Good Morning Australia!! - Nancy Reagan passes away - Iran Sentences a billionaire to death - This year's US-South Korean military exercise will be the biggest-ever - A woman was left to die in a switched-off elevator - And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

Form US First Lady Nancy Reagan is dead at age 94.  A controversial and polarizing figure during her time in the White House, she was admired by conservatives for bringing old Hollywood glamour to Washington.  But critics noted extravagant spending at a time of high unemployment, the image of a 1940s stay-at-home housewife while more women were seeking to enter the workplace, soap opera-worthy feuds with her children and step children, indifference to her friend Rock Hudson's plea for help as he was dying of AIDS, consulting with astrologers in planning the President's schedule, among other things.  She'll be buried next to her husband at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California.

American novelist Pat Conroy is dead of pancreatic cancer at age 70.  Two of his works, The Great Santini and The Prince of Tides, were made into Oscar-nominated movies.

Chinese authorities arrested several people after a woman's corpse was found in an elevator that had been shut off on 30 January in a building in Xian.  The two building engineers who turned off the lift without making sure that it was empty are among those arrested.  Scratches were found inside the elevator.  The woman was believed to be a 43-year old who lived by herself in the building, and her family rarely visited.

Northern Ireland police claim they found "a significant terrorist hide containing bomb-making components and explosives at Carnfunnock Country Park", which is 40 kilometers north of Belfast.  It is feared that rogue Republicans might step up bombings as the centenary of the 1916 Rising against British rule approaches.  Last week, a prison officer was injured by a bomb which exploded under his van in Belfast, prompting police to warn of a "severe" threat to security forces.

An immigrant ship attempting to make the Aegean Sea crossing from Turkey to Greece has sunk, killing 25 people.  Rescuers pulled 15 survivors from the sea.  More than 300 people have drowned this way in 2015, added to the thousands who died in the Aegean and Mediterranean in 2015.  NATO is stepping up its assistance to the Turkish Coast guard, since the country apparently has more important things to do than stopping people from drowning.

Turkey's Zaman newspaper blazed pro-government headlines and propaganda stories on its front page, two days after a court ordered the opposition paper to be placed under the control of authorities.  Until police raided its offices over the weekend, kicked out the staff, and clashed with supporters Zaman had been an opposition newspaper. 

A truck bombing in Iraq killed at least 70 people.  The fuel tanker blew up at a check point south of Baghdad.

Iran has sentenced a billionaire businessman to death for alleged corruption.  42-year old Babak Zanjani was convicted of withholding billions of dollars of state oil revenue in a series of companies located throughout the Muslim world.  He denies this.  The US and European Union banned Mr. Zanjani for helping Iran sell its oil in defiance of international economic sanctions.  Separately, or coincidentally, or however you wish to interpret this - the first tanker of post-sanctions Iranian oil has arrived in Spain and offloaded a million barrels of oil into the refinery at San Roque.

The largest ever joint military exercise with US and South Korean troops starts today, twice as large as last year's exercises.  More than 300,000 South Korean and 15,000 US troops will take part.  Tensions are usually high on the Korean peninsula, but it's a little worse lately because North Korea recently tested an Atomic Bomb and a long range missile.

Caspar the Friendly Octopod.  Possibly a new species!