Mourning begins for Air France crash victims (Lead)

PARIS - French President Nicolas Sarkozy came to Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris Wednesday for a multi-denominational service commemorating the 228 victims of Monday’s crash of an Air France jetliner.

Air France plane went down in region known as ‘birthplace of our strongest storms on Earth’

Air France Flight 447 vanished in a zone of ferocious weather over the Atlantic Ocean known as the birthplace of some of the world’s strongest storms — just as the plane was encountering a 400-mile-long maze of lightning, hail, driving rain and fierce 100-mph updrafts.

Susan B. Jordan, activist lawyer who represented SLA member, killed in plane crash in Utah

LOS ANGELES — Susan B. Jordan, an activist lawyer who represented high-profile clients such as Symbionese Liberation Army member Sara Jane Olson, has been killed in a plane crash in southern Utah, authorities said.

Woman whose home was destroyed by Buffalo plane crash says pilots shouldn’t take all blame

CHEEKTOWAGA, N.Y. — The woman who survived a plane plummeting into her suburban Buffalo home said Wednesday the pilots do not deserve all the blame for the crash that killed her husband and everyone aboard the flight.

60 Years on, Italian soccer club Torino still haunted by fatal Superga plane crash

TURIN, Italy — Torino’s struggles at the bottom of Serie A have hardly been a surprise for the club’s long-suffering supporters, but relegation would be especially painful this year.

Congo governor says plane crashed southeast of capital, killing at least 3 people

KINSHASA, Congo — A Boeing 737 on a test flight crashed southeast of Congo’s capital on Wednesday, killing at least three people, officials said.

Colombian woman accused of supporting rebels arraigned on terrorism charges

WASHINGTON — A woman extradited from Colombia was arraigned Monday on terrorism charges for allegedly supporting leftist rebels in her native country.

Obituaries in the news

Frederick Wirth Jr.

RENO, Nev. (AP) — Dr. Frederick “Fred” Wirth Jr., the physician to America’s first test-tube baby, has died, his family said Friday. He was 68.

Polish military plane crash tied to budget cuts

WARSAW - A military plane crash in northern Poland was linked to budget cuts that forced pilots to cut back on flight time, reported the daily Rzeczpospolita Wednesday.

Netaji’s secretary waits to hand over ‘legacy’ to India

NEW DELHI - As the nation remembers Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose on his 112th birth anniversary Friday, his old aide in Thailand is trying desperately to hand over to India two pistols belonging to the freedom fighter and has sent his son to meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Durrani defends himself on Kasab identity disclosure

ISLAMABAD - Saying he had done no wrong, sacked National Security Advisor (NSA) Mahmud Ali Durrani Thursday resolutely defended his move admitting that Ajmal Amir Kasab, the lone terrorist arrested during the Mumbai mayhem, is a Pakistani citizen, even as the issue has served to bring into the open the deep fissures within the country’s top political leadership.