World News Update, what you need to know

Rescuers have scoured the Java Sea for an AirAsia plane carrying 162 people which went missing in bad weather en route from Indonesia to Singapore, in the third crisis for a Malaysian carrier this year.

ELSEWHERE

ATHENS - One person has died while attempting to escape from a blazing ferry stranded in the Adriatic Sea and another has been injured, an Italian coastguard official says.

KABUL - The US commander of international forces in Afghanistan has hailed the achievements of 13 years of fighting against the Taliban, as NATO formally ended its war at a ceremony in Kabul.

GAZA CITY - Gaza's Hamas rulers have prevented a group of children from entering Israel for a post-war conciliatory trip meant to foster peace, Hamas and organisers say.

LONDON - The furry-hatted and red-uniformed sentries that visitors to London like to be photographed with have been withdrawn from their sentry posts outside royal palaces for fear of falling prey to lone-wolf terror attacks, British media reports say.

TEHRAN - Iran's Revolutionary Guard says one of its senior commanders has been killed during a battle against the Islamic State extremist group in Iraq.

WASHINGTON - Sony's PlayStation says its network is back online and claims it was attacked, three days after it and Microsoft's Xbox went down in an outage.