Morocco barred Dutch abortion rights activists Thursday from docking their campaign ship to spread awareness about safe abortion methods in a Muslim country that bans the practice.

Women on Waves announced last week its intention to send their ship into the Moroccan port of Smir after visits to traditionally Roman Catholic countries Spain, Portugal and Ireland at the invitation of local women's groups. Such visits began 11 years ago, the BBC reported.

The group says it intends to raise awareness about the use of pills for medical abortions and that it would carry out terminations of pregnancies aboard its own ship on international waters.

Earlier Thursday, Marlies Schellekens, a doctor from Women on Waves, said that Smir harbour was "totally blocked by warships so no one can get in," a day after Rabat said the activists would be barred from arriving by sea.

Rebecca Gomperts, the founder of Women on Waves, told the BBC the group planned to launch "a surprise" in response, but she did not provide further details.

But Moroccan sources later said Women on Waves had actually sent only a yacht into Smir several days ago rather than their usual larger main campaign ship in the apparent expectation that Morocco would not let the group in anyway.

"The yacht has now left Smir to head back home. It was a publicity stunt," an official source said.

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"The organizers took everyone for a ride ... The people (in the yacht) stayed aboard and did not complete immigration procedures that would have allowed them to enter Moroccan territory."

Women on Waves had been invited to Morocco by local rights group Alternative Movement for Individual Freedoms (MALI).

According to the BBC, Women on Waves wanted to publicize the fact that an abortion-inducement drug is already available to women in Morocco, but most are unaware of it.

The group told the BBC it had also launched a hotline for women to obtain information about contraception and abortion.

In Morocco, as in other Muslim states, abortion is illegal and punishable by up to 20 years in prison. But hundreds of illegal abortions are carried out daily in underground clinics or using herbal medicines, sometimes causing death or injury. Women on Waves told the BBC between 600 and 800 abortions take place every day in Morocco.

Each year hundreds of Moroccan single mothers are forced to abandon or give up their babies for adoption because of the stigma linked to abortion and pre-marital pregnancy.

"I understand that (the visit) is seen as a provocation by some religious groups. But this is about women's health. It has nothing to do with religion," Gomperts, told AFP by phone earlier this week.

On Wednesday Interior Minister Mohand Laenser, a secular member of the government led since December by moderate Islamists, said the Women on Waves would not be allowed into Morocco. "The organizers have never contacted us to seek permission to visit Morocco," Laenser told Reuters.

The Moroccan Association Against Clandestine Abortion said in June that legislation on abortion was out of step with social realities in the country and the number of unsafe abortions showed the need for a political commitment to legal reform.

Organizers of an all-gay cruise in June said Moroccan officials had canceled what would have been the first visit of its kind to a Muslim country.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Police on Tuesday arrested seven crew members from two boats carrying partygoers that collided, killing at least 38 people in one of Hong Kong's deadliest maritime accidents.

Police Commissioner Tsang Wai-hung said six people, including captains from both vessels, were detained on suspicion of endangering passengers by operating the craft unsafely. "We expect further persons to be arrested," Tsang said. Police announced a seventh arrest after his comments.

Tsang said police suspect both crews had not "exercised the care required of them by law," but he did not offer details.

Salvage crews were raising the Lamma IV, which sank after colliding with a ferry Monday as it carried partygoers to a fireworks show celebrating China's national day.

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More than 100 people from the party boat were rescued and sent to hospitals. The ferry was damaged but completed its journey, and some of its passengers were treated for injuries.

The ferry collided with a boat owned by utility company Power Assets Holdings Ltd., which was taking its workers and their families to famed Victoria Harbor to watch a fireworks display in celebration of the national day and mid-autumn festival.

PhotoBlog: Mourning begins as bodies are recovered from ferry crash

Police are interviewing survivors to determine if others were still missing following the accident. Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has ordered a full investigation into the crash, the worst maritime accident in the territory's waters in 40 years.

Lueng rejected suggestions that Hong Kong needed to overhaul rules governing its busy sea lanes, the South China Morning Post reported.

"This is definitely an isolated incident. The marine territory of Hong Kong is safe," he said.

Dozens gathered at Kwai Chung Public Mortuary on Tuesday looking for relatives, the Post reported.

There was no immediate word about how Monday night's collision occurred on the tightly regulated waterways of one of Asia's safest places, although it appeared human error was involved. The evening was clear and both vessels should have been illuminated by running lights when they crashed near Lamma Island off the southwestern coast of Hong Kong island.

Witnesses Sarah Blackman told the BBC she was on board one of the boats involved.

"I was on the top deck of the ferry and felt the impact — it threw people off their seats. The sound the collision made was horrific," she told the BBC.

"Our ferry cut its engines and a crew member checked if passengers had sustained injuries from the impact. Our engines went back on, and a couple of other passengers and I went back to the rear of our ferry to look for the other boat that was now behind us, and that is when we saw it sinking in the water. As far as I'm aware, no lifeboats were on board — just life buoys and life jackets," she added.

Survivors told local television stations that the power company boat started sinking rapidly after the 8:23 p.m. (8:23 a.m. ET) collision. One woman said she swallowed a lot of water as she swam back to shore.

A man said he had been on board with his children and didn't know where they were. Neither gave their names.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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GIGLIO, Italy - Six months after it capsized off Italy’s Giglio island, the Costa Concordia still lies on its side – a monument to what prosecutors say was reckless navigation.

The 122,000-ton, 1,000 foot long cruise liner, which hit a rock and partially sank on January 13, claiming the lives of 32 people including two Americans, has become part of Giglio’s skyline.

For locals it has become an eyesore that stops them enjoying the view of the Tuscan shore. But for tourists it represents a perfect photo opportunity for their summer albums.

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Every day, hundreds of tourists fill the regular ferries that connect the island from Porto Santo Stefano, the closest mainland port. It’s an hour-long crossing under the scorching summer sun - the roof deck becomes so hot you could cook pizza on its white floor - and yet everyone heads for the open top.

Armed with hats, sun cream and camera phones, they hope to glimpse the Costa Concordia even before they reach Giglio. “Can you see it from here?”, a tourist from Naples asks, excited. Yes, he can. The stricken ship lies only a few hundred yards from the port entrance, and the ferry sails right past its bow.

Once on shore, tourists head to the dock for a picture opportunity. But islanders are growing tired of this shipwreck tourism.

87-year-old Cecilia Cavero was born on the island and has lived there all her life. While sitting in the shade of a palm tree of the tiny port beach, she gives the tourists an angry look. “Every day I come here and that thing is there”, she says, pointing at the Concordia. “It’s heartbreaking. And those tourists come here for the day, take a picture and then leave.”

Costa Concordia captain admits he was 'distracted' by phone call

Her friend, Adele Ansaldo, 80, says she can’t avoid seeing it every single day. “It lies right in front of my house. Every day I open my windows and I see it. It’s sad to know there are still people in there,” she said, referring to the bodies of the last two victims yet to be found. “It’s heartbreaking”.

But others are not so bothered by the new landmark: “It has now become a symbol of the island”, fisherman Italo Arienti told msnbc.com. “But they forbid us to make souvenirs out of it”.

Norwegian tourist Jan Moe agrees. From a rock overlooking the Concordia, he says he didn’t even know it was there until he got to the island. But he doesn’t mind. “It’s good for tourism, isn’t it?”

Before the Concordia tragedy, Giglio was a hangout for the rich and powerful. But the wreck happened right where luxurious yachts, too big to enter the tiny port, used to dock. The yachts have now been replaced by packed ferries of tourists looking for a quick snap and a bite to eat. 

Some businesses have benefited: restaurants have never been so full, especially for lunch, and shops are selling out of souvenirs. But some locals say that the exploitation of the Concordia tragedy has already gone one step too far.

“Someone tried to print the wreck on t-shirts and postcards, and at some point they tried to make sell models of it”, Costanzo Basini, a former captain and souvenir shop owner, said. “It’s shameful, especially towards the relatives of the victims”.

The complicated process of removing the wreck has already started, but it will take at least 12 months before experts will be able to right the ship and tow it away.

On Friday, a memorial service will be held in the island’s church in the presence of survivors and relatives of the victims, and a concert will take place at 9:42 p.m. local time (3:42 p.m. ET) - the exact time the ship struck the rocks, six months ago.

In the meantime, Concordia remains its side awaiting its final voyage.

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GIGLIO, Italy  -  The captain of the cruise ship Costa Concordia has admitted he was distracted by a phone call at the time it capsized off Italy in January, killing 32 people - including two Americans.

Francesco Schettino gave his first interview on Tuesday night, after being released from house arrest by a judge.

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He is accused of causing the accident by taking the liner too close to rocks near the island of Giglio, off Italy’s west coast – and of abandoning the liner while many passengers and crew were still aboard.

He told Italy’s Channel 5 he does not accept full blame for the wreck, but said: “I feel guilty for having been distracted.”

He was making a phone call to a man on shore – a retired captain he was in the process of saluting - when the accident happened, and that the navigation at that moment was under another officer's control.

Salvage plan for wrecked Costa Concordia unveiled in Rome

He apologized to his countrymen in the interview, saying: “It is normal that I should say sorry, that I should apologize.”

He said he thought about the victims a lot, and became emotional when reminded of five-year-old Daiana Arlotti, the youngest to die. “This question devastates me, it is terrible... Let's leave it-- please.”

Schettino said he turned the ship abruptly, after realizing it would hit rocks, in order to save lives.

“In the end I managed to avoid a frontal impact,” he said.

Court rules Costa Concordia captain unfit to run ship

He also insisted he did not intentionally abandon ship before everyone got off.

“The ground gave in below me, it was like the tremor of an earthquake, the floor gives in and what do you do?”

The Costa company, owned by Carnival, blames Schettino for taking the ship off course, then badly mishandling the aftermath.

Additional editing by Alastair Jamieson, msnbc.com in London.

A boat carrying about 200 refugees capsized in Indonesian waters 120 nautical miles north of Australia's Christmas Island and many are feared drowned, authorities said Thursday.

Western Australia police commissioner Karl O'Callaghan said a ''large number'' of the people on the boat were feared dead, The Australian newspaper reported.

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''There were about 200 refugees on board we think. Currently there's about 40 on the hull and the rest are in the water,'' O'Callaghan told the paper.

''Some of the very early reports suggest that up to 75 people may have drowned, but I do stress that they are unconfirmed at this stage,'' he added.

The Australian cited an Indonesian official as saying 100 people from Sri Lanka were reportedly on board the ship.

People-smugglers?
An Australian customs spokesman said border protection had detected what was believed to be a people-smuggling boat in distress earlier on Thursday.

"Indonesian navy ships are on their way there now," Indonesia's National Search and Rescue Agency (Basarnas) spokesman Gagah Prakoso told Reuters.

The sinking occurred within Indonesia's search and rescue zone and Australian authorities were offering assistance, Australia's Maritime Safety Authority said.

Refugees seeking asylum in Australia often set sail from Indonesia heading for Christmas Island in dangerous and overcrowded boats.

As many as 200 died when an overcrowded boat sank off the coast of East Java in December, 2011. Fifty asylum seekers travelling from Indonesia to Christmas Island died when a storm dashed their boat onto rocks in December 2010. In 2001, a crowded boat known as the SIEV X sank on its way to Australia with the loss of 350 lives.

 Australia's Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island, south of Indonesia, is a popular destination for asylum seekers, who travel by often crowded boats from Indonesia, with the help of people smugglers.

So far this year, more than 50 boats carrying a total of more than 4,000 asylum seekers have been detected by Australian authorities. 

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Updated at 11:00 a.m. ET: A ship carrying military helicopters and missiles from Russia to Syria was halted off the coast of Scotland on Tuesday after its British insurers canceled the vessel’s cover, prompting it to turn back.

The MV Alaed was carrying weapons and Mi25 helicopters from the Russian port of Kaliningrad, the Daily Telegraph reported.

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The vessel has been closely monitored by intelligence agencies since Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last week said such shipments were adding to the arsenal of weaponry available in Syria, which has spiraled into civil war.

Britain's Foreign Office said no physical intervention had been made to prevent the ship's progress. However, Foreign Secretary William Hague told lawmakers on Tuesday that the vessel had "turned back now apparently toward Russia." That could not be independently verified as the ship appeared to have turned off its Automatic Identification System (AIS) equipment in the early hours of Monday.

Clinton last week said  Moscow had "dramatically" escalated the crisis in Syria by sending attack helicopters there. The State Department acknowledged later the helicopters she accused Moscow of sending were actually refurbished ones already owned by the Assad regime, but Russia was clearly annoyed, and the spat further fueled tensions between the two countries over Syria. It was not immediately clear whether the helicopters aboard the MV Alaed were the ones to which Clinton had been referring. 

The British marine insurer, Standard Club, said it had withdrawn cover from the ship’s owner, Femco, a Russian cargo line. 

Arms shipments from Russia to Syria are not prohibited by the United Nations because attempts to impose sanctions have been vetoed by allies of Damascus, including Moscow.

However, a European Union arms embargo outlaws the "transfer or export" of arms and any related "brokering" services such as insurance to Syria by EU members, including Britain.

"We were made aware of the allegations that the Alaed was carrying munitions destined for Syria," the company said in a statement. "We have already informed the ship owner that their insurance cover ceased automatically in view of the nature of the voyage." 

“Having its insurance withdrawn will be a problem for the MV Alaed," said Liz McMahon, senior reporter on insurance for maritime specialist, Lloyd's List. "It could make entering other ports difficult."

The Soviet-era helicopters onboard MV Alaed were returning to Syria after being sent to their Russian manufacturer, Mil, for servicing and repairs, the Telegraph reported.

NBC News first reported last week that Russia is preparing to send troops to Syria in the event that it needs to protect personnel and remove equipment from its naval facility in the Mediterranean port of Tartus.

Syria is Moscow's firmest foothold in the Middle East and buys weapons from Russia worth billions of dollars. It also hosts the Russian navy's only permanent warm-water port outside the former Soviet Union.

Russia has used its U.N. Security Council veto to dilute Western efforts to condemn Syrian President Bashar Assad and secure his exit from power, arguing that deposing a government using external pressure is unacceptable.

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The Azamara Quest, a luxury cruise adrift off the southern Philippines for 24 hours because of an engine fire, has safely reached a Malaysian port.

The vessel, carrying 600 passengers who are mostly westerners and 411 crew, was stranded at sea flames engulfed one of its engine rooms Friday night.

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It restored propulsion the next night and reached the harbor of Sandakan city in Malaysia's eastern state of Sabah on Borneo island late Sunday.

Police and buses were waiting at the port to take the passengers to a hotel. Five crew members suffered smoke inhalation, including one who was seriously injured.

The Azamara Quest, carrying 600 passengers who are mostly westerners and 411 crew, suffered an engine-room fire on Friday that disabled the engines and left the ship temporarily stranded off the southern Philippines coast.

The fire, the latest in a string of cruise ship accidents across the world, was put out on Saturday although five crew members suffered from smoke inhalation with one requiring serious medical attention.

A U.S. Navy vessel had joined the escort flotilla comprising of several Philippine Navy ships and a coast guard ship, Filipino officials said.

The heightened security comes as the waters off the coast of southern Philippines and northern Sabah are key hunting grounds for pirates and the Abu Sayyaf, a deadly Islamic militant group.

The Abu Sayyaf wants an independent Islamic nation in the south of Roman Catholic Philippines, and has been responsible for high profile kidnappings of westerners, including abducting tourists from a nearby Malaysian resort island in 2000.

Azamara Club Cruises - a subsidiary of Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd - said engineers onboard the ship had restored power to one of the ship's engines that allows for some air conditioning, running water and refrigeration.

The rest of the cruise, carrying mainly Americans, Australians and Western Europeans, has been cancelled but some of the passengers were still upbeat.

"This is our first trip on a cruise holiday and after what has happened you would think we would not want to go again but you are so wrong," said Neil Andrew Kirkpatrick who posted on the Azamara Facebook page on Sunday.

"The only discomfort is the heat due to the air-conditioning not working but I can suffer that as I know the engineering department have been working 24/7 to try to get this up and running."

The Azamara Quest was on a 17-night journey and had departed Hong Kong on Monday with port calls to Manila, Balikpapan (Borneo), Palapo (Sulawesi), Benoa Bali, Semarang and Komodo in Indonesia, Malaysia and ending in Singapore.

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