PM wants Monash to be household name

THE efforts of Australian General John Monash on the Western Front in World War I should be as widely recognised as the story of Simpson and his donkey at Gallipoli, Prime Minister Tony Abbott says.

Mr Abbott revealed on Saturday a new memorial centre to be built in France would be named in honour of the Australian military leader, who is regarded as one of the great tacticians of World War I.

After joining world leaders at D-Day commemorations in Normandy on Friday, Mr Abbott turned his attention to the First World War as he visited the Australian National Memorial at Villers-Bretonneux for the first time.

While not as famous as the Gallipoli campaign, the efforts of Australian diggers to stop German forces on the Western Front were critical to the outcome of the war.

Of the 295,000 Australians who fought there between 1916 and 1918, 46,000 never made it home and the prime minister is leading a push he believes will help improve a sense of national identity.

"No place on earth has been more densely sown with Australian sacrifice than these fields in France," Mr Abbott said.

"Australians should be as familiar with the story of the Western Front as we are with Gallipoli.

"Australians should be at least as familiar with the achievements of Monash as we are with the heroism of John Simpson Kirkpatrick (in Gallipoli)."

Sir John Monash was involved in the failed Gallipoli campaign but used his experiences to lead several significant battlefield victories, including the decisive Battle of Amiens.

Mr Abbott said he brought organisation and technology to the battlefield to "break the stalemate of trench warfare".

Attendances at the annual Anzac Day dawn service at Villers-Bretonneux have grown steadily in recent years, with the crowd this year surpassing that at Gallipoli.

Some predict it will become the nation's clear focal point of Anzac Day commemorations beyond next year's centenary in Gallipoli.

"Australians should congregate here, every April 25th, no less than at Anzac Cove," Mr Abbott said.

"And on Anzac Day four years hence, the centenary of the Battle of Villers-Bretonneux, I'm sure they will."

Mr Abbott said it was expected the new "interpretive centre", to be built behind the Australian memorial, would open in 2018 to coincide with 100th anniversary commemorations.

The "Sir John Monash" centre will help to better explain Australia's role in the final victories of World War I and the government will put up $6.9 million for the initial planning.

Mr Abbott later followed in the footsteps of former prime ministers by visiting the Victoria School, built in Villers-Bretonneux in 1927 with money donated by school children from the Australian state.

He chatted with schoolchildren and locals in the school's courtyard, where a prominent green and gold sign hangs permanently reading: "Never Forget Australia."

Mr Abbott then visited the memorial site at nearby Pozieres, the sight of a bloody 1916 battle where 23,000 Australians were killed in the space of just six weeks.

The prime minister was expected to meet with French President Francois Hollande on Saturday night before departing Paris on Sunday for Canada and the US.

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No visa info over Tamil's death: group

IMMIGRATION Minister Scott Morrison says Australian officials have contacted the family of a Tamil asylum seeker explaining visa processes so they can travel to Australia to attend his funeral.

But a spokesman for the Tamil Refugee Council said on Saturday that no one from the Australian Immigration department has been in touch with the family in India.

Asylum seeker Leorsin Seemanpillai, 29, died last Sunday after dousing himself in petrol and setting himself alight in Geelong.

Refugee advocates say the Tamil feared being returned to Sri Lanka because he thought he faced persecution from authorities.

The government has offered to return his body to Sri Lanka or India.

But immediate family who live in a refugee camp in Tamil Nadu in southern India say they fear for their safety if the funeral is held in either country. They are seeking visas to attend the funeral in Australia.

Mr Morrison acknowledged that they face very real difficulties.

He said the department had explained to them the process of application for a short-term visitor visa to travel to Australia, including the need for travel documents.

That process was very clear and it would be up to the immigration department to assess their application.

"It's not available to the minister to instruct the department in issuing a visitor visa in circumstances like these and they will have to apply the law as it stands," he told ABC radio.

Tamil Refugee Council spokesman Aran Mylvaganam said he had spoken to Mr Seemanpillai's father on Saturday, specifically asking if anyone from the Australian Immigration department had contacted him to explain how to obtain a visa.

The only Australian officials they had heard from were the Victorian refugee assistance group AMES, which offered to pay funeral costs, and the coroner's office in Melbourne.

"Either Morrison is getting the wrong advice from his department or he is simply trying to misinform the Australian people," he said in a statement.

"Whatever is the case, it is an absolute disgrace that he won't intervene to help this family in a moment of dire need."

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One dead, one hurt in SA speed boat crash

ONE person is dead and another has been rushed to hospital after a speedboat crashed on the Murray River in South Australia.

SA Police say Saturday afternoon's accident occurred during a competitive event.

"There were two victims, one is sadly deceased," an SA police spokesman said.

"The other has got some serious burns and has been flown to the Royal Adelaide Hospital."

The Adelaide Advertiser reported the victims were both male, but SA Police were unable to provide further details.

"It was a sad tragic way of ending the day's competition there," the police spokesman said.

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Alleged Sydney card skimmer charged

A man has been caught allegedly skimming money out of ATMs in Sydney's west using stolen card data. Source: AAP

A MAN has been caught allegedly skimming money out of ATMs in Sydney's west using stolen card data.

Police were contacted after the 27-year-old was seen acting suspiciously in Parramatta on Friday morning, walking from one ATM to another, allegedly making transactions with several cards.

Officers later detained and searched the man, finding 15 store cards, which are believed to have been encoded with stolen card data. He also had more than $4000 in cash on him.

The Fairfield man was charged with dishonestly obtaining financial advantage by deception and two other related charges.

He was granted conditional bail and is due to appear at Parramatta Local Court on July 16.

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10 Islamists sentenced to death in Egypt

An Egyptian court has sentenced 10 supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood movement to death. Source: AAP

AN Egyptian court has sentenced ten supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood movement to death in absentia on charges of inciting violence and blocking a road last July.

Judge Hassan Fareed on Saturday referred the sentence to the Grand Mufti, the highest Islamic authority in Egypt, a legal requirement usually considered a formality.

The remaining 38 accused in the case, including the Brotherhood's supreme guide and other senior members, will be sentenced at the next hearing on July 5.

The case is one of several ongoing mass trials of supporters of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. Under Egyptian law, those sentenced in absentia will have a new trial if they are arrested or surrender to authorities.

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Man dies after car hits pole in Victoria

A MAN has died after his car left the road and struck a power pole in the Victorian town of Warragul.

Police believe the 19-year-old Warragul man was driving west along Queen Street just before 7pm on Saturday when he lost control on a bend and collided with the pole.

He died before he could be airlifted to a city hospital.

Police are investigating reports the driver was involved in an earlier collision in Drouin and will prepare a report for the coroner.

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Smithsonian names Aussie museum director

THE Smithsonian has named Australian Melissa Chiu, a museum leader for the Asia Society in New York, as the next director of the Hirshhorn Museum for modern and contemporary art in Washington.

Darwin-born Chiu joins the Smithsonian in September. She succeeds Richard Koshalek who resigned last year after a dispute with the museum's board over funding to build an inflatable pavilion at the museum for special performances and programs.

Chiu has served as director of the Asia Society Museum since 2004 and previously was curator for contemporary Asian and Asian-American art.

Smithsonian officials say Chiu is a prolific fundraiser, securing 80 per cent of the Asia Society Museum's $US29 million ($A31.38 million) budget.

The Hirshhorn has an $US8 million budget, and the Smithsonian provides $US10 million in operating support.

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Man lied over boy's abuse before murder

WHEN a two-year-old boy turned up to his Sydney pre-school with bruises, his stepfather told the carers he'd had another fall in the shower.

The swollen bite marks around the little boy's elbow, he said, were self-inflicted.

But after the man left the pre-school that day in February 2008, staff found further disturbing signs of serious abuse.

The toddler had a bruise on his pelvic area, along with a large, fresh cut on his shoulder.

This was one of at least three occasions in 2006 and 2007 when the man had assaulted his stepson while he was in his sole care.

These attacks left the two-year-old with severe bruising, swelling and rash-like haemorrhaging to his head, face, neck and shoulders, and bleeding into his nappy.

His stepfather repeatedly lied to cover up the abuse.

And that was before he beat him to death.

The man, who cannot be named, is convicted of murdering his stepson on March 3, 2008, while caring for him alone at The Oaks on the outskirts of Sydney's southwest.

The 39-year-old was supposed to be looking after the boy while his mother was at TAFE.

He pleaded guilty in late 2013.

At a sentencing submissions hearing, crown prosecutor Chris Maxwell QC told the NSW Supreme Court the boy died from two savage blows - one to his stomach and another to his head.

The first tore his stomach wall and would have caused the two-year-old "enormous pain" that required urgent medical attention.

But the man failed to seek help after the attack.

An agreed statement of facts shows an autopsy determined the child was left in this state for perhaps hours before he was fatally hit on the head, causing a massive skull fracture and brain swelling.

"The defendant witnessed this suffering and then finally struck him in the head," Mr Maxwell said.

The autopsy stated the injuries could have only been caused by the infliction of grievous bodily harm.

Nevertheless, the man told police his stepson had fallen on concrete and had a pre-existing mental condition.

He said that hours later, after putting the toddler to bed, he went into his room and wiped some blood and vomit away from his mouth.

The two-year-old's father told the court the image of his son's cold, lifeless body haunted him.

His victim impact statement was read out by a support worker as the father left the court briefly in tears.

"My son was such a wonderful little boy," it said.

"When people ask me how I cope, I tell them, 'I have to'. But secretly, deep down, my heart has been broken beyond repair."

The convicted child killer will return to court next month.

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Gunman kills one, injures three in US

A suspect is in custody after four people were wounded in a shooting on a Seattle university campus. Source: AAP

A GUNMAN has killed one person and injured three others on a college campus in the northwestern US city of Seattle, the latest of what the mayor denounced as America's "epidemic of gun violence".

The most recent bloody rampage to shake the country came on Thursday, two weeks after an apparently mentally disturbed young man opened fire at a California university and killed six people.

The gunman opened fire in the lobby of a science building at Seattle Pacific University, killing a 19-year-old man and wounding three other people.

"Today should have been a day of celebration at the end of the school year. Instead, it's a day of tragedy and of loss," Seattle mayor Ed Murray told reporters after the shooting.

"Once again, the epidemic of gun violence has come to Seattle, the epidemic of gun violence that's haunting this nation."

The injured, including one who was in critical condition, were being treating in hospital.

"Police have one suspect in custody, an adult male who was subdued after being pepper-sprayed by a student security guard," a police statement said.

The gunman was identified as Aaron Ybarra, 26, and he was not a student at the university, the Seattle Post Intelligencer newspaper reported.

He was to make an initial court appearance on Friday on suspicion of murder, it said.

Blake Oliveira, a student, said he was in class when he heard gunfire and at first thought it came from a physics experiment. But then he heard screams, the Seattle paper reported.

The 21-year-old grabbed a metal pipe, as he and fellow students were locked in a physics lab.

Oliveira said he heard someone telling others to be calm, and then heard running.

Minutes later, he said, two police officers entered the lab and escorted everyone out.

"I took off my sandals, put them into my backpack in case I had to run," Oliveira said.

"This is all going down. I saw a cop with a shotgun and I thought, 'OK, this is kind of real right now'. And then I saw blood on the floor," the newspaper quoted him as saying.

Police spokesman Chris Fowler described how the young male gunman was taken into custody after opening fire in the lobby of a building on the campus.

He began to reload when a student who was monitoring the building "confronted the shooter (and) was able to subdue the individual", Fowler told reporters.

"Once on the ground, other students jumped on top of them and they were able to pin the shooter to the ground until police arrived."

Less than two weeks ago, a reportedly mentally unstable 22-year-old man killed six people before turning the gun on himself at a college campus in Santa Barbara, California.

School shootings have become a tragic periodic occurrence in the US in recent years.

They include the December 2012 massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, that left 20 small children dead, and the Virginia Tech shooting in April 2007 in which 33 died, including the gunman.

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Moo-ving tale as cow saved from pool

A drowning cow has been saved from a backyard pool in the NSW Hunter Valley. Source: AAP

A COW has been saved from drowning by firefighters who helped it out of a backyard swimming pool in the NSW Hunter Valley.

A woman returned to her Maitland home on Friday afternoon to find her dogs barking at the cow after it wandered through a gap in the fence and fell into the pool.

Fire & Rescue NSW said the cow was treading water in the deep end with one of its legs snared in the plastic pool cover.

Firefighters put a rope around its neck to manoeuvre the struggling animal towards the shallow end.

"Once the cow had worked out it could stand and get out via the steps, firefighters stepped back as the bovine made a quick escape out through the property to her awaiting herd in an adjoining paddock," local station officer Chris Holderberg said.

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Police search new area for Madeleine

Police investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann have focussed their attention to drains. Source: AAP

BRITISH police investigating the disappearance of Madeleine McCann are focusing their attention on a new patch of scrubland close to where she went missing in Portugal seven years ago.

Officers in Metropolitan Police uniform were seen on Friday studying a flat area of ground at the opposite end of the area which has seen activity over the past week.

The area of scrubland in Praia da Luz on the Algarve has been marked in various places with tape to highlight areas of interest to police.

Officers could be seen examining the uneven ground inside one marked-out area, which was covered with long grass.

The search entered its fifth day, with officers previously focusing on a hole which had been covered in undergrowth.

Forensics officers sifted through soil in large sieves inside a white tent set up to cover the void, which was thought to have been used as a children's den.

An item of clothing, believed to be a man's sock, was removed from the scene but was thought to have been ruled out of the investigation.

Madeleine's parents on Thursday said they were "encouraged" by the progress made by police as they search for clues as to what happened to her after she disappeared from the resort in May 2007, aged three.

Writing on the Official Find Madeleine Campaign Facebook page, Kate and Gerry McCann thanked their followers for the support they have received.

"We are being kept updated on the ongoing work in Portugal and are encouraged by the progress," the message said.

"Thank you for continuing to stand by us and supporting our efforts to get Madeleine home."

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Banksy works going under the hammer

A BANKSY print showing people in an auction room bidding for a work with the words I Can't Believe You Morons Actually Buy This Shit on it is expected to sell for a five-figure sum.

Morons, which is valued at about STG10,000 ($A18,250), is one of more than 70 works by the secretive street artist going on display in London at a selling exhibition organised by auction house Sotheby's.

Other works in the show, where prices range from STG4000 to more than STG500,000, include Pest Control - Banksus Militus Vandalus.

The work - a stuffed rat with a spray can and the words Our Time Will Come painted on a wall - was secretly installed in the Natural History Museum in 2004 where it stayed for two hours until staff spotted it and took it down.

Gallery director Fru Tholstrup said Banksy was more than just a street artist.

"He is a true cultural phenomenon of our time," she said.

"Although we all feel we know the images he's produced over the years, there's hardly ever been an opportunity to see together the full range of his best-known works."

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US companies added 179,000 jobs in May

US businesses pulled back on hiring in May, adding the fewest jobs in four months, a private survey shows.

Payroll processor ADP said on Wednesday that private employers added 179,000 jobs last month, down from 215,000 in the previous month. April's figure was revised slightly lower. Still, the gain in May was in line with the ADP's average monthly hiring figures for the past 12 months.

The data suggest that the government's jobs report, to be released on Friday, could also show a modest slowdown from April's big gain of 288,000 jobs.

But the ADP numbers cover only private businesses and often diverge from the government's more comprehensive report.

Economists forecast that the government's figures will show that employers added 220,000 jobs in May, according to a survey by FactSet.

Hiring appears to be holding steady even though the economy shrank in the first three months of the year at a one per cent annual rate, the first contraction in three years.

Most of the slowdown has been blamed on unseasonably cold weather, which shut factories, disrupted shipping, and kept shoppers away from stores and malls.

"The labour market remains strong and the economy is still recovering from the weather-induced hit in the first quarter," Paul Dales, senior US economist at Capital Economics, said in a note to clients.

The slowdown in the ADP figures occurred mostly in professional and business services, a category that includes many higher-paying jobs such as accountants and engineers, but also lower-paid temporary workers.

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Economy has solid growth foundation:Hockey

A surge in economic growth in the first three months of the year has made Joe Hockey optimistic. Source: AAP

JOE Hockey is cautiously optimistic the unemployment rate will not hit the heights predicted in the budget.

The treasurer says the latest national accounts show the resilience of the economy, with growth at its strongest in about two years.

The economy expanded at 1.1 per cent in the first three months of 2014, lifting the annual rate to 3.5 per cent and above its long-term trend of 3.25 per cent.

Mr Hockey said the figures backed up the government's economic strategy.

"We have a very solid foundation for future growth," Mr Hockey told reporters in Canberra on Wednesday.

"But as I've said on many occasions, future growth must be earned."

Mr Hockey's budget in May forecast a jobless rate of 6.25 per cent in the coming two years, a figure he says he inherited from Labor.

"I'm cautiously optimistic that we won't get there," the treasurer said.

The unemployment rate sits at 5.8 per cent.

Commonwealth Bank of Australia senior economist Michael Workman does not expect the strong growth reading to prompt the Reserve Bank to lift the cash rate any time soon.

"In our view, there is unlikely to be a policy change until we see a clear shift to lower unemployment rates," Mr Workman said, adding that would need to coincide with higher inflation in coming quarters.

Exports were the biggest contributor to growth in the March quarter, adding 1.4 percentage points.

This coincided with the extraordinary event that Western Australia was not hit by cyclones in the March quarter.

"Our miners are exporting their socks off," Mr Hockey said.

However, Treasury secretary Martin Parkinson is sticking with his budget forecast for economic growth to return to below trend for a while yet.

"That growth (in exports) won't be sustained," Dr Parkinson told a Senate estimates hearing on Wednesday.

Shadow treasurer Chris Bowen said the national accounts highlighted the importance of the mining industry but economic policy must also focus on supporting growth in non-mining sectors.

"The budget has clearly hit household budgets and consumer confidence," Mr Bowen told AAP.

Mr Hockey dismissed the drop in confidence as not unusual after a budget.

Treasury's executive director for the macroeconomic group, David Gruen, went further, saying confidence readings were not particularly helpful in predicting consumption.

"It is something of interest, it certainly generates headlines in newspapers," Dr Gruen told the hearing.

"I'm not going to say it is of no value, but I am going to say that it contains relatively little information once you know what else is going on in the economy."

Provided the economy continued to do reasonably well, with good jobs growth, consumer confidence was likely to bounce back, he said.

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Putin slams Obama as he meets Poroshenko

PRESIDENT Barack Obama has met Ukraine's president-elect Petro Poroshenko, in a show of US support for Ukraine's right to chart its own future, before an encounter with Russia's Vladimir Putin.

Obama sat down with Poroshenko on Wednesday in Warsaw, during a trip designed to assuage security concerns in eastern Europe following Russia's annexation of Crimea and what Washington says is an effort to destabilise Ukraine.

Obama said he had "been deeply impressed" by Poroshenko's vision for his troubled country.

"The United States is absolutely committed to standing behind the Ukrainian people not just in the coming days, weeks, but in the coming years," Obama told reporters.

The talks on day two of Obama's European tour come after the president met central and eastern European leaders in Warsaw and before he heads to a G7 summit in Belgium.

The summit takes place against a backdrop of signs that Western unity over how to handle Russia is fracturing.

Obama will come face to face with Putin during 70th anniversary commemorations of the D-Day landings in Normandy, France on Friday, but officials in Washington and Moscow say there are no plans for a formal meeting.

In contrast, the leaders of Britain, France and Germany will hold one-on-one talks with Putin, who said Wednesday he could not understand Obama's stance.

"It is his choice, I am ready for dialogue," Putin said in an interview with French broadcasters Europe1 and TF1 conducted at his dacha in the Black Sea resort of Sochi.

Putin went on to accuse the US administration of hypocrisy in its "aggressive" attempts to isolate Russia over its conduct in Ukraine.

"We have almost no military forces abroad yet look: everywhere in the world there are American military bases, American troops thousands of kilometres from their borders. They interfere in the interior affairs of this or that country. So it is difficult to accuse us of abuses."

The accelerating diplomacy over Ukraine comes as a seven-week pro-Russian insurgency in Ukraine's eastern rust belt grows only more violent after Poroshenko swept to power in a May 25 presidential ballot.

Hundreds of separatist gunmen on Monday attacked a Ukrainian border guard service camp in the region of Lugansk on the border with Russia.

Obama said Tuesday that US commitment to eastern European security was absolute.

"Our commitment to Poland's security as well as the security of our allies in central and eastern Europe is a cornerstone of our own security and it is sacrosanct," Obama said after inspecting a joint unit of Polish and US F-16 pilots.

He proposed a "European Reassurance Initiative" of up to $1 billion (730 million euros) to finance extra US troop and military deployments to "new allies" in Europe.

NATO defence ministers also agreed Tuesday a series of steps to bolster protection in eastern Europe after the Ukraine crisis, but insisted they were acting within the limits of a key post-Cold War treaty with Moscow.

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New home for Perth's wandering peacock

A YOUNG peacock found strutting his stuff in suburban Perth has a new home after doing time in an animal shelter.

He also has a new name: Gerald.

The juvenile bird was seen wandering in Westminster about a month ago and was cared for at the RSPCA Animal Care Centre in Malaga while the owner was sought.

On Wednesday, an animal lover who has a 4ha property in Wanneroo adopted the colourful bird.

"We are thrilled to hear he has found a loving new family," RSPCA WA chief inspector Amanda Swift said.

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PM vows to resolve Indon spy row

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has arrived in Indonesia for long-awaited talks with the president. Source: AAP

PRIME Minister Tony Abbott has pledged to resolve the spying row with Indonesia to the mutual benefit of both nations, and has told the outgoing president that his policy on asylum-seeker boats means they shouldn't be a problem for much longer.

Mr Abbott on Wednesday met President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono for the first time since the president last year learned Australia had tapped the phones of his wife and other confidants under the previous Labor government.

The president wants to mend severed ties before he leaves office in October, and Mr Abbott is keen to seize the opportunity before a new administration takes over.

Following their brief meeting in Batam, Indonesia, Dr Yudhoyono told reporters he believed the partnership could be stronger in future, with "mutual benefit and mutual respect".

"We have always thought in Indonesia that in time, cooperation between our two great countries can truly be implemented, and even better," the president told reporters.

Foreign ministers Marty Natalegawa and Julie Bishop are expected to complete a code of conduct within weeks, with Mr Abbott confident of a resolution to the "mutual benefit" of both parties.

"Intelligence sharing in dealing with common problems is the way forward for both of us," he said.

On the other thorny issue in the relationship - turning asylum-seeker boats back to Indonesian territory, Mr Abbott said there were now so few boats: "I believe this is an issue which will not substantially further trouble us".

Before they met for dinner, the prime minister praised SBY as the leading statesman of the ASEAN region.

"I believe when the history of Indonesia is written, the Yudhoyono presidency will be a watershed," Mr Abbott said.

"Marked by peace abroad, prosperity at home, the consolidation of democracy and the strengthening of national unity.

"This is a marvellous legacy that you, Bapak President, leave your country and I have to say I have been proud and thrilled and honoured to get to know you over the last few years and I will be very pleased and proud and honoured to call you a friend in the months and years and decades ahead."

Dr Natalegawa has been dampening expectations of a quick fix, pointing out that Australia's "unilateral" approach on asylum seeker boats would continue to be a problem.

He wouldn't comment on Mr Abbott's view following the meeting, but said he was keen to finish the code of conduct because, "addressing one issue will no doubt help the other one".

The reunion has been months coming and the pair were forced to wait a little longer than planned on Wednesday, when a technical problem on Mr Abbott's RAAF jet delayed him by more than two hours.

From Indonesia, he will travel to France, Canada and the US, for talks with President Barack Obama.

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McCann police probe scrubland in Portugal

FORENSICS officers have begun probing an area of previously hidden ground during the search of scrubland close to where Madeleine McCann was last seen in Portugal seven years ago.

Two men in white overalls were seen entering a tent, which has been erected on a spot of interest to police in Praia da Luz on the Algarve.

The area, which was covered by undergrowth until yesterday, has already been subject to fingertip searches by officers in Metropolitan Police uniforms.

Two white gazebo-style tents were put up and connected together to hide the scene from the TV crews and press watching from the other side of the police cordon nearby.

They placed it on top of a spot where a piece of corrugated iron was discovered beneath undergrowth yesterday.

The section of metal, which is understood to have covered up a void in the ground, was then taken away by officers.

Local forestry workers have been clearing large areas of undergrowth within the scrubland to aid the search.

Another patch that was previously overgrown was earlier scanned with ground-penetrating radar equipment to probe for disturbed earth.

A man in plain clothes and without any police insignia wheeled the device along a section of ground.

The device uses radar pulses to take images of the subsurface of the ground to check for any anomalies.

It can be used to check for disturbances in a variety of substances, including rock, soil, ice and fresh water.

It can also detect voids and cracks in buildings and under pavements.

The developments came during a third day of investigations by British police and their Portuguese counterparts as they search for clues as to what happened to Madeleine, who vanished while on holiday in the resort in May 2007, aged three.

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Ex-Montana gov, others seek money for mine

A GROUP of investors that includes former Montana governor Brian Schweitzer is seeking $10 million from a mining company in exchange for access to a huge copper and silver reserve - a move the company's chief executive says was "extortion" and included a threat to stir up negative publicity for the project.

Schweitzer, who has hinted at a 2016 presidential run, rejected the accusation and said he had been making a good-faith effort to resolve the dispute with a cash and stock settlement.

The two-term Democratic governor last year joined a handful of investors to form Optima Inc. That business controls mining rights - known as claims - on underground parcels needed by Mines Management Inc to access the proposed Montanore mine beneath the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness near Libby.

The mine would tap into underground veins of copper and silver ore valued at more than $8 billion and employ 350 people. A federal judge in April gave Montanore a preliminary condemnation order giving it rights to access the reserves through tunnels passing through Optima's claims.

The order entitles Optima to just compensation. Schweitzer says $10 million represents a "ballpark figure" of what the claims are worth, and it is based on an earlier offer from Optima that was rejected by Mines Management.

Mines Management Chief Executive Officer Glenn Dobbs told The Associated Press that when Schweitzer called him in March to make the offer, the former governor threatened retribution if Optima didn't get its way.

"It was an extortion call," Dobbs said. "They were going to announce to the world that we didn't have access to the project. They would create controversy and depress our share price ... It's really gutter-type gangsterism."

Schweitzer responded that Dobbs' accusation was "silly."

"How would it make sense for us to depress the value of the shares if that's the way we were hoping to be paid compensation? These are illogical allegations, and they are not true," he said.

Schweitzer left office last year and now serves as chairman of Stillwater Mining Inc, where he helped engineer a corporate board takeover that ousted the company's former chairman and CEO. Stillwater - Montana's largest mining company - is not involved with Optima or the Montanore mine, Schweitzer said.

A formal compensation claim against Mines Management from Optima is expected to be filed in federal court Thursday. If the two sides cannot agree on compensation, the court will appoint a commission to resolve the matter, according to Montana condemnation laws.

The mining claims at issue were originally owned by another member of Optima, Arnold Bakie, according to court documents.

Spokane-based Mines Management needs the Bakie claims to access a 4,200 metre tunnel and build another that would give it access to the silver and copper reserves, the company said in court documents.

Bakie and others with claims at the Montanore site were sued by Mines Management in an attempt to cancel out their claims.

After a state court rejected the lawsuit, the company filed a separate complaint in US District Court to condemn the claims under Montana's eminent domain law.

A previous $100,000 offer to Bakie was rejected last year.

Schweitzer said he had followed the case as governor, and he got involved once he left office. Optima was incorporated after conversations between Schweitzer and Bakie that the governor said were "mutually" initiated.

"I was familiar with the doings here as governor," Schweitzer said. "I saw what was happening: These guys from MMI (Mines Management) thought they would come in here and strong-arm Arnold Bakie and their big lawyers are going to scare him ... Now he has partners that stand with him."

In March, Mines Management turned down Schweitzer's offer to resolve the claims dispute in exchange for cash and stock worth about $10 million, according to Dobbs and Schweitzer. That's when Dobbs said Schweitzer made his threats.

Dobbs also accused Schweitzer's administration of delaying the project during his two terms in office - another claim that Schweitzer said is untrue.

"Quite the opposite. This is an opportunity to settle this thing and have it over with" so work on the mine can proceed, he said.

Mines Management has been seeking state and federal permits since 2005 for Montanore. Its reserves hold 230 million ounces of silver and 1.7 billion pounds of copper, according to Mines Management.

A permit decision by the US Forest Service and other agencies is targeted for 2015.

That timeline is largely dictated by the federal agencies, not the state, said Kristi Ponozzo, project coordinator at the Montana Department of Environmental Protection. She said she was unaware of any involvement by Schweitzer when he was in office.

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White House defends Guantanamo releases

US defence secretary Chuck Hagel has defended a prisoner exchange with the Taliban for a US soldier. Source: AAP

THE White House has defended the release of five Guantanamo detainees in exchange for a US soldier held by the Taliban, saying a potential threat had been "sufficiently mitigated."

Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl - the only US soldier held by the Taliban after being captured in Afghanistan - was freed on Saturday in a dramatic deal brokered by Qatar.

In exchange, five Taliban prisoners were turned over to the Arab emirate, where they will remain for a year, sparking criticism from some Republicans, who claimed they could return to the battlefield and pose a threat to Americans abroad.

But White House Press Secretary Jay Carney took to the US morning talk shows on Monday to downplay the threat posed by the men - influential former officials of the Taliban regime that was toppled by the US-led invasion of Afghanistan.

"We have a history in this country of making sure that our prisoners of war are returned to us, we don't leave them behind," Carney told CNN.

"And it's entirely appropriate, given the determination made by the secretary of defence, in consultation with the full national security team, that the threat potentially posed by the returned detainees was sufficiently mitigated to allow us to move forward and get Bowe Bergdahl back home where he belongs."

Carney added that a travel ban and monitoring was in effect, giving Pentagon chief Chuck Hagel "the confidence to make the determination he did.

"I can say that we do believe and have confidence that the measures put in place in agreement with the host country allow us to feel confident that the threat is sufficiently mitigated," he said.

Bergdahl's almost five years in captivity saw him transferred between various militant factions along the volatile Afghanistan-Pakistan border, finally ending up in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal district, according to militant sources.

The circumstances of the Idaho native's disappearance, from a base in Afghanistan's eastern Paktika province in 2009, remain unclear.

He arrived Sunday at the US military medical centre in Landstuhl in southern Germany where he is to continue his "reintegration process," the army said.

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Brown wooed as face of Tasmanian tourism

Greens patriarch Bob Brown is being courted as the face of Tasmania's tourism campaigns. Source: AAP

BOB Brown is being wooed as the face of Tasmanian wilderness tourism.

The former Greens leader has been sounded out by the state's tourism industry to promote Tasmania's World Heritage Area.

The idea builds on the recent Go Behind the Scenery campaign, which sought to make the state's environmental battles a point of interest for tourists.

Tourism Industry Council boss Luke Martin has said Dr Brown defines the state's recent history.

But the Greens' patriarch may not be easily wooed.

Tasmania's new Liberal state government wants to open up national parks to eco-tourism development, a move Dr Brown has called "stupid" and "greedy".

Premier Will Hodgman is also backing a federal government move to cut 74,000 hectares from the World Heritage Area.

Dr Brown says he already pushes destination Tasmania but there would be conditions to him fronting a tourism campaign.

"I'm very woo-able but not unless they get the (balance) right," he has told the Hobart Mercury.

"Private development should be outside World Heritage and outside national parks, and developments inside national parks should be public and they should be well funded."

The Hodgman government has called for potential investors to pitch "sensitive and appropriate" eco-tourism ideas.

Mr Martin says they are the norm in countries such as New Zealand and Canada, where green groups support them.

Greens leader Christine Milne said the tourism industry should oppose the federal government's World Heritage wind-back.

"It's a bit rich for the Tourism Industry Council to be appealing to Bob Brown to help it sell tourism in World Heritage Areas while the Abbott government is trying to destroy them," she said in a statement.

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Better airliner tracking announced: IATA

AVIATION industry plans to improve global tracking following the Malaysia jet disappearance will be ready in September, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) says.

Announcing the date, the association's chief Tony Tyler repeated his earlier message that there must be "no repeat" of the flight MH370 incident.

Nothing has been found of the Malaysia Airlines' Boeing 777, which vanished on March 8 with 239 people on board en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

"The loss of MH370 points us to an immediate need," Mr Tyler, IATA's director general and chief executive, told a world air transport summit in Doha on Monday.

"A large commercial airliner going missing without a trace for so long is unprecedented in modern aviation. It must not happen again.

"IATA, the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) and experts from around the world are working together to identify the best recommendations for improved global tracking.

"By September, we will deliver draft options to ICAO.

IATA's global aviation data management project is building the world's largest resource of operational information with data from a global spectrum of industry and government contributors.

"Our ultimate goal is to predict the potential for accidents and so ensure that they don't happen," Mr Tyler added.

"This is not science fiction. Each new data contribution and every improvement in our analytical capabilities moves this closer to reality."

Last week, Australia's Joint Agency Co-ordination Centre announced an end to the search in the southern Indian Ocean for the missing plane, after nothing had been found.

The agency said that an expanded search, based on satellite analysis of the plane's most likely route, would probably begin in August after commercial side-scan sonar operators were contracted.

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NATO, Russia views on Ukraine 'far apart'

NATO'S and Russia's views on the crisis in Ukraine "remain far apart," a spokeswoman for the military alliance says after its ambassadors met with Moscow's envoy to NATO, Alexander Grushko, for the first time since March.

"It is clear that there are fundamentally different views on this crisis, on its origins, on what is happening now and how it should be resolved," NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen concludes after the talks, according to spokeswoman Oana Lungescu.

The NATO ambassadors call on Russia to engage constructively with Ukraine's newly elected president, Petro Poroshenko, and say they would not recognise the annexation of Crimea.

"They also called on Russia to respect its international commitment to stop the flow of arms and weapons across the border, to stop supporting armed separatists in Ukraine and to withdraw in full and verfiable manner their troops from the border," Lungescu says.

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Businesses worried about budget cuts

MORE than half of Australia's businesses are worried about the fallout from the federal government's tough budget will have on them.

Nearly 60 per cent of businesses surveyed by Dun & Bradstreet expressed concern about the budget.

Retailers are bracing themselves for a tough September quarter, with expectations of falling profits following the steep spending cuts announced in last month's budget.

A quarter of retailers expect a fall in earnings, pulling the sector's profits index into negative territory for the first time in two years.

"The fall in expected earnings for retailers is reflective of the mood among consumers, which has dropped significantly following the release of the budget," the head of Dun & Bradstreet's Australasian operations Gareth Jones said on Tuesday.

"Combined with soft wages growth, and signs from D&B's consumer financial stress index that individuals are finding conditions more difficult, it's unsurprising that many businesses expect to see spending levels fall away."

Despite the gloom in the retail sector, manufacturers raised their expectations for sales and profits to 10-year highs.

Forty six per cent expected higher profits in the September quarter, with 57 per cent forecasting better sales.

Wholesalers were just as upbeat, with 43 per cent expecting a rise in earnings and 56 per cent flagging a lift in sales.

However their optimism was not enough to offset the lower expectations among retailers and those in the transportation, communications and utilities sector as well as those in finance, insurance and real estate, and services.

As a result the D&B all-industries sales expectations was flat at 33.4.

Overall, 62 per cent of businesses expressed confidence about growth this year compared to 2013.

Hiring expectations also lifted for a fourth consecutive quarter, buoyed by the better-than-expected 5.8 per cent unemployment rate announced in May.

More than a fifth of businesses plan to hire workers in the September quarter, with nine per cent planning to cut staff.

"Despite concerns from business about the potential impact of the budget, expectations are, on balance, favourable for the next three months," said Dun & Bradstreet's economic advisor Stephen Koukoulas.

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