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Two Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in the country's war-torn east where government forces are seeking to put down a pro-Russian insurgency, the first reported casualties in nearly three weeks, Ukraine's military said Sunday,

"Over the last day, as a result of clashes one Ukrainian soldier was killed and another three were wounded," military spokesman Oleksandr Motuzyanyk told journalists.

He was killed by mortar fire on the outskirts of ,Gorlivka, some 30 kilometres (19 miles) northeast of the rebels' de facto capital Donetsk, Motuzyanyk said.

The spokesman said the other Ukrainian soldier was killed when his vehicle hit a makeshift explosive device, which also injured another serviceman.

Over 9,000 people have been killed and more than 20,000 injured in the conflict in Ukraine since April 2014, according to the United Nations.

Kiev and the West have accused Russia of suporting the insurgency and sending regular troops across the border, claims that Moscow has repeatedly denied.

A series of truce agreements have helped to significantly reduce the fighting, although sporadic clashes continue on the frontline.  AFP

French authorities said Sunday they would make one last attempt to stop a stricken cargo ship from crashing into France's Atlantic coast.

The Panamanian-registered Modern Express cargo ship is set to hit the coastline not far from the western French resort of La Rochelle at some point between Monday night and Tuesday night, unless rescue teams can successfully attach a tow line.

The 22 crew of the Modern Express were evacuated by helicopter in dramatic scenes last Tuesday after an unexplained breakdown caused the boat to tilt dangerously.

With the boat leaning over at 40 to 50 degrees, salvage teams have been unable to fix a tow line to the 164-metre-long (538-foot) vessel, and bad weather once again disrupted efforts on Sunday.

As well as its cargo of diggers and timber, the boat was carrying 300 tonnes of fuel oil.

French authorities said there was a limited risk of pollution in the event of a crash, but a depollution vessel was at the scene.A specialist salvage team from the Netherlands has been working at the scene since Friday. They managed to attach a tow line but it was snapped in the rough seas.  AFP

Hillary Clinton, fighting for a strong finish in the Iowa caucuses, tried on Sunday to tamp down the controversy over her past handling of official emails, saying her critics were "grasping at straws."

Clinton retained a slim 3-point lead over rival Bernie Sanders in the final poll released before Monday's caucuses, and her backers hope the latest email flap does not discourage Iowans from voting for her on Monday.

Asked on ABC's "This Week" about her use of a private e-mail serverwhile secretary of state -- including the 22 documents that the State Department said Friday are now considered "top secret" -- Clinton again insisted she had done nothing wrong.

She said the emails were not classified as secret at the time and should all now be released, adding: "Let the public see them. Let's move on."

Clinton said that some emails might have been given upgraded classifications because they linked to newspaper articles about classified matters.

"That would be retroactively overclassifying a public newspaper article," she said.Clinton blamed her Republican detractors for politicizing the issue.

"This is very much like Benghazi," she said, referring to the 2012 attack on a US diplomatic mission in that Libyan city that left four Americans dead.

"It's clear that they're grasping at straws," Clinton said. She added that the timing of leaks and reports about the emails seemed "concerning."

Clinton's rival Sanders briefly raised the issue in a separate appearance on ABC but then -- as in an early Democratic debate -- declined to pile onWhen an ABC interviewer mentioned that Sanders was getting "slapped with" the label of "democratic socialist," which the Vermont senator uses himself, Sanders replied, "Look at the front pages today in terms of what Secretary Clinton is getting slapped with... the emails."

Asked to elaborate, Sanders first demurred, saying, "I'm not going to politicize that issue."

But he then added, "Republicans, needless to say, have a different point of view," suggesting that it could affect Clinton's electability in November.  AFP

CLINTON, Iowa (AP) — For Donald Trump, Iowa is more than just a race for delegates. It's a test of whether the celebrity businessman and political newcomer will be able to transform his record crowds into caucus-goers willing to brave the cold on Monday night to cast their votes.Trump, who appears to have emerged from a dead-heat with rival Ted Cruz to re-capture his position atop state polls, has done little to minimize expectations, predicting again and again that he'll do better than the polls suggest.

And as he traveled across the state in the final weekend before voting, Trump had a quiet air of satisfaction, with seemingly little worry about the outcome.

"We began this journey — it's a journey, we did it together — and it's been an amazing experience," he told a crowd gathered in the auditorium of a middle school in Clinton Saturday. "Nobody thought it was going to turn out this way."

But Trump nonetheless implored his supporters to caucus Monday with equal doses of guilt, threats and humor.

"Wouldn't that be terrible if I lost in Iowa, won everywhere else? I'd be very angry, but only for a day," he said, adding, "the bigger we can win by, the bigger the mandate, the more we can do."

While other candidates have a great deal to lose or gain in the schools, churches and community centers where Iowans will gather after dark on Monday evening to cast the first votes of the 2016 presidential nominating contest, for Trump, the spotlight is glaring.

Many remain skeptical Trump has the organizational structure to pull off a commanding win. But even then, said Doug Watts, a GOP strategist who recently parted ways with Trump rival Ben Carson's campaign, a win for Trump is "pretty critical."

If he doesn't win, Watts said, "people will start saying, 'Hmm, well, maybe he's not so inevitable. Maybe Marco Rubio can climb into a solid second in New Hampshire.'"It leaves enough of a vacuum that the other campaigns can play off it, can leverage it into the spin that this is the beginning of the end. And you'll see a lot of that if he doesn't win," he said.

A first-place finish in the state, coupled with a strong win in New Hampshire, where Trump is leading widely, could effectively shut Cruz out, starving him of momentum heading into the southern contests where he expects to do well in March.

Trump himself has spoken about the potential "psychological" consequences of a loss in the state, which will set the tone for the election going forward.

"They say bad psychological things happen if you lose," he offered in a rare moment of introspection at a rally in Norwalk, Iowa. "I don't know what the impact is."

The outcome will rest on turnout and whether Trump's campaign is able to lure the non-traditional caucus-goers who may have never participated in the caucus process.

Trump's team has been notoriously secretive about its operation, imposing what the campaign's Iowa architect, Chuck Laudner, recently described as "radio silence."

Still, the confidence from team Trump is palpable. Laudner told reporters earlier this month he felt "fantastic about the ground game."

"There's nothing about this campaign that's like all the rest or any of those in the past," he said. "We do things different. And we reach out to people that wouldn't normally be caught dead at caucus events. And so we feel really good about our chances, we feel really good about our reach and I think you're going to have a surprise on a caucus night."

With few details emerging from the campaign, there is only anecdotal evidence gleaned from voters, many of whom still report never having received phone calls from the campaign or guidance on how to caucus.

A recent Monmouth University poll of likely Iowa caucus-goers found that, of the 45 percent of likely caucus-goers who'd been contacted personally by a campaign — 13 percent had been contacted about Trump, versus 25 percent for Cruz.

While Trump continues to draw massive crowds, many of those who attend Trump's rallies have attended three or four times. At events across eastern Iowa Saturday, many people in his audiences had traveled from out-of-state, traveling from nearby Illinois and as far away as Wisconsin. Many of his recent events have also been held on college campuses, which guarantee flocks of students, but fewer committed caucus voters  AP

Twenty-seven officials in China have been "penalised" for the wrongful execution of a teenager 20 years ago, state news agency Xinhua reported late Sunday.

Hugjiltu was 18 in 1996 when he was sentenced and put to death for the rape and murder of a woman in the toilet of a textile factory in Hohhot in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

In 2014 Hugjiltu was finally exonerated after another man, Zhao Zhihong, confessed to the crime and was in turn convicted and sentenced to death.

"One of the blacklisted officials responsible for the wrongful conviction of Huugjiltu, Feng Zhiming, was suspected of job-related crimes and was subject to further investigation," Xinhua reported authorities as saying in a statement.

Feng, a former deputy chief with the public security bureau in Hohhot, could face prosecution, Xinhua added.

The other 26 -- among them police officers and court officials -- "received administrative penalties including admonitions and record of demerit", Xinhua said without giving further detail.The case has highlighted the shortcomings in China's Communist Party-controlled legal system, where acquittals are extremely rare -- 99.93 percent of defendants in criminal cases were found guilty in 2013, according to official statistics.

The use of force to extract confessions remains widespread in the country and defendants often do not have effective defence in criminal trials, leading to regular miscarriages of justice.  AFP

Around 50 people were killed when Boko Haram fighters armed with guns and explosives attacked a village in northeastern Nigeria, medics and local residents said on Sunday.

It was the third deadly attack to hit Nigeria's restive northeast since Wednesday, after suicide bombers killed at least 24 people in two separate attacks on towns to the south.

Nigeria's army said the gunmen attacked Dalori just outside the northern city of Maiduguri late on Saturday, burning down the village and sending residents fleeing into the bush.

The attack was swiftly condemned by the European Union, which said it was committed to supporting regional African states in the fight against such extremist groups.

Regional health officials said they were still counting the victims, but gave an interim toll of 46 dead.

"We are still working on the actual death toll. The bodies were collected by different teams and we are going round the hospitals collating the number of bodies taken there," said Mohammed Kanar, head of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) for northeast Nigeria.

"At the moment we have over 46 dead and 35 injured... We need to wait till tomorrow to get an exact toll."

Residents and an aid worker said at least 50 people were killed in the assault which took place after evening prayers in the mostly Muslim region.

"We were seated outside our home shortly after the Isha prayer when we heard gunshots and within a few minutes the invaders had arrived," Malam Masa Dalori, a community leader, told AFP.

"They came in Golf saloon cars and began to shoot sporadically. Many people ran to the bush including myself," he said.

- 'Whole village razed' -

"When we came back in the morning the entire community had been razed. At least 50 people were killed, and there are many people wounded," he added.

An aid worker who did not want to be named, also put the number of dead at more than 50.

Visiting the scene on Sunday, an AFP correspondent found the village largely reduced to piles of smoking ashes scattered with charred cooking pots and household items.

Small groups of women and children sat on the ground, gazing at the devastation as men wandered past burnt-out cars and ruined structures blackened by fire.

Army spokesman Colonel Mustapha Anka said the assailants had opened fire after arriving in the village on motorbikes and in two cars and had then begun torching homes.

Three female suicide bombers who initially tried to mingle with the villagers "were intercepted then blew themselves up," he said.

The assailants also tried to penetrate a camp for people displaced by the Boko Haram insurgency situated just outside the village, but were repelled by troops, he said.

- 'Join the fight' -

Separately, another three people were killed and 56 wounded in two suicide attacks on Chadian villages in the Lake Chad region, a local security official said.

In the first attack, a bomber on a motorcycle blew himself up in Guie village, killing one and injuring 32, while a second bomber hit Miterine village killing two and wounded 24.

The Lake Chad region, which borders Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon and Niger, has been frequently targeted by Boko Haram and all four countries have formed a coalition along with Benin to fight the group.

Following the Nigeria attack, the EU reiterated the bloc's commitment to provide 50 million euros ($54 million) "to assist countries of the region to fight terrorism".

"The EU remains committed to providing a comprehensive range of political, development and humanitarian support to Nigeria and the region in tackling this threat and in ensuring the sound development of the region," it said.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who in December alleged that Nigeria had largely won the fight against Boko Haram, urged local people to help the security forces in their bid to crush the group."I urge all citizens wherever they live to own the war against terror and to be part of the fight because it is the only way we can finish the remaining work that needs to be done to make our country safe again," he said in a statement.

Boko Haram which seeks a hardline Islamic state in northern Nigeria has killed some 17,000 people and forced more than 2.6 million others to flee their homes since 2009.  AFP

DUBUQUE, Iowa (AP) — Republican presidential hopeful Marco Rubio thinks he has struck the perfect balance between anger and optimism needed to win over the outraged and inspire potential conservatives to turn out and vote.

In his closing argument to Iowans ahead of Monday night's leadoff caucus, Rubio is looking to set himself apart from his more traditional rivals and the fiery outsiders vying for the Republican presidential nomination.

"Now, our time has come," Rubio said in Des Moines last week. "If we do what needs to be done...history will say we lived in the early years of this new century, a time of great uncertainty. But like all the generations before us, we did our part, we rose up to confront our challenges."

Should Rubio's efforts fall short, it could be in part because he's misjudged the depth of anger among voters in both political parties.

If he succeeds, it could be because he will have been able to convert that frustration into the inspiration as a son of immigrants projecting faith in the U.S. as a land of opportunity.

"We will turn this nation around and we will leave for our children what our parents left for us — the single greatest nation in the history of all mankind," Rubio told a crowd at the Des Moines banquet hall, igniting applause.

Rubio's call to action was catching on with many Iowa Republicans as the junior senator from Florida campaigned across the state in the lead-up to the Feb. 1 caucus.

"I was so impressed with how eloquently he identified as a regular person," said Jim Diehl of Des Moines, a Rubio supporter, said after an event in nearby West Des Moines. "He understands."

But some are proving to be a harder sell.

Dubuque resident Jo Lynn Bentz, waffling between Rubio and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, said the message makes her "feel good," but said it's "too rehearsed."

At the heart of Rubio's campaign pitch is his family's exodus from Cuba to Florida in the 1950s and his working class upbringing. The 44-year-old husband and father notes he isn't the son of a wealthy or a politically connected family, as are some of his rivals.

But Rubio, a leader in the Florida legislature before becoming a U.S. Senator in 2010, conveys a sense of duty to the nation that he says "changed the history" of his family.

That history also fuels the contempt he expresses for the current economy politics, but especially for the current foreign policies under President Barack Obama's administration, and by proxy, those of Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, Obama's former secretary of state."No one who lies to the families of those who have given their lives in the service of our country can ever be commander in chief of the United States," Rubio roars at every campaign stop, referring to ongoing condemnation that Clinton didn't do enough to prevent the deaths of four Americans in an attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

Rubio also expresses frustration with politics in Washington, despite the seat he holds in the Senate. In Oskaloosa Tuesday, Rubio indignantly told about 100 supporters: "You're frustrated with Washington? I have to work with these people."During an Associated Press interview in Iowa Friday, Rubio embraced the anger as enough to inspire action. "It's righteous anger," he said.

But the crux of his argument is about urgency.

"If we get this election wrong, we may not be able to turn back," Rubio said in conservative Sioux Center this month. "It may be too late."

Senior Rubio adviser Todd Harris zeros in on Rubio's contention that Obama's policies will only continue under Clinton, unless younger conservatives unite behind him.Marco is creating a sense of urgency in a way that doesn't scare people, but that inspires them," said senior Rubio aide and speech consultant Todd Harris. "It's a rallying cry."

In Dubuque on Friday, more than 500 people in an iconic hotel ballroom stood and applauded as he called upon them to help "be the authors of the greatest chapter in the amazing story of our country."

Attending the same event, Jackie Koontz described herself as "hopeful" and "almost tearful."  AP

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Two Brazilian women, two pregnancies, one nightmare. But two very different stories.

Regina de Lima and Tainara Lourenco became pregnant at a scary moment — the dawn of an extraordinary Zika outbreak, as authorities came to suspect that the virus was causing an alarming spike in a rare birth defect called microcephaly. Both have reason to fear for the health of their unborn offspring.But that is where the similarities end.

Lima is well-off, and took advantage of the options of affluence.

Lourenco lives in a slum. She has no options, except to hope for the best.

___

When Lima learned she was pregnant, her initial, vertiginous rush of happiness was almost immediately smothered by dread.

Lima and her husband had been trying to start a family but decided to put the project on hold in late November, after the Brazilian government announced a possible link between mosquito-borne Zika and microcephaly, in which infants are born with unusually small heads and can sometimes suffer mental retardation or a host of serious health and developmental problems.

The connection between Zika and microcephaly is not yet understood, but the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says there is strong evidence of a link. And with more than 3,700 confirmed or suspected cases of microcephaly registered here since October — compared with fewer than 150 cases in all of 2014 — the Brazilian government took the drastic step of urging would-be parents to put off pregnancies.

But for Lima, an audiovisual producer from Rio de Janeiro, it was too late. She was already pregnant, and her first trimester — thought to be when the fetus is most susceptible to Zika — would coincide with Rio's summer mosquito season.

"The first weeks were terrifying," said Lima. "I cried and cried."

She was haunted by fears she may have already had Zika without knowing it — the illness can cause a fever and red splotches on the skin, but is asymptomatic in most cases — and that her baby would develop microcephaly, which ultrasounds only pick up starting in the seventh month.

So Lima did what growing numbers of wealthy Brazilian women are doing: She requested an extended vacation from work, packed her bags and left for Europe. She plans to stay at least through the end of the dicey first trimester.

"I am in a sort of exile — I could be at home with my husband, seeing my own doctors, but instead I'm here in Europe with a suitcase," Lima said in a telephone interview from London, quickly adding that she wasn't complaining. "I am lucky to have options, to be able to make decisions. Most women in my situation don't have that luxury. They're completely at the mercy of fate."

___

Indeed, although she's living on a shoestring — crashing with friends and moving weekly so as not to overstay her welcome — Lima's peace of mind comes with a price tag that would be unthinkable for the vast majority of women in this most socially stratified of countries.

Her airline ticket alone cost several times the monthly minimum wage of complaining. "I am lucky to have options, to be able to make decisions. Most women in my situation don't have that luxury. They're completely at the mercy of fate."

___

Indeed, although she's living on a shoestring — crashing with friends and moving weekly so as not to overstay her welcome — Lima's peace of mind comes with a price tag that would be unthinkable for the vast majority of women in this most socially stratified of countries.

Her airline ticket alone cost several times the monthly minimum wage of just over $200, and with Brazil's currency at historic lows amid an economic recession, even everyday expenses in Europe have become exorbitant by Brazilian standards.

Unemployed and five months pregnant, 21-year-old Lourenco lives in a slum at the epicenter of Brazil's tandem Zika and microcephaly outbreaks, the state of Pernambuco in Brazil's impoverished and underdeveloped northeast.

Her shack is cobbled together from bits of wood and perches on stilts over a giant puddle of fetid water below. To eke out a living for herself and her 2-year-old daughter, Lourenco ventures into a nearby swamp to hunt for crustaceans she hawks for $2.50 a kilogram.

"I think I got Zika or some other disease not long ago," she said. "What can we do? Just hope that it doesn't affect the baby."

Zika is spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which is well-adapted to humans, thrives in people's homes and can breed in even a bottle cap's-worth of stagnant water — not to mention the pools of rain water that lurk in just about every nook and cranny during the muggy summer rain season. While anyone can be bitten by Aedes, public health experts agree that the poor are more vulnerable because they often lack amenities that help diminish the risk, such as air conditioning and window screens.AP