Difficulties finding QZ8501’s “black boxes” – A suicide bomber attacks Istanbul – England’s battle with the Herd Reich (who could have predicted that trying to raise nazi super cows would go wrong?) – Baby pandas! – And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

You know what?  Before we get to all of the death and destruction, here’s Baby Pandas playing in their first snowfall at Washington, DC’s National Zoo.

And the Harbin Ice and Snow Festival in Northern China is truly amazing.  And now, on to the death and destruction.

The black box flight data and cockpit voice recorders from AirAsia Flight QZ8501 may be buried in the Java Sea floor or obscured by muddy waters. Whatever the reason, searchers cannot detect any telltale “ping” coming from their emergency locator beacons.  This according to Indonesian search officials, speaking about the terribly difficult search for wreckage and bodies in fast-moving currents and stormy weather.  Teams managed to retrieve two more bodies, bringing the total to 39.  162 passengers and crew were on board when the Airbus A320-300 plunged into the Java Sea on 28 December.

A female suicide bomber attacked a police station near Istanbul’s most-popular tourist attractions, the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sofia museum.  Security cameras recorded her entering the police station, wearing a full-length black outfit.  She killed herself and a police officer, and injured one more cop.  The woman’s identity and nationality are not clear, but Istanbul’s Governor Vasip Sahin told reporters that she spoke English with “a thick accent”.

An Israeli military court sentenced the murderer of three Jewish teens to three life terms in prison.  The killings were part of the string of unnecessary violent events that led up to the 2014 Gaza War.  Hussam Qawasmeh is a ruffian with Hamas ties, with a long history of brushes with Israeli and Palestinian cops.  He was also ordered to pay more than A$76,000 to the families of 16-year old Naftali Frenkel and Gilad Shaar and 19-year old Eyal Yifrach.  The three boys went missing on 12 June while hitchhiking through the West Bank and were later found buried under a rock.  Israeli defense forces shot and killed Qawasmeh’s brother and a third suspect in September.

Hmmm.. We haven’t heard much about the Battle for Kobani in northern Syria lately.  Just over two months ago, Kurdish Peshmerga forces arrived in the city to back up the local Syrian Kurds in their fight against the nihilist maniacs of Islamic State (IS).  Today, the Kurds have regained control of about 80 percent of the city, with the assistance of US air strikes which destroyed two dozen IS positions on Sunday and Monday.

A man who was to be a key witness for Kenyan Deputy President William Ruto in his trial at The Hague has been found dead.  Meshack Yebei was kidnapped on 28 December, and his decomposed body was discovered in the western part of Kenya.  Ruto denies the charges at the International Criminal Court (ICC) that he allegedly instigated deadly ethnic violence after the 2007 elections.  The ICC dropped similar charges against Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta last month.

Remember “Kony 2012”?  Well, rogue warlord Joseph Kony of the so-called Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) was never caught is still causing trouble in Uganda and central Africa.  But he lost one of his senior commanders:  Dominic Ongwen surrendered to US Forces in the Central African Republic.  Ongwen and Kony face charges at the ICC for kidnapping children to serve as soldiers and sex slaves, and Ongwen allegedly led the LRA into committing the worst atrocities – mass murders, gang rapes, and forced amputations. 

Cuba has released some of the 53 counterrevolutionary inmates identified as political prisoners on a list drawn up by the US.  This comes after last month’s historic contact between the two nations’ respective Presidents and their plans to reestablish relations.  US and Cuban officials have a meeting scheduled in Havana later this month.

158 people were hurt when two commuter trains collided in Rio de Janeiro.  It’s under investigation.

Belgium’s Justice Minister will not allow a convicted rapist and murderer to be euthanized, as he wished.  Frank Van den Bleeken is serving a life sentence in prison, and says he is unable to control his urges.  Belgium’s right to die laws have been tested and honed since being introduced 12 years ago, but “getting out of serving one’s debt to society” will not be a reason to legally end one’s own life.

Japanese whalers will head for the Southern Ocean this week, but they’re supposedly leaving their harpoons at home.  The Japanese Fisheries Agency said the Institute of Cetacean Research plans to conduct non-lethal research on whales until 28 March.  Last year, the United Nations’ top court ruled Japan’s annual hunt was illegal.

Here’s a real simple rule one could follow:  If the nazis did something, do the opposite.  English farmer Derek Gow of Devon didn’t follow that advice, and for some reason decided to augment his herd of cattle with some descendents of “super cows” developed by the nazis to feed the fatherland.  But it turned out that the uber-rinder Heck Cattle – which were bred to approximate the huge Auroch breed of wild cattle that traversed the Eurasian continent prior to extinction in the 1600s – were also super aggressive.  The master race of belligerent bovines with their long horns tried to kill farm hands at every opportunity (at least they didn’t try to annex the Sudetenland).  How now did Gow settle his row with nazi cows?  He culled the members of his Herd Reich, turning them into burgers and sausages.  Hey, the only good nazi is a…