Search for fighter stealth jet, pilot off Japan

A Japan Air Self-Defence Force's F-35A stealth jet at Misawa Air Base in Misawa. Photo / AP

Japan: A search was underway for a Japanese fighter jet after it disappeared from radar during a flight exercise in northern Japan, defence officials said. The F-35A stealth jet went missing while flying off the eastern coast of Aomori, the Air Self-Defence Force said. The plane disappeared from radar about half an hour after taking off from the Misawa air base with three other F-35As for anti-fighter battle training, it said. A male pilot in his 40s was missing with the plane. Twelve other F-35s at the Misawa base would be grounded. Japan has started deploying the expensive US-made F-35s since last year. The Government plans to buy 147 F-35s.

India: Maoist rebels staged a deadly attack on a convoy of India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, killing a state party MP and four other people in his vehicle with an improvised explosive device in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, police said. The rebels detonated the device in the Dantewada district — an insurgent stronghold — just two days before a multi-phase general election begins in India, police officer Sunder Raj said. Bhima Mandavi, his driver and three security personnel were killed in the attack, Raj said. Five soldiers were critically wounded when their escort vehicle was hit by the explosion.

Antarctica: A group of 14 European scientific institutions plan to retrieve the world's oldest ice as part of research into past climate change. The consortium led by the Germany-based Alfred Wegener Institute said it has identified an area in Antarctica, nicknamed "Little Dome C," that should harbour ice as old as 1.5 million years. So-called ice core measurements are crucial for scientists' understanding of past climatic changes on Earth and the models they use to predict future global warming or cooling. Current ice core measurements provide reliable data going back about 800,000 years.

Albania: A man has been shot dead after a group of unidentified individuals robbed money at Albania's international airport. Police said the robbery by masked and armed people took place on the tarmac at the Mother Teresa Rinasi International Airport, slightly north of the capital Tirana. One of the robbers was shot dead in an exchange of fire with police about 1km from the airport.

"The revolution can wait, Barcelona and Man United are playing."

Protesters at Sudan's mass anti-regime sit-in, watch the footie on screens they set up today. pic.twitter.com/W2zJRGzb8Y

— Yousra Elbagir (@YousraElbagir) April 10, 2019

Sudan: Sudanese security forces tried again to break up an anti-government sit-in outside the military headquarters in the capital, Khartoum, killing at least 13 people, activists behind the demonstration said. The deaths brought the total number of fatalities in the sit-in since the weekend to 21, including five soldiers, according to the activists. The demonstration is the latest in nearly four months of anti-government protests that have plunged Sudan into its worst crisis in years. What initially erupted late last year as rallies against a spiralling economy quickly escalated into calls for an end to President Omar al-Bashir's 30-year rule. On Tuesday for the first time, leaders of the protests called on the military's leadership to abandon al-Bashir and join their call for change. And yesterday they invited military leaders to meet with their representatives to "discuss arrangements for a transition" in Sudan.

Brazil: Heavy rains blamed for the deaths of at least four people continued to fall on Rio de Janeiro as officials closed schools and urged people to avoid non-essential traffic. Torrents of water gushed down streets, sweeping up cars and uprooting trees following rains that began on Tuesday. Mayor Marcelo Crivella said the Brazilian city faced a "crisis" and said heavy rains would continue.

Caio Mussolini, Mussolini's grand grandson, is candidate at the European election... pic.twitter.com/4YrRJEOu8i

— Eurography (@Eurography1) April 10, 2019

Italy: A third descendant of Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini is entering the political arena. Caio Giulio Cesare Mussolini — Mussolini's great-grandson, whose name is taken from one of ancient Rome's most famous rulers — is running as a candidate in European elections for the far-right Brothers of Italy Party. His political ambitions follow that of his second cousins, Alessandra Mussolini, an EU parliamentarian for Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia party, and Rachele Mussolini, a Rome city council member. Benito Mussolini was Italy's dictator for two decades until his summary execution in 1945.

Germany: A German convert to Islam went on trial on charges that, as a member of the extremist Islamic State group in Iraq, she allowed a 5-year-old Yazidi girl she and her husband kept as a slave to die of thirst in the hot sun. The 27-year-old, identified only as Jennifer W. in line with privacy rules, is charged with murder, a war crime and membership in a terrorist organisation, and could face life in prison if convicted in Munich state court. Her lawyer Seda Basay-Yildiz said the defendant had no statement to make to the court about the charges against her.

France: French authorities say 21 migrants have been rescued while trying to reach Britain by crossing the English Channel in small boats. A helicopter and coast guard ship retrieved nine migrants from a boat with a dead engine in waters off Calais. A separate operation rescued 12 migrants, including two children, from another boat off Boulogne-sur-Mer.

- AP