Police with sniffer dogs searched on Friday through the gutted remains of a Johannesburg apartment block as authorities stepped up investigations into the cause of a fire that killed more than 70 people.
Officers cordoned off areas around the run-down five-storey building that was destroyed in a blaze in the early hours of Thursday in one of South Africa's worst such disasters in living memory.
Most of the bodies were burned beyond recognition and investigators would have to rely on DNA samples from friends and relatives to identify them, said Thembalethu Mpahlaza from Gauteng province's Forensic Pathology Services.
Only 12 of the 74 bodies they had recovered so far were identifiable by sight, he added.
The apartment block is owned by municipal authorities, but officials have struggled to provide a clear picture of who lived there, saying the block had been "invaded and hijacked" by unknown groups.
A provincial official said on Thursday some of those who died may have been renting from, or were being extorted by, criminal gangs in the so-called "hijacked buildings" syndicates.
President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Thursday the fire was "great tragedy" and a wake-up call for South Africa to tackle its inner-city housing crisis.
The Palestinian foreign ministry condemned on Sunday an Israeli decision to recognise more than a dozen new settlements in the occupied West Bank, upgrading existing neighbourhoods to independent settlement status.
Pope Francis left Rome's Gemelli hospital on Sunday following a five-week stay to be treated for pneumonia, making his first public appearance since February 14 by waving to well-wishers from a balcony moments before he was discharged.
A Turkish court jailed Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu on Sunday pending trial on graft charges, state media and other broadcasters said, in a move likely to stoke the country's biggest protests against President Tayyip Erdogan's government in more than a decade.
An Israeli airstrike in southern Gaza killed Hamas political leader Salah al-Bardaweel on Sunday, officials of the group said, as residents reported an escalation in Israel's six-day-old military campaign.
Ukrainian and U.S. officials are expected to meet in Saudi Arabia late on Sunday to discuss a possible partial ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia, part of an escalating diplomatic push by U.S. President Donald Trump to end three years of war.
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An Emirati businessman has contributed AED 35 million to the Fathers’ Endowment campaign, launched by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai.