Taliban militants were expected to release seven remaining South Korean hostages today, bringing to an end a six-week drama that saw two captives executed by the kidnappers in Afghanistan, a South Korean official said.

The garda force expressed its regret at the death of John Carthy tonight and offered the sympathy of all members to his family.

Gardaí today demanded more firearms training to deal with the increase in gun crime.

THE Government has doubled the amount of aid pledged to those affected by the Asian tsunami to E20 million, Foreign Affairs Minister Dermot Ahern said yesterday.

Mayor Rudolph Giuliani Saturday warned that some of the bodies of the 4,972 missing in the World Trade Center terrorist attack might never be found and announced a massive DNA matching program to help identify those that are recovered.