PERTH, Australia (AP) — Searchers hunting for the missing Malaysia Airlines jet raced toward a patch of the southern Indian Ocean yesterday to determine whether a few brief sounds picked up by underwater equipment came from the plane’s black boxes, whose battery-powered pingers are on the verge of dying out.

Ships scouring a remote stretch of water for the plane that vanished nearly a month ago detected three separate sounds over three days. A Chinese ship picked up an electronic pulsing signal on Friday and again on Saturday, and an Australian ship carrying sophisticated deep-sea acoustic equipment detected a signal in a different area yesterday, the head of the multinational search said.

The two black boxes contain flight data and cockpit voice recordings that could solve one of the most baffling mysteries in modern aviation: who or what caused Flight 370 to veer radically off course and vanish March 8 while travelling from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Beijing with 239 people on board.

But there were questions about whether any of the sounds were the breakthrough that searchers are desperately seeking or just another dead end in a hunt seemingly full of them, with experts expressing doubt that the equipment aboard the Chinese ship was capable of picking up signals from the black boxes.

Venezuela slams Spain

CARACAS, Venezuela (AFP) — The Government of Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro, after more than two months of street protests, slammed Spain yesterday for claiming it was not seeking dialogue with political foes.

Spain’s Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo confirmed Saturday that Madrid has suspended exports of anti-riot and police gear to its former colony.

He said Spanish officials were in contact with Caracas “to try to re-establish a climate of reconciliation which has broken down”.

He also said Spain was paying close attention to the fate of some 200,000 Spaniards in Venezuela.

Thirty-nine people have died in clashes between security forces and protesters angered by soaring crime, high inflation and shortages. Another 608 were wounded and 192 are going through the court process.

The conservative Spanish government’s swipe at Venezuela’s heavily state-led leftist government was not exactly welcomed.

Caracas “categorically rejects the unfortunate remarks” by Garcia-Margallo, “whose Government has no moral authority to hand out advice on violence or dialogue when the world has seen how Spain’s people have risen up to protest policies both exclusionary and in violation of human rights”, a Government statement said.

Venezuela said recession-hit Spain should “seek to promote dialogue with its different social groups who are seeking justice in Spain” as it says Maduro has done.

Nigeria economy worth US$510-b, biggest in Africa

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — Nigeria’s recalculated economy is worth US$510 billion, by far the biggest in Africa, officials announced yesterday.

The long overdue recount gives the West African nation continental bragging rights but does little for the nearly 70 per cent of its citizens living in poverty.

The new estimate of Nigeria’s GDP adds previously uncounted industries like telecommunications, information technology, music, airlines, burgeoning online retail outlets and Nollywood film production that didn’t exist when the last GDP count was made in 1990. Then, there were 300,000 landlines. Today, Nigeria has 100 million cellphone users.

With one fell swoop, Nigeria knocked out of the ring South Africa, whose GDP of US$353 billion was previously counted the biggest on the continent, winning it a place as the only African member of the G20.