Thursday 17 January 2013

Official says stability behind cremations of landslide victims


An official from Zhenxiong county, Yunnan Province, where a landslide recently claimed 46 lives, admitted on Wednesday that it was partially for stability's sake that the county government hastily incinerated the bodies of the victims without approval from the victims' families.

Zhu Henghui, director of Zhenxiong county government administrative office, said stability played a part in the decision making process of incinerating the victims' bodies, which led to protest from local villagers, who blocked the roads and demanded an explanation on Sunday.

Despite the announcement from the government claiming the landslide was a natural disaster, local villagers believe that the Gaopo coal mine, which is 500 meters from the landslide scene, is to blame for the landslide.

Zhu has agreed Wednesday to let villagers, who sent a joint letter to the State Council Wednesday to demand an re-investigation, check the local coal mine after the Chinese New Year, Beijing Times reported on Thursday.

Zhu could not be reached by the Global Times as of Thursday night.

Hu Peiwen, deputy head of the publicity department of Zhenxiong county, told the Global Times that the local government has dispatched work teams to persuade the villagers to claim the ashes of their beloved ones.

"The government's incineration of the bodies was done to prevent emotional distress to the villagers once they see them," Hu said, adding that epidemic prevention is another factor in the decision.

Hu's opinion was echoed by Zhou Chengwu, director of the Zhenxiong funeral parlor, who told the Xinhua News Agency that as the only funeral service provider in the area, the funeral house simply did not have enough ice tanks to store all 46 bodies.

"It's a small town and we only have limited resources. It's routine to incinerate bodies within 24 hours for those who died in natural disasters such as earthquakes and landslides," Zhou said.

As of Wednesday night, no family member of the victims has picked up the urns from the Zhenxiong funeral house, the Beijing Times reported.

"We are working on persuading the villagers. Most of them have showed a certain degree of understanding of our work," Xiong Tao, an official from the publicity department of the Zhenxiong government, told the Global Times.

Despite the government assurances, Luo Yuanshou, the brother of one victim, said he still hasn't picked up his sister's ashes and that he finds the incineration highly inappropriate.

"I don't understand what they mean by maintaining stability. If it is truly a natural disaster like the officials have claimed, there is no need to fear how villagers would respond. The fact that they incinerated the bodies so hastily is a sign of cover-up. I will not claim my sister's urn until I find out what truly caused the disaster," Luo told the Global Times.

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/756679.shtml

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Landslide Survivors Demand Investigation of Mine’s Role


Relief efforts continue in Yunnan, where a remote village was decimated by a landslide last Friday. 46 people died, including 19 children. China Daily reported that 29 of the victims were from a single clan, now reduced to just three members. Many survivors are now living in tents, awaiting pre-fabricated housing and the eventual construction of a new settlement nearby.

Crowds of survivors protested outside the local disaster relief headquarters on Sunday night, after it emerged that victims had been cremated without their families’ approval. Local authorities apologized, but explained that they were not equipped to deal with so many dead bodies at once. From Xinhua:

“Why can’t I see my child for the last time?” Luo Yuanju, a migrant worker who hurried home after she got the tragic news that she had lost 29 relatives in the landslide, told the Beijing News. “This cremation was done without our approval. Why couldn’t the authorities wait for one or two days?”

[…] Government authorities had cremated all the bodies by Sunday, triggering anger from the victims’ families. According to the tradition of the village, where dwellers are mostly members of the Yi ethnic minority, the bodies of the dead are usually buried instead of cremated.

Lei Chuying, deputy head of Zhenxiong county, said cremation orders were given due to consideration of epidemic prevention and people’s feelings.

“Many parts of the bodies were missing while the buried were dug out,” Lei said, “The painful scene might cause trauma among relatives.”

An official investigation quickly concluded that the landslide was an entirely natural disaster, but local authorities have still faced criticism over their lack of preparedness. From Global Times:

Jiang Xingwu, a geological expert in Yunnan, told a press conference on Saturday afternoon that the area’s steep incline of 35 to 50 degrees and the composition of the soil made it prone to landslides.

Jiang said that the earthquakes with magnitudes of 5.7 and 5.6 which hit neighboring Yiliang county in September 2012 were also a cause, and the continued rainy and snowy weather over the past month led to the saturation of the slope, with gravity eventually causing the landslide.

The People’s Daily, a flagship newspaper of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, Sunday questioned why there wasn’t any early warning given the prolonged rainy and snowy weather over the past month.

[…] Also of concern was the fact that a 2010 geological disaster prevention plan by the Zhenxiong government showed that the local government had compiled files for 184 hazardous sites including 29 major ones areas, but Gaopo village was not on the list.

In addition, some locals continued to voice suspicions that nearby mining activity was really to blame. From Xinhua:

Some villagers believe the landslide may have been triggered by a gas explosion, and they doubt the experts’ conclusion that the coal mine boundary was 500 meters away from the landslide.

“The mining area is right beneath the landslide,” a coal miner in Gaopo said, as quoted by media on Monday.

Witnesses told Xinhua they saw “earth and rocks sprayed up into the air” when the landslide occurred. At the same time, some other villagers said they had not been to the scene and only heard about the “explosion” from others.

[…] Wang Shijun, another person who lost family in the landslide, said a big crack appeared before the landslide. “Big enough to swallow a bull.”

However, some villagers said the crack was 1 meter wide and some said a half meter wide, while others said there was no crack.

Luo Yuanshou, the brother of a victim, initiated the joint letter and sent to the State Council on Wednesday. The villagers believe the Gaopo coal mine, which is 500 meters from the landslide scene, could have played a role in the landslide. Villagers wondered why the hillside remained stable following a 50-day snowstorm in 2008.

Luo told the Global Times that the villagers are demanding the State Council order the State Administration of Coal Mine Safety, the Ministry of Land and Resources and the China University of Geosciences to investigate the landslide. The original investigation “hastily concluded the landslide had nothing to do with the mine without even an on-site investigation of the mine. The hill was not that steep and is covered with vegetation,” said Luo.

Jiang Xingwu, who headed the original investigation, told the Global Times Wednesday that he stands by the results of his investigation, adding he understands that the villagers may want another opinion.

The preference for burial over cremation is not limited to the Yi: see ‘Henan Officials Commit a Grave Error‘ on CDT. Neither is Friday’s landslide the only apparently natural disaster for which human activity has been blamed: see ‘2008 Sichuan Earthquake Likely Man-Made‘.

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2013/01/yunnan-landslide-survivors-protest-unapproved-cremations/

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Illegal sale of dead bodies at city hospitals


The number of unclaimed and unidentified dead bodies lying in the government hospital mortuaries’ is increasing every year by almost 10 per cent.

According to the ‘missing people’ complaints filed at the Satya Harishchandra Foundation (SHF), an NGO that cremates unknown, unclaimed dead bodies there is a steady increase over the last few years.

The foundation that cremated 1,145 bodies in 2011, held last rites for 1,330 bodies in 2012, an increase of 184 bodies compared to the previous year.

These bodies are usually received from Osmania government Hospital and Gandhi Hospital.

The NGO officials say that they have established the foundation in 2004 and ever since they have been witnessing a regular increase in the number unidentified, unclaimed dead bodies.

In 2006, a total of 176 bodies were cremated and the figures have doubled in the recent years.

“The density of the population in Hyderabad has also increased with a lot of rural population migrating to the city.

Many people desert their family members in the hospital unable to take care of them,” explains secretary of SHF Mahesh Kumar.

The founder and general secretary of SHF K Rajeshwar Rao, added that while the number of bodies from Gandhi (673) are higher compared to OGH (657) this year, which is usually the other way around.

“This year’s number is still low compared to 736 bodies in cremated from OGH.

The reason is that there is an illegal sale of dead bodies from that hospital to private medical colleges.

Though it is permitted to sell unclaimed, unidentified dead bodies it should be done with the consent of the police, following several other protocols,” says Rao.

Mahesh Kumar also mentions that although both the hospitals sell around 15 dead bodies a month for `15,000 per body, few workers at the hospital sell more dead bodies illegally.

When Express contacted the OGH authorities on the issue, they refused to comment on the topic and said no such illegal sale of dead bodies is taking place.

However, Rao said otherwise.

“Medical colleges require a number of bodies for dissection.

Many bodies are even sent to other states like Kerala, Delhi as the law in those places doesn’t permit the sale of dead bodies, instead encourages people to donate.

He said according to the GO number 231, only unclaimed dead bodies can be also but not unidentified ones.

“Unknown bodies should be given to police,” said Kumar.

Rajeshwar Rao also said that after the number bodies arriving from OGH had declined in 2010 to 533 from 736 in 2009 and he filed an RTI application at all police zones.

“According to the RTI report, 593 unclaimed/unknown bodies were sent from the police stations to the hospitals between January 2010 - September 2011 and they were sent to us for cremation,” he adds.

He says that a majority of these dead bodies are from rural areas, economically poor who cannot afford medical care, mentally disturbed and elderly people left by their children from old city areas.

The attitude of the hospital authorities should change.

The tracing of the missing persons has come down from 27 per cent in 2008 to less than 7 per cent in 2012,” Rao ascertained.

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://newindianexpress.com/cities/hyderabad/article1423715.ece

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Arizona: Naming the dead from the desert


It's the job of a forensics team in Arizona to identify the bodies of migrants found in the desert. Anthropologist Robin Reineke describes how she pieces together the sad jigsaw puzzle of personal attributes and belongings.

There are many ways to enter the US. The way that's taken by the very poorest is to come through the Sonoran Desert on foot.

It's a very forbidding place - the temperatures in the summertime are regularly in the triple digits Fahrenheit and there's no water.

Groups of people will walk for three to five days, travelling by night and drinking out of cattle troughs or whatever they can find. It's unlikely they will see other people for the duration of the trip.

At present, Tucson, Arizona has almost 800 unidentified bodies of migrants who didn't make it to the other side.

They were found by border patrol, by citizens of the Tohono O'odham Indian reservation, or by ranchers or hikers. I compare these unidentified remains to lists we have of missing persons, collected from families of migrants last known to have been attempting the crossing.

When there is a possible match, I call the family.

Recently, I called the wife of a missing man. "There's someone who could potentially be your husband," I told her. "Can I ask you some questions?

"Did he have any tattoos? You said that he was missing an upper molar. Could you tell me more about that?"

One day in the desert heat is enough to make a body unrecognisable, so the possessions that are found with the remains can be incredibly important to the family.

There's often an interesting combination of objects. Mostly it is the normal stuff that anyone would take with them on a trip - toothpaste, socks, snacks, water.

But then there are these very personal items - photographs of loved ones, handwritten notes from family members, kids' drawings.

The letters are from the children or wives of those we've found dead, wishing them luck and telling them that they're loved, that they should be very careful on the journey, that the family's prayers are with them, that the family's hopes are with them.

And the photos have been touched and pulled out over and over again, then folded up and put back carefully.

Some of the items have unspoken stories.

There was a young kid - he was probably only 15 or 16 years old - and the soles of his shoes were just completely worn off. He had been carrying one orange paper flower.

I remember a man who had a small dead hummingbird in his pocket. I know that for a lot of indigenous North American peoples hummingbirds hold a sacred significance - they represent hope and love and they're a powerful protective symbol.

With certain objects, my familiarity with Mexican and Central American cultures helps me to make a guess about where someone came from.

For example, many migrants carry prayer cards - small cards with a saint or a holy scene printed on them with an accompanying prayer. A prayer card of the Virgin of Juquila is likely to have belonged to a Oaxacan traveller, since it is there that she is venerated.

You can think of it like a puzzle - a puzzle which has a great deal of importance to a lot of people.

While most anthropologists who work in human identification are physical or forensic anthropologists who specialise in skin and bone, I am a cultural anthropologist focused on the social world.

My training helps me bridge the gap between forensic scientists and the families of the missing, who are generally indigenous people.

The forensic scientists and I have a lot of faith in science, which is a belief system. It requires trust in officials, in the scientific method, in technology. Many families of missing migrants are coming from communities in Mexico or Central America that have been violated for centuries by officials, scientists and technologies. There is a lot of mistrust.

Moreover, the family is looking for something recognisable, something that carries the trace of the person they knew.

______________________________

Case ML #10-00533
The owner of these prayer cards was found by an off-duty border control guard while he was hiking on a remote mountain, on 12 March 2010

The male, aged between 22 and 35, had likely died years earlier, since little more than his skeleton remained


______________________________

They can get fixated on details scientists might consider nearly irrelevant, like the buttons on a pair of trousers or a brand of tennis shoes. These are things that have meaning to them. They are also things that someone can change, unlike their DNA or fingerprints.

So while I might be trying to arrange a DNA comparison with a family, they'll be asking to see photos of the remains. Sometimes they show up in my office, having driven for hours, asking to see the body.

Generally, we don't allow this unless the dead person is recognisable. Some might argue that it is not our job to protect families from the truth. But if they see an unrecognisable, decomposed corpse or skeleton, they may not only be traumatised, they may simply reject the identification. I've been involved in a few of cases where we have come very close to a positive ID and the family suddenly rejects involvement or says we're lying.

Because of the highly decomposed nature of the bodies, the calls I make are never as simple as, "I am sorry to inform you…" Instead, it's the beginning of a process that could take months. It unfolds as a kind of a negotiation between the scientists and the families. Both sides have the same goal - to find the missing person.

But for the scientists, the problem is an unidentified dead body, whereas for the families, the problem is a missing living person. These realities pull them in opposite directions.

And, coming after a long period of not hearing anything, these are months of agony for families. What they have already endured is terrifying. You cannot grieve without a body - without certainty that the person is gone. Every single day that you are living a normal life, you know they could be suffering.

One case that stands out is a large group of Guatemalans that were all from the same town, who attempted to cross in the summer of 2010.

The man who was leading the group had crossed before, maybe five or 10 years earlier. But the border had completely changed - it is a lot more difficult to cross over now. The man got lost with this whole group of friends and relatives following him.

One of them was able to call his wife and tell her that they were lost, that they had been walking for seven days, that they were out of food and water, that some of the group had been vomiting blood, that they knew they were going to die.

I received all the reports of the missing and a big sleuthing operation began. Three sets of bodies were found in different locations, months apart. We were able to identify five of them. The other seven or eight remain missing.

I went to Guatemala with my husband in the summer of 2011 to meet the families of the dead and missing from this group. I was struck by the difference between those whose loved ones had been identified and those who were still waiting.

Even with the knowledge that the whole group had been lost in the desert, and that some of them had come home in coffins, the families of the missing were distraught - sickened by the condition of not knowing. Their faces are burned into my memory.

I won't pretend that I have an easy job and that I don't take some of it home. I work with an incredible team, who have taught me everything. And I have a wonderful husband and a fuzzy dog at home to keep me sane.

And I feel very honoured to be doing this work. The unidentified are here in Tucson and I feel an obligation to them.

The immigration issue is tough but it's not intractable.

For me, it's frustrating that there is so much attention on the physical line of the border, and on border security. When hundreds are dying each year, their bodies rotting in the desert, we have to think about what is an effective border, what is effective security - and security for whom? It is time to really think about what we have done as a continent to cause people to risk their lives in such large numbers.

Immigrants are being blamed for a lot at the moment - they're being scapegoated. I feel that these people were, by and large, good, hard-working people that did not mean any harm. By attempting the crossing they were trying to do the very best for their families.

I would definitely do the same thing.

______________________________

Case ML #11-00206



Money

Many migrants carry all the money they have. Before they meet up with their coyote (guide) they are often carrying the payment with them in cash, which is usually more than $2,500.

This is very dangerous. Every year, hundreds of Central American migrants fall prey to criminals, especially drug cartels and gangs.

False Mexican Voter ID card

When false Mexican ID is found with unidentified remains, Robin’s team look at their missing lists from neighbouring countries – in this case, the owner was Honduran.

He would have needed false ID to travel through Mexico, where he would also have been considered an “illegal”. Another reason for the fake ID is that if he had been caught trying to cross into the US, he would only have been deported back to Mexico rather than all the way to Honduras.

SIM cards

These are not uncommon. Migrants often carry them as back-up in case their cell phones get taken.

List of names and numbers

This is one of the most common items found with migrants. The guides often take their cell phones at the start of the journey, so the migrants carry numbers with them instead.

The numbers were key to helping the team identify this individual, who was found in January 2011, about 10-15 months after his death.

Someone from the Mexican consulate called one of the numbers and spoke to a person who knew a man using false ID. He was ultimately identified through a DNA match, thanks to the Argentine Forensic Team, which funds a large number of DNA comparisons for Central Americans.

Prayer card

The words read “Cristo mi piloto” (Jesus is my pilot) with a prayer on the back.

Wallet

Since all travellers carry wallets, and many of them are very similar, these rarely help in the identification process.

______________________________

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21029783

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Mastung bombing: Funerals offered for 15 victims


The Shia community of Rawalpindi offered funeral prayers on Wednesday for 12 persons killed in the Mastung terrorist attack after their identities were determined through DNA testing a day earlier.

Before handing over the 12 bodies, which included two women, the Shia community offered their funeral prayers at IJ Principal Road near Muhammadi Imam Bargha in New Katarian.

The bodies of three victims hailing from Rawalpindi were earlier handed over to their relatives for burial, while the other 12 were given to their relatives after the collective funeral. Five of the dead bodies would be taken to Sindh, and rest to different areas of Punjab for burial.

Four other dead bodies remain at Holy Family Hospital.

Speaking after the funerals, Majlis Wahdat Muslimeen (MWM) Pakistan Secretary General Allama Nasir Abbas Jafri criticised the government for their failure to curb terrorism and especially the targeted killings of Shias in Balochistan.

He said if governor rule was rescinded as demanded by the Balochistan Assembly, they would start protesting against the federal government as the elected government of Balochistan’s only achievement was five years of failure to protect the common man.

All politicians are gathered in Lahore to safeguard their interests but they had never sit together to bring out a collective policy against the terrorism in the country.

DNA verification

On Tuesday, the district administration of Rawalpindi received identity confirmation of 18 out of 19 bodies from the Mastung attack and had initiated the process of handing them over to their heirs.

In response to a request from the medical superintendent of Holy Family Hospital (HFH), where 16 dead bodies were kept after being brought from Quetta two weeks ago, the Institute of Biomedical and Genetic Engineering (IBGE) Islamabad on Tuesday sent the reports for samples from 18 victims.

The Rawalpindi district administration took samples from the bodies and blood samples from relatives of the unidentified and sent them to IBGE for DNA profiling.

The bodies, which could not be visually identified due to the circumstances of their deaths, were flown in to Rawalpindi from Quetta on a C-130 on January 1 after the December 31, 2012 bombing of a bus carrying Shia pilgrims near Mastung.

Apart from the 16 bodies at HFH, three were kept at District Headquarter Hospital (DHQ) and the administration waited for the arrival of samples of the bodies taken at Quetta to match them with samples from claimants.

After a wait of 10 days, the Rawalpindi administration was informed that the samples taken at Quetta had been lost and new samples should be taken for further identification of the bodies.

A senior doctor at HFH said they had to pay Rs10,000 per sample to the IBGE and the bodies were to be transported to their native areas in Punjab and Sindh.

Rawalpindi District Coordination Officer (DCO) Saqib Zaffar said the administration was trying to contact the relatives of the dead and leaders of Shia community to hand the dead bodies.

He said there were three dead bodies from Rawalpindi, while the rest were to be transported to different areas of Punjab and Sindh.

Regarding the 19th victim, the DCO said it was being kept under consideration for further test to determine the relationship between the deceased and the claiming relative.

About the transportation of the dead bodies, he said it was preferred that the families themselves collected the bodies, however, if they could not afford to, the district government would help them in the process.

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://tribune.com.pk/story/495001/mastung-bombing-funerals-offered-for-15-victims/

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String of bomb blasts in Iraq kill at least 22, mostly Shiite pilgrims


Insurgents unleashed a string of bomb attacks mainly targeting Shiite Muslim pilgrims across Iraq on Thursday, killing at least 22 people and extending a wave of deadly bloodshed into a second day.

The eruption of violence follows nearly two weeks of relative calm, and threatens to enflame rising tensions among Iraq’s ethnic and sectarian groups.

The worst attack took place near Dujail, 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Baghdad, where a pair of car bombs exploded near pilgrims who were traveling on foot to a shrine in the town of Samarra.

The head of the Salahuddin provincial health directorate, Raed Ibrahim, said 11 people were killed and more than 60 were wounded in that attack.

“We heard thunderous explosions, and everybody went outside and saw burning cars and several bodies on the ground. Market stalls on both sides of the road were on fire,” said Naseer Hadi, who works in the Dujail post office.

The pilgrims were heading to Samarra to commemorate the death of two prominent Shiite Imams who are buried in the al-Askari shrine there.

A 2006 bombing at the gold-domed shrine that was blamed on al-Qaida in Iraq set off years of retaliatory bloodshed between Sunni and Shiite extremists that left thousands of Iraqis dead and pushed the country to the brink of civil war.

The attacks in Dujail came hours after a car bomb struck a bus carrying foreign pilgrims near the southern Shiite holy city of Karbala. Four people were killed and 12 were wounded in that attack, according to police and hospital officials.

The explosion tore through the undercarriage and blew out most of the windows of the white and blue tour bus that got hit. Nusaif al-Kitabi, deputy chairman of the Karbala provincial council, said the bus was carrying pilgrims from Afghanistan.

In the town of Qassim, 125 kilometers (78 miles) south of Baghdad, a parked car bomb exploded near a bus stop, killing five people and wounding 20. The casualties included Shiite pilgrims who were heading to Karbala, said police and hospital officials.

Shiite pilgrims are a favorite target for Sunni insurgents who seek to undermine the country’s Shiite-led government and provoke a return to sectarian fighting.

In northeastern Baghdad, a roadside bomb apparently meant to hit an army patrol missed its target and struck a civilian car, killing 2 passengers and wounding two others, said police and hospital officials. Like most other officials, they spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information to reporters.

Thursday’s bloodshed comes a day after a wave of attacks killed at least 33 people across Iraq in the country’s deadliest day in more than a month.

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/iraqi-officials-car-bomb-attack-kills-4-shiite-pilgrims-heading-to-shrines-south-of-baghdad/2013/01/17/47d7d3b8-6079-11e2-bc4f-1f06fffb7acf_story.html

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Truck hits bus; 6 dead, 57 hurt


Six people were killed and 57 others were injured, many of them critically, when a trailer truck rammed a passenger bus in the City of Naga Wednesday afternoon.

Traffic investigators of the Naga City Police Station believed that the accident was caused by a mechanical malfunction, which caused the truck, driven by Antonio Umagay, to lose its brakes.

Owners of the trailer truck and passenger bus and Representative Pablo John Garcia (Cebu Province, 3rd district) have committed to shoulder the medical expenses.

Garcia and his wife Karen said in their Twitter accounts that the congressman’s staff was working 24 hours to help the accident victims, which included arranging for the burial of four persons and providing the meals of those brought to the hospital.

Police Officer 2 Cristito Canono of the Naga Police Station told reporters the accident occurred around 4:30 p.m. in a steep portion of the Naga-Uling Road in Sitio Gaway-gaway, Barangay Uling.

Umagay, who was driving a trailer truck owned by WT Construction Inc. (WTCI), was supposed to deliver a bulldozer to Carcar City. His boss, Eddie Lopez, confirmed that Umagay had left their office in Asturias to make the delivery.

But while crossing Sitio Gaway-gaway, he suddenly lost his brakes, causing the large vehicle to speed downhill.

A passenger bus belonging to the Calvo Bus Liners Inc. was also moving uphill in the same area. The bus, driven by Jimmy Limoran, reportedly carried more than 50 passengers bound for Toledo City from Cebu City.

Umagay allegedly drove to the opposite lane, in an attempt to stop the truck.

Instead, it hit the mid-section of the passenger bus and sent it down a roadside canal.

Umagay, along with four unidentified passengers of the bus, reportedly died on the spot. Police investigators reported that an unidentified passenger died while en route toward the Toledo District Hospital.

At least 27 passengers were brought to a hospital owned by the Carmen Copper Corp. in Toledo City, while 30 others were brought to the Toledo District Hospital. Eventually, the 57 surviving passengers were brought to different hospitals in Cebu City for further treatment.

Canono said that as of 10 p.m. Wednesday, six deaths were confirmed, not eight as earlier reported.

Rescuers from the Naga City government and from Carmen Copper needed about five hours to remove all passengers from the wreckage. The last fatality, an unidentified man, was removed from the wrecked bus at 9:30 p.m.

After hearing of what happened to her husband, Jessica Umagay immediately went to the scene of the accident. One of her seven children accompanied her.

As she saw her husband’s body, Jessica said she regretted that they never found peace together. She told reporters that while she and Umagay shared a home, they were estranged.

Umagay and the bodies of the five victims (whose identities could not be confirmed last night) will be brought to the St. Francis Funeral Homes in Naga City.

Alvin Calvo, who represented Calvo Bus Liners, also told reporters that they are willing to shoulder the medical expenses.

Lopez, representing WTCI, said he has yet to take up the accident with management

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://www.sunstar.com.ph/cebu/local-news/2013/01/17/truck-hits-bus-6-dead-57-hurt-263332

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Medical Examiner Trying to ID Four Bodies


Right now authorities are working at least 140 cases across Virginia where bodies found cannot be identified.

Wednesday, authorities put faces on four of these cases and then took their work to the media for help.

These four cases - one each from Pittsylvania, Carroll, Alleghany and Lee Counties - are just the latest in a series of clay busts that have been produced in an effort to solve some of these cases with the oldest being 25 years old.

When they were found, nothing but bones remained, however enough of the skull of each one of them survived, giving authorities a new chance at solving some of their old cases.

"Our goal is to reunite deceased persons, who are currently unidentified, back with their families," said Donna Price with Medical Examiner's Office.

In the spotlight are four men: A Hispanic male found in Lee County in 2011, another Hispanic man found in southern Carroll County just last year, a third Hispanic male found in Blairs in 2005, and a fourth man believed to have been missing since the flood of 1985.

All of the first three are suspected of being migrant workers, which has made identifying them nearly impossible.

"We have an idea of who he may be but he has no known relatives in the area and the only relatives we know of that may be in Mexico... we've been unable to locate them at this time," said Lt. Todd Barrett with the Pittsylvania County Sheriff's Department.

The fourth man was found in the Jackson River in 1986. But like the other three, the suspected man is not local - officials believe originally from Ann Arbor, Michigan, they just can't verify it through a DNA match.

"It's just a strong feeling that we have. The age is within the range. The problem we have is none of his family is still alive in the area," said Sheriff Kevin Hall with the Alleghany County Sheriff's Department.

But investigators hope their luck will change as these faces, and their possible connections, go public.

All four of these men are part of the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System - also called the "NaMus System" - which is a national database, open to everyone, that compiles information in an effort to get deceased people identified.

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://www.wset.com/story/20607086/medical-examiner-trying-to-id-four-bodies

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Bus crash kills 14 in Yobe


Fourteen people have been killed and four others seriously injured when their bus crashed into a truck and caught fire in northern Nigeria, a road safety official says.

"At around 6:30 am (1630 AEST) today a commuter bus which was carrying 18 passengers crashed into an abandoned truck in the middle of the road that had lost control and fell on its side overnight," Usman Masari told AFP.

The crash happened near the town of Potiskum, capital of Yobe state, added Masari, head of the state Federal Road Safety Commission.

"The bus caught up in flames, resulting in the death(s) of 14 passengers while four others sustained serious injuries," he said.

Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, has one of the worst road accident records in Africa, with poor roads, badly maintained vehicles and reckless driving conspiring to kill thousands every year.

At least 27 people on a truck laden with cattle and sheep drowned after their vehicle plunged into a river in northwest Sokoto state last month, officials said.

Thursday 17 January 2013

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2013/01/bus-crash-kills-14-in-yobe/

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