Good Morning, Australia! – There are reports hundreds may have drowned in an immigrant tragedy – What did Nauru guards do to get suspended? – Obama follows through – Ridiculous prison terms given to teachers – And a lot more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

About 400 people may have drowned in the Mediterranean Sea after setting off from Libya for Italy, according to the Italian office of the charity Save the Children.  The migrants included sub-Saharan Africans fleeing extremism, poverty, and oppression, as well as Syrians escaping the civil war.  Smugglers packed them onto 20 derelict fishing boats and inflatable dinghies, which could not handle the journey.  Officials say the Italian Coast Guard and Navy rescued more than 5,600 immigrants from the sea in the last few days.

Eight guards from the immigrant detention center on Nauru are suspended after posing for a photograph with Pauline Hanson at a “Reclaim Australia” rally (from what?).  The photo was later posted on social media.  The guards apparently also made horrible comments online, and “frequently referred to asylum seekers in their care as ‘the enemy’,” according to a report in the Guardian Newspaper.  The extent of their irrational paranoia and xenophobia seeped through with comments blasting major international food companies for selling Halal products – repeating the hoax that Halal certification somehow funds terrorist (it doesn’t).

One year after the abduction of some 276 girls from a boarding school in Chibok, Nigeria, and the country’s president-elect is offering a grim assessment of the search:  Muhammadu Buhari will not promise that they will be found.  The Islamist terrorist group Boko Haram kidnapped the girls in its drive to establish a medieval Caliphate in Western Africa.  Many sources believe the girls were forced into marriage with militants, sold as slaves, or even forced to commit suicide bombings in Nigeria.  “Their whereabouts remain unknown. As much as I wish to, I cannot promise that we can find them,” Buhari said in a statement, “”My government will do everything in its power to bring them home.”

The US, China, and other world powers offered to help Nigeria’s military find the Chibok girls after the 14-15 April 2014 mass abduction.  But to Nobel Peace Prize laureate and education advocate Malala Yousafzai, these efforts have been noticeably lacking any teeth.  “In my opinion, Nigerian leaders and the international community have not done enough to help you,” Malala wrote in an open letter to her “brave sisters” from Chibok.  “They must do much more to help secure your release.  I am among many people pressuring them to make sure you are freed.”

Since the US-led coalition began its air attacks against Islamic State last August, the terrorists have lost about a quarter of the territory they held.  US officials caution that it is too early to say that the tide has turned, but Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi wants the coalition to step up its air campaign against IS.

Animal Stories!  Next time, just let the croc have the ball.  Also – expensive, high-tech remote-controlled drones are no match for a chimp with a stick – take that, humanity!  Anyway, the South Carolina Aquarium Sea Turtle Rescue Program released two Loggerheads back into the Atlantic Ocean, two years after they were found in critical condition.  One is named Dozer, the other is Lazarus because he technically died twice.

US President Barack Obama has removed Cuba from a list of state sponsors of terrorism.  This follows an historic face-to-face meeting with Cuban President Raul Castro at a summit over the weekend.

Six Ukrainian soldiers were killed when pro-Russian rebels targeted their vehicle outside Luhansk.  It’s raising concerns that the ceasefire in Ukraine’s east might be breaking down.

Percy Sledge, singer of the soul classic “When a Man Loves a Woman” is dead at age 74 after a long battle with liver cancer.

And this is a completely ridiculous example of how America doesn’t recognize its built-in institutional racism:

Three former schoolteachers from the city of Atlanta in America’s South have been sentenced to seven years in prison for inflating student test scores.  Prosecutors gave ten of them until Tuesday morning to accept a plea deal for one year in the slam, the three refused.

How could such a minor infraction result in large prison terms?  Technically, it’s defrauding the US Government.  You see, US public schools are funded by local property taxes, meaning that schools in poor areas automatically get less money than the tony suburbs – always – forever.  With education “reforms” passed under the previous conservative administration, teachers across the country are under pressure to bring up test scores to meet arbitrary benchmarks so that their schools don’t lose Federal funding.  And obviously that pressure is greatest in poor areas.

Oh, the kicker?  All of the teachers sentenced were black teachers from black school districts.  Now, do you think that any of those white US cops who shot and killed innocent black men over the past year or so are going to serve as much prison time?  Yeah, they’re not.  Most haven’t even been charged.  Have any of those banksters who crashed the world economy been charged yet?  No?