MANILA - GOVERNMENT work in the Philippines has been interrupted after it was discovered the country's first swine flu-linked fatality was an employee of Congress, officials said on Tuesday.

Speaker Prospero Nograles suspended work at the House of Representatives for five days after it was learned that the 49-year-old woman who tested positive for the influenza A(H1N1) virus after her death had worked at the chamber.

KUALA LUMPUR - MALAYSIA passed a law on Tuesday that will force criminal suspects to provide DNA samples, despite opposition complaints that the bill was aimed at legitimising evidence in the sodomy trial of their leader Anwar Ibrahim.

Under the act, which parliament passed with a simple majority, courts can compel suspects to provide non-intimate DNA samples such as hair and saliva, said Sivarasa Rasiah, an opposition parliamentarian. The provision of intimate samples such as semen or blood will not be mandatory.

MANILA - HUNDREDS of passengers were left stranded at ports in the central Philippines on Tuesday after the coast guard ordered ships ashore to escape a tropical storm, reports said.

Vessels have been told not to leave islands at the south-east tip of the main island of Luzon, which the weather bureau said could be hit with gusts of up to 100 kilometres (62 miles) an hour.