Hello, Australia! – What made Sepp Blatter quit FIFA? – Conditions worsen at the capsized Chinese river ship – Russia’s bizarre new theory about the downing of MH17 – And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

The US says it did not have any hand in the FIFA president Sepp Blatter’s plans to resign.  “The United States government does not have a position on who the president of Fifa is,” State Department spokesperson Mari Harf told reporters. It comes the US Justice Department indicted a total of 14 FIFA officials directly beneath Blatter in the FIFA hierarchy, accusing them of racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering.

Only four days ago, Blatter was walking tall after winning reelection as the world football body’s leader, saying at the time that resignation would be a tacit admission that he did something wrong.  So, what changed in four days?  Some believe FIFA’s giant corporate sponsors might have pressed Blatter to step aside after Monday’s revelation that US prosecutors tied Blatter’s top lieutenant to illegal cash transfers. Coca-Cola and Adidas welcomed Blatter’s announcement, and South Korean carmaker Hyundai Motor said the move was “a positive first step”. 

Some 400 people are still missing in the capsizing of a passenger ship on China’s Yangtze River.  But the divers trying to find survivors in air pockets are battling fierce winds and strong currents – so strong, that the inverted ship has drifted about three kilometers downriver before coming to rest on the bank.  Thirteen bodies have been pulled so far and 14 people rescued.  If worst fears are confirmed and hundreds are dead, it will likely be China’s worst shipping disaster in 70 years.

Three staffers from Doctors Without Borders and their pilot died in a chopper crash in Nepal.  They were en route to aid earthquake victims when the helicopter struck some high-tension electrical wires. 

Is Russia changing its story about the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 in Ukraine?  The West believes the plan was shot out of the sky by Russian-backed separatists operating a Russian-made BUK anti-aircraft missile.  But the manufacturer now says its analysis of the wreckage indicates the missile was one that hasn’t been made since 1999 – and that Russia doesn’t stock that weapon, but Ukraine does.  Missile maker Almaz-Antey intimated that it believes Ukrainian troops shot down the plane, killing all 298 passengers and crew including 27 Australians on board.  Previously, Russia has claimed a Ukrainian fighter jet downed the passenger plane.

A prominent Russian opposition figure who has been hospitalized for a week with a mysterious illness has regained consciousness.  Vladimir Kara-Murza is a journalist and a close associate of Boris Nemtsov, who was murdered outside the Kremlin in February.  Kara-Murza fell ill last week with suspected Kidney failure.  Given Nemtsov’s killing, the the fatal poisoning of defector Alexander Litvinenko in 2006, and the unsolved deaths of other Russian opposition figures, there is speculation that Kara-Murza could have been poisoned.

A Thai army officer has surrendered to authorities to face human trafficking charges.  Lieutenant General Manas Kongpaen is one of 50 military, police, and local officials slated to face prosecution since the discovery of dozens of bodies believed to be those of Myanmar's Rohingya migrants at the abandoned trafficking camps near the Thai-Malaysian border.