Monday, September 07, 2009 MANILA: Two people died and more than 800 were rescued as a ferry carrying more than 900 passengers and crew capsized early today before sinking off the southern Philippines, coast guard and police officials said. The Superferry 9, owned by Aboitiz Transport System Corp., listed at about 3:30 a.m. local time at the vicinity of the Zamboanga Peninsula while on its way to the central province of Iloilo from General Santos City in the south, Commander Armando Balilo, the coast guard’s public information officer, said in a telephone interview. The ferry’s captain immediately ordered passengers to abandon ship, he added. Some 830 people have so far been rescued by three onsite rescue vessels, Balilo said. The ship sank at around 8 a.m., Police Chief Superintendent Angelo Sunglao, Zamboanga Peninsula’s police director, said by phone. Authorities are still investigating what happened. The focus is now on getting all the passengers to safety, Caroline Ballesteros, assistant vice president of Aboitiz Equity Ventures Inc., Aboitiz Transport’s parent company, said in an e- mailed message.
BEIRUT: Thousands of people converged Saturday on central Beirut to mark the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafiq Hariri.Waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader, men, women and children gathered under sunny skies in Martyr's Square where members of the parliamentary majority were to address the crowd. The rally comes as final preparations are underway in The Hague for the launch of the international tribunal set up to bring Hariri's killers to justice. It also comes as the country prepares for legislative elections in June that will pit Western-backed political parties against a Hezbollah-led alliance backed by Syria and Iran.Hariri died in a massive car bombing on February 14, 2005 that also killed 22 others. The assassination was widely blamed on then Lebanese power-broker Syria, which has denied any involvement. The attack on the Beirut seafront was one of the worst acts of political violence to rock Lebanon since t...
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