Filipinos are assessing the damage from Friday's powerful typhoon, which is known to have killed more than 100 people while causing widespread destruction across the central part of the country.

The death toll is expected to rise, although the full extent of the damage and casualties will not be clear for some time.

Typhoon Haiyan - one of the strongest storms ever recorded - pounded the central Philippines, cutting electricity and communications while flattening buildings, uprooting trees and leaving entire communities flooded while creating landslides.

The typhoon created a storm surge of 5 meters in some locations.

Nearly 800,000 people were evacuated from their homes ahead of the storm, which is known in the Philippines as Yolanda. It affected more than 4 million people across 36 provinces.

The typhoon had winds of over 300 kilometers per hour with stronger gusts as it lashed the islands.

France's top diplomat says there is no certainty that world powers can reach a deal in nuclear talks with Iran.

As negotiations in Geneva went into a third day Saturday, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told France Inter radio there are major stumbling blocks in an initial proposed text on a deal.

The French envoy's remarks echoed those of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who said after Friday's session that "some important gaps" remain in the talks, but that the parties are "working hard."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met Secretary of State Kerry in Tel Aviv.

He told reporters ahead of a meeting with Kerry in Tel Aviv that Iran "got everything and paid nothing" because it is not reducing in any way its nuclear enrichment capability.

"Iran got the deal of the century and the international community got a bad deal. This is a very bad deal and Israel utterly rejects it."

White House spokesman Jay Carney discussed the negotiations as well,"In exchange for concrete, verifiable measures to address the P5+1's concerns during the first step, the P5+1 would consider limited, targeted and reversible relief that does not affect our core sanctions architecture.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is expected to join the talks Saturday and China will send its deputy minister in an effort to secure a deal over Iran's disputed nuclear program.

The company struggling to clean up Japan's crippled nuclear power plant has invited foreign experts and journalists to the site in a bid to reassure the world it has the situation under control. However, as Tokyo Electric Power Company prepares for the delicate task of removing spent fuel rods, it continues to face questions about its competence.

VOA's Daniel Schearf had this report from Seoul.

Workers at Japan's quake-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station this month are expected to begin removing 1,500 spent fuel rods, to be placed in safe storage.  Spent nuclear fuel is extremely hot and very radioactive. During the removal process, if the assemblies are damaged or the rods overheat, large amounts of radioactive material could be released into the air.
 
TEPCO says that despite the continuing struggles to stabilize the situation at the troubled plant, it can safely manage the dangerous transfer. To that end, the company released a video to explain the process and reassure the public, saying they have safely removed spent fuel more than 1,200 times.

Daniel Schearf Seoul.

U.S. President Barack Obama says it is time for the United States to revise its policies against Cuba.

Mr. Obama, speaking in Miami Friday, said it did not make sense that policies put in place more than 50 years ago would still be effective in the Internet age.

The president pointed out that Cuban leader Fidel Castro came into power in 1961, the same year that Mr. Obama was born. The United States cut off diplomatic relations with Cuba the same year and imposed an economic embargo a year later.

The U.S. embargo against Cuba is controversial internationally. The United Nations in October voted for the 22nd time to condemn it.

One of Wall Street's most successful hedge funds, SAC Capital Advisors, has pleaded guilty to fraud charges.

The plea is part of a $1.8-billion deal to resolve allegations the investment firm encouraged rampant insider trading for many years.

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From Washington,Bill Michaels,VOA News.