Asia/Oceania

East Timor’s two largest parties are leading in the parliamentary elections. Unofficial results had the two main parties, the Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor (Fretilin) and the National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction (CNRT), taking the majority of votes. The two parties formed a de facto coalition in 2015. But early indicators suggest voters have also backed opposition parties, including the Democratic Party (PD) the newly established People’s Liberation Party (PLP) and the emerging Khunto party, Professor Michael Leach, a Timorese expert from Swinburne University, said.

An underwater robot has captured images of huge deposits believed to be melted nuclear fuel covering the floor of a damaged reactor at Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power said solidified lava-like rocks heaped up from the bottom inside a main structure called the pedestal that sits underneath the core inside the primary containment vessel of Fukushima’s Unit 3 reactor. Experts believe the melted fuel fell to the chamber’s bottom and is now submerged by radioactive water. A 2011 earthquake and tsunami destroyed the plant.

An errant US airstrike confirmed by the Pentagon killed 12 Afghan National Police officers and wounded two others, Helmand provincial police chief Abdul Ghafar Safi said. The death toll was determined after a site inspection of the compound in the Gereshk district, he said.