ABBOTTABAD (Awesome News) – A team of foreigners comprising three French and three Canadian experts have arrived at PK-661 crash site in Havelian today (Tuesday).

Canadian experts include Mare Gratton, Stephen Vane Dudka and Jean Mare Ledoux while French officials include Pfeiffer Jerome, Pascal Epaule and Fablen Darsonval.

The officials of Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) are accompanying them to collect different samples from the location.

Earlier on Monday, Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) Monday grounded its 10 ATR turboprop planes after a crash last week killed 47 people and a second aircraft reported technical issues shortly before it was supposed to take off overnight.

PIA flight 661 smashed into a hillside in the country’s north while travelling from the city of Chitral to the capital Islamabad last Wednesday. The airline has said one of the plane’s two turboprop engines failed.

THAR (Dunya News) - Private Infrastructure Board on Tuesday has permitted Hub Power Company to start a coal power project of 330 megawatts in Thar.

As per company release, this project will start producing electricity by the end of 2018.

According to experts, it seems that the government’s announcement of eradicating load shedding by 2018 will be proven right due to its good economic policy and efforts to overcome energy crisis.

GENEVA (Web Desk) - Ambassador Tehmina Janjua, Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations and other International Organizations in Geneva, was elected today (12 December 2016) to preside over the Fifth Review Conference of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW). The unanimous decision was taken at the start of the Review Conference, being held in Geneva from 12-16 December 2016.

The Convention and its five Protocols deal with prohibitions and restrictions of certain conventional weapons, balancing humanitarian concerns with their military utility. The Fifth Review Conference of the Convention was preceded by a Preparatory Committee meeting in September 2016 that was also chaired by Ambassador Janjua.

Review Conferences of the CCW are held every five years to review the implementation of the Convention and its five Protocols, as well as to explore the possibility of developing new Protocols to address specific conventional weapons of concern.

The election of Pakistan as the President of this important Conference is an endorsement of the country’s strong credentials in multilateral diplomacy. It reflects, in particular, the international community’s confidence in, and recognition of Pakistan’s contribution to international security and arms control related issues.

The one remaining ship still looking for missing Malaysia Airlines flight 370 has begun what is likely to be its final search. Dutch-owned Fugro Equator left the Australian port of Fremantle on Monday.

Several ships have combed the seabed of a vast search area in the Indian Ocean since the plane disappeared in 2014. The Fugro Equator is expected to finish scouring the final portion of the search area by early 2017.

Officials say they will suspend the search if the plane is not found by then. Not a single piece of wreckage or any clues to the whereabouts of the plane have been found so far by the operation.

"It has been an heroic undertaking but we have to prepare ourselves for the prospect that we may not find MH370 in the coming weeks, although we remain hopeful," Australian Transport Minister Darren Chester told the West Australian newspaper.

Several countries including Australia and China have taken part in the underwater search. Earlier this month the Chinese vessel Dong Hai Jiu 101 completed its mission and is returning to Shanghai, leaving the Fugro Equator as the last ship scouring the vast 120,000 sq km (46,332 sq miles) search area.

Whether the Fugro Equator's voyage is the ship's final month-long deployment would depend on the weather, the office of Mr Chester told AP news agency.

MH370 was carrying 239 people when it disappeared en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur. Many of the passengers were Chinese.

Last week family members of some passengers journeyed to Madagascar to look for clues on the ship's whereabouts.

A few aeroplane fragments confirmed to be from MH370 had been found by members of the public on the East African and Madagascan coasts in recent months.

The location of the debris is in line with drift modelling patterns based on the theory that MH370 went down in a part of the Indian Ocean near Australia.

The families have expressed frustration at the lack of concrete evidence turned up by the official search, and have called for a coordinated effort to search beaches for debris.

A British backpacker who says she was held against her will during a car trip in Australia was rescued after texting her location to her father in England. Mary Kate Heys, 20, had agreed to ride with a man from their hostel in south-east Queensland to Brisbane.

But when he drove in the opposite direction and refused to allow her out, she told her father to call police. Police intercepted the pair at Gympie, 90km (55 miles) from the hostel, after her father contacted them.

The 22-year-old driver, from Sweden, was arrested and taken to hospital for medical treatment. He will not face charges as Ms Heys withdrew her complaint against him, police said.

'I was so scared'

Ms Heys, from Manchester, told local media that the man woke her at 04:30 local time on Monday (18:30 GMT on Sunday) at the Mooloolaba hostel, on Queensland's Sunshine Coast.

She said she initially agreed to go on a road trip with him out of concern for his wellbeing.

But she said she began to feel unsafe when he changed the plan and said they should drive to Far North Queensland.

"I was so scared and I thought I was going to die," Ms Heys told the Courier-Mail newspaper.

She repeatedly sent her father her location, as well as messages reading: "I need you to call Australian Police" and "I've been taken by a man… please hurry".

Schools and businesses were shut and airport services suspended, as the cyclone made landfall with heavy rain and winds of up to 140km/h (85mph). Teams from the army and National Disaster Relief Force, along with two naval ships, are on standby.

Fishermen in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu have been warned not to go to sea.

Police said disaster management teams had evacuated more than 15,000 people from low-lying areas.

Schools and businesses were shut and airport services suspended, as the cyclone made landfall with heavy rain and winds of up to 140km/h (85mph).

Teams from the army and National Disaster Relief Force, along with two naval ships, are on standby.

Fishermen in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu have been warned not to go to sea.

Police said disaster management teams had evacuated more than 15,000 people from low-lying areas.

China says it is "seriously concerned" after US President-elect Donald Trump expressed doubts about continuing to abide by the "One China" policy.

Under the policy, the US has formal ties with China rather than the island of Taiwan, which China sees as a breakaway province. In a TV interview on Sunday, Mr Trump said he saw no reason why this should continue without key concessions.

China urged Mr Trump to understand the sensitivity of the Taiwan issue. Foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told reporters that the "One China" policy was the basis for relations with Washington.

China's hawkish Global Times tabloid dubbed Mr Trump "ignorant as a child"

Real Madrid forward Cristiano Ronaldo beat rival Lionel Messi to win the prestigious Ballon d'Or award for a fourth time.

The 31-year-old is now one behind Barcelona's Messi, who took the honour for a fifth time last year.

Atletico Madrid's French forward Antoine Griezmann finished third in the vote.

Ronaldo helped Real Madrid win last season's Champions League and scored three goals as Portugal won Euro 2016.

He has now won the Ballon d'Or in 2008, 2013, 2014 and 2016, with Messi the only other recipient of the award since winning it for the first time in 2009.

"I never thought in my mind that I would win the Golden Ball four times. I am pleased. I feel so proud and happy," said Ronaldo.

"I have the opportunity to thank all of my team-mates, the national team, Real Madrid, all of the people and players who helped me to win this individual award."

The former Manchester United forward has scored 19 goals in 20 games for club and country this term, to add to the 54 he got last season.

Ballon d'Or winners

2016: Cristiano Ronaldo 2009: Lionel Messi

2015: Lionel Messi 2008: Cristiano Ronaldo

2014: Cristiano Ronaldo 2007: Kaka

2013: Cristiano Ronaldo 2006: Fabio Cannavaro

2012: Lionel Messi 2005: Ronaldinho

2011: Lionel Messi 2004: Andriy Shevchenko

2010: Lionel Messi 2003: Pavel Nedved

Ronaldo's Real Madrid team-mate Gareth Bale finished sixth in the vote, while Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy - the only Englishman included on the 30-player shortlist - was eighth.

The Ballon d'Or is voted for by 173 journalists from around the world.

It has been awarded by France Football every year since 1956, but for the past six years it became the Fifa Ballon d'Or in association with world football's governing body and was awarded to the world's best player.

However, Fifa ended its association with the award in September.

Fifa will hand out its own prize for the world's best men's player, along with the best women's player and team of the year, at the Best Fifa Football Awards ceremony in Zurich on 9 January.

Venezuela has closed its border with Colombia for 72 hours in the latest measure to combat smuggling gangs. President Nicolas Maduro says the "mafia" operating in border areas is causing huge damage to the economy.

Many items subsidised by Venezuela's socialist government, including diesel and petrol, are sold at a huge profit over the border in Colombia.

On Sunday, he announced that the country's highest denomination bank note would be taken out of circulation.

'Destroy the mafia'

President Maduro said the move would stop gangs hoarding the currency.

"Let's destroy the mafia before the mafias destroy our country and our economy," he said on national television.

"This measure was inevitable, it was necessary," he added. "The mafias will go bust."

There were emotional scenes in court on the first day of the blasphemy trial of Jakarta's governor, a Christian of Chinese descent. Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, known as Ahok, cried as he denied allegations he insulted Islam.

Mr Purnama is the first non-Muslim governor of Indonesia's capital in 50 years. The case is being seen as a test of religious tolerance in the world's largest Muslim-majority nation.

The prosecution said Mr Purnama insulted Islam by misusing a Koranic verse which suggests Muslims should not be ruled by non-Muslims, to boost public support ahead of February's governorship election.

He insisted his comments were aimed at politicians "incorrectly" using a Koranic verse against him, not at the verse itself. If convicted, he faces a maximum five-year jail sentence. After the short hearing, the trial was adjourned until 20 December.

Rights groups say the authorities have set a dangerous precedent in which a noisy hardline Islamic minority can influence the legal process, says the BBC's Rebecca Henschke in Jakarta.