Two suicide bombers killed at least 15 people and wounded more than 30 in Iraq's Tikrit city as police and soldiers were collecting their salaries at a local bank, police and hospital officials said Thursday. The attacks were the latest to target local Iraqi security forces as the last U.S. troops prepare to pull out of the country more than eight years after the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein. One suicide bomber detonated his explosives among officers who were gathered outside the Rafidain bank in the centre of Tikrit, 150 km (95 miles) north of Baghdad, and moments later another blew up a car when emergency workers arrived, police said. "Just a few minutes after I entered I heard a huge explosion, we ran outside to see what was happening, I saw bodies and the wounded all over the place," said Assam Dhiyab, a policeman who was collecting his unit's wages in the bank. A Tikrit hospital official said at least 15 people were killed and more than 30 wounded in the blasts. Most of the casualties were Iraqi soldiers.
The announcement comes after a review of existing laws by an independent legal expert, Stephen Howells, who found the problem has been fed by a lack of effective deterrents.
Howell's report estimates there are currently at least 50,000 illegal workers in Australia and potentially more than 100,000.
Although the number is proportionately small - 0.2 percent of the 22 million population compared with 3.5 percent in the United States - the government's move comes amid a slowing economy that has led to mounting job losseernment will hold consultations with businesses before amending the law.
Refugees from Asia and the Middle East who come by boats seeking asylum are not part of this problem, noted the report. Rather, the illegal workers arrive by air on tourist, business, working holiday-maker and student visas, and take up work.
The report did not give the nationalities of illegal workers.
Most employers are law abiding, but a small number of employers and labor suppliers, particularly in industrial and services sectors, use illegal workers as a cheaper source of labor, it said.
In the US, employers caught after their first offense are fined $275 to $2,200 for each illegal worker hired. Three or more offenses can lead to fines of up to $11,000 for each worker.
The Ashram employees, however, are neither confirming nor denying the incident.
They only confirmed that the other Gandhi articles in the Ashram's possession are safe.
Mahatma Gandhi came to Wardha in 1936 and settled at the Ashram which receives around three lakh visitors every year.
A fire has swept through a four-storey building in the Chinese capital, Beijing, killing at least 17 people. State media said 24 others were hurt.
The authorities are investigating the cause of the blaze, in the southern suburb of Daxing. Safety standards for buildings in China were recently revised after a big fire in November killed 58 people. A probe into that blaze showed that unlicensed welders had accidentally ignited netting around the building.
The fire started in the early hours of Monday morning.Beijing's Communist Party secretary, Liu Qi, and the city's mayor, Guo Jinlong, have told investigators to "ridly establish the cause", Xinhua news agency reported.
The authorities are investigating the cause of the blaze, in the southern suburb of Daxing. Safety standards for buildings in China were recently revised after a big fire in November killed 58 people. A probe into that blaze showed that unlicensed welders had accidentally ignited netting around the building.
The fire started in the early hours of Monday morning.Beijing's Communist Party secretary, Liu Qi, and the city's mayor, Guo Jinlong, have told investigators to "ridly establish the cause", Xinhua news agency reported.
A new explosion at a nuclear plant hit punch-drunk Japan Monday as it raced to avert a catastrophic meltdown in the wake of a quake and tsunami feared to have killed more than 10,000 people.Panic selling saw stocks tumble on the Tokyo bourse, with carmakers, banks and electronics firms taking a hit on fears for the economy as power shortages prompted rolling blackouts and plants remained closed in quake-hit areas.Japan has been battling to control two overheating reactors at the ageing Fukushima plant after the cooling systems were knocked out by Friday's 8.9-magnitude quake and the resulting tsunami that swallowed up whole towns.Shortly after Prime Minister Naoto Kan said the plant was still in an "alarming" state, a blast at its number-three reactor shook the facility and sent plumes of smoke billowing into the sky.The plant's operator TEPCO said that six people were injured in the blast, which authorities said was probably a hydrogen explosion.The chief government spokesman Yukio Edano said TEPCO reported that the reactor was probably undamaged and there was a low possibility of a major radiation leak at the plant, 250 kilometres (160 miles) northeast of Tokyo.Authorities have declared an exclusion zone within a 20 km (12 mile) radius of the plant and evacuated 210,000 people.Another explosion blew apart the building surrounding the plant's number-one reactor on Saturday but the seal around the reactor itself remained intact.As the nation struggled with the devastation wrought by the twin disasters of a shattered land and a surging sea, tales of terror, death and miraculous survival emerged.Miki Otomo, whose home near Sendai was destroyed, said she quickly piled into the car in a desperate bid to outrun a churning torrent of wood, mud and metal."The tsunami wave was coming and I grabbed grandfather and our dog and drove. The wave was right behind me, but I had to keep zigzagging around obstacles and the water to get to safety," she said.But many were not so lucky. Miki Otomo's sister was in a bus when the wave bore down on it."The bus driver told everybody to get out of the bus and run. My sister was able to get away but some people just couldn't run fast enough," she said.The slower passengers were engulfed by the swirling waters, the image of their deaths seared into the survivors' memories.Otomo is now living at an evacuation centre in an area school with about 1,000 other exhausted survivors who cheated death.A new tsunami scare triggered evacuations on the devastated northeast coast after a large wave was spotted rolling in to shore, but authorities later lifted an alert.With ports, airports, highways and manufacturing plants shut down, the government has predicted "considerable impact on a wide range of our country's economic activities".Tokyo's stock market plunged more than six percent in afternoon trade as investors absorbed the impact, including power outages and plant shutdowns.The yen surged to a four-month high after the central bank pumped a record amount of money into financial markets while shares in auto makers were hammered more than 10 percent after they were forced to close factories.Leading risk analysis firm AIR Worldwide said the quake alone would exact an economic toll estimated at between $14.5 billion and $34.6 billion (10 billion to 25 billion euros), without taking into account the effects of the tsunami.Kan said in a televised national address Sunday that Japan was facing its worst crisis since the end of World War II -- which left the defeated country in ruins."The current situation of the earthquake, tsunami and the nuclear plants is in a way the most severe crisis in the 65 years since World War II," said the premier, who was dressed in an emergency services suit.
Rolling power outages were due to start later Monday. Millions of people have already been without electricity since the disaster hit Friday, forcing the shutdown of nuclear plants in the affected areas.Japan relies on nuclear energy for about a third of its power needs.Edano said Sunday it was likely a partial meltdown had occurred at the Fukushima number-one reactor. A meltdown occurs when a reactor core overheats and causes damage to the facility, potentially unleashing radiation into the environment.
France's Institute of Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety said "very large" amounts of radioactivity were "produced simultaneously with the explosion" at Fukushima Saturday.The United Nations said a total of 590,000 people had been evacuated in the quake and tsunami disaster, including 210,000 living near the two Fukushima nuclear plants.The colossal 8.9 magnitude tremor sent waves of churning mud and debris racing over towns and farmland in Japan's northeast, destroying everything in its path and reducing swathes of countryside to a swampy wasteland.
The police chief in badly hit Miyagi prefecture said the death toll was certain to exceed 10,000 in his region.
In the Miyagi port town of Minamisanriku alone some 10,000 people were unaccounted for -- more than half the population.
The national police agency said the confirmed death toll now stood at 1,597, but groups of hundreds of bodies were being found along the shattered coastline.
Many survivors were left without water, electricity, fuel or enough food, as authorities appeared overwhelmed by the monumental scale of the disaster.
Japan committed 100,000 troops -- about 40 percent of its armed forces -- to help earthquake and tsunami survivors as the world rallied behind the disaster-stricken nation and a US aircraft carrier began ferrying in food.
Japan sits on the "Pacific Ring of Fire", and Tokyo is in one of its most dangerous areas, where three continental plates are slowly grinding against each other, building up enormous seismic pressure.
The immense force of Friday's quake has moved Honshu -- the main Japanese island -- by 2.4 metres (eight feet), the US Geological Survey said
A new explosion at a nuclear plant hit punch-drunk Japan Monday as it raced to avert a catastrophic meltdown in the wake of a quake and tsunami feared to have killed more than 10,000 people.
Panic selling saw stocks tumble on the Tokyo bourse, with carmakers, banks and electronics firms taking a hit on fears for the economy as power shortages prompted rolling blackouts and plants remained closed in quake-hit areas.
Japan has been battling to control two overheating reactors at the ageing Fukushima plant after the cooling systems were knocked out by Friday's 8.9-magnitude quake and the resulting tsunami that swallowed up whole towns.
Shortly after Prime Minister Naoto Kan said the plant was still in an "alarming" state, a blast at its number-three reactor shook the facility and sent plumes of smoke billowing into the sky.
The plant's operator TEPCO said that six people were injured in the blast, which authorities said was probably a hydrogen explosion.
The chief government spokesman Yukio Edano said TEPCO reported that the reactor was probably undamaged and there was a low possibility of a major radiation leak at the plant, 250 kilometres (160 miles) northeast of Tokyo.
Authorities have declared an exclusion zone within a 20 km (12 mile) radius of the plant and evacuated 210,000 people.
Another explosion blew apart the building surrounding the plant's number-one reactor on Saturday but the seal around the reactor itself remained intact.
As the nation struggled with the devastation wrought by the twin disasters of a shattered land and a surging sea, tales of terror, death and miraculous survival emerged.
Miki Otomo, whose home near Sendai was destroyed, said she quickly piled into the car in a desperate bid to outrun a churning torrent of wood, mud and metal.
"The tsunami wave was coming and I grabbed grandfather and our dog and drove. The wave was right behind me, but I had to keep zigzagging around obstacles and the water to get to safety," she said.
But many were not so lucky. Miki Otomo's sister was in a bus when the wave bore down on it.
"The bus driver told everybody to get out of the bus and run. My sister was able to get away but some people just couldn't run fast enough," she said.
The slower passengers were engulfed by the swirling waters, the image of their deaths seared into the survivors' memories.
Otomo is now living at an evacuation centre in an area school with about 1,000 other exhausted survivors who cheated death.
A new tsunami scare triggered evacuations on the devastated northeast coast after a large wave was spotted rolling in to shore, but authorities later lifted an alert.
With ports, airports, highways and manufacturing plants shut down, the government has predicted "considerable impact on a wide range of our country's economic activities".
Tokyo's stock market plunged more than six percent in afternoon trade as investors absorbed the impact, including power outages and plant shutdowns.
The yen surged to a four-month high after the central bank pumped a record amount of money into financial markets while shares in auto makers were hammered more than 10 percent after they were forced to close factories.
Leading risk analysis firm AIR Worldwide said the quake alone would exact
an economic toll estimated at between $14.5 billion and $34.6 billion (10 billion to 25 billion euros), without taking into account the effects of the tsunami.
Kan said in a televised national address Sunday that Japan was facing its worst crisis since the end of World War II -- which left the defeated country in ruins.
"The current situation of the earthquake, tsunami and the nuclear plants is in a way the most severe crisis in the 65 years since World War II," said the premier, who was dressed in an emergency services suit.
Rolling power outages were due to start later Monday. Millions of people have already been without electricity since the disaster hit Friday, forcing the shutdown of nuclear plants in the affected areas.
Japan relies on nuclear energy for about a third of its power needs.
Edano said Sunday it was likely a partial meltdown had occurred at the Fukushima number-one reactor. A meltdown occurs when a reactor core overheats and causes damage to the facility, potentially unleashing radiation into the environment.
France's Institute of Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety said "very large" amounts of radioactivity were "produced simultaneously with the explosion" at Fukushima Saturday.
The United Nations said a total of 590,000 people had been evacuated in the quake and tsunami disaster, including 210,000 living near the two Fukushima nuclear plants.
The colossal 8.9 magnitude tremor sent waves of churning mud and debris racing over towns and farmland in Japan's northeast, destroying everything in its path and reducing swathes of countryside to a swampy wasteland.
The police chief in badly hit Miyagi prefecture said the death toll was certain to exceed 10,000 in his region.
In the Miyagi port town of Minamisanriku alone some 10,000 people were unaccounted for -- more than half the population.
The national police agency said the confirmed death toll now stood at 1,597, but groups of hundreds of bodies were being found along the shattered coastline.
Many survivors were left without water, electricity, fuel or enough food, as authorities appeared overwhelmed by the monumental scale of the disaster.
Japan committed 100,000 troops -- about 40 percent of its armed forces -- to help earthquake and tsunami survivors as the world rallied behind the disaster-stricken nation and a US aircraft carrier began ferrying in food.
Japan sits on the "Pacific Ring of Fire", and Tokyo is in one of its most dangerous areas, where three continental plates are slowly grinding against each other, building up enormous seismic pressure.
The immense force of Friday's quake has moved Honshu -- the main Japanese island -- by 2.4 metres (eight feet), the US Geological Survey said
Panic selling saw stocks tumble on the Tokyo bourse, with carmakers, banks and electronics firms taking a hit on fears for the economy as power shortages prompted rolling blackouts and plants remained closed in quake-hit areas.
Japan has been battling to control two overheating reactors at the ageing Fukushima plant after the cooling systems were knocked out by Friday's 8.9-magnitude quake and the resulting tsunami that swallowed up whole towns.
Shortly after Prime Minister Naoto Kan said the plant was still in an "alarming" state, a blast at its number-three reactor shook the facility and sent plumes of smoke billowing into the sky.
The plant's operator TEPCO said that six people were injured in the blast, which authorities said was probably a hydrogen explosion.
The chief government spokesman Yukio Edano said TEPCO reported that the reactor was probably undamaged and there was a low possibility of a major radiation leak at the plant, 250 kilometres (160 miles) northeast of Tokyo.
Authorities have declared an exclusion zone within a 20 km (12 mile) radius of the plant and evacuated 210,000 people.
Another explosion blew apart the building surrounding the plant's number-one reactor on Saturday but the seal around the reactor itself remained intact.
As the nation struggled with the devastation wrought by the twin disasters of a shattered land and a surging sea, tales of terror, death and miraculous survival emerged.
Miki Otomo, whose home near Sendai was destroyed, said she quickly piled into the car in a desperate bid to outrun a churning torrent of wood, mud and metal.
"The tsunami wave was coming and I grabbed grandfather and our dog and drove. The wave was right behind me, but I had to keep zigzagging around obstacles and the water to get to safety," she said.
But many were not so lucky. Miki Otomo's sister was in a bus when the wave bore down on it.
"The bus driver told everybody to get out of the bus and run. My sister was able to get away but some people just couldn't run fast enough," she said.
The slower passengers were engulfed by the swirling waters, the image of their deaths seared into the survivors' memories.
Otomo is now living at an evacuation centre in an area school with about 1,000 other exhausted survivors who cheated death.
A new tsunami scare triggered evacuations on the devastated northeast coast after a large wave was spotted rolling in to shore, but authorities later lifted an alert.
With ports, airports, highways and manufacturing plants shut down, the government has predicted "considerable impact on a wide range of our country's economic activities".
Tokyo's stock market plunged more than six percent in afternoon trade as investors absorbed the impact, including power outages and plant shutdowns.
The yen surged to a four-month high after the central bank pumped a record amount of money into financial markets while shares in auto makers were hammered more than 10 percent after they were forced to close factories.
Leading risk analysis firm AIR Worldwide said the quake alone would exact
an economic toll estimated at between $14.5 billion and $34.6 billion (10 billion to 25 billion euros), without taking into account the effects of the tsunami.
Kan said in a televised national address Sunday that Japan was facing its worst crisis since the end of World War II -- which left the defeated country in ruins.
"The current situation of the earthquake, tsunami and the nuclear plants is in a way the most severe crisis in the 65 years since World War II," said the premier, who was dressed in an emergency services suit.
Rolling power outages were due to start later Monday. Millions of people have already been without electricity since the disaster hit Friday, forcing the shutdown of nuclear plants in the affected areas.
Japan relies on nuclear energy for about a third of its power needs.
Edano said Sunday it was likely a partial meltdown had occurred at the Fukushima number-one reactor. A meltdown occurs when a reactor core overheats and causes damage to the facility, potentially unleashing radiation into the environment.
France's Institute of Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety said "very large" amounts of radioactivity were "produced simultaneously with the explosion" at Fukushima Saturday.
The United Nations said a total of 590,000 people had been evacuated in the quake and tsunami disaster, including 210,000 living near the two Fukushima nuclear plants.
The colossal 8.9 magnitude tremor sent waves of churning mud and debris racing over towns and farmland in Japan's northeast, destroying everything in its path and reducing swathes of countryside to a swampy wasteland.
The police chief in badly hit Miyagi prefecture said the death toll was certain to exceed 10,000 in his region.
In the Miyagi port town of Minamisanriku alone some 10,000 people were unaccounted for -- more than half the population.
The national police agency said the confirmed death toll now stood at 1,597, but groups of hundreds of bodies were being found along the shattered coastline.
Many survivors were left without water, electricity, fuel or enough food, as authorities appeared overwhelmed by the monumental scale of the disaster.
Japan committed 100,000 troops -- about 40 percent of its armed forces -- to help earthquake and tsunami survivors as the world rallied behind the disaster-stricken nation and a US aircraft carrier began ferrying in food.
Japan sits on the "Pacific Ring of Fire", and Tokyo is in one of its most dangerous areas, where three continental plates are slowly grinding against each other, building up enormous seismic pressure.
The immense force of Friday's quake has moved Honshu -- the main Japanese island -- by 2.4 metres (eight feet), the US Geological Survey said
As workers doused the stricken reactor with seawater to try to avert a catastrophe, Japan’s Prime Minister Naoto Kan said the chaos unleashed by Friday’s 8.9-magnitude quake was an “unprecedented national disaster”. The quake, one of the biggest ever recorded, unleashed a terrifying 10-metre wave that tore through towns and cities on Japan’s northeastern coast, destroying everything in its path.
In the small port town of Minamisanriku alone, some 10,000 people are unaccounted for – more than half the population – public broadcaster NHK reported. Radiation leaked from the quake-crippled plant after a blast blew off the roof, and authorities prepared to distribute iodine to local people to protect them from exposure.
The blast raised fears of a meltdown at the power facility, 240 kilometres north of Tokyo, as officials scrambled to contain what could be the worst nuclear disaster since the Chernobyl explosion in 1986. The government insisted radiation levels were low because although the explosion severely damaged the main building of the plant, it had not affected the reactor core container. Japan’s nuclear safety agency said the accident rated less serious than either the Three Mile Island or Chernobyl disasters.
Valeriy Hlyhalo, deputy director of the Chernobyl nuclear safety centre, was quoted by Interfax news agency as saying that Japanese reactors were better protected than Chernobyl. Local media said three people suffered radiation exposure near the plant. An evacuation order for tens of thousands of residents was expanded to 20 kilometres around the Fukushima plant, where authorities scrambled to control rising temperatures and pressure inside several reactors.
Work was continuing to douse the site with seawater to reduce the temperature. “Right now we are considering the accident should be rated four,” an official of Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said early Sunday, adding that the rating may be changed according to how the situation develops.
In quake-hit areas, 5.6 million households had no power Saturday and more than one million households were without water. Telecommunications networks were also hit. Kyodo news agency said more than 1,700 people were killed or missing as a result of the 8.9-magnitude quake, the biggest in Japan since records began in the 19th century. In a rare piece of good news, a ship that was earlier reported missing was found swept out to sea and all 81 people aboard were airlifted to safety.
Some 50,000 military and other rescue personnel were spearheading a Herculean rescue and recovery effort with hundreds of ships, aircraft and vehicles headed to the Pacific coast area. Japan has been struggling to assess the full extent of the devastation. Japan had, on Friday, declared an atomic emergency amid growing international concern over its reactors after an 8.9 magnitude earthquake.
The operator Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) pumped water into the Fukushima No 1 plant and released steam to depressurise the hut containers, an action that experts say will release a certain amount of radioactive vapour. Tepco said that, at its highest level, the hourly radiation inside the plant reached 1,015 micro sievert before the blast – equivalent to the permissible exposure for people over one year.
Top Japanese government spokesman Yukio Edano said containment activities would now focus on “dousing the container with sea water”. Premier Naoto Kan, speaking at the same press conference, urged residents to stay calm and vowed the government would “do our best not to have even a single person suffer from health problems”.
“Raymond Davis has no diplomatic visa, therefore, the US’ claim of criminal immunity is invalid,” the sources said, adding as per the Blue Book of the Foreign Office, Davis had no diplomatic card.
Meanwhile, the US Embassy, which has been making claims that Davis is diplomat and is entitled to blanket criminal diplomatic immunity, is closely monitoring the situation. “We are waiting for the Lahore High Court’s decision,” US Embassy’s official spokesperson told The Nation when asked whether there were any senior US government officials planning unscheduled visit to Pakistan either on Sunday or Monday.
The sources in the government said that hectic process inter-ministerial consultations continued among the ministries of foreign affairs, interior and law, justice and human rights over the legal natty gritty of the case. “It is a very complex and sensitive case, therefore, it needed special attention and legal analysis,” the sources said.
The sources said that ministry of foreign affairs had not addressed the question of certification of diplomatic status to Raymond Davis in exclusivity but had given its input over four different private petitions filed in the Lahore High Court including with regard to issue of immunity.“The question of immunity under Vienna Convention 1961 does not provide immunity in case of Raymond Davis. Such a concession stands automatically removed in grave criminal cases as of Raymond Davis,” a legal expert privy to these developments observed. He was of the view that Davis had committed cold-blooded murder of two persons in the daylight and in an open bazaar without any reason.
In a related devolvement, Pakistani security agencies continued manhunt for more than fifty other Americans who are believed to have been operating their spy nets on the back of national spy agencies. Investigations also revealed that Davis had also been operating a spy network and had been calibrating with other people since his arrival in Pakistan. Davis, who had worked previously on contract as a security officer for Xe Services, a controversial private contractor formerly known as Blackwater, killed two Pakistanis in Lahore on January 27.
The Lahore episode, involving 36-year-old Davis, has stressed the already uneasy relations between the United States and Pakistan, which have been battling terrorists in the region together for almost ten years.
An explosion was heard and smoke was seen at Tokyo Electric Power Co's Fukushima No1 nuclear power plant, Jiji news agency quoted the police as saying on Saturday. Japan earlier in the day warned of a meltdown at the nuclear reactor damaged when a massive earthquake and tsunami struck the northeast. Earlier in the day, Japan launched a massive, military-led rescue operation after a giant quake and tsunami killed hundreds of people and turned the northeastern coast into a swampy wasteland as authorities braced for a possible meltdown at a nuclear reactor. Prime Minister Naoto Kan said he is sending 50,000 troops for the rescue and recovery efforts following Friday's 8.9-magnitude quake that unleashed one of the greatest disasters Japan has witnessed - a 23-foot (7-meter) tsunami that washed far inland over fields, smashing towns, airports and highways in its way. The official death toll stood at 413, while 784 people were missing and 1,128 injured. In addition, police said between 200 and 300 bodies were found along the coast in Sendai, the biggest city in the area near the quake's epicenter. An untold number of bodies were also believed to be lying in the rubble and debris. Rescue workers had yet to reach the hardest-hit areas. Adding to the worries was the damage at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, where two reactors had lost cooling ability. Because of the overheating, a meltdown was possible at one of the reactors, said Ryohei Shiomi, an official with Japan's nuclear safety commission. But even if there was a meltdown, it wouldn't affect humans outside a six-mile (10-kilometer) radius, he said. More than 215,000 people were living in 1,350 temporary shelters in five prefectures, or states, the national police agency said. Since the quake, more than 1 million households have not had water, mostly concentrated in northeast.
Japanese authorities have successfully released pressure from the quake-stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear reactor and thus avert a potentially catastrophic meltdown, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said on Saturday. Release of radioactive gas won’t be at a level dangerous to health, said a spokesperson for the agency. Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), which operates the Fukushima nuclear power plants, said that venting gas from a containment vessel of the No. 1 reactor had been successful in reducing perilously high pressure levels. TEPCO will also repeat the procedure at its adjacent No. 2 plant, also faltering after the reactors were damaged by Friday’s massive earthquake and tsunami. Prime Minister Naoto Kan said he couldn’t rule out the possibility of a radiation leak from the No. 2 plant. Earlier in the day workers frantically struggled to cool the facility and restart its quake-damaged diesel generators to avoid a total meltdown, agency officials said. The massive earthquake and tsunami that struck northeastern Japan cut the supply of off-site power to the plant on Friday and diesel generators intended to provide back-up electricity to the cooling system subsequently failed.
Thousands of residents near a nuclear plant in Fukushima prefecture, north of Tokyo, were told to evacuate as a precaution after the 8.9 magnitude quake, but the government said no radiation was leaking. Up to 500 bodies were found in the coastal city of Sendai, media said. NHK television said the victims appeared to have drowned. The extent of the destruction along a lengthy stretch of coastline suggested the death toll could rise significantly.
Tsunami warnings were issued across the Pacific but were later lifted for some of the most populated countries in the region, including Australia, Taiwan and New Zealand.
Warnings were issued in some 54 locations stretching from Asia’s Pacific rim to the other side of the ocean, with the United States alerting Hawaii, the northern and central California coast, the Oregon coast, and parts of Alaska, and urging residents to clear beaches and stay out of marinas. Huge waves struck the isles of Hawaii.
Other Japanese nuclear power plants and oil refineries were shut down and one refinery was ablaze. Television footage also showed an intense fire in the waterfront area near Sendai, the city hardest hit by the quake. A major explosion hit a petrochemical complex in Miyagi prefecture after the quake, Kyodo said.
Japan’s small coastal town of Ofunato was hard hit with at least 300 houses destroyed and scores reported missing. After the latest undersea quake, more than 300 houses either collapsed or were washed away in the city, Jiji Press reported.
The first quake struck just under 400 km northeast of Tokyo, the US Geological Survey said. It was followed by more than 40 aftershocks, one as strong as 7.1. “We were shaken so strongly for a while that we needed to hold on to something in order not to fall,” said an official at the local government of the hardest-hit city of Kurihara in Miyagi prefecture. “We couldn’t escape the building immediately because the tremors continued... City officials are now outside, collecting information on damage,” she told AFP by telephone. Political leaders pushed for an emergency budget to help fund relief efforts after Prime Minister Naoto Kan asked them to “save the country,” Kyodo news agency reported.
Stunning TV footage showed a muddy torrent of water carrying cars and wrecked homes at high speed across farmland near Sendai, home to one million people and which lies 300 km northeast of Tokyo. Ships had been flung onto a harbor wharf, where they lay helplessly on their side.The quake, the most powerful since Japan started keeping records 140 years ago, sparked at least 80 fires in cities and towns along the coast, Kyodo news agency said.
A ship carrying 100 people had been swept away by the tsunami, Kyodo said. One train was derailed and another unaccounted for. According to reports, thousands of people went missing in the calamity.
The tsunami also reached Sendai airport, submerging the runway while a process known as liquefaction, caused by the intense shaking of the tremor, turned parts of the ground to liquid.
In Tokyo, residents who had earlier fled swaying buildings jammed the streets trying to make their way home after much of the city’s public transportation was halted. Electronics giant Sony Corp, one of the country’s biggest exporters, shut six factories, as air force jets raced to the northeast coast to determine the extent of the damage.
“I was unable stay on my feet because of the violent shaking. The aftershocks gave us no reprieve. Then the tsunamis came when we tried to run for cover. It was the strongest quake I experienced,” a woman with a baby on her back told television.
The tsunami alerts revived memories of the giant waves which struck Asia in 2004. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre issued alerts for countries to the west and across the Pacific as far away as Colombia and Peru.
The earthquake was the fifth most powerful to hit the world in the past century.
There were several strong aftershocks. In Tokyo, there was widespread panic. An oil refinery near the city was on fire, with dozens of storage tanks under threat.
Around 4.4 million homes were without power in northern Japan, media said.
“People are flooding the streets. It’s incredible. Everyone is trying to get home but I didn’t see any taxis,” said Koji Goto, a 43-year-old Tokyo resident.
NHK television showed flames and black smoke billowing from a building in Odaiba, a Tokyo suburb, and bullet trains to the north of the country were halted. Thick smoke was also pouring out of an industrial area in Yokohama’s Isogo area. TV showed residents of the city running out of shaking buildings, shielding their heads with their hands from falling masonry.
TV footage showed boats, cars and trucks tossed around like toys in the water after a small tsunami hit the town of Kamaichi in northern Japan. An overpass, location unknown, appeared to have collapsed and cars were turning around and speeding away.
“The building shook for what seemed a long time and many people in the newsroom grabbed their helmets and some got under their desks,” Reuters correspondent Linda Sieg said in Tokyo. “It was probably the worst I have felt since I came to Japan more than 20 years ago.”
Millions of people in greater Tokyo were stranded far away from home on Friday evening after the earthquake shut down the capital’s massive subway system.
Countless workers, who had earlier fled violently swaying office blocks, found themselves stuck far from their families - and unable to speak to them because the overloaded mobile phone system could not carry most calls.
US President Barack Obama led international offers of sympathy and aid in what he called Japan’s “time of great trial”, while the Kan government called on help from US forces stationed in the country.
The United Nations said Friday that search and rescue teams from more than 45 countries were ready to head to quake and tsunami hit Japan if the Asian state needs help.
“More than 68 teams from more than 45 countries are on standby,” Elisabeth Byrs, spokeswoman of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) told AFP.
The search and rescue teams mobilised under a UN disaster response network are monitoring the situation and ready to help should Japan request aid, she explained.
Japan sits on the “Pacific Ring of Fire”, which is dotted with volcanoes, and Tokyo is in one of its most dangerous areas where three continental plates are slowly grinding against each other, building up enormous seismic pressure.
Meanwhile, more than 1,500 people probably died in the massive quake and tsunami disaster that devastated large parts of northern Japan’s Pacific coast,officials said early Saturday.
The news agency report came as grim updates indicating appalling loss of life kept emerging from along the hard-hit east coast of northern Honshu island, where the monster wave destroyed more than 3,000 homes.
The National Police Agency said 137 people were confirmed dead and 531 were missing — while police in Sendai, Miyagi prefecture, separately said 200 to 300 bodies had been found on the shore.
Fears rose for greater losses as reports came in of a ship with 100 people swept away, two trains missing, and a dam break flooding more homes.
The defence ministry said about 1,800 homes in Minamisoma, Fukushima prefecture, were destroyed, while in Sendai authorities said 1,200 houses were toppled by the tsunami.
The small town of Ofunato further north reported 300 house collapsed or swept away.
More than 80 fires blazed in and around Tokyo and in the Iwate, Miyagi, Akita and Fukushima prefectures, Kyodo reported, quoting Japan’s Fire and Disaster Management Agency.
The monster quake was the strongest recorded in the seismically unstable archipelago, located on the “Pacific Rim of Fire”.
TOKYO: One of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded hit Japan Friday, unleashing a 10-metre high tsunami that tossed ships inland and sparked fears that destructive waves could hit across the Pacific Ocean.The devastating 8.9-magnitude quake left many people injured in coastal areas of the main Honshu island and Tokyo, police said, while TV footage showed widespread flooding in the area. 26 people were reported dead.
A monster 10-metre (33 feet) wall of water was reported in Sendai city in northeastern Miyagi prefecture, media said after a four-metre wave hit the coast earlier. The government said the quake had caused "tremendous damage".
Helicopter footage showed massive inundation in northern coastal towns, where floods of black water sent shipping containers, cars and debris crashing through streets. An oil refinery was ablaze near Tokyo.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre issued a widespread warning for territories as far away as South America, New Zealand and Hawaii, where evacuations were ordered.
"An earthquake of this size has the potential to generate a destructive tsunami that can strike coastlines near the epicentre within minutes and more distant coastlines within hours," the centre said in a statement.
Swells of up to one metre were reported hitting Russia's far east, with bigger waves expected later.
Television footage showed a wide, muddy stream moving rapidly across a residential area near the Natori River in Sendai, levelling all in its path.
The tsunami also reached Sendai airport, submerging the runway while a process known as liquefaction, caused by the intense shaking of the tremor, turned parts of the ground to liquid.
Public broadcaster NHK said several dozen houses had been washed away in Miyagi Prefecture.
In the capital, where millions evacuated strongly swaying buildings, multiple injuries were reported when the roof of a hall collapsed during a graduation ceremony, police said.
Plumes of smoke rose from at least 10 locations in the city, where four million homes suffered power outages.
The first quake struck just under 400 kilometres (250 miles) northeast of Tokyo, the US Geological Survey said. It was followed by more than a dozen aftershocks, one as strong as 7.1.
The quake was the largest ever in Japan, the fifth strongest tremor worldwide since 1900 and the seventh strongest in history, according to the US Geological Survey and Japanese seismologists.
"We were shaken so strongly for a while that we needed to hold on to something in order not to fall," said an official at the local government of the hardest-hit city of Kurihara in Miyagi prefecture.
"We couldn't escape the building immediately because the tremors continued... City officials are now outside, collecting information on damage," she said by telephone.
A major blackout occurred across a wide area of northeastern Japan.
Prime Minister Naoto Kan quickly assembled his cabinet after the quake hit, and the government dispatched naval vessels from near Tokyo to Miyagi.
The quake affected the nation's key transportation systems, including Narita airport, which shut its runways for safety checks.
The quake, which hit at 14:46 pm (0546 GMT) and lasted about two minutes, rattled buildings in greater Tokyo, the world's largest urban area and home to some 30 million people.
In Tokyo, where the subway system stopped, sirens wailed and people streamed out of buildings. The government moved to reassure people that there had been no radiation leak from the country's network of nuclear power plants.
Japan sits on the "Pacific Ring of Fire", which is dotted with volcanoes, and Tokyo is situated in one of its most dangerous areas.
The quake sent the Nikkei share index plunging at the close while the yen fell sharply against the US dollar before recovering.
The mega-city of Tokyo sits on the intersection of three continental plates -- the Eurasian, Pacific and Philippine Sea plates -- which are slowly grinding against each other, building up enormous seismic pressure.
The government's Earthquake Research Committee has warned of a 70 percent chance that a great, magnitude-eight quake will strike within the next 30 years in the Kanto plains, home to Tokyo's vast urban sprawl.
The last time a "Big One" hit Tokyo was in 1923, when the Great Kanto Earthquake claimed more than 140,000 lives, many of them in fires. In 1855, the Ansei Edo quake also devastated the city.
In 1995 Kobe earthquake killed more than 6,400 people.
More than 220,000 people were killed when a 9.1-magnitude quake hit off Indonesia in 2004, unleashing a massive tsunami that devastated coastlines in countries around the Indian Ocean as far away as Africa.
Small quakes are felt every day somewhere in Japan and people take part in regular drills at schools and workplaces to prepare for a calamity.
Nuclear power plants and bullet trains are designed to automatically shut down when the earth rumbles and many buildings have been quake-proofed with steel and ferro-concrete at great cost in recent decades.
American Ambassador to Pakistan Cameron Munter met Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir at the Foreign Office in Islamabad on Thursday.
They discussed the issue of Raymond Davis and the overall standing of the US-Pakistan ties.
Sources said Ambassador Munter reiterated the US’s demand for immediate release of Raymond Davis, a CIA contractor charged with killing two Pakistani citizens in Lahore on January 27. Ambassador Munter was hopeful that Raymond Davis would soon be released contrary to Pakistan’s position that matter was in the court, which would decide his future.
Interestingly, the meeting was held after a resolution was moved in the US House of Representatives urging Pakistan to release Davis or brace itself for a freeze on all monetary assistance. Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican, has reportedly moved the resolution.
They discussed the issue of Raymond Davis and the overall standing of the US-Pakistan ties.
Sources said Ambassador Munter reiterated the US’s demand for immediate release of Raymond Davis, a CIA contractor charged with killing two Pakistani citizens in Lahore on January 27. Ambassador Munter was hopeful that Raymond Davis would soon be released contrary to Pakistan’s position that matter was in the court, which would decide his future.
Interestingly, the meeting was held after a resolution was moved in the US House of Representatives urging Pakistan to release Davis or brace itself for a freeze on all monetary assistance. Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican, has reportedly moved the resolution.
