Crippled ship pulls into US port

The crippled cruise ship making its way to the US has suffered a setback after a tow line snapped. Source: AAP

THE last passengers have left a stricken cruise ship in the United States, some kissing the ground, and many angry.

"All guests have now disembarked the Carnival Triumph," the operator Carnival Cruise Line tweeted on Thursday night.

Cheering passengers hung over rails or waited in lines to exit while others, unkempt and some wearing bathrobes, rushed down the single enclosed gangway of the 14-storey ship as they began disembarking at the US port of Mobile, Alabama.

Customs staff had earlier boarded the ship to speed up the process and the cruise line arranged around 100 buses to ferry passengers to Texas or New Orleans for an overnight stay.

No injuries were reported, but one guest with a medical condition was taken off the ship with the help of the Coast Guard.

After a fire on Sunday off the coast of Mexico caused the ship to lose power and left all on board in squalid conditions, the ship was towed towards port at the speed of a recreational jogger.

A tow line attached to one of four tugboats pulling the vessel broke, further hampering the operation.

The 3143 guests and around 1000 crew had been forced to relieve themselves in plastic bags and flee to the open deck to escape overflowing toilets and overheated rooms, CNN reported.

While they praised the crew for working long shifts to ensure guests were as comfortable as possible, many passengers voiced anger over the ordeal, the New York Daily News reported.

"Let us off! Let us off!" some chanted during a disembarking process that lasted several hours.

Passengers also poured scorn on Carnival chief executive Gerry Cahill, who had boarded the vessel to apologise.

"It was absolutely filthy," passenger Robin Burgess said.

"I'm feeling awesome just to see land," added Brittany Ferguson, 24.

Some rolled out banners with messages such as "Sweet Home Alabama" which others had sung on the slow approach into dock.

"Help, we need beer!", another sign said, as others had earlier created human SOS signs also spelling "H-E-L-P."

Passengers related stories of sewage pouring down walls, pungent smells and camping out on deck to avoid the odour.

The planned four-day cruise embarked from Galveston, Texas, on February 7.

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Mideast funeral picture wins top award

SWEDISH photographer Paul Hansen has won the 2012 World Press Photo award for a picture of two Palestinian children killed in an Israeli missile strike being carried to their funeral.

The picture, published in the newspaper Dagens Nyheter, shows a group of men marching the dead bodies through a narrow street in Gaza City.

The victims, a brother and sister, are wrapped in white cloth with only their faces showing.

"The strength of the pictures lies in the way it contrasts the anger and sorrow of the adults with the innocence of the children," said jury member Mayu Mohanna of Peru. "It's a picture I will not forget."

World Press Photo, one of photojournalism's most prestigious contests, issued awards in nine categories to 54 photographers of 32 nationalities.

Hansen's November 20 shot won top prize in both the spot news single photograph category and the overall competition.

The contest drew entries from professional press photographers, photojournalists and documentary photographers across the world. In all, 103,481 images were submitted by 5666 photographers from 124 countries.

Hansen will receive a 10,000 euro ($A12,998.83) prize.

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Hundreds pay tribute to Shandee

Shandee Blackburn's boyfriend Arron Macklin visits the site where his girlfriend died last week. PIC: Liam Kidston Source: The Courier-Mail

Boddington Street, Mackay, where Shandee was found. PIC: Liam Kidston Source: The Courier-Mail

HUNDREDS of people have braved the rain in Mackay tonight to pay tribute to Shandee Blackburn.

The Mackay 23-year-old was was murdered on her walk home from work last week.

Family and friends dressed in fluoro clothes and wore "Justice for Shandee" wristbands before leaving for the walk from Harrup Park Country Club.

Clasping hands and holding back tears, they walked along the same route the 23-year-old took after finishing work last Friday about midnight.

Her boyfriend of three months Arron Macklin visited the scene of her death this afternoon, wearing one of the wristbands.

"It's for awareness," he said.

Earlier, The Courier-Mail reported that Arron Macklin should have been with the girl of his dreams on Valentine's Day - giving her the photograph of the two of them he'd had framed.

But Shandee Blackburn is dead - stabbed to death in a vicious attack as she walked home from work.

Her distraught boyfriend visited the scene of her death yesterday to play their song and leave behind a present.

He wept as he leant against his car, clutching a Valentine's Day balloon and a single rose wrapped in their photograph.

"Tomorrow would have been three months that we were together," he said.

"She just had a beautiful smile, she had beautiful looks," he said.

"I just loved her cuddles. We'd only just started . . . everything was sky-rocketing. It was going so well."

Arron said he had told Shandee, 23, he had framed a photograph of the two of them which he planned to give her on Valentine's Day.

"It was funny, because she said 'I was going to do the same for you'," he said.

The couple met at work, but it wasn't until they were talking at a party that he confessed he liked her.

Arron said the first movie they went to see together was the final instalment in the Twilight series.

He said he remembered wanting to hold her hand for the first time during a scene where characters Edward and Bella hold hands.

Later, Shandee decided that the song playing during that scene, A Thousand Years by Christina Perri, would be "their song".

Yesterday, Arron played that song for the girl he lost as he left her Valentine's Day present behind.

"She was just a beautiful person," he said.

Police will tonight hold a re-enactment, retracing Shandee's path home seven days after she met her attacker outside a block of units in Boddington St.

Detective Acting Inspector Paul Elliot said the police re-enactment would begin at 11pm and run until 1am, based around what they knew of her movements.

Shandee left work at the Harrup Park Country Club around midnight Friday and walked along Juliet St before turning into Boddington St.

Police say she was alone when she was attacked, just moments after she turned into Boddington St. She was less than a block from home.

Shandee's family will also hold a walk in her memory at 7pm, leaving from Harrup Park and tracing her movements to Boddington St before returning to Harrup Park.

Shandee's sister Shannah said the support from the community had been overwhelming.

"Anyone that wants to come along and feels like they want to be a part of that for Shandee, she loved fluoro," she said.

"So if people want to wear anything fluoro, or bring some fluoro bands or anything like that, we'd really appreciate it.

"We've had some amazingly beautiful words said, not only about Shandee, but people showing their support.

"We have been getting hand written notes that people have been leaving for us and I'd just really like to say thank you.

"It does help and it touches us that so many people care and want to help."Crime Stoppers: 1800 333 000.

 additional reporting Thomas Chamberlin

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Streets cordoned off in WA siege

POLICE are negotiating with a man holed up in his house in Perth's northern suburbs.

Firefighters were called to the home on Mayflower Crescent, Craigie, mid-afternoon on Thursday because of a fire in the backyard.

The man became aggressive towards the firefighters and the Tactical Response Unit was brought in.

Several streets have been cordoned off.

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President's son quits Indonesia parliament

THE son of Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has resigned from parliament following criticism over his absence at a recent plenary session of the House.

Edhie Baskoro announced his resignation on Thursday, two days after being caught on camera signing an attendance form, then skipping the plenary session of the 550-seat House.

The 32-year-old politician argued he missed the session because he was busy preparing for a meeting of the leadership of his father's ruling Democratic Party.

He also is secretary-general of the party, which has been plagued by a recent series of graft scandals.

In a move to save the party, President Yudhoyono last week relieved chairman Anas Urbaningrum of his duties to allow him to focus on legal issues following corruption allegations.

Edhie Baskoro graduated from Perth's Curtin University of Technology in 2005.

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'Axe the Tampon Tax' issue rises again

FEDERAL politicians are again under pressure to scrap the GST on tampons, with thousands of people signing an online petition calling for the 10 per cent levy to be dropped.

Perth student Sophie Liley launched the petition on change.org on Tuesday and within 36 hours had gained 15,000 signatures of support from men and women.

Labor had campaigned to have GST on tampons scrapped in 2000.

In September 2001 the Senate passed a bill exempting the products, breast pumps, funeral services, and caravan park and boarding house rents from GST - but the changes were vetoed in the House of Representatives.

The latest "Axe the Tampon Tax" petition says most women will end up being taxed $1000 over their lifetime for sanitary products and calls on Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott to make scrapping GST on tampons a key 2013 election pledge.

"It's completely outrageous that women are forced to pay the GST on tampons because they're labelled as 'luxury' items - particularly when condoms, lubricants, incontinence pads and sunscreen are GST free," Ms Liley said.

"A government that charges women the GST as a direct consequence of their basic biology is a country that is fundamentally sexist.

"It sends the message that in this day and age, despite having our first female prime minister, we are okay with continued sexism in this country."

The issue has also gained support on social media sites, with plenty of people posting Twitter messages linked to the petition, with the hashtag #bloodyoutrage.

The issue also arose in 2009 after supermarket chain Coles reduced the price of female hygiene products by 10 per cent to offset the GST.

Coles said at the time it was removing the equivalent cost of the tax because tampons should be treated the same as basic food, education and medical services.

But the government refused to budge, with the then assistant treasurer Nick Sherry commenting: "The government has made a commitment to maintain the existing GST arrangements."

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NATO raid kills civilians: Afghan official

A NATO airstrike has killed eight civilians, four children and four women, as well as a number of insurgents in an eastern province near the Pakistani border, an Afghan official says.

The governor of Kunar province said the airstrike occurred during a joint NATO-Afghan operation in the Shigal district on Tuesday night and early Wednesday.

Sayed Fazelullah Wahidi said a number of insurgents were killed in the strike, but he couldn't give a specific number.

The international military alliance in Kabul said it was looking into the reports.

"We are definitely aware of the allegations of these civilian casualties," said Jamie Graybeal, a spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), as the alliance is known.

"We take these allegations very seriously and we are in the process of determining the circumstances surrounding this incident."

The killing of civilians at the hands of US and other foreign forces has been one of the most contentious issues in the 11-year war.

The UN body monitoring the rights of children said last week that attacks by US military forces in Afghanistan, including airstrikes, have reportedly killed hundreds of children over the last four years.

The Geneva-based Committee on the Rights of the Child said the casualties were "due notably to reported lack of precautionary measures and indiscriminate use of force."

ISAF, which is composed mainly of US forces, dismissed that claim, saying that it takes special care to avoid civilian casualties.

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Two homes destroyed in WA bushfire

TWO homes have been destroyed in Western Australia's South West as a string of bushfires sparked by lightning strikes sweep through the region.

The Department of Fire and Emergency Services said just before 6pm (WST) that a homestead in Southampton, to the northwest of Bridgetown, had burnt down.

A home some 900 metres away had also been destroyed.

About 130 firefighters are battling the blazes, which span the South West and Lower South West.

An emergency warning has been put in place, meaning residents have to act now to survive.

The department says 1685 hectares have been burnt so far, and the fire is moving in an easterly direction.

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Pope greets pilgrims after resignation

The Vatican has begun a momentous transition process following the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI. Source: AAP

LOOKING tired but serene, Pope Benedict XVI has told thousands of faithful he is stepping down for "the good of the church".

In his first public appearance since dropping the bombshell announcement of his resignation, the 85-year-old Benedict basked in more than a minute-long standing ovation when he entered the packed audience hall for his traditional Wednesday general audience.

He was interrupted by applause by the thousands of people, many of whom had tears in their eyes.

A huge banner reading "Grazie Santita" (Thank you Your Holiness) was strung up at the back of the hall.

Benedict appeared wan and spoke very softly, but his eyes twinkled with joy at the flock's warm and heartfelt welcome.

He repeated in Italian what he had told his cardinals on Monday in Latin: that he simply didn't have the strength to continue.

"As you know, I have decided to renounce the ministry that the Lord gave to me on April 19, 2005," he said, to applause.

"I did this in full liberty for the good of the church."

He asked the faithful "to continue to pray for the pope and the church."

Benedict is the first Pope to resign in nearly 600 years, and the decision has placed the Vatican in uncharted waters: No one knows what he'll be called or what he'll wear after February 28.

The Vatican, however, has made it clear that Benedict will play no role in the election of his successor, and once retired, he will be fully retired.

He plans to live a life of prayer in a converted monastery on the far northern edge of the Vatican gardens.

As a result, Benedict's final public appearances are expected to draw great crowds, as they may well represent some of the last public speeches for a man who has spent his life - as a priest, a cardinal and a pope - teaching and preaching.

And they will also represent a way for the faithful to say farewell under happier circumstances than when his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, died in 2005.

"We were just coming for vacation, and now we are getting all of this!" marvelled Terry Rodger, a tourist from New Orleans as he headed to the audience.

"I am very excited. I'm surprised."

The audience was the start of a busy day for Benedict.

He will also preside over Ash Wednesday services later in the day to mark the official start of the Catholic Church's solemn Lenten season.

The service is usually held in a church on Rome's Aventine hill, but was moved at the last minute to St Peter's Basilica.

The Vatican said the shift was made to accommodate the crowds, though it will also spare the Pope the usual procession to the church.

The Vatican insisted no serious medical ailment was behind Benedict's decision to retire, though it admitted for the first time on Tuesday that Benedict has had a pacemaker for years and recently had it replaced.

The move sets the stage for a conclave by mid-March to elect a new Pope. Benedict's final general audience will be held February 27.

"It is the perfect occasion to give a cordial and affectionate goodbye to this Pope who has given us a great example of courage, humility, inner honesty, and a great love for the church," said Monsignor Claudio Maria Celli, head of the Vatican's communications office.

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UK inflation holds steady at 2.7 per cent

BRITAIN'S inflation rate remained unchanged in January, figures show.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) was unchanged at 2.7 per cent but economists predict energy price hikes and rising food prices could push the rate above three per cent by the summer.

The Bank of England (BoE) warned last week that inflation might remain above its two per cent target for the next two years.

The BoE will publish its latest quarterly economic forecasts on Wednesday.

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