Death toll in western Ugandan boat accident rises to 108 people

The death toll in the weekend boat accident in western Uganda has risen to 108 from 19 that were reported on Saturday.

David Kazungu, Commissioner for Refugees in the ministry of relief, disaster preparedness and refugees told Xinhua in an interview here that 108 bodies have been retrieved from Lake Albert as of Monday afternoon.

Most of the passengers on the boat were Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) refugees returning home.

"So far on Saturday we retrieved 19 bodies from Lake Albert, on Sunday we retrieved six bodies and today by two o'clock 83 bodies have been retrieved by the police marine unit," Kazungu said.

He said the total number of the people who were on the boat is not yet known. Fourty five people survived the accident.

"The bodies are being taken by the DRC officials with whom we have been working with since Saturday on identification of the bodies and return of the bodies for decent burial," he said, adding that some bodies especially those for children have not yet been identified.

He said the refugees were returning home after the UN Intervention Brigade neutralized the Allied Democratic Forces, a Ugandan rebel group operating in eastern DRC.

"These were returning back to Congo. This comes after the intervention forces have created peace majorly within the Kamango region. The King of Kamango area has been calling on his people to return home," he said.

He said the search for more bodies is still continuing and the chance of finding more survivors is slim.

Charles Ssebambulidde, the police commander for Uganda's Albertine region, said that rescue teams pulled scores of bodies — mostly women — from the lake over the weekend.

Lake Albert lies on the Uganda-Congo border, and most of the drowning victims were Congolese refugees returning home from a resettlement camp, according to the United Nations refugee agency and Ugandan officials.

Ssebambulidde said the authorities confirmed the boat carried more than 150 passengers as well as their belongings when it capsized. That boat, which is now in police custody, should only have carried 80 people without luggage, he said.

"This tragedy has shocked me profoundly," U.N. Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres said in a statement sent from Geneva. "My thoughts are with those who have lost dear ones, and the survivors. I am grateful to the government and other actors who have mounted a rescue-and-recovery operation and are assisting the survivors."

The U.N. statement said as many as 250 people may have been aboard the boat, one of two transporting Congolese refugees returning home, suggesting the death toll could rise even further as more bodies are recovered.

Boat accidents are common in Uganda, as transport providers take advantage of lax policing to load their boats with more passengers than they can safely transport.

Ssebambulidde, the Ugandan police official, said it appeared the victims of the latest accident were so desperate to return home that they did not bother about safety. He said the boat was clearly "overloaded."

Uganda hosts more than 320,000 refugees and asylum seekers from violence-prone neighboring countries. More than 175,000 of them are Congolese, according to the U.N. refugee agency.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/africa/2014-03/25/c_126310046.htm

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/uganda-boat-accident-death-toll-rises-107-23035504

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30 people killed in Thailand bus crash

A double-decker bus carrying municipal workers on a field trip in western Thailand plunged off a steep road and into a ravine, killing at least 30 people and injuring 22 others, officials said on Tuesday.

The accident on Monday night was the latest fatal crash on a mountain road in Tak province known for its treacherous dips and turns where 300 accidents occurred last year, said provincial governor Suriya Prasatbunditya. The road is frequented by buses and trucks travelling to and from the border with Myanmar.

The driver was trying to pass cars on a winding downhill road when it skidded off the edge and flipped several times as it tumbled about 30m into a valley before crashing into a tree, Suriya said, recounting what other drivers who witnessed the accident told police.

The driver, who survived the accident with a broken rib, said he tried to slow down but claimed the brakes stopped working, Suriy said.

The bus was one of four carrying local workers and villagers on Monday night from Tak to north-eastern Thailand.

"Accidents happen on this road very often," Suriya said. "We've put warning signs up to caution road users but the accidents keep happening."

Road accidents are common in Thailand, where safety standards are poor and road rules are rarely enforced. Last year, more than 8 600 people died in accidents on Thai roads.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://www.news24.com/World/News/30-people-killed-in-Thailand-bus-crash-20140325

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Typhoon Haiyan: Storm victim’s body left to hang on a tree

The body of a boy was dug up in this city almost five months after super typhoon “Yolanda” devastated the Eastern Visayas region, but the authorities just left the boy’s cadaver in a body bag literally hanging from a tree branch for two weeks.

The body was found in San Jose district’s Barangay Cogon by a canine search team on March 11 in a shallow grave near an old chapel.

Barangay Cogon residents said no one in the village could identify the boy so he could not have been a resident of the barangay, but residents decided to temporarily bury the boy in the grounds of the village’s chapel.

Under current arrangements, bodies of Yolanda fatalities are usually sought with canine teams and dug up by a search team. Crime scene investigators will then take photographs and DNA samples from the cadaver for possible identification.

After processing, the Bureau of Fire Protection is supposed to retrieve bodies for burial at one of the mass grave sites in the city.

But in the case of the body dug up in Barangay Cogon, the BFP never came for the body although village leaders repeatedly told them over a period of two weeks about the body abandoned in their barangay.

“The stench of the corpse that they dug up was already horrid and everyone could smell it because they hung it on a fallen tree by the road side,” one resident said in the vernacular after asking not to be identified.

“Residents are already afraid of catching disease so we are pleading with the authorities to please get the corpse,” the resident added.

Village chief Arlie Go-Perez said she repeatedly told the BFP about the body and it took them two weeks to return and get the body.

When asked about the incident, the local police’s crime scene investigators disavowed knowledge of the body that was dug up last March 11 and they claimed that that was the first time they heard about the matter.

Later in the day, however, the authorities finally retrieved the body and buried it in a mass grave in Barangay Suhi.

The incident has become common in the city, where 2,669 are known to have died, excluding the deaths from nearby towns and provinces. More than half of the Tacloban number come from the San Jose district.

The government’s confirmed death toll is at 6,268 with 1,785 still missing, but the data has not been updated for a month and information on the dead or the missing cannot be found on the website of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.

The NDRRMC could not explain why the fatality figure has not been updated, although its spokesman Reynaldo Balido confirmed that bodies were still being found in Tacloban four months after the diaster.

“Sometimes they find two or three a day, then there are days where they find none,” Balido earlier told a news wire agency.

United Nations undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs herself was shocked that bodies were still turning up when she visited the city last month.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://manilastandardtoday.com/2014/03/25/storm-victim-s-body-left-to-rot-on-a-tree/

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Malaysia plane: How do you mourn a missing person?

The relatives of passengers on board the missing Malaysian Airlines plane have been told the plane crashed in the ocean, with no survivors. So how hard is it to mourn a missing person?

When flight MH370 went missing, Prahlad Shirsath travelled from his home in North Korea to Beijing and then on to Malaysia as he searched for news of his wife's whereabouts.

Kranti Shirsath, a former chemistry professor and mother of two, was travelling to see her husband who worked at a non-profit organisation in Pyongyang.

When there was no news and the days passed, Shirsath's family called him back to his home country of India, where they could endure the uncertainty together.

This is called an "ambiguous loss", says Pauline Boss, professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota, who treats people undergoing this unique kind of bereavement. There is no physical proof of death - no body - so people cling to the hope that the missing are still alive.

"People can't begin mourning when there is ambiguous loss - they're frozen," says Boss. "Frequently, society thinks they should be mourning but, in fact, they are stuck in limbo between thinking their loved one might come back and thinking they might not."

This is a kind of suffering that freezes their grief, says the professor, author of Ambiguous Loss: Learning to Live with Unresolved Grief.

The latest news that the plane probably crashed in the southern Indian Ocean, with no survivors, is unlikely to release them from this limbo, she says. "There is no closure even if they find definitely that the plane is in the ocean. They still have no body to bury. It will always be ambiguous until remains are found or DNA evidence."

People need to see evidence before they are assured that the death has occurred, says Professor Boss, and without that, grief is frozen and complicated. A more clear-cut death is undoubtedly painful but funeral rituals can take place where there is a body, and family and friends come together to re-affirm that the person has died.

In the absence of a confirmed explanation for what happened, relatives imagine their own outcomes. Before the latest news, Kranti's family, including her 16-year-old son, were inclined towards the one that offered most hope - that the plane was hijacked, a scenario in which it was more likely that Kranti was alive.

"We don't really have the strength to entertain the possibility of any bad news at the moment," says Satish Shirsath, Prahlad's younger brother, speaking a few days ago. He was the one who booked Kranti's tickets online.

"I also feel that maybe if I had chosen another route - maybe if I had booked my sister-in-law from Pune instead of Bombay, then to Delhi and Beijing - perhaps it would have been different," he says.

When there is no knowledge of what happened, there is no one to attribute responsibility to, so blaming oneself is typical, says Boss. The first thing she tells families in therapy is that it is not their fault.

Catastrophic events like 9/11 and the Asian tsunami left many relatives and friends waiting in vain for definitive news, but this kind of loss can also happen when someone walks out the door and never comes back.

Valerie Nettles - whose son Damien went missing 17 years ago in the Isle of Wight when aged 16 - has learned to compartmentalise the pain.

She says she lives with one step in two different worlds - one in an "abyss of not knowing" and the other in the practicality of everyday life.

"I always thought that if something happened to my child, I would die - but you don't," she says.

She remembers a vivid dream about her son, in which she saw him across a motorway with her husband and younger son.

"I was elated they had found him, but then I woke up," she says.

Dreams about loved ones are common for people whose relatives are missing. Sometimes, people even dream the ends of the incomplete stories of the missing person - that they are either dead and at peace or happy somewhere far away.

Some cultures attach a lot of significance to these dreams, says Boss, and it helps people to cope better with the ambiguity.

Ambiguous loss is less difficult to negotiate if you live in a culture - for example, where religions such as Hinduism and Islam are dominant - that tend to "accept the fate that a higher power has delivered," Boss says.

"The more 'mastery-oriented' people are, the harder time they seem to have. Because you can't manage it, you can't master it, you have to live with not knowing and that is very hard for most of us to do."

Telling someone who has a missing relative to simply begin the mourning process is not helpful, she adds, because you cannot push those who are suffering in this way to accept any one scenario.

"My first question to the family is - what does this mean to you? And you get the answer and you can build on that," she says.

Nettles is closely following the developments of the missing airplane from Texas, where she now lives. Having every detail played out so publicly must be a "rollercoaster" for the passengers' loved ones, she says.

"It tears you apart - all the 'what-ifs' and 'maybes'." Nettles still wrestles with having decided to relax Damien's curfew deadline the night he disappeared in 1996.

Seventeen years on she has tried to move on for her family but she says she is "limping through life".

"I'm still hoping for something - I don't know what," she says.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26715476

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El Salvador: Digging to solve hundreds of gang murders

El Salvador is a nation riddled with gangs - and consequently has one of the highest murder rates in the world. Most crimes go unpunished, but one man spends his time in the mountains, digging up the forgotten victims.

It had taken a few furtive phone calls, but eventually Israel Ticas, known as The Engineer, agreed to meet me high up on a mountainside.

I had wanted to interview him and see the latest site he was working at, but his bosses weren't having that.

"I have been told off for talking to the media recently," he explained, his voice a hoarse whisper down the line.

"I can talk to you but solely in a personal capacity."

A couple of nights later, we drove up the snaking mountain roads to Juayua, a small town outside San Salvador.

Surrounded on both sides by rich jungle, the altitude makes it the perfect environment for coffee plantations. And the perfect environment for hiding dead bodies.

Although he doesn't like the title, Israel Ticas is El Salvador's only forensic archaeologist.

A short, wiry guy with a dark, lined face, the result no doubt of so many hours working outside, he is shivering in the bitterly cold mountain air. We retire to a nearby restaurant to get warm.

Still wearing his hard hat, the dig he has come from was no hunt for Mayan pottery or dinosaur bones. It was a mass grave.

In El Salvador, Ticas is also known as The Engineer, a reference to the fact he initially studied computer engineering before turning his mind to solving murders.

"Forensic archaeology was unknown here in El Salvador," he tells me, his hands cupped around a mug of hot chocolate.

He learnt his skills as a criminal investigator abroad, particularly on visits to Africa where he worked on sites of mass killings and genocide.

Then he brought the DNA and victim identification techniques he had seen back to his native El Salvador - until recently the country with the highest murder rate in the world.

"What I did was fuse those methods," he says, "adapt and apply them to the criminal gangs and their modus operandi here."

Certainly El Salvador's drug war has kept him in work.



"I've identified 25 different methodologies of murder," he explains with the matter-of-factness of a scientist.

"Every criminal mind is different. But each of them innovates too.

"For example, when dismembering a body, if one person disposes of it in seven parts, someone else says 'I'm going to turn it into 20'," he says.

It is a sobering thought, and over the course of our conversation, he reveals many more grisly details, most of which are far too gruesome to repeat.

I want to know how such daily exposure to the country's extreme violence makes him feel - as a citizen rather than as a scientist.

"It makes me sad," he says, his first reference to emotion.

"I don't agree with anyone's right to take away the life of someone else - especially when it's a Salvadoran taking the life of another Salvadoran," he adds.

But then, it's quickly back to the relative safety of empirical science.

"I've worked on more than 2,000 crime scenes. Thanks to God for giving me this little bit of intelligence, I've been able to recover bodies from places no-one could have recovered them from.



"I've recovered people who were buried 60 metres deep, got all 206 bones of the body back, all that evidence. That is what gives me professional satisfaction."

Ticas was the subject of a recent documentary in which the filmmakers followed him as he exhumed remains from quarries and mines, shallow graves and deep pits across the country.

Often, the grieving mothers of the victims come to urge him personally to find their missing loved ones, heaping further pressure on a man already under considerable strain.

At times that strain begins to show.

More than once he mentions the difficulty of working on the bodies of dead children, of holding a six-year-old's skull in his hands and having to think of it as just evidence, as "material".

"I give conferences in university psychology departments and I tell them 'you should study me. What's wrong with me?'

'How can I work cleaning the face of a dead baby with a brush for two days and not feel anything?'"

His rhetorical questions hang in the mountain air.

"But then sometimes I might suddenly drop the brush, look to the heavens and ask God 'how can you allow this to happen?'"

His morbid fascination could just be the natural by-product of work which has undoubtedly brought some closure to hundreds of families in El Salvador.

An inherently private man, Ticas insists he is unaffected by post-traumatic stress.

Yet something he said revealed a little of what it must be like to be The Engineer of El Salvador: "Sometimes I feel like I'm living in a film. But then, when I open my eyes, it's reality."

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26662942

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Hub bus disaster: Victims put to rest in mass grave, DNA taken

Funeral prayers were offered for the victims of a road tragedy in Hub that claimed 38 lives, according to a media report.

The bodies of 29 victims and body parts and ashes of others were buried in a mass grave in Hub. The dead were transported by Edhi ambulances from Karachi to Hub for burial.

Prior to the funeral, families of the victims protested against the government and criticised them for not sending anyone to take notice of the issue. On March 22, two trucks collided with two passenger buses in the Gadani area of Hub, burning to death at least 38 people, including several women and children.

The police had registered cases against the three drivers and officials collected DNA samples to identify the victims who were charred beyond recognition.

The Sindh Health Department had collected DNA samples of 30 bodies and 24 family members in order to enable cross-matching.

Medical experts from the Sindh police and Abbasi Shaheed Hospital took samples on the night of the accident.

The results of the DNA tests are expected to be received in 15 to 20 days.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://www.nation.com.pk/national/25-Mar-2014/victims-put-to-rest-in-mass-grave

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Washington mudslide: death toll rises to 14 with 176 reports of missing

Authorities say the death toll from a massive mudslide in a rural part of Washington state has risen to 14 after searchers found six additional bodies among the debris, as dozens more remain unaccounted for.

It was virtually impossible to pin down the number of those missing. Snohomish County Emergency Management Director John Pennington said late Monday that officials were working off a potential list of 176 people, but he stressed that authorities believed that included many duplicate names.

Other authorities said they have not been able to determine whether there were multiple calls about the same missing person.

"It was Saturday and probably a higher number than what you would see on a week day," Pennington said of the victims during a press conference Monday. He added that it remains unclear how many structures were impacted at the time.

The 1-square-mile mudslide struck Saturday morning in Snohomish County, critically injuring several people and destroying about 30 homes. Authorities have described the search for additional survivors to be "grim" as crews battle uneven ground and rising waters.

Crews were able to get to the muddy, tree-strewn area after geologists flew over in a helicopter and determined it was safe enough for emergency responders and technical rescue personnel to search for possible survivors, Snohomish County Fire District 21 Chief Travis Hots said Sunday evening.

"We didn't see or hear any signs of life out there today," he said, adding that they did not search the entire debris field, only drier areas safe to traverse. "It's very disappointing to all emergency responders on scene."

Hots said the search under way is technically still a "rescue" operation but added that no survivors have been found since Saturday.

Before crews could get onto the debris field late Sunday morning, they looked for signs of life by helicopter. Authorities initially said it was too dangerous to send rescuers out on foot.

Rescuers' hopes of finding more survivors were buoyed late Saturday when they heard people yelling for help, but they were unable to reach anyone. The soupy mud was so thick and deep that searchers had to turn back.

The slide wiped through what neighbors described as a former fishing village of small homes -- some nearly 100 years old.

As the search for the missing continued, authorities said some may have been able to get out on their own. The number unaccounted for could change because some people may have been in cars and on roads when the slide hit just before 11 a.m. Saturday, authorities said.

Officials described the mudslide as "a big wall of mud and debris." It blocked about a mile of State Route 530 near the town of Oso, about 55 miles north of Seattle. It was reported to be about 15 feet deep in some areas.

Authorities believe the slide was caused by ground made unstable by recent heavy rainfall.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee described the scene as "a square mile of total devastation" after flying over the disaster area midday Sunday. He assured families that everything was being done to find their missing loved ones.

"There is a full scale, 100 percent aggressive rescue going on right now," said Inslee, who proclaimed a state of emergency. The slide

blocked the North Fork of the Stillaguamish River. With the water pooling behind the debris, authorities worried about downstream flooding and issued an evacuation notice Saturday. The water had begun to seep through the blockage Sunday afternoon, alleviating some concerns.

Snohomish County officials said Sunday that residents could return home during daylight hours. Even though the evacuation had been lifted, Inslee urged residents to remain alert.

The National Weather Service issued a flash flood watch for Snohomish County through Monday afternoon.

Shari Ireton, a spokeswoman for the Snohomish County sheriff's office, said Sunday that several people were injured in the slide.

A 6-month-old boy and an 81-year-old man remained in critical condition Sunday morning at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. Hospital spokeswoman Susan Gregg said two men, ages 37 and 58, were in serious condition, while a 25-year-old woman was upgraded to satisfactory condition.

Bruce Blacker, who lives just west of the slide, doesn't know the whereabouts of six neighbors.

"It's a very close knit community," Blacker said as he waited at an Arlington roadblock before troopers let him through. There were almost 20 homes in the neighborhood that was destroyed, he said.

Search-and-rescue help came from around the region, including the Washington State Patrol and the Army Corps of Engineers. More than 100 were at the scene.

Evacuation shelters were set up at Post Middle School in Arlington and the Darrington Community Center.

Dane Williams, 30, who lives a few miles from the mudslide, spent Saturday night at a Red Cross shelter at the Arlington school.

He said he saw a few "pretty distraught" people at the shelter who didn't know the fate of loved ones who live in the stricken area.

"It makes me want to cry," Williams said Sunday.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/03/25/2-killed-in-big-wash-mudslide-sheriff-office-says/

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Bad weather halts search for missing Malaysian jet

Bad weather and rough seas have suspended the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane.

The delay will only prolong the agony for the relatives of the 239 people on board the jet, which officials are now sure crashed in the remote Indian Ocean.

On Monday Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak made the sombre announcement.

Declaring that all those on board must be presumed lost, he referred to fresh analysis of satellite tracking data which could only conclude that flight MH370 had flown along the southern corridor and ran out of fuel in the ocean south west of Perth.

China has demanded to see the satellite evidence as most of those on board the jet were Chinese nationals.

Distressed relatives have reacted with anger at the Malaysian handling of the search and many remain sceptical of the conclusions as no wreckage as yet been found.

“They said the plane went down in the Southern Indian ocean, but they have not found the plane yet, what are they basing this on?” said one woman whose husband was on the missing airliner. “We do not trust what the Malaysian government is saying,” she added.

Another whose brother had been on the plane said: “We do not believe what they say, if the relatives have died we need to see their bodies to believe they are really dead. “

Satellite data

The revelation that flight MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean is based on new analysis by UK investigators and the British satellite firm Inmarsat, Malaysia's prime minister has said.

Najib Razak said relatives of the flight's 239 passengers and crew had been told of the "heartbreaking" news.

Inmarsat used new techniques to detect the plane's course, he said.

The UK's Air Accidents Investigation Branch, which probes serious civil aircraft incidents, was also involved.

Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing after taking off from Kuala Lumpur on 8 March.

Mr Razak's announcement came as the international search effort reached a fifth day of operations in the southern Indian Ocean.

Inmarsat has told the BBC it gave the Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) the new data on Sunday - stressing it needed to be checked before it was made public.

Engineers spent all weekend looking back at a previous Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 flights, going back several weeks.

They compared the satellite data from those flights with flight MH370 and were able to work out it went south.

This is cutting-edge modelling, never tried before. It uses the Doppler effect - which is what makes a police siren sound different from different points.

They had it reviewed by other scientists before handing it over.

As far as they can tell, the plane was flying at cruising height, above 30,000ft. They found no evidence of fluctuating heights being reported.

This is it now - they cannot pinpoint the position any further. They handed this data over on Sunday morning.

The firm said its latest calculation involved a large amount of data analysis, focusing on a number of factors including the movements of other aircraft.

It involved an entirely new way of modelling which is why the analysis took some time, the firm said.

Inmarsat senior vice-president Chris McLaughlin said the firm had studied electronic "pings" - or bursts of data - which the plane had sent to one of its satellites.

He told the BBC: "We have been dealing with a totally new area. We've been trying to help an investigation based on a single signal once an hour from an aircraft that didn't include any GPS data, any time and distance information.

"So this really was a bit of a shot in the dark and it's to the credit of our scientific team that they came up and managed to model this."

Mr McLaughlin continued: "They managed to find a way in which to say just a single ping can be used to say the plane was both powered up and travelling, and then by a process of elimination - comparing it to other known flights - establish that it went south."

A spokeswoman for the AAIB said it could not comment on the investigation, but confirmed: "As set out by the Malaysian prime minister, we have been working with the UK company Inmarsat, using satellite data to determine the area on which to focus the search."



Oceanographer Dr Simon Boxall, from the University of Southampton, told the BBC: "The algorithms and the techniques [Inmarsat] have applied to try and locate - to within a certain area - where the last transmission was made is really quite phenomenal - but also quite tragic because it does show this plane was heading to an open area of ocean."

He continued: "They've probably crammed almost a year's worth of research into maybe a couple of weeks, so it's not a routine calculation they would ever, ever make.

"They've been looking at all the signals they have, all the recordings they have, and processing that many times over to try and pinpoint where the plane's signal came from. Technologically it's really quite astounding."

But Philip Baum, editor of Aviation Security International Magazine, said the mystery of the missing Boeing 777 jet had not been solved.

"We still believe there was a deliberate act that took place on board the flight deck inside the cockpit that resulted in the aircraft turning and heading south," he said.

"So until we find the black box we're really not going to know anything more."

Mr Razak told a news conference in Kuala Lumpur that work by the AAIB and Inmarsat had revealed MH370's last position was in the ocean west of Perth, Australia.

"This is a remote location, far from any possible landing sites. It is therefore with deep sadness and regret that I must inform you that - according to this new data - flight MH370 ended in the southern Indian Ocean," he said.

He added that for the relatives of those on board, "the past few weeks have been heartbreaking. I know this news must be harder still".

Malaysia Airlines said all relatives of those on board had been informed "face-to-face by our top management", as well as by text message.

Boeing said in a statement: "Our thoughts and deepest sympathies continue to be with the families and loved ones of those aboard."

British Royal Navy ship HMS Echo is due to arrive in the area on Tuesday to help with the search.

Tuesday 25 March 2014

http://www.euronews.com/2014/03/25/bad-weather-halts-search-for-missing-malaysian-jet/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26720772

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Update: Up to 108 missing after US mudslide

A large rescue operation began soon after the landslide struck on Saturday

Authorities say they have 108 reports of people missing or unaccounted for after Saturday's huge landslide in the north-western US state of Washington.

Eight bodies have been recovered so far after the 54m (177ft) deep wall of mud swept near the town of Oso, about 90km (55 miles) north of Seattle.

Search crews have worked day and night, using helicopters in the dangerous conditions that destroyed 30 homes.

Several people, including an infant, were critically injured.

'Situation very grim'

Snohomish County emergency management director John Pennington said the figure did not necessarily represent the total number of injuries or fatalities.

He said the list had been consolidated from a number of sources.

"It's a soft 108," Mr Pennington told a news conference, reports the Associated Press news agency.

"We have not found anyone alive on this pile since Saturday," he added.

Snohomish County fire chief Travis Hots told reporters: "The situation is very grim."



'Gone in three seconds'

Authorities have continued their search-and-rescue operations amid a tangled debris field that Washington Governor Jay Inslee labelled "a square mile of total devastation"

An 81-year-old man and a six-month-old boy were said to be in critical condition at a Seattle hospital on Sunday.

An eyewitness told the Daily Herald that he was driving on the road near Oso and had to quickly brake to avoid the mudslide.

"I just saw the darkness coming across the road. Everything was gone in three seconds," Paulo Falcao told the newspaper.

Robin Youngblood, another witness, told the Seattle Times: "All of a sudden there was a wall of mud. Then it hit and we were rolling.

"The house was in sticks. We were buried under things, and we dug ourselves out."

The landslide cut off the city of Darrington and clogged the north fork of the Stillaguamish River.

This prompted fears of severe flooding downstream if the build-up of water behind the debris breaks through suddenly.

The authorities say the landslide was caused by recent heavy rain.

The area has had problems in the past with unstable land.

Monday 24 March 2014

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-26723240

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World Trade Center museum to receive 9/11 victims’ remains

New York City plans to move the remains of unidentified victims in the 2001 terror attack to a new resting place within the 9/11 Memorial Museum.

The roughly 8,000 unidentified remains, which are in the custody of the Office of Chief Medical Examiner, will be moved to the museum this year, spokeswoman Julie Bolcer said.

“We’re getting ready,” said city Medical Examiner’s Office spokeswoman Julie Bolcer. “We’re planning the move.”

Lee Ielpi, whose firefighter son, Jonathan, died on 9/11, said the remains should be moved in a solemn motorcade “with clergy of all religions to show the world how we treat our dead, murdered on 9/11, with respect and dignity.”

The “remains repository” will be hidden from view behind a wall engraved with a quote by Virgil: “No day shall erase you from the memory of time.” The space will include an ME’s office, to continue DNA-ID efforts, and a family visiting room.

Only medical examiners and families of victims will be given access to the repository, according to the spokesperson for both the museum and the medical examiner's office.

Some 9/11 relatives strongly oppose putting the remains in the museum — which will charge $24 for admission — saying visitors should not have to fork over cash to pay their respects.

The decision to house remains in the museum repository has been controversial.

In 2011, 17 families of 9/11 victims filed a petition in court to force the museum to consult with the victims' families before deciding what to do with the remains. They eventually asked for a congressional hearing. Both efforts were unsuccessful.

On its website, the museum said the decision to move the remains to the repository at the museum was because of overwhelming feedback received from families after the attacks.

The 9/11 Memorial Museum is scheduled to open this spring as part of the part of the National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the World Trade Center site.

DNA identifications of the unidentified remains will continue in the new repository, according to the museum.

In New York, 2,753 people were killed when hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175 were intentionally crashed into the north and south towers of the World Trade Center. A total of 2,977 people were killed in New York, Washington and outside of Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Monday 24 March 2014

http://nypost.com/2014/03/23/world-trade-center-museum-to-receive-911-victims-remains/

http://www.abc15.com/news/national/911-remains-to-be-moved-to-spot-within-museum

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Uganda: Search continues for Lake Albert boat victims

The coxswain (pilot) of the boat that capsized on Lake Albert killing an unspecified number of Congolese refugees has been arrested by police in Kibaale as the search for more bodies continues.

As many as 60 people are feared dead -- with 22 bodies found so far -- in another of the worst boat disasters in Uganda’s recorded history that occurred early Saturday.

Four years ago, some 70 people were involved in a boat fatality when their boat capsized on the same lake - also on a Saturday.

The coxswain of the latest incident, only identified as Ocelle, is currently under police custody at Kitebere landing site.

Kibaale district police commander John Ojokuna Elatu, who identified the coxswain, said he will be transferred to the district police headquarters.

Ojokuna said the coxswain of the ill-fated boat will be charged with traffic offences of overloading, operating a boat under the influence of alcohol and recklessness “as soon as possible”.

‘Hopes fading’

Meanwhile the search and rescue operation for both survivors and bodies is going on, with the police and local fishermen teaming up in the efforts.

By Sunday morning the number of people rescued had reached 42 with at least 22 bodies already recovered.

It is believed that over 40 bodies are still in the waters.

Charles Kisembo, the fisheries officer in charge of Ndaiga sub-county declared that finding more people alive is unlikely, and that hope for any survivors is fading.

“We do not expect to get survivors, but the search continues,” he said.

The boat capsized near Kitebere landing site in Kibaale district en route to Ntoroko landing site where it was taking some 100 Congolese refugees who were reportedly fleeing from Kyangwali refugee settlement camp in Kyangwali sub-county Hoima district.

The refugees boarded at Senjojo landing site on Saturday morning but later encountered mechanical problems a few hours later at around 10am local time, leading to their boat tipping over.

The bodies of those who died were taken to Ntoroko health center mortuary aboard a Kibaale district speed boat.

Among the deceased are 14 children.

What survivors say

Alice Nanzeri, who survived with her children, said the boat was overloaded with people and luggage which could have caused the accident.

“We had mattresses and all our household items and the boat was very full,” she said Nanzeri.

Her theory was that the mattresses could have absorbed water along the way, which made the boat heavier and hence leading to the deadly mishap.

Nanzeri said that they clang onto the capsized vessel, and were lucky to be found by an advancing rescue boat.

Another survivor, Pastor Modest Kasongo, blamed the accident on the coxswain, whom he said was sipping on a sachet of alcohol the whole way until the accident occurred.

“The pilot must have been drunk and lost control because he was taking alcohol,” he said.

The refugees said that they were escaping from the settlement camp due to the unfavorable conditions there, especially inadequate food supplies.

“We have been having a single meal daily and we could not manage such an environment,” said one of them.

Costa Toyokana, 12, who lost all his relatives in the accident, told New Vision he does not know what to do next.

“All my parents and others have perished so am helpless now,” he moaned.

The survivors said they have not been getting food supplies from the leaders of the camp, which prompted them to return home where they say they believe is now secure and that they can practice agriculture to fend for their families.

One refugee said that they only received 10kgs of maize and beans and they do not know what next.

They said they are now planning to go to Ntoroko and then board commuter taxis to Bundibugyo and then proceed to their villages which are bordering Uganda.

The relocation of the Congolese refuges started in August this year when they fled their home area in Kamango in Western DR Congo after Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) attacked them and they fled to Uganda.

Over 20,000 refugees have been settled in Kyangwali refugee settlement land by the United Nations High Commission for Refuges (UNHCR).

Monday 24 March 2014

http://www.newvision.co.ug/news/653824-boat-disaster-pilot-arrested-as-search-continues.html

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11 killed, eight injured in road accident near Murree

Eleven passengers were killed while a dozen got multiple injuries when a Rawalpindi-bound passenger van plunged into a ravine at a Salgran, a picnic spot in Murree, on Sunday.

The bus, which was carrying 20 passengers from the hill town of Murree to Rawalpindi, lost traction on a slippery road amid rainfall, rolling on its side as it fell down a slope.

According to officials of Rescue 1122, a passenger van (LES 1923) coming from Rawalpindi with 25 people on board met an accident at Salgran, a famous tourist spot near Rawalpindi, and plunged into 150-meter deep ravine. As a result, as many as 11 passengers died at the spot while a dozen got multiple injuries, who were later shifted to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) Islamabad.

"Eleven passengers have been killed while a dozen got multiple injuries in the accident. The injured and dead bodies have been shifted to PIMS," In charge Rescue 1122 Rawalpindi told The Nation.

A spokesperson of PIMS also confirmed that 11 dead bodies were shifted to PIMS while 12 injured were admitted to the emergency ward.

Officials of Murree Police Station said rescue operation was over and initial investigations were on. The rescuers said the victims trapped in the wreckage of the wagon were pulled out after cutting the body of the vehicle.

"We will investigate thoroughly to sort out what had made the ill-fated van plunge into ravine," Muhammad Sohail, officer on duty at Murree Police Station, said when contacted. He did not rule out the possibility of bad weather causing the accident.

It is worthy of mentioning here that it was the second accident in the current year as on January 8, 2014, a dozen of passengers were killed when two passenger busses had collided with each other and plunged into ravine at the same spot of Salgran.

Since January 2013, more than 130 people have been killed or injured in 11 traffic accidents on the same spot at Salgran.

The popular hill resort Murree is situated around 50 kilometres northeast of Islamabad and attracts tourists from across the country.

Bus accidents are common on the mountainous track to the hill town because of careless driving and speeding.

However, after the latest accident, the residents of the area have criticised the local administration and the traffic police for their failure to check speeding and overloading by the public transporters which they said was the major cause of the increasing fatal accidents in the mountainous area.

Pakistan has one of the world's worst records for fatal traffic accidents, blamed on poor roads, badly maintained vehicles and reckless driving.

Monday 24 March 2014

http://www.nation.com.pk/national/24-Mar-2014/11-die-in-murree-van-plunge

http://www.dawn.com/news/1095190/10-killed-eight-injured-in-road-accident-near-murree

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DNA samples taken: 35 bodies of Hub tragedy yet to be identified

Families of almost all victim of the Saturday tragic accident on the RCD Highway near Hub are anxiously waiting for the identification of the bodies of their loved ones so that they could take the coffins home for burial. But, it appears that their wait is not going to be over anytime soon.

At least 36 people were killed when two passenger coaches and a pickup rammed into an overturned truck on the RCD Highway near Hub. All the vehicles caught fire after the collision since at least one coach and the truck were allegedly carrying oil smuggled from Iran. The bodies of all the victims, some of them said to be employees of Pakistan Navy, were charred beyond recognition.

Family members of the accident victims continued to camp outside the Edhi morgue in Sohrab Goth, where the bodies were taken from the site of the accident, for a second consecutive day on Sunday. The mourners were just waiting for authorities’ nod to take the bodies of their loved ones for burial.

However, the body of one of the 36 victims was identified and handed over to his family on Sunday, while samples had been taken from the remaining 35 bodies for carrying out DNA tests for identification.

“Only one body was handed over to a victim family,” said Anwar Kazmi of the Edhi Foundation. “That particular body was recognisable to some extent. Health officials are taking DNA samples to identify remaining 35 victims. They have sent samples to a forensic laboratory in Islamabad and the process may take 10 to 15 days to complete.”

Meanwhile, there was no word from any official over the core issue of oil smuggling or to trace key players behind the illegal transportation of the smuggled Iranian oil, which has become a regular feature of Karachi-Balochistan buss.

“We have enhanced patrolling in areas under our jurisdiction and we are not allowing a single vehicle carrying (smuggled) oil,” said DPO Cheema. “We are also coordinating with all agencies concerned which include anti-smuggling bodies so that no such incident recurs due to any negligence.”

Monday 24 March 2014

http://www.dawn.com/news/1095122/dna-samples-taken-35-bodies-of-hub-tragedy-yet-to-be-identified

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8 dead after massive Washington mudslide, at least a dozen missing

Searchers have found five more bodies in the sludge of a massive landslide in the northwestern state of Washington, bringing the death toll to at least eight from the wall of debris that swept through a small riverside neighbourhood.

Four more bodies were discovered late on Sunday, said Snohomish County sheriff’s Lt Rob Palmer said. Earlier in the day, authorities said one body had been found on the debris field. Three people were already confirmed dead on Saturday.

More people remained missing, and authorities said the number was “fluid.” Earlier yesterday, they said it was at least 18, but that count came before additional bodies were discovered.

The mudslide that struck Saturday morning also critically injured several people and destroyed about 30 homes.

Crews were able to get out to the muddy, tree-strewn area after geologists few over in a helicopter and determined it was safe enough for emergency responders and technical rescue personnel to search for possible survivors, Snohomish County Fire District 21 Chief Travis Hots said last evening.

“We didn’t see or hear any signs of life out there today,” he said, adding that they did not search the entire debris field, only drier areas safe to traverse.

Despite that, Hots said crews were still in a “search and rescue mode. It has not gone to a recovery mode at this time.” Searchers continued looking into the night on Sunday. Several people, including an infant, were critically injured in the mudslide that hit Saturday morning about 88 kilometres north of Seattle. About 30 homes were destroyed.

Rescuers’ hope of finding more survivors that had been buoyed late Saturday when they heard people yelling for help from within the debris field, but they were unable to reach anyone.

The mud was so thick and deep that searchers had to turn back. The slide wiped through what neighbors described as a former fishing village of small homes, some nearly 100 years old.

Some of the missing may have been able to get out on their own, authorities said. The number unaccounted for could change because some people may have been in cars and on roads when the slide hit, Hots said.

Authorities believe the slide was caused by ground made unstable by recent heavy rainfall.

Monday 24 March 2014

http://indianexpress.com/article/world/americas/eight-dead-in-washington-state-landslide-18-missing/

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Another deadly road accident in Egypt kills 17

Seventeen workers were killed Sunday after their company vehicle crashed in an accident on the Cairo-Alexandria Desert Road near Beheira governorate.

At least two injured and were sent to a nearby hospital, according to Al-Ahram Arabic news website.

The dead were transferred to Gharb Al-Nobara Hospital morgue.

No further details were given on the circumstances of the accident.

Egypt is notorious for its poor road safety. According to the World Health Organisation, 12,000 Egyptians are killed in accidents annually.

Only two weeks ago, 25 people, including three children, died in a road accident in the Sinai Peninsula when a passenger bus collided with a parked truck carrying 50 tons of building materials.

Sunday 23 March 2014

http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/97348/Egypt/Politics-/Another-deadly-road-accident-in-Egypt-kills-.aspx

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Maharashtra tanker blast toll rises to 10

The toll in Saturday’s petrol tanker blast went up to 10 with two more people dying due to their injuries, officials said here Sunday.

According to investigating officer D.K. Palwankar of Kasa police station, near Dahanu town, the process of identifying the victims is underway and three men have been identified so far.

The DNA tests will be conducted to ascertain the identity of other victims before the bodies are handed over to their relatives, he said.

Among the dead are at least two women, while 24 injured people have been shifted to hospitals in Mumbai and Thane, Palwankar said.

The tanker was carrying around 35 tonnes of petrol when the driver lost control over it Saturday afternoon on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad national highway.

The tanker skidded, overturned, caught fire and exploded on the highway near Charoti village around 2.30 p.m.

Police officer Preeti Patil of Kasa police station said the burning, speeding tanker skidded down the highway, knocking down around 10 other vehicles in its path.

One restaurant and some small shops in the vicinity were damaged as leapt out from the tanker.

An hotel Apsara where the tanker went and halted was badly damaged due to the flames.

Teams of firefighters and police rushed to the site for rescue operations as massive traffic snarls blocked both sides of the highway near the Charoti toll post. One side of the highway could be cleared for traffic only by 6 p.m.

Eight injured people were admitted to hospitals.

The bodies and the injured have been taken to the Kasa Primary health centre. Doctors at the centre said that though the dead were identified by their relatives, the bodies may have to be sent for DNA analysis as they are badly charred.

An hotel Apsara where the tanker went and halted was badly damaged due to the flames.

The premises of the Hotel Apsara suffered up to 70 per cent damage due to the fire as the flames from the vehicles parked near the hotel swept up its walls.

The flames from the explosion also damaged a jeep, three Tata Magic taxi vans, three autorickshaws and 10 motorcycles.

Some of the clients who were trapped in the hotel due to the fire were later rescued by the fire personnel. “As it was lunch time, there were many truck drivers and passengers inside the hotel,” said Jadhav.

“Until the fire is completely extinguished, we would not be able to ascertain the number of people stuck inside the burning vehicles, but as of now, seven persons have been confirmed dead,” said an official.

Sunday 23 March 2014

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Seven-burned-alive-as-oil-tanker-explodes-on-Mumbai-Ahmedabad-national-highway/articleshow/32499712.cms

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70 years later, U.S. soldier killed in Normandy returns home

U.S. Army Private First Class Lawrence S. Gordon — killed in Normandy in 1944, then mistakenly buried as a German soldier — will soon be going home to his family.

But don’t thank the American military for this belated return. The Pentagon declined to act on his case, despite exhaustive research by civilian investigators that pointed to the location of his remains.

Instead, Gordon’s family and advocates used the same evidence to persuade French and German officials to exhume Gordon and identify him through DNA testing. That’s right: the relatives of this U.S. soldier, who fought against the Germans, are relying on Germany to bring him back home.

Gordon’s case is another example of breakdowns in the American system for finding and identifying tens of thousands of missing service members from past conflicts. More than 9,400 troops are buried as “unknowns” in American cemeteries around the world. Yet, as ProPublica and NPR recently reported, the Joint Prisoners of War/Missing in Action Accounting Command (J-PAC) rarely disinters any of those men to try to use DNA to identify them. On average, just 4 percent of such cases move forward.

A Pentagon review ordered by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel of how the military is managing its mission to find and identify MIAs concludes next month.

Gordon’s family benefited from a fluke of circumstance: Gordon was in a German cemetery in France, not an American one, allowing his case to advance without the U.S. military’s participation.

Jed Henry, a filmmaker from Wisconsin whose grandfather served in Gordon’s unit, took up Gordon’s case in 2011. Henry scoured records, witness statements and various archives and pieced together evidence about Gordon’s whereabouts.

Gordon’s family knew only that he was killed in Normandy when a German shell hit his armored car in August 1944. Gordon’s bloody wallet was sent home to his mother in Canada. (Gordon had Canadian citizenship, but he was born to American parents and decided to enlist in the U.S. Army.)

Henry found paperwork revealing the Army had recovered the destroyed vehicle and two badly burned, unidentifiable bodies. They were buried as American unknowns.

After the war ended, the Army dug up both sets of remains, finding they wore German clothing. Using fingerprints, one was identified as U.S. Army Pvt. James Bowman, who had been in the turret of the car next to Gordon.

It was impossible to use fingerprints to identify the other set of remains. The bones were given a number, X-356, for lack of a name. Because of the German clothing, they were turned over to the Germans, who interred them in a crypt in France.

That evidence was enough to persuade the French and German governments to exhume the remains last fall and test for DNA, but not the Pentagon.

“Why is that we had enough evidence to convince the French and the Germans but not the Americans?” Henry asked. “Why is the burden of proof in America so much higher? It’s ludicrous.”

The April 2013 internal J-PAC memo argued that the evidence was too thin to eliminate the thousands of other men who died in the area during that time, concluding “that the association between [Gordon] and this set of remains was possible but improbable.” J-PAC historian Jeffery Johnson questioned whether it was even within the agency’s authority or responsibility to try to identify Gordon because he was a Canadian citizen.

Another J-PAC official told Henry in an email that the case didn’t meet the criteria for disinterment set by Pentagon policy. In practice, J-PAC’s scientific director, Tom Holland, has broad leeway to interpret that criteria and he has set an extraordinarily high standard that has led to the 96 percent rejection rate. J-PAC did only one World War II disinterment in 2013 and none in 2012.

So the critical tests on the remains were performed by France’s National Forensic Science Institute, which found that DNA from a molar matched that of Gordon’s nephews, according to a letter from the French prosecutor overseeing the matter.

Dirk H. Backen, the Brigadier General of the German Defense Attaché, sent a personal letter to Gordon’s namesake and nephew, Lawrence R. Gordon, after learning of the test results, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

“Eventually, justice has won. My congratulations for showing such honorable commitment, patriotism, faith and courage to walk that long path for your uncle,” Backen wrote. “He will come home and that is what counts. He fell in a battle against my countrymen, but he did this under a just cause: To liberate Europe from fascism and to restore peace, freedom and humanity. His sacrifice was not in vain.” There will be a ceremony on June 10 in France to turn Gordon’s remains over to his family. For the flight across the Atlantic, representatives of the Canadian, German and French military will escort Gordon, Henry said. It’s unclear if the American military will be there, he added.

The remains will go next to the University of Wisconsin for an anthropologist and odontologist to inspect. The lab there will also test the DNA to confirm the French results. The family has invited J-PAC to observe the process but has opted not to give the remains to the agency to examine independently.

The family won’t wait on the U.S. government to proceed with burying Gordon in Saskatchewan on Aug. 13, the 70th anniversary of his death, Henry said.

The Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office said in a statement that “we strongly believe that Pfc. Gordon will receive full military benefits and honors suitable to the honorable service and sacrifice that he made for all of our Countries during the Second World War.”

Gordon’s family and advocates are frustrated the U.S. military is just now stepping up to be involved.

J-PAC’s “mission statement says to achieve the fullest possible accounting of soldiers,” Henry said. “They’re never going to get everybody, but they can certainly do a hell of a lot better than what they’re doing.”

Sunday 23 March 2014

http://www.salon.com/2014/03/22/70_years_later_u_s_soldier_killed_in_normandy_is_finally_coming_home_partner/

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Final rites: ‘Mothers can’t even recognise their children’

The death toll has risen to 42 people when two passenger buses carrying smuggled petrol and diesel on their rooftops caught fire after a fierce collision with a truck on the RCD Highway near Gadani Morr in Lasbela district of Balochistan on Saturday.

Police and rescuers had confirmed 37 deaths in the tragic accident and inferno till the filing of this report.

The collision and resulting fire was so fierce that one of the buses and the truck were completely burnt and the passengers did not get a chance to escape the fire and were burnt alive before the rescuers arrived.

Police officials from Hub, Coast Guards personnel, Frontier Corps officials as well as volunteers of the Edhi Foundation and a couple of fire tenders reached the spot and took part in rescue activities and the shifting of bodies and injured to hospitals in Karachi.

Officials said most of the deaths occurred due to the hydraulic doors and sealed windows of the air-conditioned buses. When the buses caught fire after the collision their doors were jammed and people could not escape from the windows due to the presence of iron bars.

There were reports of some six to seven Pakistan Navy personnel among the dead in the accident who were returning to their bases in Karachi from Balochistan but Navy officials neither confirmed nor denied such reports.

A spokesman for the Pakistan Navy said an investigation was under way to find out if Navy personnel were also on board the buses but added that the actual situation could only be ascertained after DNA tests. He said samples were being taken for DNA tests as almost all the bodies were completely charred and were not identifiable.

The Edhi Foundation said they received 37 bodies, of which 36 were shifted to the mortuary as they were charred beyond recognition while the body of the driver of the ill-fated truck, who was identified as Nasir Ali, was handed over to his family.

Anwar Kazmi, spokesman for the Edhi Foundation, said the truck driver was burnt alive on the driving seat of the truck after the accident and he was identified due to his body’s presence in the truck, but the 36 bodies taken out of the buses were completely charred and it was even difficult to distinguish between male and female bodies.

“Three to four bodies were of children who can be identified due to their size and height, otherwise they were unrecognisable,” he added.

Forensic scientists collected the DNA samples of the charred bodies and sent them to Islamabad for identification as it was the only solution left to identify the ill-fated passengers who perished in the accident.

“Mothers cannot even recognise their children,” says Riasat Ali, a clerk at the Edhi Morgue in Sohrab Goth, Karachi. “Today’s incident reminds me of the 2012 Baldia Town factory fire in which everyone was burnt to death as well,” he recalls, as he sweeps away ashes on the floor.

Scores of burnt bodies – and body parts – lie wrapped in white cotton shrouds, tucked away on stretchers of the morgue.

The stench of burnt flesh pervades the hall which was crammed with 37 charred bodies of passengers of the ill-fated bus that collided with a truck early Saturday. Outside the hall, some relatives of the victims cling to their cell phones, while some carry photographs of their loved ones to help in the identification.

“I took these [pictures] from their houses, but I think these are useless now,” says Salman, as he chokes. He has come to the Edhi mortuary to identify his friends, Zafar and Khalid. “I came here to take their bodies to their parents so that they can bury them.”

Shakir, who lives in Lyari, Karachi, is also waiting outside the mortuary. “Akhtar and Tanveer were in the bus and since the accident, their phones are not responding,” he says about his friends who were coming from Balochistan in the bus. “But all bodies are burnt. They decompose if you touch them,” he exclaims. “I could not even differentiate between a man and a woman. God save us from such days.”

“We have identified the drivers of the two trucks – only because their bodies were found in the driving seats,” says Ahmed Edhi, the assistant in-charge of Edhi Karachi Zone. One of the bodies has been handed over to the heirs, he adds. Thirty-six bodies remain in the mortuary but they can only be identified after DNA tests.

Edhi spokesperson Anwar Kazmi says that male and female recognition is not possible but they know that five bodies are of children.

The Sindh Health Department has set up an information desk at the Edhi Cold Storage for the collections of samples for DNA identification.

Sunday 23 March 2014

http://tribune.com.pk/story/686194/final-rites-mothers-cant-even-recognise-their-children/

http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-13-29262-42-die-as-accident-causes-inferno-on-RCD-Highway

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Nigeria: Scores of human skulls found in Ibadan

Residents of Oyo State capital on Saturday evening received with shock the discovery of an underground dungeon where hundreds of human skulls were found.

Most of the people who besieged the site, in Soka area in Oluyole local government area of the state, wept when a search party went to the underground located in the state's capital and uncovered several corpses of persons killed inside the dungeon.

As at the time of filing this report, many of such skulls were still being discovered. Apart from hundreds of skulls, human body parts, including decomposed ones, disused clothes, shoes, pictures and voter cards were found at the scene.

It was gathered that the search party was combing the area for nine missing people while 16 people were rescued from the site.

It was gathered that about 20 decomposed bodies were discovered, including about 18 males and five females, looking skinny with chains on their legs.

One of the women was said to have been delivered of a baby early yesterday, but the infant was sold. The woman was brought out of the bush; she had stains of blood on her.

When asked to explain how she got to the place, she uttered a few words and fainted. About nine of them were lying on the ground, very weak and unable to speak.

There were human skulls, bones and other parts found in the bush.

It was a forest of death as there were also open graves where bodies were dumped.

It was gathered that the bush was where human parts were freely sold to people who often came to the area at night.

A source informed that some Fulani herdsmen were usually seen in the bush with their cattle.

One Akeem Isiaka (38) was arrested at the scene and taken away by security agents to Sanyo police station .

Inside the bush were the bodies dumped in some open containers and some deep dry wells where their captors dropped them.

In one of the buildings, an abandoned factory where the captives were slaughtered and sold in parts to clients was found.

There were clots of blood on the floor of the room and a platform built by wooden plank. Some mechanics around the area confirmed that many high-profile people usually visited the area especially in the night to patronise their clients.

When contacted , the Oyo State police command spokesperson, Mrs Olabisi Clet-Ilobanafor, said some arrests were made yesterday, but the prime suspect was at large. She, however, declined to mention the number of people arrested.

The police spokesperson said some security personnel have been detailed to the scene to prevent the people from taking the remains.

Every year, hundreds of Nigerians lose their lives to ritual killings.

Their body parts are sold for large sums of money to people who believe they will become more powerful through magical potions containing human flesh and blood.

Sunday 23 March 2014

http://allafrica.com/stories/201403230024.html

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Update: At least 19 dead, 32 missing in Uganda Lake Albert boat capsize

At least 19 people were dead and 32 others missing in a boat accident off Lake Albert in Western Uganda on Saturday, according to reports quoting local security officials. Lake Albert lies along the Uganda-Congo border, and is about 100 miles long and 20 miles wide. Ugandan police officials said among the bodies recovered in the accident, 16 were children.

Reports say there were over 96 people on board the vessel with most of them being refugees from Democratic Republic of Congo at the Kyangwali Refugee Settlement located in Hoima District South West Uganda.

The cause of the accident is believed to have been overloading as the ill-fated vessel was transporting people from Kyenjonjo to Hoima. Some reports say the captain of the boat has survived and has since been arrested.

The refugees were reported to be on their way to Democratic Republic of Congo from Kyangwali and Bugoma in Hoima district.

Authorities said at least 45 passengers were rescued with 32 others still missing even as search and rescue operations continued with a police marine unit and fire brigade scouring the area.

Sunday 23 March 2014

http://www.rttnews.com/2290312/at-least-19-dead-32-missing-in-uganda-lake-albert-boat-capsize.aspx?type=gn&utm_source=google&utm_campaign=sitemap

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