7 reported dead after bus falls from Rio de Janeiro viaduct

A passenger bus plunged from a 10-meter-high (30-foot) viaduct in central Rio de Janeiro on Tuesday, killing at least seven people and closing a major thoroughfare.

At least six people were injured in the accident, said Sergio Simoes, who heads Rio state's Civil Defence department, adding that number of injured was likely to rise. Simoes said the dead were five men and two women.

He said it was unclear how many were aboard and whether any of the passengers were children.

Helicopter footage aired by Globo television network showed emergency response teams evacuating the injured from the overturned bus as rush-hour traffic stood at a standstill on Avenida Brasil, the highway that serves as the main entrance to Rio. Some of the injured were evacuated by helicopter.

The cause of the accident was not immediately known, but Globo cited eyewitness as saying that a dispute between a passenger and the driver might have helped spark the crash.

Buses are the main form of public transit in this city of 6 million, despite their sometimes questionable safety records and often uncomfortable overcrowding levels. Rio's buses, operated by private companies, don't have seat belts, and it's not unusual for up to several dozen people at a time to travel standing up. Rio's buses are also known for driving at high speeds, even through residential neighbourhoods.

With two key metro stations closed pending the extension of the subway, buses have taken on an even more crucial role in recent months and are the sole public transit option in poor neighbourhoods ringing the city.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://www.leaderpost.com/news/reported+dead+after+falls+from+viaduct+Janeiro/8184978/story.html

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Tsunami survivor keeps searching for missing family

Kneeling among brown weeds and scattered debris, Miho Suzuki, 24, placed a bouquet of flowers on the remains of the home she shared with her parents and brother in the Ukedo district of Namie.

Then she began searching.

Suzuki's father, Fumio, and mother, Toshiyo, then aged 63 and 60 respectively, have been missing since the 2011 earthquake and tsunami devastated the port town.

"I want to find their remains and raise a tomb in Namie for them," Suzuki said.

April 1 was her first chance to do so. That day, the government lifted the entry restrictions it had imposed due to high radiation levels from the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, just a few kilometers away.

"I have no clues, but I cannot help but search for them," Suzuki said, looking under a collapsed levee, between pieces of debris and anywhere else she could reach.

At the time of the disaster, Suzuki was working in a clothing store in Minami-Soma, a neighboring city to the north of Namie, in the same prefecture.

She tried to drive home but was stopped at an intersection near her house by local fire brigade members. "Ukedo has vanished," they said. Her house was located only 100 meters from the port.

The next morning, with an explosion occurring at the nuclear plant that she used to see every day, Suzuki was evacuated to a mountainous district in Namie. She was given no time to look for her family.

She started her lone life as an evacuee there without seeing her house even once following the earthquake and tsunami.

In mid-April 2011, her brother Kiyotaka, then aged 24, was found dead on a road about 300 meters from their home. His car was parked in the yard.

Suzuki thinks her parents were both at home with Kiyotaka because her mother and father did not have driver's licenses.

"It is a blessed relief that my family stayed together in their last moments," she said.

For now, time seems to have stood still in Ukedo, with washed-up fishing boats and the bare steel frames of buildings still dotting the landscape. Exhaust stacks of the crippled power plant loom in the distance.

"Everything remains the same as the day the tsunami hit," Suzuki said. "Nothing has changed."

But as evacuation zones are reviewed and a path to residents returning to Fukushima becoming clear, debris removal work is beginning in earnest.

Suzuki has mixed feelings, swaying between delight that her hometown is recovering from the disaster and her own hope of finding her parents' remains, even if they are only small pieces.

"I feel as if (the clearance work) will remove even the traces and bones of my parents," she said.

Suzuki said she will continue her search. But she added that even if radiation levels in Namie fall enough to live there safely, she will not return, because her family is not there.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/quake_tsunami/AJ201304020238

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Total of 54 Tibet landslide bodies recovered

Chinese rescue crews have recovered a total of 54 bodies in the aftermath of a huge landslide in Tibet that buried more than 80 mine workers, state television reported on Tuesday.

China Central Television reported that operations resumed on Tuesday morning after being suspended on Monday due to fears of more landslides in the area.

A total of 36 bodies had been recovered by Monday before operations were suspended, state media reported previously. The latest total would mean that 29 miners were still missing.

The disaster struck on Friday when the landslide crashed down a mountain east of the Tibetan regional capital of Lhasa onto a mine workers’ camp and buried 83 people.

Chances of finding any survivors are regarded as slim, state media has reported. Experts from the ministry of land and resources were investigating the cause of the landslide.

Mountainous regions of Tibet are prone to disasters, which can be exacerbated by heavy mining activity.

In recent years China has discovered huge mineral resources in Tibet, including tens of millions of tonnes of copper, lead and zinc, and billions of tonnes of iron ore.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1205660/total-54-tibet-landslide-bodies-recovered

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At least 13 youths killed in Myanmar mosque fire

A fire engulfed a mosque housing Muslim schoolchildren in Myanmar's largest city Tuesday, killing at least 13. Authorities, anxious over sectarian violence that has shaken the nation, quickly blamed the blaze on an accidental electrical short.

Security forces and three trucks of riot police blocked off roads around the scarred, two-story building compound in eastern Yangon which encompasses a mosque, a Muslim school and a dormitory. There were no reports of violence, but around 200 Muslim residents gathered uneasily nearby, many expressing suspicions the fire had been set intentionally.

Myanmar has been on edge after sectarian violence between Buddhists and Muslims erupted in the central city of Meikhtila in March, killing dozens of people and displacing more than 10,000. The violence that has largely targeted Muslims has since spread to several other towns where extremist Buddhist mobs have torched or ransacked mosques and Muslim-owned property.

Security bars blocked most of the white building's windows, which were marked by black smoke in the late morning. The building burned from the inside, and firefighters had extinguished the flames before dawn.

Mosque member Soe Myint said most of the children were sleeping on the ground floor when the blaze began and they were able to flee to safety.

But 16 of them were sleeping in a small loft on the first floor and were trapped when the ladder that led to the loft caught fire. Three boys jumped to safety, he said, and the rest died.

Security bars blocked most of the white building's windows, which were marked by black smoke in the late morning. The building burned from the inside and firefighters had extinguished the flames before dawn.

Police officer Thet Lwin, who was at the scene before dawn, said the fire was triggered by an electrical short "and not due to any criminal activity."

Every time he mentioned the word "electrical short," though, angry Muslims shouted and began banging on vehicles with their fists.

Zaw Min Htun, a member of a local Muslim youth organization, said he raced to the mosque early Tuesday after hearing it was on fire.

"Muslims are very angry," he said, calling on authorities to investigate what happened. "The children are innocent .... Someone burned the mosque."

Zaw Min Htun said he saw no burned wires inside the mosque and said the building's fuse box was in good condition.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://www.turnto10.com/story/21849676/myanmar-police-say-13-children-die-in-fire

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Mine rescue efforts hampered by weather

36 bodies now recovered, but teams moved to safety after further slide.

Rescue workers searching for missing miners, buried by Friday's massive landslide near Lhasa, in the Tibet autonomous region, were forced to clear the site twice on Monday, as the risk of further landslides grew.

By 4 pm, 36 bodies had been recovered at the scene of the tragedy, out of 83 believed to be buried at the Jiama mining area of Maizhokunggar county, according to the rescue headquarters.

But thousands of rescuers had to stop searching from 4 pm onwards, as the risk of further landslides increased.

Rescue efforts have continued day and night and 1 million cubic meters of earth and stones had been removed from the landslide site - which is at an altitude of 4,600 meters - by Monday morning, according to officials.

At about 10:50 am, the mountainside where Friday's landslide took place experienced a minor landslide, which brought with it thousands of cubic meters of sand and stones, forcing rescuers to retreat from the area.

Then, around 4 pm, academicians from the Chinese Academy of Engineering said they had identified four crevices about 600 meter long appearing on the top of the mountain, and workers were again told to leave the site for safer areas.

Other experts involved in geology, surveying and seismic work were still evaluating the situation at 6 pm.

More than 4,500 rescuers and 200 machines were working at the site to find the buried miners, said a spokesman with the rescue headquarters.

Weather conditions at the site had deteriorated during the day, said officials, with occasional rain and snowfalls hampering rescue efforts.

Chen Jun, an army traffic division official, said the conditions meant soldiers working at the site had only cold water and dry food available.

Li Suzhi, a doctor, added that medical staff had treated many rescuers over the past couple of days, suffering from the cold, fever or altitude sickness.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/epaper/2013-04/02/content_16369106.htm

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Bosnia to bury hundreds more Srebrenica victims

The bodies will be buried on July 11, the anniversary of the mass killings in 1995, at the Potocari Memorial in eastern Bosnia which commemorates those who died.

Four hundred and sixty-one victims' bodies are currently being kept at the Podrinje Identification Centre in Tuzla, and the head of the centre, Rifat Kesetovic, said that so far, 188 families have agreed to bury their family members on the anniversary.

“It is still early to give estimates concerning the number of burials that will take place on July 11, but we assume that between 300 and 500 killed Srebrenica residents will be buried,” said Kesetovic.

“Identifications are conducted continuously, without a break. We can assume that more victims will have been identified by July,” he said.

A total of 6,194 people who were killed at Srebrenica have been identified in Tuzla so far, and 5,657 of them have been buried in Potocari.

“The number of people who have been identified at the Podrinje Identification Centre is close to 7,000,” Kesetovic said.

Alongside the identification process, the re-exhumation of incomplete bodies is being carried out, Kesetovic explained, because other parts of those bodies have been discovered since their burials.

About 200 re-exhumations have already been conducted, while several hundred are still pending, he added.

More than 7,000 Bosniaks from Srebrenica were killed in the days following the capture of the enclave by the Bosnian Serb army on July 11, 1995.

Several verdicts from the Hague Tribunal, the Bosnian State court and the International Court of Justice have ruled that the killings constituted genocide.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/up-to-500-victims-to-be-buried-in-potocari

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Migrants fear loved ones lost in refugee camp fire

Mount Gambier’s Karenni community is waiting anxiously for the results of DNA tests on the charred bodies of family members and friends who perished in a fire in a Thailand refugee camp.

At least 38 people were killed, 100 injured and 2000 were left without shelter when a fire broke out two weeks ago in Camp 2, where many of Mount Gambier’s Karenni refugees lived before migrating to freedom in Australia.

Khun Dee, who arrived in the Blue Lake city with his wife in 2006, is relieved to know his mother had survived, but fears he has lost friends in the blaze.

“I have spoken to my mother on the phone, so I know she is alive, but she has lost all her possessions in the fire,” he said.

“We have already applied for a visa to bring her to us in Mount Gambier, but we don’t know if the process is going to be delayed by the fire.

“I hope she can come to live here with us.”

Khun Dee lived in the camp with his family since the age of four and although most of his direct family members are now scattered around the world, he had left behind many friends he made in the 20 years he spent in the camp hiding from the cruelty of Burmese soldiers.

“There are about 3000 people in the camp and you know every one because you are not allowed to leave the camp, so we will know people that had died,” he said.

“They sent us photos, but we can’t identify the victims because they had been burnt beyond recognition.

“We will just have to wait for the results of DNA tests.”

Authorities believe the fire could have been sparked by an unattended cooking flame, but the cause has not yet been determined as investigations by the Thai police continue.

Khun Dee has made a heartfelt plea to the South East community to make a financial donation to the survivors in Camp 2.

“People in the camp are not treated like human beings and have very little possessions and now they have lost the few things they have, like food, cooking equipment and clothes,” he said.

“They also have no shelter now, which is just a roof without any walls, and it gets very cold there at night and very hot during the day.”

Khun Dee’s plea is part of an Australia-wide appeal through the Karenni Federation of Australia to raise money, which will be paid directly to the camp leader, a Karenni person who heads the camp committee and has the power to purchase the necessary items.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://www.borderwatch.com.au/story/1402063/migrants-fear-loved-ones-lost-in-refugee-camp-fire/?cs=1266

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Pirates 'kill fishermen' off Bangladesh

Pirates are thought to have drowned 16 fishermen in southern Bangladesh in order to steal their boat.

Their hands and feet were bound before the victims were thrown into the Bay of Bengal to drown, police said.

The bodies had no injury marks, local deputy police chief Imran Bhuiyan told AFP, prompting speculation the men had been thrown into the water alive.

A fishing boat recovered three bodies while 13 were seen floating in the water off Kutubdia Island, he added.

Police and navy officials were using the help of fishermen to recover the remaining bodies.

"Three dead bodies have already been brought to the shore. Two navy ships are now searching the bay for other missing fishermen," a Bangladeshi naval official told the BBC's Anbarasan Ethirajan in Dhaka.

"Sea robbery is more or less common in that part of the sea. But killing in huge numbers like this, is not a common phenomenon."

Concerned relatives have joined the search for some 30 fishermen from the Bashkhali area - near Chittagong and some 300km (190 miles) south-east of the capital Dhaka - who set sail last week.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-21995397

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Dead militants haunting village

Security forces hunting down remnants of Sulu militants in Lahad Datu claim to have seen apparitions of dead gunmen around Kampung Tanduo, the scene of bloody clashes with the terrorists last month, Kosmo! Ahad reported.

A source told the paper that at least three ghostly figures had been sighted, appearing at around the twilight hours.

"They kept seeing the three figures, with one of them wearing a white serban (turban)," he said, adding that the phantom gunmen were seen for just a few seconds each time.

The source said there were three pits in the village where dead militants were buried and many of the bodies were found in the mass graves with amulets around their waist, purportedly to make them invincible.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://news.asiaone.com/News/AsiaOne%2BNews/Malaysia/Story/A1Story20130401-412568.html

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SAR Team Halts Search for Cililin Landslide Victims

A joint search and rescue team has decided to halt the search for three remaining missing victims of a landslide in Cililin, West Java.

Spokesman of the National Disaster and Mitigation Agency (BNPB) Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said on Sunday that after discussions between the agency, the victims' families and local public figures on Saturday evening, it was agreed not to extend the one-week search efforts.

“The effort to search for the landslide victims was halted because of medical considerations and the subsequent impact if the remains are found,” Sutopo told Investor Daily.

Fifteen death victims have been found, while three others — Imas (50) and four-month old baby Jesika — have not been found.

The last body, found on Sunday morning, was identified as 18-year-old Iis.

Sutopo said that with the victims having been buried for too long, their remains must have had already decomposed seriously. He said that the findings of the decomposed bodies could be hazardous to the search team members.

He added that the weather at the site also posed the danger of causing another landslide.

“The family of the victims have agreed to let them go,” Sutopo said.

The Cililin landslide took place last week after hours of torrential rains. Dozens of residents were forced to flee their homes after seven houses were buried by the slide.

It is the second deadly landslide to strike Indonesia this month. Three people were killed and one injured after heavy downpours triggered a landslide in Papua’s provincial capital earlier this month.

Sutopo said the West Java government will relocate to a safer place, those who had lost their houses in the landslide.

“The site for the relocation is up to the victims and the government will appropriate the land, in a safe area, of course,” Sutopo said. “The provincial government will help the construction of the houses.”

Sutopo also said that the agency is active in training people in landslide-prone area to anticipate such disaster.

The Cililin landslide is the latest after a landslide killed three people and injured another earlier in March after days of heavy rain drenched Jayapura, Papua. The landslide destroyed a home in the Gereja Emanuel housing complex in North Jayapura. Three occupants, ages 17 to 26, were killed in the landslide.

Tuesday 2 April 2013

http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/news/sar-team-halts-search-for-cililin-landslide-victims/582967

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