Libya: Deaths As Militias Fire On Protesters

At least 31 people have been killed and nearly 300 wounded after militiamen fired on a demonstration demanding their eviction from Libya's capital Tripoli, the prime minister said.

Hundreds of people carrying white flags in a sign of peace, as well as the national flag, and singing the national anthem had assembled in the capital's Meliana Square.

They then marched to the Misratah militia headquarters in the Gharghour district when gunmen inside fired into the air to scare them off.

But when the crowd continued to move towards the building, the gunmen started firing at them, according to witnesses.

Footage aired on the privately owned al-Nabaa television network showed protesters running from gunfire while carrying others covered in blood.

A Reuters reporter said they saw an anti-aircraft cannon firing from the militia compound into the crowd.

The protesters fled at first but came back heavily armed to storm the gated buildings, where militiamen when were holed up until nightfall.

Dozens of army trucks later arrived to attempt to separate the crowds and militiamen in the compound, sealing off roads to prevent more armed people joining the battle.

Witnesses said some of the militiamen were wounded or arrested, while the remainder eventually fled.

Some of the protesters were armed with weapons too

The commander of the militia, Al Taher Basha Agha, vowed in a telephone interview with Libya al-Ahrar accused the protesters of opening fire first.

"Who is the person who is inciting them?" he said. "The evil ones who are using the civilians as a bridge to cross to power.

"Tripoli has not seen a war yet, it will see it soon," he threatened.

Many residents of Tripoli are frustrated with the continued presence of the militia, who are hangovers from the 2011 uprising that ousted dictator Muammar Gaddafi and now a powerful force in the increasingly lawless North African country.

The militia frequently fight with other armed factions in the city.

Prime Minister Ali Zeidan, who was briefly seized by militiamen himself last month, said his embattled government was working on a plan to drive out all militias from Tripoli.

"There will be no exception," he said. "All militias - including those in Tripoli - will be out."

Sadat al Badri, president of Tripoli's city council, which called for the protest, said tensions were rising over the militias.

"We're going to announce a general strike and launch a civil disobedience campaign until these militias leave," he said.

The militias have rejected calls from the weak central government to leave the capital.

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Typhoon Haiyan: Cameron Pledges Extra £30m

The UK Government is to give an extra £30m in aid to help the relief effort after the devastating typhoon in the Philippines.

Prime Minister David Cameron said Britain had already pledged £23m to help the relief effort but he added it was clear more aid was needed after "watching appalling scenes of mass destruction".

During a news conference in Sri Lanka ahead of the Commonwealth summit, Mr Cameron said: "Today I can announce we are providing another £30m to support the UN and the Red Cross emergency appeals and we are also supplying an RAF C-130 Hercules aircraft to help ensure aid workers can move between the worst affected areas and get aid to those who need it."

His pledge comes on the day an RAF cargo plane carrying heavy duty vehicles and medical supplies is due to arrive in the Philippines as part of Britain's emergency response.

The huge C-17 transport plane, carrying two JCB diggers, two Land Rovers and a forklift truck emblazoned with stickers reading "UK aid from the British people", is expected to land this morning.

A 12-strong team of British doctors, surgeons and paramedics are already in the devastated country helping to treat survivors.

The devastated town of Tanuan, south of Tacloba

Mr Cameron added: "A week after Typhoon Haiyan hit, the scale of the disaster is becoming clearer every day - over 3,600 dead, nearly 12 million affected.

"They are going to need sustained help from the international community as they start to rebuild their lives.

"I'm proud of the fact that the UK has taken the lead in international relief with rapid response of warships, aircraft and equipment.

"I'm also very proud of the fact that the British public has once again shown great generosity and compassion and has so far donated £23m."

Authorities in the Philippines have put the official death toll at 3,633, with 1,179 people missing and nearly 12,500 injured.

The UN has put the number of dead at 4,460 and said that 2.5 million people still "urgently" required food assistance.

At least 600,000 people have been displaced with many homeless, and large numbers of survivors are struggling without food, water and shelter.

The Philippines has put the official death toll at 3,633

Meanwhile, the Foreign Office is looking into reports that a British man may have been killed in the wake of the typhoon.

Colin Bembridge, 61, was staying with his Filipino partner Maybelle, 35, and their three-year-old daughter Victoria near Tacloban when the storm struck.

The Philippines government has defended its efforts to deliver aid, with interior secretary Mar Roxas saying: "In a situation like this, nothing is fast enough."

Workers in Tacloban have been burying scores of unidentified bodies in a mass grave as desperately needed aid begins to arrive.

Save the Children said three lorries carrying household and family hygiene kits will set off in convoy from Manila to reach Tacloban and will benefit 5,000 people.

Additional fuel, which has been in very short supply in the area, will also arrive and enable further distributions to take place over the coming days.

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Sri Lanka: Cameron's Deadline On 'War Crimes'

Prime Minister David Cameron has told the Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa that he has until March to conduct an independent investigation into alleged war crimes.

At a news conference at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) in Colombo, Mr Cameron said the issue would remain high on the international agenda.

He said: "The Sri Lankan government needs to go further and faster on human rights and reconciliation.

"I accept it takes time but I think the important thing is to get on the right track.

"This issue is not going to go away, it's an issue of international concern."

The UN and rights groups say as many as 40,000 civilians may have been killed in the final stages of the civil war in Sri Lanka in May 2009.

But Mr Rajapaksa has denied any civilians were killed.

The PM's visit is the first by a foreign leader to the region since 1948

He has also blocked all calls for an independent probe into claims of war crimes committed by government forces against the Tamil population in the northern Jaffna region.

In response to Mr Cameron's comments, a senior Sri Lankan minister reaffirmed that the country's government would "definitely" not allow it.

Economic development minister Basil Rajapaksa, who is the president's brother, said: "Why should we have an internal inquiry?

"We will object to it ... Definitely we are not going to allow it."

Mr Cameron said Mr Rajapaksa wanted more time to address the claims, but put him on notice to deliver by March or he would push for an international investigation through the auspices of the UN human rights council.

He added: "I sense that they do want to make progress on these issues and it will help having international pressure to help make that matter."

Both men held a meeting on Friday night to discuss the human rights issue, where Mr Cameron said "very strong views were expressed on both sides".

It comes after Mr Cameron was mobbed by Tamil protesters who claim relatives were murdered by the state.

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New York Taxi Crash Driver Will Face No Charges

The family of a British tourist who lost her leg after a New York taxi ploughed into her is "shocked" the driver will not be facing criminal charges.

Sian Green, 24, had to have the lower part of her left leg amputated after she was hit by a cab while sightseeing with a friend.

Her lawyer in New York, Daniel Marchese, said in a statement the city's assistant district attorney's office had informed him it would not be pressing charges against the man driving the cab, Faysal Himon.

The crash happened near the Rockefeller Center

He added Ms Green had been left "incredibly dismayed" and would be pursuing a civil suit, while her family were said to be "disappointed".

"The Green family is shocked by this news, and disappointed," he said.

"Despite this news, Sian continues to improve both physically and mentally since her return to the United Kingdom.

"While she is incredibly dismayed by this decision, she does not let it affect her positive spirit, unbelievable strength and incredible poise, which she demonstrated to the world throughout this ordeal."

The driver claims he was distracted by a cyclist

Cab driver Mr Himon was ticketed by the New York Police Department for being unauthorised to drive the vehicle, but has otherwise faced no other sanction following the accident in Manhattan on August 20.

Mr Himon has claimed throughout that he was distracted by a cyclist who had banged on the back of his moving vehicle, causing him to accelerate and hit Ms Green who had been on the pavement at the time.

Mr Marchese said the assistant district attorney had "indicated that failure to charge was due to lack of evidence regarding the taxi cab driver's intent during the investigation phase".

Miss Green spent four weeks in hospital

"As the legal representative for Sian's civil case, I believe this incident was not an accident, but rather a negligent act of calculated recklessness to which my client was the victim," he added.

"We will continue to aggressively pursue legal action to help remedy this tragic incident that changed Sian's life."

Ms Green spent four weeks in a New York hospital following her accident, also sustaining cuts to her right leg.

Immediately after the crash, quick-thinking plumber David Justino used his belt as a tourniquet, tying it around Ms Green's left leg, earning praise from medics.

He was also recognised by US celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz who had been filming scenes for his television show nearby and rushed to help.

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Typhoon Haiyan: Victims Flee Tacloban

By Mark Stone, Asia Correspondent on Leyte Island, Philippines

With nothing but the clothes on their backs, hundreds of typhoon victims are making a desperate bid to escape Tacloban.

People are try to escape the devastation of Tacloban

The ferry terminal in Ormoc City is full of lost Filipinos. They have nowhere to go. No plan, no home, no job, nothing.

All they have left are the few belongings they carry: small damp rucksacks, plastic bags, umbrellas. Some have only what they are wearing.

And they are supposed to be the lucky ones - the survivors of this cruel swipe of nature.

Each of them has their own story. Here is just one.

Julio Gatela is 32. He had a computer shop in Tacloban until his city became the place most devastated by the typhoon.

We meet him in the vast queue for one of the ferries away from here.

Julio lost everything when the typhoon hit

The first thing we discover is that he has eaten just a few biscuits for five days.

There is food in this particular town, but he hasn't the money to buy any. He has just enough for the ferry and no more.

He shows us, pulling out an old damp sack from his bag. It is full of coins he managed to collect from the rubble of his home. The rest of his savings were notes - paper money which would never have survived so much water.

This is a not a well-off part of the Philippines. There are banks but not everyone has an account. Julio doesn't. He saved his earnings at home.

Our conversation is heartbreaking. Julio doesn't know what he'll do.

Many people have been left with just the clothes on their backs

"I don't have nothing else to do. I just want some rest. It's tragic out there (in Tacloban) so I have to calm myself and try to forget everything terrible that happened to us."

He is visibly depressed. I think he's probably emotionally broken. His face twitches as he talks to us.

"We don't know where else to go. What happened and why to us is a mystery for us."

He recalls the moment the storm hit.

"It was really terrible. Thundering strong winds. I cannot describe how strong it is. Different from every typhoon I have ever seen before.

"My roof was trembling. I put my life jacket on and I just waited. No one really knew what was going to happen. We have never seen big waves like this."

Many are trying to get to the neighbouring island of Cebu

With any luck, and with the coins he has salvaged, he will be on a ferry soon.

It will take him to the neighbouring island of Cebu where he hopes he will find the power to get him back on track.

"I don't know." he says. "I will just start at the beginning again."

In disasters like this, it's natural to think about the children, the mothers, the elderly. The reality is that everyone is suffering.

In fact, the children are probably the most resilient. I can see a few running around now, playing in the stifling sun which breaks the torrential rain. They don't really understand the chaos around them.

As I watch the kids playing, Julio recalls the friends and family he has lost.

"My uncle and many friends. And everything is destroyed. Everything."

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Typhoon Haiyan: 4,000 Dead In Philippines

The death toll from Typhoon Haiyan has now reached 4,000, according to a notice at Tacloban city hall.

The figure is the first public acknowledgement that the number of fatalities has exceeded an estimate provided by Philippine President Benigno Aquino, who said this week the predicted death toll would be closer to 2,500.

On Thursday, official confirmed deaths nationwide stood at 2,357 after the November 8 typhoon - one of the strongest ever recorded.

President Aquino has faced mounting pressure to speed up the distribution of aid.

Helicopters from the USS George Washington deliver supplies

There has also been confusion over the number of fatalities in the disaster.

A notice board in Tacloban City Hall said the toll had doubled overnight to 4,000 deaths.

The notice first said the figure was for Tacloban alone, before mayor Alfred Romualdez apologised and said it was for the whole central Philippines.

The figure is compiled by local officials who began burying bodies in a mass grave on Thursday.

A soldier stands at a checkpoint in the devastated city of Tacloban

The UN has put the latest overall death toll at 4,460 but an official said it was now reviewing the figure.

Preliminary numbers of those missing remained at 22,000, according to the Red Cross.

Tacloban Mayor Alfred Romualdez said some victims may have been swept out to sea after a tsunami-like wall of seawater slammed into coastal areas.

Mr Aquino said initial estimates of 10,000 dead by local officials were overstated by "emotional trauma".

Survivors have grown increasingly desperate and angry over the speed of aid distribution, which has been hindered by looting, a lack of fuel for rescue vehicles and debris-choked roads.

It comes as helicopters from the USS George Washington aircraft carrier began flying food, water and medical teams to ravaged regions on the islands.

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Sri Lanka: Cameron Urged To Raise Atrocities

Tamil: I Was Tortured And Raped

Updated: 8:54am UK, Thursday 14 November 2013

By Lisa Holland, Foreign Affairs Correspondent

Navaneethan Subramaniam is not allowed out of the London mental health unit where he is being treated unless he is accompanied.

He arrived in August after smuggling himself illegally into Britain via Europe in the back of a lorry.

Navaneethan's lawyer says he is under constant supervision because there are fears he may try to take his own life after suffering weeks of torture, allegedly at the hands of the Sri Lankan army.

This is the first time Navaneethan has left the hospital grounds. He wants to tell his story and has been allowed to leave for a few hours by doctors to meet us at a nearby cafe.

Navaneethan speaks virtually no English and talks to us through a Tamil solicitor.

During the Sri Lankan civil war he says he was a driver for the separatist group the Tamil Tigers - but he insists he is no longer an activist.

After the end of the civil war he says he went to France but was deported back to Sri Lanka, where he said he was abducted one day on his way home from work.

The 33-year-old said he was picked up and tortured in May of this year - four years on from the supposed end of the civil war.

His story is typical of the claims of abuses which human rights groups say are continuing in Sri Lanka. 

He told me: "They came in front of me, stopped me and said, 'I want to speak to you, come', then grabbed me from behind my head, grabbed my collar and pushed me into the van."

Navaneethan says he was taken to an army camp where he was held for 23 days.

He said: "I was questioned. They said, 'You have been the driver of the vehicles belonging to the group (Tamil Tigers). You smuggled arms and hid them. Where are the bunkers with weapons?'."

He says he was slapped and punched, beaten with a rifle butt, given electric shocks, made to feel like he was drowning and repeatedly sexually abused.

"I was beaten but before that I was given electric shocks. It was like two squares held onto my waist. After that I was assaulted with a rifle butt. My ear was pulled with pliers and I was stabbed with an army knife.

"The sexual thing ... three army personnel came one night. I was kept the whole night. One after the other they came to me and they did it."

"I was mostly beaten with plastic pipes, long wooden poles and wires. They put a plastic bag over my head and put water inside. I couldn't breathe at all.

"At that time I felt instead of going through all this torture I would rather die - my torture was that severe. 

"Like what happened to me, the torture is on a massive scale and the outside world has no idea about these things."

Navaneethan - who is applying for permission to stay in Britain - returned to the hospital after spending a few hours with us.

Sky News raised his case with Dr Chris Nonis, Sri Lanka's High Commissioner to the UK.

He said: "People who came over here as economic refugees living off the British taxpayers' money who now should be deported naturally do not want to be deported, and they will come up with all sorts of conjecture of 'torture', because they have a compelling reason why they want to stay.

"There will always be a group of people who funded terrorism, who made terrorism a business, who will perpetuate a proxy propaganda war. All these are usually unauthenticated, unverified and uncorroborated.  

"We have a formal process of investigation. It is a domestic process and that will continue because no one condones any form of torture.

"But there are lots of spurious allegations and it is fundamentally important for a country post-conflict that we separate fact from fiction."

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Tamil 'Tortured And Raped By Sri Lankan Army'

By Lisa Holland, Foreign Affairs Correspondent

Navaneethan Subramaniam is not allowed out of the London mental health unit where he is being treated unless he is accompanied.

He arrived in August after smuggling himself illegally into Britain via Europe in the back of a lorry.

Navaneethan's lawyer says he is under constant supervision because there are fears he may try to take his own life after suffering weeks of torture, allegedly at the hands of the Sri Lankan army.

This is the first time Navaneethan has left the hospital grounds. He wants to tell his story and has been allowed to leave for a few hours by doctors to meet us at a nearby cafe.

Navaneethan speaks virtually no English and talks to us through a Tamil solicitor.

During the Sri Lankan civil war he says he was a driver for the separatist group the Tamil Tigers - but he insists he is no longer an activist.

After the end of the civil war he says he went to France but was deported back to Sri Lanka, where he said he was abducted one day on his way home from work.

The 33-year-old said he was picked up and tortured in May of this year - four years on from the supposed end of the civil war.

Tamils claim they were abused in government-run refugee camps

His story is typical of the claims of abuses which human rights groups say are continuing in Sri Lanka. 

He told me: "They came in front of me, stopped me and said, 'I want to speak to you, come', then grabbed me from behind my head, grabbed my collar and pushed me into the van."

Navaneethan says he was taken to an army camp where he was held for 23 days.

He said: "I was questioned. They said, 'You have been the driver of the vehicles belonging to the group (Tamil Tigers). You smuggled arms and hid them. Where are the bunkers with weapons?'."

He says he was slapped and punched, beaten with a rifle butt, given electric shocks, made to feel like he was drowning and repeatedly sexually abused.

"I was beaten but before that I was given electric shocks. It was like two squares held onto my waist. After that I was assaulted with a rifle butt. My ear was pulled with pliers and I was stabbed with an army knife.

"The sexual thing ... three army personnel came one night. I was kept the whole night. One after the other they came to me and they did it."

Sri Lanka's High Commissioner dismissed the claims of torture

"I was mostly beaten with plastic pipes, long wooden poles and wires. They put a plastic bag over my head and put water inside. I couldn't breathe at all.

"At that time I felt instead of going through all this torture I would rather die - my torture was that severe. 

"Like what happened to me, the torture is on a massive scale and the outside world has no idea about these things."

Navaneethan - who is applying for permission to stay in Britain - returned to the hospital after spending a few hours with us.

Sky News raised his case with Dr Chris Nonis, Sri Lanka's High Commissioner to the UK.

He said: "People who came over here as economic refugees living off the British taxpayers' money who now should be deported naturally do not want to be deported, and they will come up with all sorts of conjecture of 'torture', because they have a compelling reason why they want to stay.

"There will always be a group of people who funded terrorism, who made terrorism a business, who will perpetuate a proxy propaganda war. All these are usually unauthenticated, unverified and uncorroborated.  

"We have a formal process of investigation. It is a domestic process and that will continue because no one condones any form of torture.

"But there are lots of spurious allegations and it is fundamentally important for a country post-conflict that we separate fact from fiction."

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Typhoon Haiyan Aid 'Must Reach Victims Faster'

United Nations humanitarian chief Valerie Amos has said aid must reach Typhoon Haiyan survivors more quickly.

Ms Amos spoke out amid reports of widespread hunger and thirst and as a mayor of one of the affected areas said he would not be able to maintain law and order unless food arrived soon.

Officials are preparing to bury some of the storm's thousands of victims in mass graves in the hope of minimising the spread of disease in typhoon-hit towns.

Meanwhile Philippine Energy Secretary Jericho Petilla has warned that it could take six weeks to restore power to some areas.

Ms Amos told reporters in Manila: "The situation is dismal. Those who have been able to leave have done so. Many more are trying. People are extremely desperate for help.

Officials are struggling to cope with the sheer scale of the disaster

"We need to get assistance to them now. They are already saying it has taken too long to arrive. Ensuring a faster delivery is our ... immediate priority."

Criticism has been growing that help is taking too long to arrive in areas devastated by Typhoon Haiyan, known locally as Yolanda, last Friday.

There is a lack of fuel in many areas meaning the few trucks on the ground an unable to move aid from airports to cities.

The weather also remains a challenge, with frequent downpours. 

Body bags are piling up as preparations are made for mass burials

Thousands of desperate survivors are clamouring to escape Tacloban, where clean drinking water is in short supply and scores of dead bodies lie piled up in bags outside the ruined city hall.

"There are still so many cadavers in so many areas. It's scary," the city's mayor Alfred Romualdez said, adding that retrieval teams were struggling to cope.

He said: "There would be a request from one community to collect five or 10 bodies and when we get there, there are 40.

"We need more manpower and more equipment.

"I cannot use a truck to collect cadavers in the morning and then use it to distribute relief goods in the afternoon."  

People queue to charge their mobile phones in Tacloban city

Mr Romualdez said the plan was to start mass burials in the nearby village of Basper on Thursday, after attempts to lay to rest some of Haiyan's victims were abandoned when gunshots halted a convoy travelling towards a communal grave.

City officials estimate that they have collected 2,000 bodies but insist many more need to be retrieved.

The UN fears that 10,000 people may have died in Tacloban city alone, but President Benigno Aquino has described that figure as "too much". 

Tacloban city administrator Tecson Lim said 70% of the city's 220,000 people are in need of emergency assistance, and that only 70 of the city's 2,700 employees have been showing up for work.

US officials said relief was starting to get through, as an aircraft carrier expected to arrive in the Philippines by Friday headed towards the region.

Sky News Correspondent Katie Stallard, watching supplies arrive at an airfield in Cebu City, said: "We are seeing signs that the international relief effort is getting going, but many people will simply not know it is coming."

In Tabontabon, the town's mayor Brendo Gamez told Sky's Asia Correspondent Mark Stone that he feared a breakdown of law and order if aid was delayed.

He said: "We have no food ... if the people of Tabontabon suffer hunger, I don't think I can control them any more."

Some £13m has been raised by the British public in just 24 hours for emergency aid, which will go directly to help more than 11 million people affected by Typhoon Haiyan.

The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), a group of 14 UK aid organisations, said that while life-saving aid is on the move, agencies are battling to overcome blocked roads, closed ports, an ill-equipped airport and increasing security concerns.

The disaster-ravaged country has become "increasingly volatile" as people become desperate for food and water, with some resorting to force, the DEC said.

Coree Steadmen, Christian Aid's emergency manager in the Philippines, said: "The devastation here is unimaginable. Aid workers are walking for hours and not seeing a single standing building.

"Most roads are covered with fallen trees and collapsed houses. Where roads are accessible, they are gridlocked with cars fleeing the area.

"Getting aid through is tough, but we are resourceful and we will find a way."

:: To make a donation to the DEC Philippines Crisis Appeal visit www.dec.org.uk, call the 24-hour hotline on 0370 60 60 900, donate over the counter at any high street bank or post office or send a cheque.

You can also donate £5 by texting the word SUPPORT to 70000.

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South Africa: Dozens Killed In Bus Crash

At least 29 people have been killed and many others injured in a bus crash in South Africa, 60 miles east of the capital Pretoria.

The vehicle collided with a truck near the town of Kwaggafontein, according to a government spokesman.

The injured have been taken to taken to hospital in nearby KwaMhlangu.

It is reported that the narrow potholed route is notorious for fatal accidents, with religious leaders holding a service last year to pray for improved safety.

A provincial minister had also pledged to improve conditions.

Joseph Mabuza, Mpumalanga province safety department spokesman, said: "So far 29 people have been confirmed death and 11 seriously injured, and 12 slightly injured.

"The truck driver was trying to avoid a stationary vehicle and collided with the oncoming bus.

"We are not sure if the truck driver and the bus driver survived the accident."

In September, 27 people died when a lorry crashed into traffic near the eastern city of Durban, while 24 were killed when a double-decker bus crashed on a mountainous pass near Cape Town in March.

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Typhoon Haiyan: People 'In Desperate Need'

Aid agencies have launched a joint emergency appeal to get food, water and shelter to victims of the devastating Philippines typhoon.

The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), made up of 14 aid charities, said its members were already responding to the crisis but the scale of the destruction meant there was "huge unmet need".

A "huge injection" of funds is needed to get aid through to victims after the typhoon made roads impassable and put airports out of action, the DEC said.

Although the official death toll stands at 1,774, around 10,000 people are thought to have been killed.

A further 10 million could be affected after the typhoon, said to be the strongest ever to make landfall, hit the southeast Asian nation.

Homes on a hillside in Tacloban have been obliterated by the storm surge

Authorities said they had evacuated 800,000 people ahead of the typhoon, but many evacuation centres proved to be no protection against the wind and rising water.

The Philippine National Red Cross, responsible for warning the region and giving advice, said people were not prepared for a storm surge.

Although weakened, the typhoon has also killed eight people and devastated farmland since making landfall in southern China. 

DEC chief executive Saleh Saeed said: "The destruction in Tacloban city, on the east coast, is said to be reminiscent of the Boxing Day tsunami.

People in the devout Philippines still try to use a badly-flooded church

"There is currently no food, water or electricity. We can only imagine how much worse the situation will be for families living in towns and remote villages.

"DEC members are doing all they can to get aid through but they need a huge injection of funds in order to do so.

"The priorities are getting food, water and shelter to people in desperate need."

Sky's Asia correspondent Mark Stone, on the island of Leyte, said up to 20 people had been killed in the area by falling bags of rice in the scramble to get to aid supplies.

Aid workers are being held up by blocked roads and closed airports.

The DEC includes the British Red Cross, Christian Aid, Oxfam and Save the Children.

All of its members will support the appeal and 13 of the 14 are responding either directly or through partner organisations.

The UK is deploying a Royal Navy warship, HMS Daring, and donating £10m of humanitarian assistance in aid for the victims, Prime Minister David Cameron said.

The ship carries equipment to make drinking water from seawater.

Typhoon Haiyan has made landfall in southwest China, killing eight people

Britain will also deploy RAF military transport aircraft in aid of recovery efforts, earmarking at least one C-17 cargo plane to move humanitarian aid and large equipment.

Meanwhile, Australia announced assistance of £5.8m and the US government has pledged $20m in immediate aid and has ordered the aircraft carrier USS George Washington to the sail to the Philippines.

Japan said it will fly a relief team over to the ravaged country and Taiwan is sending £125,000 in aid.

The United Nations World Food Programme has also allocated $2m (£1.25m) and Unicef is sending emergency supplies.

Sky's chief correspondent Stuart Ramsay is in Hagnaya in Cebu where he said people are begging on the streets because supplies from NGOs have not yet reached them.

He said nearly 100% of the buildings in the town have been damaged.

"There's concern that there is another weather front likely to hit the area with a lot of rain forecast in the next couple of days."

:: To make a donation to the DEC Philippines Crisis Appeal visit www.dec.org.uk, call the 24-hour hotline on 0370 60 60 900, donate over the counter at any high street bank or post office or send a cheque.

You can also donate £5 by texting the word SUPPORT to 70000.

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Typhoon Haiyan: Families Search For Relatives

By Mark Stone, Asia Correspondent, in Leyte

Many thousands of relatives of those who were hit by the typhoon still have no idea of the fate of their loved ones.

At the ferry terminal in Cebu city, hundreds are queuing to make the hardest of journeys.

Communications on the neighbouring island where their families live are down, the pictures emerging are grim and so the only way they will find out if their families survived is to go.

A woman with an umbrella stands amid the rubble of Tacloban, Leyte

Ramon Gerado Jnr, 46, has made an extraordinary journey to find his family.

Like so many Filipinos, Ramon works abroad. So for three days he travelled from Saudi Arabia, where he is a construction worker.

Aerial shots show the true scale of the Typhoon Haiyan destruction

"I am praying that my family is OK. But still, I am ...." he stops. It all seems too much.

We board the ferry for the two-hour crossing to Leyte Island.

It is packed, and with another storm coming, the sea is rough.

Everyone on board must be thinking the same thing: a mixture of hope and dread.

Some families have been forced to take food from damaged shops

Sitting next to me are two young women. They are in their late teens I would guess, and judging by their appearance they are sisters.

They are not talking. They are deep in thought. They seem far away, staring out of the window at the coastline of their battered homeland.

I decide not to break their thoughts by engaging in conversation, so I can only guess why they are making the journey.

It is pretty obvious though. If they are like the other 99% then they too are making the grim journey to find out the fate of their families.

Worried relatives have travelled to Leyte to look for loved ones

Both are clutching their mobile phones, presumably hoping the brightly-coloured handsets might suddenly defy the lack of signal and ring with good news.

As we arrive at the small city of Ormoc, on Leyte Island, we start to get a sense of the scale of devastation.

The buildings are roofless, the trees that are still standing have been stripped of all their branches. And this is only the beginning of the journey.

It will be many more hours before we get to Ramon's town. "I want everyone to witness what has happened here to my family," he said.

:: To make a donation to the DEC Philippines Crisis Appeal visit www.dec.org.uk, call the 24-hour hotline on 0370 60 60 900, donate over the counter at any high street bank or post office or send a cheque.

You can also donate £5 by texting the word SUPPORT to 70000.

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Syria Opposition Agrees To Join Peace Talks

Syria's Western-backed opposition has agreed to take part in international peace talks in Geneva, if conditions are met.

The decision to try to end more than two years of civil war was reached after two days of talks by the Syrian National Coalition.

The coalition's leader had previously expressed a willingness to agree to the talks which will be attended by the Syrian regime, but this is the first time the group as a whole has committed to the proposed conference.

But the coalition outlined conditions that must be met before talks can go ahead, including guaranteed access to relief agencies to besieged areas and the release of political prisoners, especially woman and children.

"All we can do is hope is that these (Geneva) talks will end with the departure of Bashar al Assad," said Adib Shishakly, a member of the coalition.

The US and Russia, which are sponsoring the talks, are trying to get the negotiations under way by the end of this year.

Some Islamist rebel factions have declared their opposition to the Geneva process if the conference does not result in President Bashar al Assad's removal, and others have said they would charge anyone who attended the planned international talks with treason.

Human Rights Watch criticises the use of incendiary weapons in Syria

The breakthrough comes as the Syrian government is accused of using incendiary weapons in dozens of attacks over the past year.

Incendiary weapons can contain any number of flammable substances, including napalm, thermite, or white phosphorus.

Human Rights Watch claimed a half-ton bomb killed 37 people at a school in Aleppo on August 26.

British emergency doctor Saleyha Ahsan, who treated the patients, told HRW that most of them were covered in burns.

Of one victims, she said: "The clothes had been burned off him. It was the most horrific injury I have ever seen in a live patient. Only his eyes moved."

HRW said that since last November, when it documented one of the first cases of incendiary bomb use in the Damascus suburb of Daraya, Syrian jets and helicopters had dropped incendiary bombs at least 56 times. All of the weapons were made in the Soviet Union, it said.

President Assad's forces have used cluster bombs and vacuum bombs and are accused by the West of firing rockets loaded with the nerve agent sarin into districts outside Damascus in August, killing hundreds.

More than 100 countries - but not Syria - have signed up to an international convention banning their use in areas with "concentrations of civilians".

But loopholes and inconsistencies limit its effectiveness, HRW said.

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Super Typhoon Haiyan: Struggle For Aid Workers

Rescuers are struggling to get desperately needed aid to areas of the Philippines devastated by Typhoon Haiyan.

Aid workers are being held back by blocked roads and damaged airports as they try to deliver tents, food and medicines to the worst affected areas.

Troops have been sent to the city of Tacloban to restore law and order after reports of looting, with Philippines President Benigno Aquino considering declaring a state of emergency or martial law where necessary.

Looters have reportedly broken into supermarkets, while a Red Cross aid convoy was raided. Consumer goods such as televisions and washing machines have also been stolen.

At least 10,000 people are thought to have been killed in Tacloban alone by the typhoon, officials believe.

Corpses hung from trees in the city and were scattered in the streets. Many were buried in flattened buildings.

Cars lie abandoned and submerged after Typhoon Haiyan struck

One UN official said he was told there had been a three-metre (10ft) water surge through the city.

A further 300 are confirmed dead with 2,000 missing on the neighbouring island of Samar.

Water has been cut off in many areas, making the relief effort more difficult.

Sky's Chief Correspondent Stuart Ramsay, in Manila, said: "The relief operation is only just getting going, it's fairly piecemeal at the moment.

Looters break a shop's butter to make it easier to get food supplies

"They really don't have the volume of aircraft they need to either get aircraft in or people out in sufficient quantities to try and control what has become, day-by-day, a more difficult situation."

At least six people have also been killed in Vietnam after the typhoon made landfall near the Chinese border.

Some 600,000 people were evacuated from at-risk areas in the north of the country before Haiyan - downgraded to a weaker Category One storm - battered the coast with 98mph (157kmph) winds.

All schools in the capital Hanoi were closed on Monday, and extra police were dispatched to redirect traffic in flood-prone areas.

A woman mourns next to the body of her husband and others

In the Philippines millions of people are said to have been directly affected by the typhoon's path and the death toll is expected to rise further as rescuers reach cut-off areas.

"This area has been totally ravaged", said Sebastien Sujobert, head of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Tacloban.

"Many lives were lost, a huge number of people are missing, and basic services such as drinking water and electricity have been cut off."

Haiyan hit the east coast of the Philippines on Friday and smashed through its central islands, with winds of 147mph (235 kmph) and a storm surge of 20ft (six metres).

Video from Eastern Samar province's Guiuan township - the first area where the typhoon made landfall - also showed a trail of devastation. Many houses were flattened and roads were strewn with debris and uprooted trees. 

The devastation has left a Hiroshima-like landscape

Witnesses reported seeing looting and violence with President Aquino admitting it was a major concern.

Military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Ramon Zagala told AFP news agency that 100 soldiers had been sent to help police restore law and order in Tacloban.

The United Nations said it was sending supplies but access to the worst hit areas was a challenge.

US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel has directed the military's Pacific Command to deploy ships and aircraft to support search-and-rescue operations and airlift emergency supplies.

The European Commission has released €3m (£2.5m) in emergency funds, while the UK is providing £6m in aid and Prime Minister David Cameron has telephoned President Aquino to offer his support.

Threatening to further hamper relief efforts is a new storm approaching the southern and central Philippines.

Government weather forecasters said the tropical depression could bring fresh floods to typhoon-affected areas.

The depression is expected to hit land on the southern island of Mindanao late Tuesday and then move across the central islands of Bohol, Cebu, Negros and Panay, which all suffered typhoon damage, forecaster Connie Dadivas said.

It could bring "moderate to heavy" rains, or about five to 15 millimetres (0.2 to 0.6 inches) per hour, he said.

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Super Typhoon Haiyan: Miracle Baby Born

The birth of a baby girl amid the devastation of Super Typhoon Haiyan has provided a rare moment of joy for survivors.

Bea Joy Sagales was born at the airport in Tacloban, the city where officials fear at least 10,000 people have perished.

Her mother Emily Ortega, 21, was in a shelter when the storm flooded the city.

She clung to a post to survive and managed to reach the relative safety of the airport, where a military doctor assisted with the birth.

Cheers broke out in the terminal when it became clear the birth - described as "near miraculous" by officials - had been a success. 

Elsewhere in Tacloban, survivors have been scavenging for food and looting shops in order to stay alive, witnesses say.

Emily Ortega lies amid the debris at the airport in Tacloban

"Tacloban is totally destroyed. Some people are losing their minds from hunger or from losing their families," high school teacher Andrew Pomeda, 36, said as he warned of the increasing desperation of survivors.

"People are becoming violent. They are looting business establishments, the malls, just to find food, rice and milk. I am afraid that in one week, people will be killing from hunger."

Witnesses described how survivors are forming long queues at aid stations, waiting desperately for handouts of rice and water.

Some sit and stare, covering their faces with rags to keep out the smell of the dead.

A medic places baby Bea on her mother's chest moments after the birth

One woman, eight months pregnant, described through tears how her 11 family members vanished in the storm, including two daughters.

"I can't think right now. I am overwhelmed," she said.

Erika Mae Karakot, a survivor on Leyte island, said: "Please tell my family I'm alive.

"We need water and medicine because a lot of the people we are with are wounded. Some are suffering from diarrhea and dehydration due to shortage of food and water."

Another woman said: "I have no house, I have no clothes. I don't know how I will restart my life. I am so confused.

'Zombie-like' survivors have been left to trudge through thick mud

"I don't know what happened to us. We are appealing for help. Whoever has a good heart, I appeal to you."

Aid agencies have warned that many of the 480,000 people whose homes have been destroyed by the bludgeoning force of the cyclone face a desperate battle to survive.

"Everything is gone. Our house is like a skeleton and we are running out of food and water. We are looking for food everywhere," said Jenny Chu, a medical student in Leyte.

"Even the delivery vans were looted. People are walking like zombies looking for food. It's like a movie."

Lieutenant Colonel Fermin Carangan, of the Philippine Air Force, said he and 41 officers were sheltering in their airport office when "suddenly the sea water and the waves destroyed the walls and I saw my men being swept by waters one by one".

He was swept away from the building and clung to a coconut tree with a seven-year-old boy.

"In the next five hours we were in the sea buffeted by wind and strong rain. I kept on talking to the boy and giving him a pep talk because the boy was telling me he was tired and he wanted to sleep."

He finally saw land and swam with the boy to a beach strewn with dead bodies.

He said: "I think the boy saved my life because I found strength so that he can survive."

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UN Expected To Elect China To Rights Council

By Mark Stone, Asia Correspondent in Beijing

China is almost certain to be elected to the United Nations Human Rights Council despite evidence of a worsening human rights record across the country.

On Tuesday, the UN General Assembly will elect 17 new member states to the 47-member council, whose role is to "promote universal respect for the protection of all human rights and fundamental freedoms".

China's bid comes at a time when evidence suggests Beijing's record on the human rights of individuals across the country is at a particularly low ebb.

Oslo: Liu Xiaobo's plight has attracted attention across the world

Over the past month, Sky News has seen evidence of an abortion forced upon a couple, houses forcibly demolished before owners could remove their belongings and individuals detained for expressing displeasure with their government.

Since President Xi Jinping took office in March, his government has made no secret of its widespread and concerted effort to crack down on dissent.

Activists, journalists and well-established dissidents have been rounded up and detained in record numbers.

Government security prevented the Sky crew from talking to his wife

The forced demolition of homes continues, as does the practice of forced abortions in provinces where over-zealous local officials take enforcement of the one-child policy to its extreme.

"Electing China as a world judge on human rights would be like asking the fox to guard the chickens," said Hillel Neuer, executive director of the Geneva-based human rights group UN Watch.

China's government argues vehemently that it has improved the "collective" human rights of its people by pulling so many millions out of poverty over the past three decades.

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told Sky News: "In the past 30 years China has pulled more people out of poverty than anywhere else and pushed forward the largest scale urbanisation project in the world.

"So in China, millions of people's lives are being changed for the better."

In its official nomination papers for the Human Rights Council, China says: "The Chinese Government respects the principle of the universality of human rights and has made unremitting efforts for the promotion and protection of the human rights and fundamental freedoms of the Chinese people.

"China earnestly fulfils its obligations under relevant international human rights treaties."

Mr Neuer disputed this, saying: "This is a complete lie. The truth is that the Chinese Communist Party has Nobel Peace Laureate Liu Xiaobo behind bars, denies 1.3 billion human beings their basic freedoms of assembly, speech and religion, and crushes Tibetans, Uighurs and other minorities."

Mr Liu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011.

He was unable to travel to Oslo to collect the award because he was locked up for "subversion" of the Chinese government. Three years on, he remains in a jail in northern China.

Sky News tried to visit his wife last week. She lives on the fifth floor of an apartment block to the north west of Beijing's Tiananmen Square.

Residents pick though their belongings after their homes were bulldozed

Mrs Liu has been under house arrest since the day her husband was awarded his Nobel prize.

We arrived at the apartment block knowing it was unlikely we would succeed in seeing her and as we opened the lobby door, three plain-clothed security men confronted us. They forcibly removed us with no explanation.

Mrs Liu has lived with guards at her door 24-hours a day for three years. Her crime is being married to a dissident.

A few miles from Mrs Liu's locked apartment is a pile of rubble which was once home to a small community.

We had driven there after a tip-off that a forced demolition had taken place. We arrived an hour after the bulldozers had moved out.

The Sky team were prevented from filming by site officials

Across the two-acre site, locals were sifting through their belongings. They had not been granted the time to move out before their houses were flattened to make way for new developments.

Standing on top of the rubble that was once her house, Liang Jian Wei said: "Yesterday we were happily living here. This morning, with no sign at all, they demolished the house."

The mood was more one of resignation than anger.

"I'm not angry, I'm frustrated," Jian Wei says.

"I can only accept this reality. In this society, led by the Communist Party, anything could happen.

"There's no place I can go to tell my story, to make some sense out of it. I don't think our country has the full rule of law."

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Super Typhoon Haiyan: '10,000 Could Be Dead'

At least 10,000 people in the central Philippine province of Leyte could have been killed by Typhoon Haiyan, according to a police chief.

The national government and disaster agency have yet to confirm the fatalities, a sharp increase from initial estimates on Saturday of at least 1,000 deaths.

If the typhoon death toll is confirmed, it would be the deadliest natural catastrophe on record in the Philippines.

Coastal villages in Leyte were flattened, or swallowed by the storm surge

As the super storm tore through the province it destroyed 70-80% of the town of Tacloban, said chief superintendent Elmer Soria.

"The devastation is so big. We had a meeting last night with the governor and the other officials. Based on their estimate, 10,000 died," Mr Soria said.

A child is returned home after leaving an evacuation site in Tacloban

Most of the dead are understood to have drowned or were crushed by collapsed buildings. Many corpses hung on tree branches, buildings and in the roads.

"On the way to the airport we saw many bodies along the street," said Philippine-born Australian Mila Ward, 53, who was waiting at the Tacloban airport to catch a military flight back to Manila.

Shivering children wait ito be evacuated from a rescue centre in the city

"They were covered with just anything - tarpaulin, roofing sheets, cardboards," she said. Asked how many, she said, "Well over 100 where we passed."

The Philippines has no resources on its own to deal with a disaster of this magnitude, and the US and other governments and agencies are mounting a major relief effort, according to Philippine Red Cross chairman Richard Gordon.

A woman about to give birth is carried into a medical centre at Tacloban

Haiyan was one of the strongest tropical storms ever to have made landfall, lashing the Philippines with wind gusts of 275kph (170mph) and whipping up a storm surge which swallowed coastal towns and villages.

Haiyan, a category five typhoon that churned through the Philippine archipelago in a straight line from east to west, has weakened significantly before it is expected to hit Vietnam later today.

Residents beside a road littered with debris

Tacloban, a city of 220,000 people south of Manila, bore the brunt of Haiyan, which flooded villages up to one kilometre from the shore. Bodies have been seen floating in roads covered with debris from fallen trees, tangled power lines and flattened homes.

Interior secretary Manuel Roxas said: "From a helicopter, you can see the extent of devastation. From the shore and moving a kilometre inland, there are no structures standing. It was like a tsunami. I don't know how to describe what I saw. It's horrific."

A pregnant woman cooks a meal inside a building overlooking Tacloban

Mr Roxas said patrols had been sent out to stop widespread looting by residents desperate for food and water as city officials warned they were struggling to retrieve bodies and send relief to survivors.

"The dead are on the streets, they are in their houses, they are under the debris, they are everywhere," said Tecson John Lim, a Tacloban city administrator.

In Vietnam villagers are evacuated in preparation for the arrival of Haiyan

The typhoon has weakened as it approaches central and northern Vietnam, where authorities have evacuated more than 500,000 people.

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Iran 'Will Not Halt Uranium Enrichment'

Iran's president has said his country will not abandon its nuclear rights after talks with world powers ended without agreement.

International foreign ministers and diplomats from six world powers and Iran spent three days in Geneva trying to broker a deal on limiting Iranian atomic programmes, in exchange for lifting some sanctions on the country.

Although they were unable to find a breakthrough, the two sides agreed to to meet again in less than two weeks.

The talks are reported to have stalled over France's request that Iran reduce its stockpiles of 20% uranium by oxidising it, putting it further away from being weapons grade material but still usable in a fuel programme.

After the talks concluded early on Sunday morning in Geneva, Hassan Rouhani told the conservative-dominated parliament in Tehran: "There are red lines that must not be crossed.

"The rights of the Iranian nation and our national interests are a red line. So are nuclear rights under the framework of international regulations, which include enrichment on Iranian soil," he said, according to the ISNA news agency.

The Natanz uranium enrichment facility

Tehran has always insisted its programme is for energy and other civil purposes, not military.

Optimism about a potential breakthrough in the decade-long dispute were raised when senior politicians - including US Secretary of State John Kerry and UK Foreign Secretary William Hague - joined the talks.

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov and a Chinese deputy foreign minister also flew in to take part.

But when French foreign minister Laurent Fabius told France Inter radio that Paris could not accept a "fool's game" his pointed remarks hinted at a rift within the Western camp. 

Sky's Foreign Affairs Editor Tim Marshall, in Geneva, said: "I really think they were close. The Iranians were slightly less disappointed but I think Laurent Fabius is going to take some heat from this.

"The US and Britain have led the toughest line against the Iranians in the last five years but France has been as tough as anyone, if not tougher."

Britain's Foreign Secretary William Hague said the atmosphere at the talks was "completely different" from a few months ago.

"We must continue to apply ourselves in the coming weeks, building on the progress that has been made," he said.

The six world powers and Iran agreed to resume talks on November 20 to try to clinch a deal.

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