London

Pope’s funeral won’t postpone royal wedding

Prince Charles’ wedding to Camilla Parker Bowles will go ahead Friday as planned, even if it clashes with the funeral of Pope John Paul II, the prince’s office said Sunday.

The prince’s Clarence House office said there were no plans to change the wedding date if the pope’s funeral also was scheduled for Friday.

“It is only a hypothetical question at the moment, but as far as Clarence House is concerned the wedding will go ahead as planned on Friday,” the spokeswoman said.

In line with church protocol a funeral for the pope, who died Saturday, must be held sometime between Wednesday and Friday.

The College of Cardinals, meeting today, is expected to set a date for the funeral.

Charles and Parker Bowles will be will be married in a civil ceremony in the town hall at Windsor, west of London, Friday afternoon, followed by a service of prayer and dedication at Windsor castle’s chapel.

Thailand

Two killed in bombings at store, airport

A series of bomb blasts on Sunday hit a Western-owned department store chain and a regional airport, killing at least two people and wounding dozens in southern Thailand, officials said.

The three explosions occurred in Songkhla, a province just north of where an Islamic insurgency has been active since early last year, and the bombings raised the possibility that the militants could be expanding their field of operations.

Songkhla Gov. Somporn Chaibongyang said two people were killed by an explosion at Hat Yai airport, the main gateway to Thailand’s far south. Another bomb exploded at the Carrefour department store in Hat Yai town, the governor said.

Thai media said as many as five people had died, including three at Carrefour, part of a French-owned chain, but the reports could not be confirmed.

A third bomb was detonated in front of a hotel in the city of Songkhla, on the coast of the Gulf of Thailand not far from Hat Yai, but the governor said he had no reports of casualties from that explosion.

Syria

U.N. envoy: Withdrawal to be completed April 30

U.N. envoy says Syria is to withdraw completely by April 30

Syria plans to pull all its troops and intelligence agents from Lebanon by April 30, and a U.N. team could be dispatched to verify the withdrawal, a U.N. envoy said Sunday after meeting President Bashar Assad.

The full withdrawal will mark the end of Syria’s 29 year military presence in Lebanon and will comply with the demands in a U.N. resolution, helping to relieve the international pressure on Damascus.

U.N. envoy Terje Roed-Larsen said Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk al-Sharaa had informed him “all Syrian troops, military assets and the intelligence apparatus will have been withdrawn fully and completely” by April 30, at the latest.

Roed-Larsen said the Syrian commitment implies all its security forces will be withdrawn in line with the 1989 Taif agreement, which paved the way for the end of the Lebanese civil war, and U.N. resolution 1559 that was passed by the Security Council in September. The resolution called for Syria to withdraw its troops and stop interference in Lebanon.

Thailand

Tsunami survivors pray at Buddhist temple

Pressing their hands in a gesture of respect, hundreds of tsunami survivors crowded Sunday into a Buddhist temple in southern Thailand that was a makeshift mortuary for those killed by the deadly waves on Dec. 26.

Until just a few weeks ago, the grounds of the Bang Muang temple were filled with thousands of bodies, as officials struggled to cope with the crushing number of corpses from the tragedy.

The bodies are now gone, moved to a custom-built facility elsewhere. But those who gathered to pray for the souls of the victims are still haunted by the December disaster.

The ceremony was held according to Thai religious tradition, in which the dead are honored 100 days after their passing. Communities throughout Thailand’s tsunami-hit provinces started memorial services Saturday, and more were expected to take place today.