World/Nation
'Living hell' for those forced to 'Slave Islands'
SINUI ISLAND, South Korea - He ran the first chance he got.
The sun beat down on the shallow, sea-fed fields where Kim Seong-baek was forced to work without pay, day after 18-hour day mining the big salt crystals that blossomed in the mud around him. Half-blind and in rags, Kim grabbed another slave, and the two disabled men headed for the coast.
Far from the glittering steel-and-glass capital of Seoul, they were now hunted men on this remote island where the enslavement of disabled salt farm workers is an open secret.
"It was a living hell," Kim said in a recent series of interviews with The Associated Press whose details are corroborated by court records and by lawyers, police and government officials.
Lost, they wandered past asphalt-black salt fields sparkling with a patina of thin white crust. They could feel the islanders inspecting them. Everyone knew who belonged and who didn't.
Weather an issue as plane search continues
SURABAYA, Indonesia - More ships arrived Friday with sensitive equipment to search for the fuselage of AirAsia Flight 8501 and the more than 150 people still missing since it crashed five days ago.
Rear Marshal Henry Bambang Soelistyo, head of Indonesia's National Search and Rescue Agency, said the search would be stepped up as long as the weather allowed.
"We will focus on underwater detection," said Soelistyo, adding ships from Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and the U.S. had been on the scene from before dawn Friday to try to pinpoint the wreckage and the all-important black boxes- the flight data and cockpit voice recorders.
The Airbus A320 crashed into the Java Sea on Sunday with 162 people on board. Nine bodies have been recovered so far.
Nine planes, many with metal detectors, were also scouring a 8,380 square mile area off Pangkalan Bun, the closest town on Borneo island to the search area. Two Japanese ships with three helicopters are on their way to the area, Soelistyo said.
Stampede leaves 36 dead, 47 hurt in Shanghai
SHANGHAI - Grieving relatives identified the bodies of loved ones a day after a stampede during New Year's celebrations along Shanghai's historic waterfront area killed 36 people. Some families lashed out at authorities, accusing them of being unresponsive to their plight and failing to prevent the disaster.
The chaos began about a half-hour before what was supposed to be a joyful celebration of the start of 2015. In the end, dozens were dead and 47 people were hospitalized, including 13 who were seriously injured, according to the Shanghai government. Some of the victims had suffocated, said Xia Shujie, vice president of Shanghai No. 1 People's Hospital.
Seven of the injured had left hospitals by Thursday afternoon.
The stampede's cause was still under investigation. It happened at Chen Yi Square in Shanghai's old riverfront Bund area, famed for its art deco buildings from the 1920s and 1930s. Throngs of people often jam the area during major events.
A day after the tragedy, some criticized the government, blaming it for failing to keep order at the city's most popular site and for miscommunications with victims' relatives.
What if Hillary doesn't run for president?
WASHINGTON - In Washington, in Iowa, in New Hampshire, really in any place that's already talking about the 2016 campaign for president, just about everyone expects Hillary Rodham Clinton to run for president.
But is it possible that Clinton might not give a White House campaign another try?
The former first lady, New York senator and U.S. secretary of state has paid speeches lined up into 2015, including one scheduled in the middle of March. She often speaks of her affinity for her work at the Clinton Foundation and joy over becoming a grandmother for the first time.
To be sure, such musings are overshadowed by evidence that Clinton will run again. She has largely left the potential 2016 field frozen in place, locking down financial donors, endorsements and connections around the country and in the early states like Iowa and New Hampshire.
Medical weed a challenge for legal pot states
SEATTLE - A year into the nation's experiment with legal, taxed marijuana sales, Washington and Colorado find themselves wrestling not with the federal interference many feared, but with competition from medical marijuana or even outright black market sales.
In Washington, the black market has exploded since voters legalized marijuana in 2012, with scores of legally dubious medical dispensaries opening and some pot delivery services brazenly advertising that they sell outside the legal system.
Licensed shops say taxes are so onerous that they can't compete.
- The Associated Press