The World in Brief

A special investigator inspects the tail wing of crashed TransAsia Airways flight GE222 on the outlying island of Penghu, Taiwan, Thursday, July 24, 2014. Stormy weather on the trailing edge of Typhoon Matmo was the likely cause of the plane crash that killed more than 40 people, the airline said Thursday. (AP Photo/Wally Santana)
A special investigator inspects the tail wing of crashed TransAsia Airways flight GE222 on the outlying island of Penghu, Taiwan, Thursday, July 24, 2014. Stormy weather on the trailing edge of Typhoon Matmo was the likely cause of the plane crash that killed more than 40 people, the airline said Thursday. (AP Photo/Wally Santana)

Taiwan starts task of identifying remains

XIXI, Taiwan -- Firefighters collected ID cards and body fragments as they picked through wreckage Thursday for evidence to identify the victims of a plane crash that killed 48 people on a Taiwanese island.

Hydraulic cranes, meanwhile, lifted twisted chunks of the aircraft from a narrow alley in a village to help investigators sort through the rubble for clues on what caused the ATR-72 to crash in stormy weather late Wednesday.

The plane operated by Taiwan's TransAsia Airways was carrying 58 passengers when it crashed while trying to land in the Penghu archipelago in the Taiwan Strait between Taiwan and China.

TransAsia said Thursday that the plane, which flew from the city of Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan, may have crashed because of the stormy weather trailing behind a typhoon. The head of Taiwan's Civil Aviation Administration, Jean Shen, defended the agency's decision to let flights resume after the storm, saying weather conditions had met basic requirements for flying.

Identifying bodies that had been dug out of the wreckage overnight was the top priority, a disaster response official said Thursday. Family members of the dead were flown in by TransAsia to identify their loved ones.

The airline has apologized for the crash and offered victims' families $6,600 each in compensation and $27,000 for funeral expenses.

Islamists seize part of Syrian army base

BEIRUT -- Fighters from the extremist Islamic State group on Thursday overran part of an army base in northern Syria, which has been under the militants' siege for months, in fighting that killed or wounded dozens on both sides, activists said.

Since June, the Islamic State has seized a huge chunk of territory straddling the Iraq-Syria border, where the militants have declared a self-ruled state that operates under Islamic law.

The base lies in Raqqa province, where much of the territory fell to Syrian rebels fighting President Bashar Assad last year. Earlier this year, the Islamic State, which sided with the rebels at the start of the Syrian conflict three years ago, captured much of Raqqa and has tried to capture the base several times.

The assault on the base began around midnight Wednesday with two suicide car bombs, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, and Syrian army helicopters fought back.

The activist group said 35 Islamic State fighters died and that dozens of government troops were killed or wounded, including six soldiers who were beheaded. It said both sides exchanged mortar and artillery fire.

2 Finnish women slain in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Gunmen riding on a motorcycle opened fire and killed two Finnish aid workers in the western Afghan city of Herat on Thursday, officials said.

The two women were riding in a taxi when they were shot dead, said Sami Wafa, the chief of staff of the Herat governor. Herat police spokesman Raouf Ahmadi said the taxi driver had been detained as part of the investigation.

Finland's Foreign Ministry confirmed that two Finnish citizens died in Afghanistan on Thursday. Spokesman Keijo Norvanto said the two worked for the International Assistance Mission, an aid group that has been operating in Afghanistan since 1966. The organization could not immediately be reached for comment.

Meanwhile, NATO troops said two of its service members were killed in an attack in southern Afghanistan on Thursday. The U.S.-led alliance provided no other details.

School bus-train crash kills 19 in India

HYDERABAD, India -- Eighteen children were killed Thursday when a train crashed into their school bus at an unmanned railroad crossing in southern India, police said.

The bus driver also died, while another 20 children ages 7 to 14 were injured and hospitalized, 15 of them in critical condition, said Telangana state education minister G. Jagdishwar Reddy.

They were on their way to school Thursday morning when the train hit the bus, dragging it several hundred feet along the tracks, according to the Hindustan Times newspaper.

Hundreds of villagers rushed to the scene in Medak district, 60 miles north of Hyderabad. Some of them hurled stones at police as shocked parents grieved.

A father who lost both of his children suffered a heart attack and died after hearing the news of the collision, said state Irrigation Minister T. Harish Rao.

Accidents are common on India's railroad network, one of the world's largest with 23 million people riding daily on about 11,000 passenger trains. Most accidents are blamed on poor maintenance and human error.

-- COMPILED BY DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE STAFF FROM WIRE REPORTS

A Section on 07/25/2014

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