Jet misses runway and crashes in China, killing 43

BEIJING:   A Chinese passenger jet broke apart as it approached a fog-shrouded runway in the country's northeast and burst into flames as it hit the ground Tuesday, killing 43 people and injuring 53 others, state media said.

The Henan Airlines plane with 91 passengers and five crew crashed in a grassy area near the Lindu airport on the outskirts of Yichun, a city of about 1 million people in Heilongjiang province, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Xinhua quoted Hua Jingwei, an Yichun publicity official, as saying that some passengers were thrown from the cabin before the broken plane hit the ground.

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Australian PM meets ousted rival; poll predicts loss

SYDNEY:   Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard  met ousted predecessor Kevin Rudd on Saturday to bolster a flagging campaign as a new poll predicted she would lose a general election in two weeks' time.

The meeting between Gillard and her former boss, the first since she forced him from office in a leadership coup in June, took place under tight security at federal government offices in Brisbane, capital of Rudd's home state of Queensland.

Gillard called the election after replacing Rudd in a coup within their Labor Party on June 24.

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Australia government neck and neck vs opposition

WELLINGTON:   Australia's ruling Labor Party is now level with the conservative opposition ahead of an August 21 election, an opinion poll showed on Monday, the second survey in three days to show a slide in support for the government.

Support for Prime Minister Julia Gillard's Labor was 50 percent, down from 52 percent the week before, according to the Newspoll survey published in the Australian newspaper. Support for the conservative opposition rose to 50 percent from 48 percent,

Government infighting and cabinet leaks appear to be weighing on Labor's popularity, after it had been comfortably ahead in polls when the election was called on July 17.

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Koreas mark truce, but drills underscore tensions

ABOARD THE USS CURTIS WILBUR:   On the 57th anniversary of the armistice that ended the Korean War, U.S. and South Korean ships intensified high-profile military exercises Tuesday that underscore rising tensions in a region yet to truly find peace.

The massive maneuvers, called "Invincible Spirit," are being conducted by an armada of South Korean and U.S. ships — including the USS George Washington supercarrier — in international waters off the South Korean coast.

The normally quiet patch of the East Sea has been a buzz of military activity — with helicopters dropping sonar buoys into the waters, squadrons of carrier-based F-18 fighters embarking on bombing runs and destroyers blasting their guns at unmanned aerial drones.

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US, South Korea start war games at sea

SEOUL:   The United States and South Korea on Sunday launched a major naval exercise involving a nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier in the Sea of Japan despite North Korea's threats of nuclear retaliation.

The war games are the first in a series intended "to send a clear message to North Korea that its aggressive behaviour must stop," US Defence Secretary Robert Gates and South Korean Defence Minister Kim Tae-Young have said.

Seoul and Washington, citing the findings of a multinational investigation, accuse Pyongyang's communist regime of torpedoing a South Korean warship near the tense Yellow Sea border in March.

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