance weight, didn't work. So we reported the distress situation, according to the captain's judgment, and tried to launch the lifeboats, but the ferry was too tilted and we couldn't reach."

The captain has said he waited to issue an evacuation order because the current was strong, the water was cold and passengers could have drifted away before help arrived. But maritime experts said he could have ordered passengers to the deck, where they would have had a greater chance of survival, without telling them to abandon ship.

The cause of the disaster is not yet known. Senior prosecutor Ahn Song-don said investigators are considering factors including wind, ocean currents, freight, modifications made to the ship and the fact that it turned just before it began listing. He said authorities will conduct a simulation and get experts' opinions.

A Ministry of Ocean and Fisheries official had said Friday that the vessel had taken a sharp turn. But on Tuesday a ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity saying he wasn't authorized to speak to the media, said the ministry now has more complete details about the ship's path.

Data transmitted by the Sewol's automatic identification system, an on-board transponder used for tracking, show that the ship made a J-shaped turn.

The ministry official said AIS data received by a central station was incomplete because the ship's signal was weak, and that it missed more than three minutes of tracking. More complete data, retrieved from a base station in Mokpo, show that over the course of most of that time, the ship was making a roughly 180-degree turn.

Although the fisheries ministry released those details only on Tuesday, Ahn said prosecutors previously had complete details about the ferry's path.

It remains unclear why the ship turned around. The third mate, who was arrested Saturday, was steering at the time of the accident, in a challenging area where she had not steered before, and the captain said he was not on the bridge at the time.

In Ansan, funerals were held for more than 10 of the teens Tuesday, and education officials were building a temporary memorial that they expected to complete by Wednesday.

At the city education office, parents issued a letter pleading for more government help in the search, and condemning its response so far. The letter also criticized media for reporting false rumors, and for doggedly pursuing interviews with surviving children.

"The children say that when they look at the window, sudden fear of water seizes them. What the children need is utmost stability," said Jang Dong-won, father of a rescued female student.

On Jindo island, Lee Soo-ha, whose son remains missing, said parents like him "feel as if we're suffocated because we can't do anything to help." He said he thinks the government has handled the search poorly but added, "we don't have any alternative."

"The most urgent problem is the rescue. Later, after the urgent problem is solved, we can care about investigating the reason why this happened," Lee said. "And then we can judge how the government responded to the problem."

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Cries of anguish as SKorea ferry toll reaches 113

JINDO (South Korea): For a moment there is silence in the tent where bodies from the ferry disaster are brought for identification. Then the anguished cries begin.
The confirmed death toll from the April 16 disaster off South Korea's southern coast reached 113 on Tuesday, officials said, and about 190 people were still missing. Four crew members accused of abandoning the ship and failing to protect the passengers were arrested, three days after warrants were issued for the captain and two other crew.

The families who line up here to view the decomposing bodies have not known for nearly a week whether they should grieve or not. Now that they know, they sound like they're being torn apart.

"How do I live without you? How will your mother live without you?" a woman cried out Tuesday.

She was with a woman who emerged from the tent crying and fell into a chair where relatives tried to comfort her. One stood above her and cradled her head in her hands, stroking her face.

"Bring back my daughter!" the woman cried, calling out her child's name in agony. A man rushed over, lifted her on his back and carried her away.

The victims are overwhelmingly students of a single high school in Ansan, near Seoul. More than three-quarters of the 323 students are dead or missing, while nearly two-thirds of the other 153 people on board the ferry Sewol survived.

The number of corpses recovered has risen sharply since the weekend, when divers battling strong currents and low visibility were finally able to enter the submerged vessel.

Emergency task force spokesman Koh Myung-seok said bodies have mostly been found on the third and fourth floors of the ferry, where many passengers seemed to have gathered. Many students were housed in cabins on the fourth floor, near the stern of the ship, Koh said.

One by one, coast guard officers carried the newly arrived bodies covered in white sheets from a boat to a tent on the dock of Jindo island Tuesday.

The bodies are then driven in ambulances to two tents: one for men and boys, the other for women and girls. Families listen quietly outside as an official briefs them, then line up and file in. Only relatives are allowed inside.

Bodies are being identified visually, but family members have been providing DNA samples in case decomposition makes that impossible.

Twenty-two of the 29 members of the ferry's crew survived, and nine of them have been arrested or detained in connection with the investigation.

The captain, Lee Joon-seok, and two crew members were arrested Saturday on suspicion of negligence and abandoning people in need. Prosecutor Yang Jung-jin said a court issued arrest warrants Tuesday for four other crew members authorities had detained a day earlier. Two additional crew members were detained Tuesday.

The four crew members arrested Tuesday talked to reporters after a court hearing, their faces hidden with caps, hooded sweatshirts and masks.

One said they tried to correct the ferry's listing early on but "various devices, such as the balance weight, didn't work. So we reported the distress situation, according to the captain's judgment, and tried to launch the lifeboats, but the ferry was too tilted and we couldn't reach."

The captain has said he waited to issue an evacuation order because the current was strong, the water was cold and passengers could have drifted away before help arrived. But maritime experts said he could have ordered passengers to the deck, where they would have had a greater chance of survival, without telling them to abandon ship.

The cause of the disaster is not yet known. Senior prosecutor Ahn Song-don said investigators are considering factors including wind, ocean currents, freight, modifications made to the ship and the fact that it turned just before it began listing. He said authorities will conduct a simulation and get experts' opinions.

A Ministry of Ocean and Fisheries official had said Friday that the vessel had taken a sharp turn. But on Tuesday a ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity saying he wasn't authorized to speak to the media, said the ministry now has more complete details about the ship's path.

Data transmitted by the Sewol's automatic identification system, an on-board transponder used for tracking, show that the ship made a J-shaped turn.

The ministry official said AIS data received by a central station was incomplete because the ship's signal was weak, and that it missed more than three minutes of tracking. More complete data, retrieved from a base station in Mokpo, show that over the course of most of that time, the ship was making a roughly 180-degree turn.

Although the fisheries ministry released those details only on Tuesday, Ahn said prosecutors previously had complete details about the ferry's path.

It remains unclear why the ship turned around. The third mate, who was arrested Saturday, was steering at the time of the accident, in a challenging area where she had not steered before, and the captain said he was not on the bridge at the time.

In Ansan, funerals were held for more than 10 of the teens Tuesday, and education officials were building a temporary memorial that they expected to complete by Wednesday.

At the city education office, parents issued a letter pleading for more government help in the search, and condemning its response so far. The letter also criticized media for reporting false rumors, and for doggedly pursuing interviews with surviving children.

"The children say that when they look at the window, sudden fear of water seizes them. What the children need is utmost stability," said Jang Dong-won, father of a rescued female student.

On Jindo island, Lee Soo-ha, whose son remains missing, said parents like him "feel as if we're suffocated because we can't do anything to help." He said he thinks the government has handled the search poorly but added, "we don't have any alternative."

"The most urgent problem is the rescue. Later, after the urgent problem is solved, we can care about investigating the reason why this happened," Lee said. "And then we can judge how the government responded to the problem."

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Fresh Thai poll no closer despite multi-party meeting

BANGKOK: Thailand's political impasse looked no closer to a solution on Tuesday despite a rare meeting of political parties and the Election Commission to discuss how and when a new vote should be held after a general election in February was declared void.

About 58 parties including the ruling Puea Thai Party met in Bangkok to discuss a rerun, after months of anti-government protests that have crippled Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra's caretaker government and the economy.

However, the main opposition Democrat Party did not attend, citing unspecified security concerns, and the parties did not settle on a date for a new election.

The failure of the talks highlights the political division between the mostly poor, rural supporters of Yingluck and her brother, ousted former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, and the largely middle- and upper-class backers of the royalist establishment.

The confrontation has brought occasional outbreaks of violence and undermined growth in Southeast Asia's second biggest economy. Elections, won by former telecoms tycoon Thaksin or his loyalists since 2001, have failed to bring reconciliation.

The Constitutional Court nullified the February 2 election, which Yingluck looked set to win, because voting was not held in 28 constituencies where anti-government protesters stopped candidates registering. The constitution says voting must take place around the country on the same day.

The Election Commission on Tuesday said that a new vote could be held on July 20 at the earliest.

"Otherwise it would be too tight and we would not have time to resolve any unexpected issues," said Somchai Srisuthiyakorn, an election commissioner.

Yingluck's caretaker government has a narrow remit, with limited fiscal authority, and the failure to agree on when to hold a vote will add to her mounting problems, which include a set of legal challenges that could bring her down within weeks.

"I want elections at the earliest date possible. We have no lawmakers and therefore, have nobody to solve the country's problems," Yingluck told reporters on Tuesday.

The Democrats boycotted the February vote and have remained noncommittal over whether they will take part in the next one.

Bargaining tool

Thailand has been in crisis since 2006 when the military ousted then premier Thaksin in a coup.

On one side are Bangkok's middle class, the bureaucratic establishment and residents of the south, a Democrat stronghold, who see Thaksin as a corrupt crony capitalist and threat to their interests and say he wins elections with handouts.

On the other side are the supporters of Yingluck and Thaksin, largely from the north and northeast, who say Thaksin, who lives in self-imposed exile to avoid a jail term handed down in 2008 for abuse of power, was the first leader to help them.

The pro-establishment protesters, based in a Bangkok park, are demanding political reforms to end what they see as Thaksin's grip over a fragile democracy, before a new vote.

Twenty-five people have been killed and scores wounded since the protests began in November. Puea Thai accuses the protesters of trying to seize power through underhand means, abetted by the Democrats.

"Some political parties have joined hands to block the election process in order to create a power vacuum and put themselves in charge," Yingluck's party said in a statement on Monday.

Critics say the Democrats are refusing to take part because they know they will again lose to Thaksin's political machine unless the electoral system is changed.

"The Democrats are using this as a bargaining tool to increase their chance of returning to power," said Gothom Arya, a lecturer in human rights and peace studies at Mahidol University in Bangkok.

"They are afraid that if Puea Thai Party wins another election, they will remain the opposition for a long time."

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‘Piles and piles’ of bodies in South Sudan slaughter

NAIROBI: The UN's top humanitarian official in South Sudan says he saw "piles and piles" of bodies after rebels belonging to one ethnic group slaughtered members of other groups in a remote town.

Toby Lanzer told The Associated Press in a phone interview on Tuesday that the killings are "quite possibly a game-changer" for a conflict that has been raging since mid-December.

UN human rights investigators, on Monday, said that hundreds of civilians were killed last week because of their ethnicity after rebel forces seized Bentiu, the capital of oil-producing Unity state. Lanzer said thousands of civilians are now streaming to the UN base in Bentiu because many believe more violence is coming. The base now holds 25,000 people seeking shelter but has very little water and only one latrine per 350 people.

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Fresh Thai poll no closer despite multi-party meeting

BANGKOK: Thailand's political impasse looked no closer to a solution on Tuesday despite a rare meeting of political parties and the Election Commission to discuss how and when a new vote should be held after a general election in February was declared void.

About 58 parties including the ruling Puea Thai Party met in Bangkok to discuss a rerun, after months of anti-government protests that have crippled Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra's caretaker government and the economy.

However, the main opposition Democrat Party did not attend, citing unspecified security concerns, and the parties did not settle on a date for a new election.

The failure of the talks highlights the political division between the mostly poor, rural supporters of Yingluck and her brother, ousted former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, and the largely middle- and upper-class backers of the royalist establishment.

The confrontation has brought occasional outbreaks of violence and undermined growth in Southeast Asia's second biggest economy. Elections, won by former telecoms tycoon Thaksin or his loyalists since 2001, have failed to bring reconciliation.

The Constitutional Court nullified the February 2 election, which Yingluck looked set to win, because voting was not held in 28 constituencies where anti-government protesters stopped candidates registering. The constitution says voting must take place around the country on the same day.

The Election Commission on Tuesday said that a new vote could be held on July 20 at the earliest.

"Otherwise it would be too tight and we would not have time to resolve any unexpected issues," said Somchai Srisuthiyakorn, an election commissioner.

Yingluck's caretaker government has a narrow remit, with limited fiscal authority, and the failure to agree on when to hold a vote will add to her mounting problems, which include a set of legal challenges that could bring her down within weeks.

"I want elections at the earliest date possible. We have no lawmakers and therefore, have nobody to solve the country's problems," Yingluck told reporters on Tuesday.

The Democrats boycotted the February vote and have remained noncommittal over whether they will take part in the next one.

Bargaining tool

Thailand has been in crisis since 2006 when the military ousted then premier Thaksin in a coup.

On one side are Bangkok's middle class, the bureaucratic establishment and residents of the south, a Democrat stronghold, who see Thaksin as a corrupt crony capitalist and threat to their interests and say he wins elections with handouts.

On the other side are the supporters of Yingluck and Thaksin, largely from the north and northeast, who say Thaksin, who lives in self-imposed exile to avoid a jail term handed down in 2008 for abuse of power, was the first leader to help them.

The pro-establishment protesters, based in a Bangkok park, are demanding political reforms to end what they see as Thaksin's grip over a fragile democracy, before a new vote.

Twenty-five people have been killed and scores wounded since the protests began in November. Puea Thai accuses the protesters of trying to seize power through underhand means, abetted by the Democrats.

"Some political parties have joined hands to block the election process in order to create a power vacuum and put themselves in charge," Yingluck's party said in a statement on Monday.

Critics say the Democrats are refusing to take part because they know they will again lose to Thaksin's political machine unless the electoral system is changed.

"The Democrats are using this as a bargaining tool to increase their chance of returning to power," said Gothom Arya, a lecturer in human rights and peace studies at Mahidol University in Bangkok.

"They are afraid that if Puea Thai Party wins another election, they will remain the opposition for a long time."

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‘Piles and piles’ of bodies in South Sudan slaughter

NAIROBI: The UN's top humanitarian official in South Sudan says he saw "piles and piles" of bodies after rebels belonging to one ethnic group slaughtered members of other groups in a remote town.

Toby Lanzer told The Associated Press in a phone interview on Tuesday that the killings are "quite possibly a game-changer" for a conflict that has been raging since mid-December.

UN human rights investigators, on Monday, said that hundreds of civilians were killed last week because of their ethnicity after rebel forces seized Bentiu, the capital of oil-producing Unity state. Lanzer said thousands of civilians are now streaming to the UN base in Bentiu because many believe more violence is coming. The base now holds 25,000 people seeking shelter but has very little water and only one latrine per 350 people.

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Everest avalanche death toll reaches 13

KATHMANDU: Rescuers on Mount Everest found the body of a 13th Nepalese guide on Saturday as authorities ruled out hope of finding any more survivors from the deadliest accident ever on the world's highest peak.

Three sherpas remained missing from Friday's avalanche which struck after a large party of guides left Everest base camp carrying tents, food and ropes to prepare for international clients ahead of the main climbing season, which starts later this month.

Towards the evening, rescuers suspended the search until Sunday. "We have suspended the rescue operation for today. It is risky to continue searching the mountain as evening sets in," tourism ministry official Madhusudan Burlakoti told AFP.

The avalanche smashed into the sherpas on early Friday at an altitude of about 5,800 metres (19,000 feet) in an area nicknamed the "popcorn field" due to ice boulders on the route leading into the treacherous Khumbu icefall.

Dozens of guides were on the move when a huge block of ice broke off from a hanging glacier, before splitting into smaller chunks and barrelling down into the icefall, one of the most dangerous areas on the route to ascend Everest.

The ice "tumbled for several thousand feet, resulting in debris that came further out into the icefall", according to an account by the International Mountain Guides climbing company, which has a team stationed on the peak.

Veteran climber Alan Arnette, who reached the summit of Everest in 2011, said mountaineers usually tried to go through the icefall "as quickly as possible".

The hanging glaciers "are by definition unstable, sooner or later they are going to break and fall, making the icefall very dangerous", Arnette told AFP from his home in Colorado.

"You first hear the sharp crack of ice and then you can try to shield behind another block of ice, but in this case, they really had nowhere to hide."

More than 300 people, most of them local guides, have died on Everest since the first summit by Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953.

The death toll underscores the huge risks borne by local guides, who ascend the icy slopes, often in pitch-dark, usually weighed down by tenting equipment, ropes and food supplies for their clients.

The nature of their work means that sherpas will usually make many more trips up the mountain and expose themselves to far greater risk than foreign climbers who pay tens of thousands of dollars to summit the peak.

Climbers have suspended all expeditions until rescue operations conclude, police official Kumar Timilsina told AFP from the base camp of the 8,848-metre peak.

"People have lost friends they've worked hand in hand with. Everyone is heartbroken," Timilsina said.

In Kathmandu, anxious families waited for the bodies of their loved ones to arrive ahead of funeral rites at the city's Buddhist monasteries.

Teenager Phinjum Sherpa said her 36-year-old father, Ang Kaji Sherpa, had been on five Everest expeditions.

"He used to say that... after the 10th expedition, he will stop," she told AFP, while waiting for his body to arrive at a monastery in the capital.

"I spoke to him on Thursday evening. He said he was going up the next morning, but the weather was not very good... He said, 'pray for me'."

"We are six siblings and our grandparents are old. I am worried about how we will take care of each other," said the teenager.

Ang Tshering Sherpa, president of the Nepal Mountaineering Association, a national body representing tourism promoters, said guides' families would receive life insurance payments amounting to $10,000.

"It's very difficult for families when the main breadwinner dies, but the association will look after their children's education," he said.

The previous worst accident on Everest occurred in 1996 when eight people were killed during a storm while attempting to summit the mountain.

In the past, some accidents have been blamed on overcrowding or on ill-prepared foreign climbers taking unnecessary risks to reach the summit before returning home.

Every summer, hundreds of climbers from around the world attempt to scale peaks in the Himalayas when weather conditions are ideal.

Nepal's government has issued permits to 734 people, including 400 guides, to climb Everest this summer.

The impoverished Himalayan country is home to eight of the world's 14 peaks over 8,000 metres.

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Boko Haram claims responsibility for Nigeria attack

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria: Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the deadliest attack ever in Nigeria's capital in a video obtained on Saturday, as the search continued for 85 schoolgirls still missing after a mass abduction by the Islamists.

The bombing at a bus station packed with morning commuters early on Monday killed at least 75 people on the outskirts of Abuja, hours before gunmen kidnapped 129 girls from a school in northeastern Borno state, Boko Haram's base.

Officials said a total of 44 have since escaped and are now safe. The shock of the bombing and the kidnapping, which have broad worldwide condemnation, have underscored the serious threat posed by the insurgents to Africa's most populous country and wealthiest economy.

"We are the ones that carried out the attack in Abuja," Boko Haram's leader Abubakar Shekau said in video message obtained by AFP.

"We are in your city but you don't know where we are." Shekau, declared a global terrorist by the United States which has a $7 million (5.1 million euro) bounty on his head, spoke in Arabic and the Hausa language that is dominant in northern Nigeria.

The 28-minute video made no reference to the abductions from the Government Girls Secondary School in Chibok but the military, local officials and girls who have escaped have blamed that attack on Boko Haram.

Borno's education commissioner Inua Kubo told journalists late on Friday that 14 more girls had been found, leaving 85 girls still missing.

Some girls had escaped immediately after the kidnapping, jumping off the back of a truck as the Islamists tried to cart them away under the cover of darkness.

It was not yet clear how the latest group managed to flee, but Kubo said 11 were found in a town on the road that connects Chibok to Borno's capital Maiduguri, and three others had fled back to their school.

Some of those who escaped earlier this week said the hostages were taken to the Sambisa Forest area, where Boko Haram is known to have well-fortified camps.

The military said it had launched a major search and rescue operation, but some in the region say they have lost confidence in the security forces after the defence ministry issued an erroneous report claiming that most of the girls were safe.

That statement, issued late on Wednesday, said all but eight of those abducted were free, but defence spokesman Chris Olukolade was forced to withdraw the report on Friday after it turned out to be inaccurate.

Parents have been scouring the bushland for days looking for the hostages, pooling money to buy fuel for motorcycles and vehicles to help with the search.

One father said he and others decided to turn back after locals told them the insurgents were nearby and were prepared to slaughter anyone who advanced further.

"If we were armed as they are we would surely go ... and face them," said Enoch Mark, whose daughter and two nieces were among those taken.

Boko Haram, which says it wants to create an Islamic state in northern Nigeria, is blamed for killing thousands since 2009.

The group's name loosely translates as "Western education is forbidden", and attacks targeting schools and universities have been a prominent feature of the five-year uprising.

Students have been massacred while sleeping in their dormitories, but a mass abduction specifically targeting girls is unprecedented.

A security source said there were indications that the Islamists have used female hostages as both sex slaves and cooks.

Boko Haram has categorically ruled out peace negotiations and backed away from several ceasefire offers, but Mark nevertheless pleaded with the insurgents to show compassion.

"We call on Boko Haram to release our daughters who have committed no offence against anyone," he said.

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SKorea ferry tragedy: Relatives give DNA swabs to identify dead

JINDO/MOKPO, South Korea: Some relatives of the more than 200 children missing in a sunken South Korean ferry offered DNA swabs on Saturday to help identify the dead as the rescue turned into a mission to recover the vessel and the bodies of those on board.

The Sewol, carrying 476 passengers and crew, capsized on Wednesday on a journey from the port of Incheon to the southern holiday island of Jeju. 32 people are known to have died.

The 69-year-old captain, Lee Joon-seok, was arrested in the early hours of Saturday on charges of negligence along with two other crew members, including the third mate who was steering at the time of the capsize.

Prosecutors later said the mate was steering the Sewol through the waters where it listed and capsized — for the first time in her career.

Asked why the children had been ordered to stay put in their cabins instead of abandoning ship, Lee, apparently overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster, told reporters he feared they would have been swept out to sea in the strong, cold current.

Early reports said that the ferry turned sharply and listed, perhaps due to a shift in the cargo it was carrying and crew members said the captain, who was not initially on the bridge, had tried to right the ship but failed.

Some 500 relatives of the 270 people listed as missing watched a murky underwater video shot after divers reported they had seen three bodies through the windows.

The official number of those missing was revised up from an earlier estimate of 269.

Packed in a gymnasium in the port city of Jindo day and night since Wednesday, tempers frayed and fist fights broke out after the video was shown. The video, viewed by relatives and journalists, did not appear to show any corpses.

"Please lift the ship, so we can get the bodies out," a woman who identified herself as the mother of a child called Kang Hyuck said, using a microphone.

Relatives have criticized what they say is the slow response of the government and contradictory information given out by authorities in the early stages of the rescue mission.

Chances of finding survivors "almost zero"

President Park Geun-hye was jeered by some when she visited on Thursday. "Park Geun-hye should come here again," Kang Hyuck's mother said.

Three cranes were moved close to the sunken ship on Saturday but were not deployed. Strong tides and rough weather again impeded efforts to get inside.

Coastguard spokesman Kim Jae-in said the cranes would be deployed when the divers say it is safe.

"Lifting the ship does not mean they will remove it completely from the sea. They can lift it two to three metres off the seabed," he said.

Coastguard officials said that divers would make another attempt to enter the ship in the evening.

"The chances of finding anyone alive now are almost zero," said Bruce Reid, chief executive officer of the International Maritime Rescue Foundation.

"There will still be a search operation on the water, a surface search, but it would be more of a recovery exercise now. They'll be looking for bodies."

The capsize occurred in calm weather on a well-travelled 400km (300 mile) sea route from Incheon to Jeju some 25km (15 miles) from land.

Lee, the ship's captain, was described by officials from Chonghaejin Marine Co Ltd, the owner of the vessel, as a "veteran".

"I had ordered (passengers) to leave the ferry, but (later) I said to them to stay because there was no rescue ship," he told South Korean television as he was led away by police.

Police also raided Chonghaejin offices in Incheon and Yang Joong-jin, a prosecutor in the city of Mokpo, said ten people were being questioned over the loading and stowing of the Sewol's cargo.

Yonhap news agency said 180 vehicles were onboard the ferry along with 1,157 tons of freight. At least some of the freight was in containers stacked on the foredeck.

Relatives and friends of the schoolchildren have also gathered at the Danwon High School in the commuter town of Ansan.

The vice-principal of the school, Kang Min-gyu, 52, was one of those rescued as the children followed orders and stayed aboard. He hanged himself outside the gym in Jindo, police said.

His body was discovered on Friday and police released part of a two-page suicide note.

"Burn my body and scatter my ashes at the site of the sunken ferry," he wrote. "Perhaps I can become a teacher for the missing students in my next life."

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115 kidnapped Nigeria schoolgirls still missing

LAGOS: A Nigerian school principal on Thursday denied reports from the military that most of the students kidnapped from her school by Islamists were now safe, saying that only 14 of the 129 taken had escaped.

"The report from the military is not true," Asabe Kwambura told AFP, referring to an official claim that only eight of the girls were still being held. She specified that Wednesday's report from the area's governor Kashim Shettima that only 14 had safely returned home was "correct."

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'Taliban negotiator under house arrest in UAE'

KABUL: A leading Taliban peace negotiator has been placed under house arrest in the United Arab Emirates, officials said on Thursday, dealing a blow to President Hamid Karzai's efforts to jump-start a nascent Afghan peace process before leaving office.

Agha Jan Mutassim, a finance minister during Taliban rule from 1996 to 2001, has been missing for over a week, according to the Afghan government, disappearing after arranging a meeting in Dubai between Afghan and Taliban officials in February.

"Mutassim ... one of the key Taliban leaders and who supported Afghan peace initiative, was put under house arrest in the UAE where he lived," the Afghan High Peace Council, a body formed by Karzai to engage in peace talks with the Taliban, said on Thursday.

"The Afghan government has made requests to the UAE authorities to lift all the restrictions," it said in a statement.

A Western security source in Kabul confirmed Mutassim had been put under house arrest, and that the UAE was considering deporting him to Afghanistan.

It was not immediately clear why Mutassim was confined to his home, or who was behind his arrest.

Authorities in the UAE declined to comment.

The Karzai administration, in its final months of power, has been trying to rekindle dialogue with important members of the Afghan insurgency that has lasted for more than 12 years.

The Taliban leadership's willingness to hold talks only with Western or Arab officials has angered Karzai.

Last ditch push for peace

In March, Mutassim, once a powerful figure in the Taliban political committee but whose links to the group are now unclear, brought 16 high-ranking former and current Taliban figures and Afghan peace council members together in Dubai, Afghan officials told Reuters.

Few details have emerged about the talks, and little progress is believed to have been made.

The Taliban central leadership council disavowed Mutassim's peace overtures in a statement and said it did not authorise any peace talks with Afghan government representatives. It said he did not represent the movement.

Afghan and Western officials, however, say Mutassim remains an influential figure and could lure senior members of the group to the peace process.

The Taliban are fighting to expel foreign forces and impose strict Islamist rule.

For years, their reclusive leadership, believed to be located in Pakistan under the leadership of Mullah Mohammed Omar, has refused to negotiate directly with the government of Karzai, whom the Taliban says is an illegitimate leader installed by the United States.

The Karzai government has held informal talks with Taliban figures since 2001, and has renewed peace efforts in recent months, perhaps to ensure Karzai leaves a legacy as he readies to hand over the leadership before the end of the year.

This month, Afghans went to the polls to elect a new president to replace Karzai who is constitutionally bound to step down after serving two terms.

Afghanistan's allies praised the April 5 vote as a success because of a high turnout estimated at 60 percent of 12 million eligible voters and the failure of the Taliban to stage high-profile attacks.

Early results show no outright winner, meaning a likely run-off between former foreign minister Abdullah and a former World Bank official and former finance minister, Ashraf Ghani. Final results are due on May 14, with a run-off, if needed, in late May.

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