12 killed in bus mishap

MULTAN:

At least 12 people were killed and 23 injured when a bus they were travelling in collided with a truck in central Pakistan early on Sunday, police said. The bus was coming from the southern port city of Karachi when it rammed into a speeding truck while overtaking a vehicle near Noorpur, some 112 km south of Multan, local police officer Arif Nawaz said. Nawaz said that 10 passengers died on the spot and two others succumbed to their injuries in hospital. — AFP

CPI-ML legislator killed

RANCHI:

Suspected Maoist guerrillas on Sunday shot a communist legislator of the Jharkhand assembly. Mahendra Prasad Singh, the lone Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) legislator, was shot dead at Dogibhoya village of Giridh district, about 200 km from Ranchi. Police said three men came to meet Singh at 2.45 pm and shot him dead after speaking to him briefly. The killers fled the scene. No one has claimed responsibility for the killing but police blamed the Maoist guerrillas for the slaying. — HNS

Seers’ cases to continue

CHENNAI:

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayaram Jayalalitha on Sunday ruled out withdrawing the criminal cases against the two Shankaracharyas, Jayendra Saraswathi and Vijayendra Saraswathi. The bail plea by Vijayendra Saraswathi, the junior Shankaracharya of the Kanchipuram mutt, comes up before a court on Monday, two days after the Tamil Nadu government said it had no plans to take over the order. — HNS

Two soldiers killed in J&K

SRINAGAR:

Two Indian paramilitary troopers were killed as security forces continued a gun battle on Sunday with separatist guerrillas holed up inside the burning passport office here. Both sides traded gunfire even a day after the guerrillas stormed the building, located at Gogjibagh neighbourhood in the heart of Srinagar. “The militants are still inside and we have laid a tight cordon around it,” said a police officer. — HNS

2 killed in boat accident

BEIJING:

Two people were killed and seven others missing after a ferry capsized and sank following a collision with a speeding cargo boat in southern China’s Guangdong province, state press said on Sunday. The accident occurred on a waterway near Dongguan city on Saturday when the empty cargo boat, running at high speed, hit a ferry boat carrying 14 passengers and a crew of two, Xinhua news agency said. — AFP

Pilot blamed for crash

HONG KONG:

An inquiry into a 1999 air crash at Hong Kong’s airport has concluded pilot error was to blame for the accident, a media report said on Sunday. The findings of the long-running inquiry is with the city’s political leader Tung Chee-hwa and a court hearing is expected soon, the Sunday Morning Post reported, citing sources close to the inquiry. The probe into the crash of China Airlines flight CI642 came to the same conclusion as an earlier inquiry by Hong Kong’s Civil Aviation Department. — AFP