INTERNATIONAL NEWS in brief

US soldier released by Taliban after 5 years

WASHINGTON (AP):

Nearly five years after his capture by insurgents, Sgt Bowe Bergdahl climbed into an American helicopter. He took out a pen and wrote on a paper plate, "SF?" — asking the troops who had come to find him in eastern Afghanistan if they were US special operations forces.

Over the roar of the rotors, one of them shouted to Bergdhal: "Yes, we've been looking for you for a long time."

The only American prisoner of the Afghan war, Bergdahl broke down in tears.

The emotional moment was described by a defence official, one of several US officials who detailed Bergdahl's release on Saturday.

In exchange for the 28-year-old American, President Barack Obama agreed to release five high-level Afghan detainees from the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

"While Bowe was gone, he was never forgotten," Obama said in a statement from the White House Rose Garden, where he was joined by Bergdahl's parents. "The United States of America does not ever leave our men and women in uniform behind."

South Koreans express anger at ferry crew

INCHEON, South Korea (AP):

Less than two months after the ferry, Sewol, sank, court proceedings over the disaster are set to begin for 15 crew members - four of them for homicide. The job of defending them falls almost entirely on six state-appointed lawyers, three of whom started practising law only this year.

The defendants are surrounded by hostility in South Korea, all the way up to President Park Geun-hye, who has called the crew's actions murderous. Private lawyers have abandoned their cases. Even the family of a deceased crew member who was praised as a hero speaks of him with shame.

The anger raises questions about the fairness of the crew members' impending trial, details of which will be worked out at a June 10 court hearing in Gwangju. All surviving crew members responsible for the ship's navigation have been charged with negligence and with failing to do their duty to protect passengers in the April 16 disaster.

Authorities have recovered 288 bodies and continue to look for 16 others in the wrecked vessel off South Korea's south-western coast.

There are allegations that the ferry operator, Chonghaejin Marine Co, dangerously overloaded the vessel and gave crew members inadequate emergency training, and some company officials also have been arrested, but they may be better able to defend themselves than the crew. The fugitive head of Chonghaejin, Yoo Byung-eun, is a billionaire. The Sewol's captain, Lee Joon-seok, reportedly made 2.7 million ($2,635) a month.

Suspect held in Brussels Jewish museum shootings

PARIS (AP):

A man has been arrested in south-east France in the investigation of a shooting at a Jewish museum in Brussels that left at least three people dead, the Paris prosecutor's office said yesterday.

An official with the prosecutor's office says the suspect has been handed to anti-terrorist investigators and could be held at least through Tuesday under French counterterrorism law. She says the man was arrested on Friday during a customs inspection at a train and bus station in the port city of Marseille.

The man was found to have a revolver and an automatic weapon of the same type used in the Brussels shootings on May 24. The official said ballistics analyses are under way to determine if it is the same weapon.

The man had arrived in Marseille on a bus from Amsterdam that had stopped in Brussels, she said. She would not provide further information and was authorised not to be publicly named when speaking of ongoing investigations.

The Paris prosecutor was expected to give a news conference yesterday on the matter.