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BBC News with Marion Marshall.
Italian police say the smugglers who abandoned a cargo ship full of migrants in open waters earned about 3 million dollars from their operation. The ship was found drifting in the Mediterranean on Thursday, with more than 350 people on board, many from Syria. James Reynolds reports.
Italian police are piecing together details of the smugglers' operation. The police chief of the Cosenza province Luigi Liguori says that each migrant paid between 4 to 8 thousand dollars to board the ship, meaning that the smugglers took in around three million dollars. Officers say that the smugglers wore hoods and lock the migrants in the ship's hold before apparently abandoning ship on a life boat. The smuggler's new technique appears to be simple and effective: point a cargo ship towards Italy and let the coast guard pick it up.
French riot police has been called in to end violent confrontations between about 200 African and Afghan migrants in the port of Calais. Seven men were injured in the clashes. More from Hugh Scholfiled in Paris.
Iron bars, planks, sticks and stones were used as the two groups of migrants fought each other into this out of the morning in the area known as Junes just about Calais port. Social workers say tensions have been growing recent days especially between Afghans and migrants from different counties in Africa. Often these tensions result in skirmishes in food lines, but on this occasion the situation deteriorated. Another factor adding to their frustration is that over the new year there have been fewer lorries passing through Calais to Britain, and therefore fewer opportunities for migrants to steal on board.
The Indonesian authorities say a bad weather has prevented them from sending divers to the bottom of the Java sea to confirm the presence of wreckage from an Air Asia plane. Officials released sonar pictures of several large objects have located but want to get visual confirmation. A spokesman for the Russian Embassy in Jakarta Alexander Shilin said they'd send expert divers as well as specialist equipment to assist the search off the coast of Southern Borneo.
Among the members of our team, there are 22 deep water divers, and all of them are excellent specialists, having vast experience in conducting such search of small items on the bottom of the sea. The plane disappeared on Sunday when 162 people were on board.30 bodies have been recovered.
Masked gunmen in northern Libya have kidnapped 13 Egyptian Coptic Christians. Eyewitnesses in the Libyan city of Sirte say suspected Islamist militants went to the Egyptian's residential compound late at night, asked to see their identity papers. Once the gunmen have separated Christians from Muslim workers, they reportedly handcuffed the Christians-thought -to-be men and drove away with them. The kidnapping is the latest in a series of attacks on Egyptian Christians working in Libya.
World News from the BBC.
The authorities in the Italian port of Brindisi say fierce heat from slow burning blazes is keeping investigators from searching the lower decks of the ferry that caught fire nearly a week ago. The commander of the port said temperature was still very high inside the vehicle decks of the Norman Atlantic, hampering the search for bodies.
Police in the United States say a girl who survived a plane crash which killed the rest of her family has been released from hospital. The seven year old girl had walked more than a kilometre from the wreckage to seek help at a nearby house. The owner of the property told the BBC the girl appeared at his door, disoriented and trembling, and told him that her family had died in a plane crash.
Israeli officials say the government will freeze the monthly transfer of revenue to the Palestinians, a day after they pressed ahead with an application to join the International Criminal Court. The unnamed officials say the Cabinet has decided to block the transfer of 125 million dollars. A Palestinian official described the move as an illegal collective punishment.
Reports from Sri Lanka say government supporters have fired shots at a rally by the main opposition candidate in the next week's presidential election, injuring one person. A private group, the campaign for free and fair elections, known as CAFE, said the election related violence was increasing. Charles Haviland reports.
The election watch dog group CAFE says almost all reported violent incident has been perpetrated by supporters of the incumbent president Mahinda Rajapaksa against those of his rival Maithripala Sirisena. On Friday, a pro-government gang threw stones at an opposition campaign meeting, injuring more than ten people. There have been other types of mouth practice too. State run television has produced at least 2 guests suspected to be bogus, professing to be close relatives of women allegedly seduced by Mr Sirisena. He denies the allegations.
BBC News.