RESCUERS said yesterday there is little hope of finding alive 11 miners trapped underground after a gas explosion in a central Chinese coal mine that killed 26 of their comrades.

Chilean president Sebastian Pinera arrived in the UK tonight saying Chile had given a great example to the world of “commitment, courage, faith, hope and unity”.

The man tasked with digging out the 33 trapped Chilean miners has told how he and his team of experts pulled off the amazing rescue.

TAOISEACH Brian Cowen has written to the President of Chile to congratulate all those involved in the successful rescue of the miners.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen has written to the President of Chile Sebastian Pinera describing the rescue of 33 miners trapped underground for 68 days as "extraordinary and inspirational".

The last of the Chilean miners, the foreman who held them together when they were feared lost, was raised from the depths of the earth today in a joyous ending to a 69-day ordeal that riveted the world

The first of the Chilean miners trapped underground for 69 days were being winched to fresh air and freedom today amid cheers from their families and countrymen.

Chile's president said his government is "very close" to pulling 33 trapped miners to safety and he hopes to be there in person to see the rescue before leaving on a trip to Europe.

A former Nazi soldier who founded a secretive, commune-like colony of German immigrants died in a Chilean prison where he was serving time for child molestation and human rights abuses dating to the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet.

AN AFTERSHOCK measuring 7.2 on the Richter scale and four other tremors rocked disaster-hit Chile yesterday, triggering a tsunami alert just minutes before billionaire Sebastian Pinera was sworn in as the new president.

Billionaire Sebastian Pinera won Chile's presidential vote in the country's first democratic election of a right-wing ruler in 52 years.

CHILE’S presidential election could come down to a nerve-racking vote-by-vote count after a late surge by former President Eduardo Frei made his race against billionaire Sebastian Pinera too close to predict.

Chile has inaugurated a 'Museum of Memory' to make sure the tens of thousands of people who were imprisoned, killed or disappeared during General Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship are not forgotten.

Right-wing billionaire Sebastian Pinera set himself up for an election run-off against a veteran of the coalition that has ruled Chile for two decades of democracy.