WorldNews

[attach=full]19937[/attach] Thailand's Thongchai Jaidee is well rested and excited for his fourth Masters start this week at Augusta National, confident more Asian success in golf's majors will come in time. South Korean Yang Yong-Eun's victory in the 2009 PGA Championship remains the only major title won by an Asian man, but 45-year-old Asian Tour star Thongchai has watched a rising tide of talent from India, China, Japan and South Korea. World number 43 Thongchai, one year younger than Jack Nicklaus when he became the oldest Masters winner at age 46, has not given up on making it happen himself, saying the Masters offers his best chance to contend. "I've had a full month of not playing in tournaments and was instead getting myself ready for the Masters. Continue reading...

KINGSTON, Jamaica (AP) — Police commanders in Jamaica have ordered a "high-level probe" into allegations that an officer was fatally shot after staging an attempted robbery with an accomplice at a bar. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19936[/attach] Demonstrators in Rio de Janeiro took to the famous sands of Copacabana on Sunday to protest the death of boy who was killed in the crossfire during a police gunfight in a favela. Police say Eduardo de Jesus Ferreira died during a shootout between officers and drug traffickers. Antonio Carlos Costa, the founder of the activist group, told AFP the purpose of the demonstration was to "wake up" Rio's population to the major cause of these violent deaths: the gap between rich and poor. "How will the city of Rio de Janeiro respond? Continue reading...

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Olympiakos failed to clinch the Greek league title Sunday as it lost 3-1 to Giannena, delaying the leader's celebrations for at least one more round. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19930[/attach] West African bloc ECOWAS on Sunday withdrew an earlier statement announcing a regional summit on April 8 to discuss the Boko Haram threat, saying no such meeting was planned for that day. ECOWAS did not specify whether the summit had been cancelled or postponed. "We sincerely apologise for this misunderstanding," ECOWAS said, without giving any further details. Earlier on Sunday, ECOWAS had said leaders of west and central African states would gather in the capital of Equatorial Guinea, Malabo, on Wednesday to try to draw up a joint strategy against Nigeria's Boko Haram militants. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19929[/attach] BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq won the battle to retake the city of Tikrit from the Islamic State group, backed by a coalition of the unlikely in Iranian advisers, Shiite militias, and U.S.-led airstrikes, but the country now faces what could be its most important battle: Winning the support of the Sunnis. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19928[/attach] CAIRO (AP) — A bomb blast on a bridge leading to an upscale neighborhood in central Cairo killed a policeman and wounded at least two passers-by on Sunday, hours after Egyptian security forces killed the leader of an extremist group that claimed responsibility, police said. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19927[/attach] Pope Francis appealed Sunday for an end to "absurd violence" in hotspots around the world and said the international community must not stand by in the face of the "immense humanitarian tragedy" in Syria and Iraq. In his traditional Easter message, the 78-year-old pontiff said he was praying for those killed in armed conflict, including the students massacred by Somali gunmen at a university in Kenya. In his third Easter message since his election as pope in 2013, the head of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics prayed "for peace, above all, for Syria and Iraq, that the roar of arms may cease". He called on the international community to "not stand by before the immense humanitarian tragedy unfolding in these countries and the drama of the numerous refugees" created by the two conflicts. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19926[/attach] Some 1,500 migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean to Italy in five different boats were rescued in one day, Italian coastguards said Sunday. Four coastguard vessels and an Italian navy ship intervened Saturday to save three large boats carrying migrants off the Libyan coast after intercepting distress calls from satellite telephones, only to find two other migrants boats in difficulty nearby. The Italian vessels were on Sunday transferring the migrants to the island of Lampedusa and the Sicilian ports of Augusta and Porto Empedocle. In a separate incident on Saturday, 318 migrants were brought to the Sicilian port of Pozzallo after being rescued off Libya by an Icelandic navy ship taking part in a patrol for the EU borders agency Frontex. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19917[/attach] WASHINGTON (AP) — Congressional scrutiny and approval of any nuclear agreement with Iran is essential and will help ensure the deal isn't a bad one, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said Sunday. Continue reading...

CAIRO (AP) — The Confederation of African Football will respect a decision by sport's highest court and lift its ban on Morocco participating in the 2017 and 2019 African Cups. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19916[/attach] Germany's aviation regulator said Sunday it had no previous knowledge of Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz's struggle with severe depression before the disaster in the French Alps. A spokeswoman for the Federal Aviation Office (LBA) told AFP that parent company Lufthansa had given it "no information about the medical background" of Lubitz, who prosecutors allege deliberately crashed the plane last month, killing all 150 people on board. In particular, Lufthansa physicians who examined Lubitz did not make the authorities aware of an "earlier phase of serious depression", said the LBA, which issues pilots' licences. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19915[/attach] World number one Chen Long put on a powerful performance on Sunday to defeat his illustrious teammate Lin Dan 20-22, 21-13, 21-11 and win his maiden Malaysia Open title. Both Chinese shuttlers adopted a cautious approach in the first game, testing each other with long rallies focused mainly on the baseline with the occasional net play. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19914[/attach] Kenya on Sunday began three days of national mourning for the 148 people massacred by Somalia's Shebab militants at a university as authorities identified one of the gunmen as a smart law graduate. Hundreds packed Nairobi's Anglican cathedral where Archbishop Eliud Wabukala said Easter services were overshadowed by "great and terrible evil" as police patrolled outside. Flags were at half mast and although President Uhuru Kenyatta has vowed to retaliate "in the severest way possible", there have also been calls for national unity. Kenyatta said people's "justified anger" should not lead to "the victimisation of anyone" -- a clear reference to Kenya's large Muslim and Somali minorities. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19905[/attach] Grieving parents of the victims of last year's South Korean ferry sinking completed a 46-kilometre (28-miles) marathon march Sunday to call for an independent probe into the tragedy. More than 600 people, including relatives of 250 high school students killed in the sinking, marched across Seoul for two days to protest what they say is the government's attempt to influence the investigation. Some of the parents taking part in the march had newly shaven heads -- a symbol of protest and determination -- and held black-ribboned framed portraits of their dead children. Following months of political bickering, Seoul lawmakers passed a bill in November launching an independent probe, led by the 17-member committee. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19908[/attach] Libya's Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni said his government would run its own oil sales and deposit revenues abroad in a bid to divert proceeds away from a rival, self-declared administration in Tripoli. The fighting has worsened as militants loyal to Islamic State have become involved and exploited the chaos to carry out a series of high profile attacks. Prime Minister Thinni announced late on Saturday that he had authorized his government's oil corporation to open a separate bank account in the United Arab Emirates for oil revenues, and to seek independent oil sales. Until now oil sales and revenues have gone through Libya's central bank and the National Oil Corporation in Tripoli, which says it wants to stay out of the conflict between the two governments. Continue reading...

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Former Bangladesh Prime Minister Khaleda Zia avoided arrest on corruption charges Sunday after a court granted her bail. Judge Abu Ahmed Jamadder approved Zia's request for bail when she surrendered to court in the capital, Dhaka. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19907[/attach] Authorities in Kenya said Sunday they have identified one of the four dead Shebab gunmen who massacred nearly 150 people at Garissa University as an ethnic-Somali Kenyan national and law graduate. The spokesman said Abdullahi's father, a local official in the northeastern county of Mandera, had "reported to the authorities that his son had gone missing and suspected the boy had gone to Somalia". Continue reading...

[attach=full]19906[/attach] A bomb exploded near a police checkpoint on bridge in an affluent Cairo neighbourhood on Sunday, killing an officer, Egyptian police officials said. The bomb had been placed next to the checkpoint on a side of the May 15 bridge located in the neighbourhood of Zamalek, the officials said. A police official said the bomb went off as the driver of a minivan pulled over to ask the police officer a question, likely for directions. Militants have repeatedly set off bombs in Cairo targeting police checkpoints and vehicles. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19904[/attach] KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysia's jailed opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim was granted a furlough Sunday to attend his father's funeral, soon after he began a five-year prison sentence on sodomy charges that he says are politically motivated. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19903[/attach] Chile's President Michelle Bachelet visited the flood-hit north of the country where at least 25 people died and 125 others are still missing, vowing to "rebuild" the stricken region. "We stand with you, as we have from the beginning, and we will rebuild," Bachelet said Saturday as she toured the region. According to a tally released Friday by the National Emergency Office, about 2,700 victims of the flooding are being housed in emergency accommodation and as many as 30,000 people have been affected. Bachelet said government officials were looking into the risk of disease outbreaks and were committed to providing support to victims. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19902[/attach] SANAA (Reuters) - Warplanes from a Saudi-led coalition bombed Yemen's capital Sanaa overnight, residents said, on the eleventh day of a campaign against Iran-allied Houthi forces opposed to President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. The raids came despite calls by Russia and the Red Cross on Saturday for a pause to allow urgent humanitarian aid deliveries and evacuation of civilians. Residents reported explosions at bases housing army units loyal to the Houthis, while air strikes also hit areas along Yemen's border with Saudi Arabia. ... Continue reading...

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) — Kekuta Manneh and Octavio Rivero scored second-half goals to lift Vancouver over the Los Angeles Galaxy 2-0 Saturday night, keeping the Whitecaps perfect in Major League Soccer. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19901[/attach] A super typhoon dissolved into a tropical depression and made landfall in the Philippines Sunday, forecasters said, easing fears after thousands of residents fled remote coastal villages to avoid potential giant waves. Maysak, which began as a Super Typhoon in the Pacific Ocean, reached the northeast coast of the main island of Luzon at 8:00 am (0000 GMT) with winds of 55 kilometres (34 miles) an hour, chief state weather forecaster Esperanza Cayanan said. "As of now, most of our fears have melted away," she told a news conference shortly after the depression reached Dinapigue, a remote town on Luzon's northeast coast, about 250 kilometres (155 miles) from Manila. Continue reading...

[attach=full]19896[/attach] Pope Francis condemned indifference and "complicit silence" to jihadist attacks on Christians as he presided over Easter ceremonies in the wake of a massacre of nearly 150 people at a Kenyan university by Shebab Islamists. The leader of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics brought up the extremist persecution of Christians as the holiest ceremonies of the Church calendar reached a climax Sunday, when believers celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. The Vatican has increasingly voiced frustration that attacks on Christians in places such as Iraq, Libya, Pakistan and Nigeria have not been more strongly condemned by Muslim authorities and Western governments. Continue reading...