World news: Japanese safety chiefs fear stricken reactor core leaking

Japanese nuclear safety officials today said they suspect that the reactor core at one unit of the troubled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant may have breached.

That raises the possibility of more severe radioactive contamination to the environment.

Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the nuclear safety agency, said that "something at the reactor may have been damaged" in Unit 3 of the six-unit plant.

He said "our data suggest the reactor retains certain containment functions", an implication that the damage may have occurred in the reactor's core, but that it was limited.

Officials said the damage could instead have happened in other equipment, including piping or the spent fuel pool.

The plant was damaged in the devastating earthquake and tsunami.

Today the official death toll from the March 11 disaster passed the 10,000 mark and was still climbing two weeks after the magnitude-9 quake struck off the north eastern coast.

Hundreds of thousands of survivors are still camped out in temporary shelters.

Some 660,000 households do not have water more than 209,000 do not have electricity.

Shuttle launch for Giffords

The astronaut husband of wounded US Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords says she wants to be at his shuttle launch next month.

She will be, he said, pending final approval from her doctors.

Ms Giffords is recovering from the shooting in January that killed six people.

Adultery jail term ditched

The Mexican Senate has repealed part of the Federal Criminal Code that made adultery an offence punishable by two years in prison.

Senators voted Friday with 69 in favour and one abstention to get rid of a law they said was never enforced.

Ex-leader on killing charge

Former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma said he has been charged in the brutal slaying of an investigative reporter in 2000.

Mr Kuchma spoke after the latest round of questioning by investigators. He would not specify the charges.

The Prosecutor General's Office suspects Mr Kuchma of abuse of office in giving illegal orders to his subordinates that eventually led to the killing of Heorhiy Gongadze.

Milkshake retrial: wife guilty

A HONG Kong jury has found an American woman guilty of murder in her retrial over the death of her wealthy husband, Robert Kissel in 2003.

The jury's decision today upheld the original verdict handed down to Nancy Kissel, from Michigan. She had denied murder but admitted manslaughter.60 killed as earthquake hits Burma

A strong earthquake that toppled homes in northeastern Burma has killed more than 60 people, and there were fears today the toll would mount as conditions in more remote areas became known.

Last night's quake, measured at a magnitude 6.8 by the US Geological Survey, was centred just north of the town Tachileik in the mountains along the Thai border, but was felt hundreds of miles away in the Thai capital Bangkok.