Koreas fail to agree on industrial site

NORTH and South Korea have failed again to reach agreement on reopening their jointly-run industrial estate as they wrangled over who was to blame for its shutdown.

A fourth round of talks about the complex ended on Wednesday without agreement, but the two sides will meet again next Monday, said Seoul's chief delegate Kim Ki-Woong.

The Kaesong estate in North Korea, the last remaining symbol of cross-border co-operation, shut down in April as military tensions mounted after the North's February nuclear test and South Korean-US war games.

Dialogue resumed in recent weeks but little progress has been made amid squabbles over which side should take responsibility for the suspension of business there.

Wednesday's discussions appeared to be a repeat of previous rounds, with each side refusing to budge on conditions for resuming operations at the estate, built after a landmark inter-Korean summit in 2000.

The South urged the North to promise not to cause another closure and to take a respectful and constructive position to resolve the issue, according to an official with Seoul's unification ministry.

However, the North reiterated its previous position that operations at the zone should be normalised as soon as possible, the official said.

"There was a big difference" over how to work out a legal framework to prevent a future shutdown, Kim told reporters at the end of Wednesday's talks.

Kaesong was previously a valuable source of hard currency for the impoverished North.

At a meeting earlier this month, the two sides agreed in principle to reopen the estate, where 53,000 North Koreans worked in 123 South-owned factories producing textiles or light industrial goods.

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FBT changes dominate climate debate

Labor minister Mark Butler (C) says legislation will be drafted for the ETS before the election. Source: AAP

LABOR'S crackdown on work-related benefits to help pay for a shift to an emissions trading scheme (ETS) continues to anger the motor industry after the government said it would mainly impact luxury car owners.

Changes to fringe benefit tax (FBT) arrangements on car leasing and salary sacrifice packaging aim to raise $1.8 billion of the $3.8 billion needed for an early shift from a fixed carbon pricing regime to an ETS in 2014.

The move, which will impact about 320,000 people, has angered automotive groups and the opposition, but the government is determined to push through the measure, even if it means recalling parliament.

"In the event that parliament were to resume before the election, I could take draft legislation to the parliament," Climate Change Minister Mark Butler said on Wednesday.

If rejected, Labor would take it to the election and seek a mandate from voters, he added.

Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey said the surprise change was like taking a baseball bat to an already ailing motor vehicle industry.

"This is poorly thought out, there was no consultation with any stakeholders," he told reporters after meeting with car salesmen in western Sydney.

However, Mr Hockey stopped short of committing the coalition to block the measure, saying "we would not start from yesterday" when asked if he would back the change.

The senior Liberal agreed with car retailers who say they rely on the FBT scheme to keep up sales in an already cut-throat sector.

But Deputy Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said people were "fiddling the system" by buying expensive luxury cars and claiming personal travel as a work-related expense.

"The chances are it's not a Holden Commodore, it's a BMW," he said.

Treasurer Chris Bowen tried to soften the blow, adding that people entitled to dispensation would still be able to get it as long as they could justify their claims.

"If you are not using your car for business, then you don't need a business-use deduction," he said.

The savings from the FBT measure form the single biggest plank of Labor's push to an ETS next year, and neutralise lingering voter antipathy toward imposition of the $24 a tonne carbon tax.

Other savings will come from public service job cuts and the scrapping or winding back of some clean energy programs.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says the ETS push is in line with a promise he made to Australians in 2007 during his first leadership term, and will save the average Australian household $380 in 2014/15.

But industry says changes to the FBT scheme will hit middle-income earners hardest.

"Motorists ... should not be targeted to help minimise the budget impact of other policy decisions," Australian Automobile Association director Andrew McKellar said.

The Australian Greens, who are critical of cuts to environmental programs, are promising to stall any government legislation related to the earlier ETS move in the upper house.

"We won't be moving to the ETS in 2014," said Greens leader Christine Milne.

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Rudd close to boat policy announcement

THE Rudd government is closer to laying out changes to its strategy on asylum seeker boat arrivals as Opposition Leader Tony Abbott declared Australia was facing a national emergency.

After moving to neutralise the carbon tax as an election issue by "terminating" it on Tuesday, federal Labor now plans to address its biggest policy weakness.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on Wednesday outlined his three-pronged approach to the vexed policy area covering action at the global, regional and national level.

"That's the correct response to a problem which is not uniquely Australia's - it is a problem right around the world," he told reporters in Gladstone.

The prime minister's comments came as a search and rescue operation began off Christmas Island after an asylum seeker boat carrying 80 people issued a distress call.

It also came a day after four people died when a boat capsized while under the escort of two navy vessels en route to Christmas Island.

The bodies of two men and two women, all thought to be in their 20s and 30s, were recovered from the water and a further 144 people were rescued.

Last weekend a baby boy, who was on a vessel swamped by high seas as it struggled toward the Australian coastline, was drowned.

Mr Rudd indicated Labor was looking at the effectiveness of the United Nations Refugee Convention.

While there's no suggestion Australia will withdraw from the convention, his comments imply the government might push for the 60-year-old agreement to be changed to reflect current movements of displaced people.

This could make it easier for Australia to reject refugee applications for people it deems to be economic migrants and not persons fleeing persecution or war.

Foreign Minister Bob Carr has already expressed concerns there were more economic migrants, particularly from Iran, coming to Australia on boats provided by people smugglers in Indonesia.

Iran currently refuses to accept people who don't want to be returned.

Mr Rudd, who recently visited Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, said on Wednesday he was looking at strengthening co-operation with nations in southeast Asia and the southwest Pacific.

The government was also looking at reforming Australia's domestic refugee determination process.

As part of the process, the foreign affairs department is updating advisory information provided to refugee tribunals and courts on asylum seeker source countries.

The government wants to change a review process that overturns the overwhelming majority of failed asylum seekers.

Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare has also called on all sides of politics to work together to "fix this God-awful problem".

"This is a wretchedly difficult area and it's been poisoned by politics," he said in Sydney.

Mr Abbott said he was more than happy to put partisanship aside and support Labor in making the changes needed to stop the boats.

"Bring back the parliament, let's debate this issue and let's make the changes now to stop the boats," he said in Mackay, Queensland.

"This is a national emergency, it's got to be addressed now."

Australia's border protection commander Rear Admiral David Johnston said his staff had suffered psychologically.

"It is a dreadful feeling in the stomach when we hear that a vessel has capsized or that it's in some difficulty," he told reporters.

Recently retired navy Lieutenant Commander Barry Learoyd, commander of the patrol boat HMAS Albany in the 2009 SIEV-36 incident when an intercepted vessel exploded with the loss of five asylum seekers, said boat turnbacks could be done.

"If the government says yes we are to turn the vessel around, then there would be procedures in place to make sure that happens as safely as we can," he told ABC television.

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European stocks climb at open

EUROPE'S main stock markets rose at the start of trading on Wednesday, with London's benchmark FTSE 100 index up 0.26 per cent to 6,573.30 points.

In Frankfurt, the DAX 30 gained 0.19 per cent to 8,216.70 points and in Paris the CAC 40 advanced 0.21 per cent to 3,859.20 compared with Tuesday's closing values.

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France vows to punish Mali hostage killers

A body found in northern Mali may be that of Philippe Verdon (R) kidnapped by al-Qaeda in 2011. Source: AAP

FRENCH President Francois Hollande says there is a "very strong" chance that a body found in northern Mali is that of a French hostage and vowed the killing would not go unpunished.

Philippe Verdon, who was kidnapped by al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) from a hotel while on business in northeastern Mali in November 2011, was already believed to be dead.

His captors announced in March that the 53-year-old had been executed in response to France's military intervention in Mali.

"We found a body 10 days ago in northern Mali, we are doing everything possible to confirm that this could be, alas, the body of Philippe Verdon," Hollande said at Mali's embassy to Paris, where he was awarded the highest rank in the country's National Order on Monday.

"We will then determine the cause of death and nothing will go unpunished," Hollande said.

AQIM is holding hostage eight Europeans, including five French nationals.

French forces intervened in Mali in January to help the weak Malian military drive out Islamist rebels who had seized control of the country's north.

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Thousands protest over Zimmerman verdict

Protests have been held in US cities after a jury found George Zimmerman not guilty of murder. Source: AAP

THOUSANDS have protested in US cities as President Barack Obama appealed for calm following the acquittal in Florida of a man who gunned down an unarmed black teenager.

The angry protests highlight simmering racial tensions after a jury found volunteer watchman George Zimmerman not guilty of murdering 17-year-old Trayvon Martin.

Demonstrators held noisy rallies in US cities including New York, San Francisco, Boston, Detroit and Chicago.

At least six people were arrested in Los Angeles early on Monday when riot police broke up an "unlawful assembly" in Hollywood near the CNN building.

To the chants of "No justice, no peace!" a separate crowd blocked traffic on an important freeway elsewhere in the giant metropolis, local media reported.

The most numerous rally on Sunday was in New York City, where several thousand - including families with children - marched to Times Square under the watchful eye of police.

Many in the multi-racial crowd brandished signs bearing a portrait of Martin, while some, despite sweltering July heat, wore "hoodie" sweatshirts as the teen did the night he was killed.

"I am appalled," said Carli VanVoorhis, a 21-year-old hairdresser.

"The man was armed, the kid was not, and the man with the gun got away," she said.

"If we say it was not a racial issue, we would be lying."

"We have a big problem with race, and another problem is guns," said protester Rodney Rodriguez. "If Zimmerman didn't have a gun, he couldn't have killed Trayvon Martin."

The case has pitted those who believe that Zimmerman, a 29-year-old Hispanic neighbourhood watchman, killed Martin in self-defence, and those who believe it was a murder sparked by racist assumptions.

Obama, the first black US president, urged Americans to step back and accept the trial verdict.

"We are a nation of laws, and a jury has spoken," he said in a statement.

"I now ask every American to respect the call for calm reflection from two parents who lost their young son."

Zimmerman was accused of pursuing Martin through a gated community in the town of Sanford and shooting him during an altercation on the rainy night of February 26, 2012.

The defence successfully argued that Zimmerman fired his handgun in self-defence after the teen wrestled him to the ground and was slamming his head against the pavement.

According to Florida's controversial "Stand Your Ground" law, people who fear for their lives can use deadly force to defend themselves without having to flee a confrontation.

"We should ask ourselves, as individuals and as a society, how we can prevent future tragedies like this," Obama said. "As citizens, that's a job for all of us. That's the way to honour Trayvon Martin."

Obama last year spoke emotionally about the case, noting that if he had a son he would "look like Trayvon."

The racial divide was evident in Sanford pastor Valerie Houston's Sunday sermon.

"Dr (Martin Luther) King (Jr) stated, the daily life of the Negro is still in the basement of the Great Society," she said.

"And today I state, the daily life of my people is still enslaved to a white supremacist society."

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Bangladesh Islamist jailed for 90 years

Wartime head of Bangladesh's largest Islamic party was jailed for 90 years for atrocities in 1971. Source: AAP

A BANGLADESHI court has sentenced an elderly Islamist leader to 90 years in prison for masterminding atrocities during the 1971 war of independence against Pakistan.

Ghulam Azam, compared by prosecutors to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, was found guilty of all five charges of planning, conspiracy, incitement, complicity, and murder and torture during the war, which the government says killed three million people.

However, 90-year-old Azam, the wartime head of the country's largest Islamic party, Jamaat-e-Islami, and now its spiritual leader, was spared the death penalty because of his age and health, and was instead sentenced to nine decades in prison, an official said.

"He was found guilty beyond reasonable doubt in all five charges. The tribunal observed that he deserved death penalty," junior Attorney General M K Rahman said.

"But because of his old age and health complications, he was sentenced separately in the five charges. In all he has been sentenced to 90 years in prison."

Azam remained stoney-faced in his wheelchair as the sentence was read out.

Violence erupted in cities across Bangladesh ahead of the judgment, killing two people, as supporters of Azam clashed with police and paramilitary troops who responded with rubber bullets and in some cases live rounds, officials said.

Jamaat called a nationwide strike on Monday to protest the verdict, saying the war crimes trials are aimed at eliminating its leaders.

Prosecutors had sought the death penalty for Azam, describing him as a "lighthouse" who guided all war criminals, and the "architect" of the militias which committed many of the 1971 atrocities.

When India intervened at the end of the nine-month war and it became clear Pakistan was losing, the militias killed dozens of professors, playwrights, filmmakers, doctors and journalists.

Azam was described as the "mastermind" of the massacres of the intellectuals. Many of their bodies were found a few days after the war at a marsh outside the capital, blindfolded and with their hands tied behind their backs.

Azam is the fifth person convicted by the International Crimes Tribunal. Three Islamists have been sentenced to death and one was given life imprisonment.

Previous verdicts by the tribunal have sparked widespread and deadly violence on the streets of a country that has a 90 per cent Muslim population.

Azam's lawyer Tajul Islam said the charges were based on newspaper reports of speeches Azam gave during the war, which led to the creation of Bangladesh.

"The prosecution has completely failed to prove any of the charges," he told AFP before the verdict.

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Activists break into French nuclear plant

Police arrested Greenpeace activists who broke into the grounds of a nuclear power plant in France. Source: AAP

SAINT-PAUL-TROIS-CHATEAUX , France, July 15, AFP - Police have arrested 29 Greenpeace activists who sneaked into a nuclear plant in southern France, in the latest break-in by the environmental group aimed at highlighting alleged security weaknesses at atomic facilities.

The activists managed to enter the grounds of the Tricastin plant, around 200km north of Marseille, around dawn, Greenpeace and police said.

They hung yellow banners reading "Tricastin: a nuclear accident" and "Francois Hollande: president of a catastrophe?" in reference to the French president, according to Isabelle Philippe, a spokeswoman for the environmental group.

Before entering the facility, the activists also projected images inside the plant, including one showing a crack running along part of the structure.

"Greenpeace wants to point out all the security weaknesses in the production of nuclear energy," she said.

"Tricastin is one of the most dangerous plants and one of five that should be closed quickly.

"It was the easiest thing in the world for the activists to enter the plant, it took them 20 minutes to get from the entrance to the top of the structures."

The interior ministry said all the activists had been detained in a full sweep of the facility. It had taken several hours to arrest them all, after some had chained themselves to structures inside the plant.

Among those arrested were French, Italian, Romanian and Spanish nationals.

The EDF energy giant that runs France's atomic power plants said that the activists did not manage to reach any sensitive areas within the site.

Greenpeace has staged several break-ins at French nuclear plants in recent years in an effort to highlight what they say are dangers of atomic power and to expose security problems at the power stations.

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Pamplona bull run hospitalises 21

Bull-runners were crushed in a pile-up in Pamplona on the seventh day of Spain's famed festival. Source: AAP

DAREDEVIL bull-runners have been crushed in a pile-up in the Spanish city of Pamplona during its famed San Fermin festival, with at least 21 people hospitalised.

Television pictures showed a pile of runners, in traditional white shirts and red neckerchiefs, blocking the entrance to a bullring, the end point of the frantic dash through the town's cobbled streets.

The pile-up blocked several of the animals from charging into the arena, with panicked runners scrambling over the heads of those in front of them and others trying to pull the fallen free.

Two of the beasts - of the six bulls and the six steers that ran - leapt over the pile, crushing runners under their hooves. The others were herded to the arena through a side passage.

Several people were also trampled under the bulls' hooves during the crowded 850-metre dash through the city's narrow streets, which took four minutes and 15 seconds.

It was the sixth day of the fiesta in this northern town, which draws festival-goers and daredevils from around the world for a week of drinking and perilous bull-runs.

Javier Sesma, a doctor from the emergency unit of the local Navarra Hospital, told reporters that 21 people were injured in the run and the pile-up overall.

These included a 19-year-old man from the Spanish town of Vitoria who was in serious condition with a chest injury, and an Irish man with a less severe injury, also to his chest.

The 19-year-old was "in an especially serious condition with a chest trauma causing breathing problems, and is requiring breathing apparatus," Sesma said. "He is in a stable but serious condition."

He added that a further two people were being treated for gore wounds.

Spanish media said it was the worst stampede in decades at the festival.

Live television pictures showed one man being carried away unconscious, his face bleeding.

Saturday's chaotic run nearly doubled the overall toll of those hospitalised in the previous six days of runs.

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Texas abortion law passes despite protests

The Texas senate approved a bill setting some of the strictest limits on abortion despite protests. Source: AAP

THE Texas senate has approved a bill setting some of the strictest limits on abortion in the United States, just weeks after a filibuster by opposition Democrats dramatically thwarted the measure.

The bill - similar to the one that state Senator Wendy Davis helped block in a 13-hour filibuster on June 25 - was approved 19-11 late on Friday, with one Democrat joining the Republican majority, local media reported.

Davis became a national hero for Democrats and supporters of abortion. Pro-choice advocates filled the spectator gallery Friday and held rallies outside the state senate, but were unable to stop the measure from being approved.

Republican Governor Rick Perry has vowed to sign the bill into law.

The bill includes a ban on abortions starting at 20 weeks after conception, unless the woman's health is imminently endangered; sets strict requirements for doctors performing abortions; and mandates that a doctor must be present when a woman takes a pill to induce an abortion.

Texas media reported that police tussled with noisy protesters who resisted eviction from the spectator gallery. Some protesters even chained themselves to the railing to avoid being dragged out.

During the June 25 session a raucous gallery crowd was key in preventing the vote from being held on time. There were too many activists for police to control - a mistake not repeated on Friday, when the capitol was swarming with state troopers.

Police also checked bags and took out items that could be thrown, including bottles suspected of containing excrement and urine, the Houston Chronicle reported.

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