VILLAGERS handed over chickens and other fowl for slaughter yesterday as Turkey stepped up efforts to stem the spread of a deadly strain of bird flu.

TURKEY yesterday reported two new cases of people infected with deadly bird flu as a top World Health Organisation (WHO) official warned that the threat of a pandemic was growing daily.

A Turkish court today filed terrorism charges against a Turk who reportedly confessed to recruiting suicide bombers and preparing the truck bombs that killed 62 in Istanbul last month.

Police stormed Istanbul’s main court house today and captured about two dozen Kurds, who had raided the building and taken hostages to press demands for the release of imprisoned Kurdish rebel chief Abdullah Ocalan.

RESCUERS dug frantically in the rubble of a school dormitory yesterday, hunting for 135 children believed trapped after a powerful earthquake rumbled through southeastern Turkey. Reports say up to 100 people were killed and 390 injured.

The Kurdish rebel group PKK and Peru’s Shining Path were among 18 people and groups added to the EU’s terrorist list, which was made public today.

A US F-16 fighter jet crashed in southeastern Turkey today as it was heading toward northern Iraq to patrol a no-fly zone.

Seven people were killed and two injured when a pick-up truck hit a land mine in northern Iraq.