MBANGA-PONGO, Cameroon — Investigators focused Monday on the possibility a Kenya Airways jetliner lost power in both engines during a storm just after takeoff and was trying to glide back to the airport when it plunged into a mangrove swamp 12 miles from the runway.

All 114 people on board were killed in the crash, officials said after picking their way along a muddy path to the site strewn with pieces of metal, bodies and shoes.

After being delayed an hour by storms, the Kenya-bound Boeing 737-800 sent a distress signal shortly after takeoff from Douala early Saturday, then lost contact 1-13 minutes later. It took searchers more than 40 hours to find the wreckage, most of it submerged in murky orange-brown water and concealed by a canopy of trees.

A coast guard officer said late Monday that one of the two flight recorders had been found, a development that could help investigators determine what happened./AP

WAR ON DRUGS

Venezuelan official calls U.S. agency a ’new cartel’

CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela on Monday said it will not allow U.S. agents to carry out counter-drug operations in the country, accusing the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration of being a “new cartel” that aids traffickers.

Justice Minister Pedro Carreno said the country suspended cooperation with the agency in 2005 after determining that “they were moving a large amount of drugs.” President Hugo Chavez at the time also accused the DEA of spying.

“The United States with its DEA monopolizes the shipping of drugs like a cartel,” Carreno told reporters. “We determined that we were evidently in the presence of a new cartel.” He did not elaborate.

Spokesman Brian Penn said the U.S. Embassy categorically denies the accusation and called the DEA “the leading agency combatting drug trafficking around the world.”/AP

VEGAS BLAST

Videos being reviewed in deadly explosion

LAS VEGAS — Security videotapes might show who left a device that exploded in a casino parking garage early Monday, killing a man who attempted to remove it from the top of his car, authorities said.

The man was pronounced dead at a hospital after the explosion, which occurred a little after 4 a.m. behind the Luxor hotel-casino, said a Las Vegas police spokesman.

Police said the small blast was not a terrorist act or a mob hit, but an apparent murder of a man who worked at a business inside the hotel. Police did not identify either the dead man or the uninjured person.

Police denied initial reports that a backpack exploded and said no threat was made against the Luxor or its employees./AP

RETURNING HOME

Former Bangladeshi leader back after ban on homecoming lifted

DHAKA, Bangladesh — Former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who had been barred from returning to Bangladesh after she was accused of speaking against its military-backed interim government, arrived in the capital Monday, and thousands of supporters cheered, beat drums and sprinkled her with rosebuds.

The government lifted a ban on Hasina’s return on April 25, seven days after it barred her homecoming amid media reports that the government wanted to exile her.

Authorities had accused Hasina of making “inflammatory statements” about the country’s interim government while abroad, and warned that her return might create further confusion and incite divisions among the public.

Hasina, who held the office from 1996-2001, was charged with murder on April 11 while she was in the United States on a personal visit. The murder case stems from the deaths of four protesters in a riot in October./AP

CONTRACT KILLING

Woman convicted in death of boyfriend’s 6-month-old baby

CAPE TOWN, South Africa — A woman was convicted Monday of hiring a hit squad to murder her lover’s baby daughter, ending a trial that had dominated headlines for months with details of South Africa’s first known contract killing of an infant.

Dina Rodrigues was found guilty of murder for orchestrating the June 2005 killing of the 6-month-old girl, her then-boyfriend’s child from a previous relationship.

The case has riveted South Africa — where an estimated 1,100 children are killed each year — in part because both the baby and Rodrigues were white and from privileged backgrounds. Most cases involving violence against children involve black and underprivileged defendants and victims.

High Court Judge Basheer Waglay also convicted four men of murder and robbery in the case./AP

The four had been hired by Rodrigues for a total of $1,500 to commit the crime, and posed as delivery men to gain access to the home of Jordan’s grandparents, prosecutors said./AP