ATHENS - A Greek bank worker plunged to his death from the Acropolis on Thursday, in what police said could be the latest in a growing number of suicides caused by economic suffering in the debt-ridden nation. 

The man was in his 40s and worked at Greece's troubled state-owned agricultural lender, ATEbank. He took a break shortly after starting work in the morning but never returned, police said. 

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"Guards and tourists saw him at the spot before the jump," a police official said on condition of anonymity. 

"Others heard a loud scream and saw him lying on the ground. It could be suicide, but there's no note." The official said the man did not appear to have any financial problems. 

A report on Greek news site Ta Nea [link in Greek] said police were still trying to determine whether the death was an accident or suicide.

The incident happened at around 9 a.m., as tourists began arriving at Greece's most famous attraction, a 150-metre high, flat-topped rock which is the location of the 5th century BC Parthenon temple. 

In debt or jobless, many Italians choose suicide

The growing rate of suicide in Greece has come to symbolize the human toll of the country's unabated debt crisis, as repeated bouts of austerity drive Greeks to despair. 

The country's government, which took office after a June 17 election, says the suffering has become intolerable and it will ask the European Union at a two-day summit starting on Thursday to ease the punishing terms imposed in exchange for an international bailout.

Conservative Prime Minister Antonis Samaras is under huge public pressure to ease the burden of the IMF-EU bailout as he faces an opposition committed to tearing it up, which made strong gains in the election. 

'Martyr for Greece': Retiree's suicide sparks violent protests

Unable to attend the summit because of eye surgery at the weekend, Samaras sent a letter to EU leaders asking for a "different approach", a government spokesman said on Wednesday. 

He is unlikely to win much leeway, with euro zone paymaster Germany fiercely opposed to any let-up in the austerity. 

The suicide rate in Greece has shot up through five years of recession and two years of steep cuts to wages, pensions and jobs in exchange for two multi-billion-euro bailouts since 2010. 

Critics say the austerity has helped condemn the lifeless Greek economy to ever deeper recession, shuttering businesses and driving unemployment to almost 23 percent. 

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BEIJING – “I will not commit suicide” has become a new mantra among China’s human rights activists. 

They are responding half-mockingly and half-seriously to fears that they could be “suicided” by the Chinese government for their activism.

The movement comes in response to the suspicious death of Li Wangyang, a Chinese dissident jailed after the 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters. Li, 61, was found dead in a hospital ward on June 6 under what his family says were suspicious circumstances, just two days after the 23rd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown. He had served over 20 years in Chinese prison for his activism.  

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Hu Jia, a high-profile HIV/AIDS activist who served three and a half years in prison for the same crime Li was jailed for, “subversion of state power,” recently tweeted about the need to counter any foul play by the government.

Tiananmen activist found dead under suspicious circumstances

“It looks like I should leave a notarized document with my lawyer, saying: ‘Citizen Hu Jia will never commit suicide at any time, because of anyone, in any situation, or for anything,’” Hu tweeted. “If you are a dissident, activist or political prisoner constantly detained by secret police, I suggest you make a declaration or notarize such a document. This country does not lack people who were “suicided.’”

Wu Gan, another outspoken dissident known by the nickname “super vulgar butcher” on China’s blogosphere, also tried to pre-empt any future suicide claims by the government for his activism. “Here’s my announcement,” he wrote on Weibo, China’s most popular Twitter-like service. “I’m healthy (apart from fatty liver disease), optimistic, and have a lot of hope in the future. I wait for the day when the sky clears up and they are brought to justice. I will absolutely never commit suicide.” 

The movement didn’t take long to reach Twitter, where a "#Iwillnotcommitsuicide” hash tag was created on June 8, just two days after Li’s mysterious death, and has been widely re-tweeted over the last three days.  

Another activist, Liu Ping, from the southern province of Jiangxi, wrote on her Weibo account:  “I solemnly declare, if I’m caught (by police) I will never commit suicide!” 

Wang Lihong, a former Beijing businesswoman, jailed for eight months for her activism, expanded on the theme on her Twitter account. “I, Wang Lihong, once tried to kill myself in prison. It wasn’t because I was weak. I was only defending my dignity. But I will never do that again, no matter how you lure, ask, or even force – I will not commit suicide, unless you do it.” 

Li’s body was found in the Daxiang District Hospital in Shaoyang, Hunan Province, where he was receiving treatment for long-term ailments related to the more than 20 years he spent in prison. He had been released on May 5, 2011. 

But he may have grown too confident in his new-found freedom. On June 4, the 23rd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown,  i-CABLE, a Hong Kong based news channel, broadcast an interview with Li in which he was extremely outspoken in his description of his torture during his time in prison.  

Two days after the interview, he was found dead in his hospital room.

According to the local government in Shaoyang, Li’s body was cremated on the morning of June 9 with his relatives’ consent. They also said an autopsy was conducted by four legal and forensic experts the day before, which was witnessed and filmed by local congressional representatives and journalists.  

NBC News could not verify the reports with Li’s sister or her husband because their cell phones remained off on Monday.  

BEIJING – Li Wangyang, a former labor activist and Chinese dissident jailed after the 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing, was found dead in a hospital ward under what his family says were suspicious circumstances, just two days after the 23rd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown. 

His sister, Li Wangling, and brother-in-law, Zhao Baozhu, found his body when they paid a routine visit to the Daxiang District Hospital in Shaoyang, a city roughly 1,000 miles south of Beijing, on the morning of June 6.

They found him dead in his hospital room, hanging by a security bar in a window with hospital bandages around his neck. (Disturbing photos of Li circulating on Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, show Li’s feet on the ground, something that puts in doubt the idea that he hung himself).  

Security and hospital authorities said that he had committed suicide.  

But his family is not buying that. 

"I'd never believe Li killed himself,” his brother-in-law Zhao said during a rushed phone interview with NBC News on Thursday. 

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When asked what he thought was the true cause of Li’s death, Zhao said, "I don't know.  But the government has agreed to our request to do an autopsy at a lawyer's presence. No matter what, we want justice." 

 

Li had done a controversial interview with a Hong Kong-based TV channel that aired on June 4, the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests, in which he detailed the torture he underwent during the more than 20 years he spent in Chinese prisons.When Zhao was asked if he thought that interview had something to do with Li’s death, he said, “Yes.”

Zhao then quickly hung up the phone, saying someone had entered his hotel room, "It's not convenient now, let's talk later." 

Over 20 years in prison
Li, 61, had worked as a glass factory worker before he took the position of Chairman of Shaoyang Autonomous Workers Federation in 1989. He was a supporter of the student protests in Beijing in 1989 before they were brutally suppressed by the government with hundreds, if not thousands, of people killed by the army. 

Li was first arrested on June 9, 1989 for the crime of "active participation in a counter-revolutionary group.” He spent 11 years in a local prison. 

When Li was released from that prison term in 2000, he was suffering from severe heart disease, hyperthyroidism, and cervical vertebra diseases, according to family and friends. He was extremely weak and lost most of his hearing and sight in his left eye.

His second arrest, just one year later, made him one of the longest-serving political prisoners in China. 

In September 2001, Li was sentenced to 10 more years in prison for the crime of "subversion of state power.” That sentence was a result of a 22-day hunger strike by Li as an effort to protest the continuous persecution he had been subjected to after his release. His medical treatment was terminated and his house had been demolished, leaving him in frail health with nowhere to go, according to media reports.

After he went back to prison, his sister, Li Wangling, was put in a forced labor camp for three years for accepting interviews with the Voice of America and Radio Free Asia. 

Li was finally released from that prison sentence on May 5, 2011. Huang Lihong, a local teacher and Li’s friend, told NBC News that Li’s health was greatly damaged at the time. 

"He had lost his sight and hearing. He couldn’t walk, and suffered from diabetes and heart disease, due to longtime torture. His muscles contracted and he was in bed all the time,” said Huang.

However, Huang believed Li had been doing better in the past 12 months. "His health was improving and he remained hopeful. He was happy when we told him we believed the 1989 movement would be redressed soon." 

Too outspoken: ‘I’m not afraid of death’
But Li may have been too confident that past wrongs would be righted soon. In an interview on June 4, the 23rd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown, with i-CABLE, a Hong Kong based news channel, Li was extremely outspoken in his description of his torture during his various prison terms. 

"The prison had their own tailored handcuffs, smaller than your wrists,” Li explained. “They used pliers to handcuff me, and that was almost like clamping my wrist bones with pliers. When they did that I almost lost consciousness and couldn’t see anymore." 

In the two-minute-long video interview, Li, who appeared physically deteriorated, said he didn’t regret what he did. "Every man has a share of responsibility for the fate of his country. I’m not afraid of death, if that would fasten China’s process to enter a multi-party and democratic society." 

When asked about the candle vigil on the night of the anniversary in Hong Kong, Li said, "I hope Hong Kong’s memorial will spread all over China," with his arm waving firmly in the air and a very thick Hunan accent, "I hope it’s remembered by all Chinese people." 

Two days after the interview he was found dead in his hospital room. 

‘Everything seemed fine’ two days before
Another longtime friend of Li’s also expressed disbelief that he would ever take his own life. 

"Everything seemed fine when I visited him on June 4," Zhu Chengzhi, a long-term activist and former school mate of Li’s, told NBC News in a phone interview Thursday. 

"We talked about many things, like Syria deporting foreign ambassadors. He was in a good mood, and seemed to be more open minded since last May,” said Zhu. “As a close friend, I don’t believe he would commit suicide." 

Zhu also said in another interview that just one day before his death, Li asked his sister to buy him a radio so he could listen to the news.

Zhou Zhirong, a local leader of China’s legal, but powerless, "Democratic Party", is organizing a "committee of investigation into the death of Li Wangyang," under the risk of being arrested himself for doing so. 

"I have no evidence whether [Li] was killed, but I think the long term persecution by the authorities led to Li’s death," said Zhou in a phone interview with NBC News Thursday. "Li Wangyang is Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela in China. I don’t believe our investigation will come to any fruition, but it will wake up the citizens and make them fight for their rights." 

NBC News calls to Shaoyang and Longhui police for comment on Li’s death went unanswered.  

As of Thursday afternoon 2,700 people, including prominent Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei, scholars, lawyers and writers, had signed an online petition to step up pressure on China to investigate Li’s death, according to Reuters.  

Horace Lu contributed to this report.

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The family of a 58-year-old Japanese woman who set herself on fire after the 2011 quake and tsunami will file a lawsuit against the operator of a nuclear plant that went into meltdown after the giant wave hit, local media reports say.

They will seek $910,000 in damages in the death of Hamako Watanabe from the Tokyo Electric Power Co., according to The Japan Times and The Mainichi. They plan to file the lawsuit -- which would be the first over a suicide linked to the nuclear crisis -- on May 18 in Fukushima District Court.

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Her husband, Mikio Watanabe, 61, said his wife suffered depression in the aftermath of the accident on March 11, 2011.

The couple lived about 25 miles from the Fukushima power plant and their home had been designated as being within a planned evacuation zone. She killed herself at a garbage incinerator after going back to clean the house in Kawamata, The Japan Times said, citing sources. 

"The accident changed everything in our lives,” Watanabe told The Mainichi. “I decided to go to court because I thought no more victims should cry themselves to sleep."

The couple had moved around after the 9.0 quake and ensuing tsunamis struck, triggering meltdowns at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant and leaving nearly 16,000 dead.

As of last Saturday, Japan had shut down the last of its 50 usable nuclear reactors amid strong opposition from the public and local governments to keeping them up and running, The Associated Press reported.

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Hamako Watanabe's workplace was shuttered after the tsunami, and she began to show signs of insomnia and had a poor appetite. A group of lawyers representing victims of the nuclear crisis said her depression and suicide were due to the nuclear disaster, The Mainichi reported.

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Tepco declined to make comment to the newspapers, though the family notified the utility on April 20 of its intention to file the lawsuit. Tepco said in a letter dated May 1 that it would consider the matter.

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ASOLO, Italy – On Tuesday, Generoso Armenante, a 49-year-old former security guard at a convenience store in the southern town of Salerno, left home after having lunch with his wife – and quietly found a secluded spot where he hanged himself. 

Armenante had been fired more than a year ago, and had been struggling to find another job ever since. Next to his body he left a letter: “I decided to end it because I am a failure. I can’t live without work.” 

Unfortunately, he is not alone. Tens of other Italians have also chosen to take their own lives in response to the strain of the economic crisis and the consequent austerity measures. 

On Tuesday, two other people committed suicide, apparently due to financial hardship. A 60-year-old businessman in Milan hanged himself from a tree after failing to repay his debts.

And a 64-year-old bricklayer in Salerno, who lost his job around Christmas, shot himself in the chest. He left a similar message: “I can’t live without a job.”

The three men are casualties of the debt crisis that has pushed Italy’s economy to the brink over the past year and put considerable strain on most Italians, especially those who own or work for small businesses. At least 34 people have killed themselves citing economic reasons since the start of the year, according to the Italian Association of Small Businesses. 

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‘If my business fails, I fail with it’
A dramatic hike in taxes, combined with large cuts in public spending, a clampdown on tax evasion and a credit crunch from banks have pushed many Italian businesses to the brink of bankruptcy. 

Some have stuck to the old Italian script, griping about the government measures at the local cafe over a cappuccino and hoping for better times. But others have seen no way out, and have opted for death.  

The most affected region is the relatively prosperous Veneto in the northeast of Italy, home of Venice and an abundance of businessmen. 

In a part of the country that has had a reputation for skilled merchants since Venice was a maritime republic, as many as one in 10 own their own business. Some of the most recognized Italian brands, such as Benetton and Diesel, originate from the area. 

“My business is like my family,” Massimo Zappia, who owns a window frame business in Asolo, a town about 20 miles north of Venice, told NBC News. “I feel responsible for each of my employees. If my business fails, I fail with it.” 

Zappia, 42, blames the credit crisis for some of his woes as a small business owner.  “These days it takes six months for banks to make their mind up for small loans of just a few thousand dollars. And as a businessman, I feel left alone.” 

Struggling to ‘soldier on’
This feeling of failure and loneliness is at the very heart of acts of desperation among the business community in Italy. The message left by Armenante, the security guard who hanged himself on Tuesday is the same mantra repeated by workers and businessmen who either tried to kill themselves and lived to tell the tale or by those who thought about trying, but found other reasons to live. 

Giovanni, who is in his mid-40s and also lives in Asolo, admits that he thought about ending his life after failing to repay a debt of $25,000. The self-employed plumber, who asked that his last name not be used, told NBC News that he only stopped himself because he didn’t want his family to pay for his mistakes, adding that he has a disabled son and a wife with a history of psychological problems.

“It was a dark moment, and I thought there was no way out,” he said. “They strangled me economically; I just can’t keep up with repayments. I got to the point where I couldn’t go back home and look at my wife and children in the eyes, and tell them I didn’t know how to carry on,” he said. 

“There are moments when you think that there is an easy way out. It only takes a moment to die. But then you think of your family and you realize you can’t. You just need to soldier on.”

To help ease the problem, a workers’ association near Asolo started a helpline for people in distress. They received at least 60 calls in their first two months of activity, but say that it’s worried families who tend to call rather than the businessmen themselves. 

“It’s their wives that call the most, because businessmen around here are very proud,” said Stefano Zanatta, president of Confartigianato Veneto, a local business association. “They wouldn’t admit to having a problem until it becomes so big they can’t tackle it anymore.”

Some, however, do call. “Once we got a call from a businessman who couldn’t even afford to send his daughter to school,” Zanatta said. “We offer them psychological support and financial advice before it’s too late.” 

Zanatta says that he expected a dramatic hike in the number of calls during the month of June. That’s the deadline for filing tax returns in Italy, and the time when many businessmen may realize they just can’t survive the economic crisis.  

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ATHENS -- An elderly Greek's suicide outside parliament has quickly become a symbol of the pain of austerity and has been seized upon by opponents of the budget cuts imposed by Greece's international lenders.

Dimitris Christoulas, 77, shot himself in the head on Wednesday after declaring that financial troubles pushed him over the edge. A suicide note said the retired pharmacist preferred to die than scavenge for food.

The highly public -- and symbolic -- nature of the suicide prompted an outpouring of sympathy from ordinary Greeks, who held a protest march and set up an impromptu shrine with notes condemning the crisis at the spot where he killed himself.

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The BBC reported that violence flared at the demonstration on Wednesday night, with some protesters hurling Molotov cocktails at police. They responded by firing tear gas.

"As you walk around the streets of Athens and beyond you can see the social fabric tearing," the BBC's Mark Lowen said.

The conservative newspaper Eleftheros Typos called the victim a "martyr for Greece" and said his act was filled with "profound political symbolism" that could "shock Greek society and the political world and awaken their conscience" in the weeks before a parliamentary election that will determine Greece's future.

'Family man'
Anger was directed as much at politicians as it was at the austerity medicine prescribed by foreign lenders in return for aid to lift the country out of its worst economic crisis since the Second World War.

"It's horrible. We shouldn't have reached this point. The politicians in parliament who brought us here should be punished for this," said Anastassia Karanika, a 60-year-old retiree.

The head of the Attica Pharmacists' Union, Constantinos Lourantos reportedly told Skai radio that Christoulas was "a calm, family man."

With the tragedy occurring barely a month before elections are expected in Greece, smaller parties opposed to harsh spending cuts included in the country's second bailout were quick to point the finger at bigger parties backing the rescue.

"Those who should have committed suicide -- who should have committed suicide a long time ago -- are the politicians who knowingly decided to bring this country and its people to this state of affairs," said Panos Kammenos, a conservative lawmaker who recently set up the Independent Greeks anti-austerity party.

Smaller parties like the Independent Greeks have been riding high in opinion polls at the expense of the two main co-ruling parties, the conservative New Democracy and socialist PASOK, backing the bailout.

The two big parties are together expected to take less than 40 percent of the vote. Losing more voters to the smaller parties could put them at risk of not having enough seats in parliament to forge a pro-bailout coalition again.

That in turn would have profound implications for Greece's finances, given continued aid from European partners and the International Montary Fund is contingent on Greece's new government pushing through reforms demanded as part of the bailout.

Sorrow
New Democracy and PASOK, which have ruled Greece for decades, expressed their sorrow for the tragedy. Political opponents attacked them for joining in the mourning.

"Shame on them. The accomplices responsible for the suffering and despair of the Greek people ... should at least keep quiet in the face of the hideous results of the capitalist crisis and their policies, instead of pretending to be saviors and sensitive," the KKE Communist party said.

Resentment is growing in Greece over repeated rounds of wage and pension cuts that have compounded the pain from a slump which has seen the economy shrink by a fifth since 2008.

Unemployment has surged to a record 21 percent -- twice the eurozone average -- with one out of two young people without a job. The number of suicides has surged and many Greeks feel ordinary people like the retired pharmacist are being forced to pay for a crisis that was not of their making.

Economy-related suicides hit Italy
Meanwhile, an Italian man shot himself dead on Wednesday because his company was going bust, following a wave of economy-related suicides in the country which one opposition politician blamed on Prime Minister Mario Monti's reforms.

The 59-year-old Rome-based construction firm owner left a note apologizing to family members and explaining that his business had failed, police said.

A day earlier, a 78-year-old woman in Sicily jumped to her death because her monthly pension payments had been reduced. On Monday, a picture-frame maker hanged himself because of economic difficulties.

And last week, two men set themselves on fire in northern Italy due to financial woes. Both survived, one with severe burns.

Opposition politician Antonio Di Pietro, leader of the Italy of Values (IDV) party, criticized the government's reform agenda in parliament, and said Monti had the suicides of people who can't make it to the end of the month "on his conscience".

At a news conference on Wednesday, Monti refused to reply to the comments from Di Pietro, a fiery former anti-corruption magistrate, who was one of the harshest critics of former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

Italy is struggling with a recession, rising unemployment and increasingly severe austerity measures.

Reuters and msnbc.com staff contributed to this report.

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A retired Greek pharmacist shot himself dead outside Greece's parliament Wednesday, saying he refused to scrounge for food in the garbage, touching a nerve among ordinary Greeks feeling the brunt of the country's economic crisis.

The public suicide by the 77-year-old in the center of Athens quickly triggered an outpouring of sympathy in a country where one in five is jobless and a sense of national humiliation has accompanied successive rounds of salary and pension cuts.

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Just hours after the death, an impromptu shrine with candles, flowers and hand-written notes protesting the crisis sprung up in the central Syntagma square where the suicide occurred. Dozens of bystanders gathered to pay their respects.

One note nailed to a tree said "Enough is enough", while another asked "Who will be the next victim?"

"This is a human tragedy," government spokesman Pantelis Kapsis said as politicians in parliament decried the death.

Acts of suicide have been instrumental in the past in provoking popular protest. A Tunisian vegetable seller triggered the start of the so-called "Arab Spring" by setting himself on fire in December 2010.

Witnesses said the man put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger after yelling out: "I have debts, I can't stand this anymore."

Another passerby told Greek television the man said, "I don't want to leave my debts to my children."

A suicide note found in his coat pocket blamed politicians and financial troubles for driving him to take his life, police said.

Compared government to Nazi collaborators
The government had "annihilated any hope for my survival and I could not get any justice. I cannot find any other form of struggle except a dignified end before I have to start scrounging for food from the trash," the note said.

“I can’t find another way to react apart from putting a dignified end to things before I start looking through garbage in order to survive and before I become a burden for my child,” the note added, according to reports cited by ekathimerini.com, which named the dead man as Dimitris Christoulas.

In his note, Christoulas compared the current government in Greece to the administration that collaborated with the Nazi occupation during World War II, ekathimerini.com added.

The president of the pharmacists' union in the broader Attica region, Costas Lourantos, said he recalled meeting the man several years ago and was struck by his dignified manner.

"When dignified people like him are brought to this state, somebody must answer for it," said Lourantos. "There is a moral instigator to this crime - which is the government that has brought people to such despair."

Second pharmacist says she's next
Shortly after news of the man's death, Lourantos says he received an anonymous call from a pharmacist saying she would be next to follow suit.

"I am now frantically looking to find out who it was so we can stop her," Lourantos said.

The busy square, through which thousands pass by during the morning commute hours when the suicide occurred, was cordoned off while the body was taken away.

Greece is stumbling through its worst post-World War Two economic crisis as austerity measures demanded by foreign lenders in exchange for financial aid push the country into its fifth year of recession.

The government last year said suicides had increased 40 percent over the previous two years as the worsening crisis drives ordinary Greeks to despair.

With financial hardship fast becoming an unavoidable facet of life for many, some Greeks said the pharmacist's public suicide would not be the last.

"This is the point to which they've brought us," asked 54-year old Maria Parashou, who rushed to the square to pay her respects after reading about the suicide. "They've cut our salaries, they've humiliated us. I have one daughter who is unemployed and my husband has lost half of his income, but I won't allow myself to lose hope."

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Updated at 8:30 p.m. ET: The president of Somalia's Olympic committee and the head of the country's soccer federation were among the at least six people killed by a female suicide bomber at Mogadishu's newly reopened national theater Wednesday.

Sports official Shafici Mohyadin said the two were killed when the blast hit the first-anniversary celebration of Somalia's satellite television channel. The officials were Aden Yabarow Wiish, the president of the Somali Olympic Committee, and Said Mohamed Nur, head of the Somali Football Federation.

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Al-Shabab insurgents claimed responsibility for the blast in yet another stark reminder of the fragile security in the capital, Mogadishu.

The bombing was an apparent attempt to kill the Prime Minister Abdiweli Mohamed Ali at the TV celebration.

While the al-Qaida-allied militants pulled their fighters out of the capital last August, they have struck targets regularly in the heart of the coastal city using roadside bombs, mortars and suicide bombers.

A soldier guarding the theater said the bomber had been stopped but the premier's security team had insisted she be allowed in because she was carrying police ID.

"The suicide bomber was a young, slim lady with plaited hair. She wore a veil and carried a police identity card," Mohamed Ali, a soldier, told Reuters.

"She sat under the tree in front of the theater for a while. She stood and went toward the theater when she heard the voice of the PM. We were suspicious and shouted 'stop'. She wanted to target the PM. We stopped her. But the PM's guards inside shouted 'let her come in' because she had a police identity card in her hand. And all of a sudden we heard the explosion."

Ali Muse, the head of Mogadishu's ambulance service, earlier said at least 10 people were killed and dozens wounded, including the country's national planning minister, although the higher death toll could not be verified.

Corpses were strewn across the floor of the theater and some of the dead were still in their seats, a Reuters reporter at the scene said. Ambulance workers collected the bodies and sirens wailed as the wounded were rushed to hospitals.

Al-Shabab said it had targeted government officials and lawmakers with explosives planted ahead of the event, and denied that it had used a suicide bomber.

"We were behind the theater blast. We targeted the infidel ministers and legislators, and they were the casualties of today," Sheikh Abdiasis Abu Musab, the spokesman for al-Shabab's military operations, told Reuters.

In a statement, the White House expressed its condolences to the Somali people Wednesday, adding that the country had "made great strides in the past months to improve security and rebuild Mogadishu after two decades of civil strife." Al-Shabab is an obstacle in the path of this progress, the statement read.

British Prime Minister David Cameron called the bombing "sickening" and acknowledged the "difficult moment" for everyone involved with Somalia's Olympics efforts.

International Olympic Committee said of Wiish and Nur, "Both men were engaged in improving the lives of Somalian people through sport and we strongly condemn such an act of barbarism. Our thoughts are with the Somalian sporting community who lost two great leaders, and with the families of the victims."

Mogadishu's national theater closed during the early 1990s as the city was engulfed by civil war and terrorism. Many saw its re-opening as a symbolic step on the city's road to normality.

Public entertainment, including theater, were frowned upon by the al-Shabab militants forced out of large parts of the city last year.

Directors had planned to use the theater to stage plays reflecting the transition toward peace, which many parts of the country have recently enjoyed.

NBC News, msnbc.com staff and Reuters contributed to this report.

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KABUL, Afghanistan -- A number of Afghan national army soldiers have been arrested inside the country’s defense ministry over a foiled suicide bomb plot, officials told NBC News.

The soldiers were held on Monday afternoon along with 11 suicide bomb vests in a guard box in the building in the capital, Kabul, army officials said on Tuesday.

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Afghan news web site Khaama also reported the arrests, saying the incident raises fresh concerns over infiltration of militants among the country’s Afghan security forces.

There were no further details immediately available.

Tim Marshall, foreign editor of UK channel Sky News, said that the incident was serious, and showed that the Taliban are determined to chase NATO out of the country.

"The fact that these arrests took place within the walls of the defense ministry illustrates the level of insurgent penetration within the Afghanistan establishment and just tells you -- gives a signal of -- what is likely to happen when NATO leaves," he said.

Afghan massacre suspect's wife: 'He did not do this'

The arrests came on the same day that at least three NATO service members were shot dead by Afghan security forces in two separate attacks.

A gunman wearing an Afghan army uniform killed two NATO troops in southern Afghanistan, while another was shot in eastern Afghanistan by an alleged member of the Afghan Local Police.

The attacks brought to 16 the number of NATO-led forces killed so far this year in what appeared to be attacks by members of Afghan forces.

Meanwhile, support for the war in Afghanistan has dropped sharply among both Republicans and Democrats, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll published Tuesday.

The survey found that more than two-thirds of those polled — 69 percent — thought that the United States should not be at war in Afghanistan, the New York Times reported.

PhotoBlog: 12 die in Quran-burning protests in Afghanistan

Just four months ago, 53 percent said that Americans should no longer be fighting in the conflict, it said.

It added that the increased disillusionment was even more pronounced when respondents were asked their impressions of how the war was going. The poll found that 68 percent thought the fighting was going “somewhat badly” or “very badly,” compared with 42 percent who had those impressions in November.

The poll was conducted by telephone from March 21 to 25 with 986 adults nationwide.

Akbar Shinwari, NBC News in Kabul, and msnbc.com staff also contributed to this report.

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Two senior journalists working for Rupert Murdoch's News International have attempted suicide as pressure mounts at the scandal-hit publisher of the now-defunct News of the World, according to media reports.

The suicide attempts follow weeks of intense scrutiny of the role of The Sun, another Murdoch paper, in the phone-hacking scandal and police bribery case.

The man and the woman, who were reportedly involved in separate incidents, were rescued in time, a friend of one of them said, according to a report Tuesday on stuff.co.nz. The two journalists have been checked into the hospital, according to a report Tuesday by the Financial Times. The newspaper reported that their care is being paid for by News International.  

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"It was not a suicide pact," the friend told the New Zealand-based news organization. "The attempts were not simultaneous and there is no suggestion of a pact."

Eleven current and former staff of the Sun, Britain's best-selling daily tabloid, have been arrested this year on suspicion of bribing police or civil servants for tip-offs, Reuters reported Tuesday.

Their arrests have come as a result of information provided to the police by the Management and Standards Committee, or MSC, a body set up by parent company News Corp to facilitate police investigations and liaise with the courts.

The work of the MSC, which was set up to be independent of the conglomerate's British newspaper arm News International, has caused bitterness among staff, many of whom feel betrayed by an employer they have loyally served.

"People think that they've been thrown under a bus," one News International employee told Reuters. "They're beyond angry - there's an utter sense of betrayal, not just with the organization but with a general lynch-mob hysteria."

News International, the European arm of Murdoch's empire, is facing multiple criminal investigations and civil court cases as well as a public inquiry into press standards after long-simmering criticism of its practices came to a head last July.

Politicians once close to Murdoch, including Prime Minister David Cameron, turned their backs on him and demanded answers after the Guardian newspaper revealed the News of the World had hacked the phone of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.

The London Evening Standard reported that other News International journalists are “terribly stressed and many are on the edge.” The company has reportedly offered psychiatric help to any journalist who wants help.  

This article includes reporting by Reuters and msnbc.com staff.

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MOSCOW -- After a rash of teenage suicides in Russia, including those of two 14-year-olds who plunged to their deaths from a 14-story building while holding hands, experts are urging the government to take immediate action.

“Children are constantly under pressure,” Lyudmila  Rubina, a Russian child psychiatrist, told Al Jazeera. “They can’t find a common language to express their feelings at home and sometimes they are physically punished. There is no support at school and schools don’t want to play any role in the child's upbringing.”

Russia has the world's third-highest rate of suicide among teenagers ages 15 to 19, with about 1,500 taking their own lives every year, according to a recent UNICEF report. The rate is higher only in the neighboring former Soviet republics of Belarus and Kazakhstan.

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In recent years, there have been 19 to 20 suicides annually per 100,000 teenagers in Russia — three times the world average, Boris Polozhy of the respected Serbsky psychiatric center in Moscow said Friday.

"Until the highest authorities see suicide as a problem, our joint efforts will be unlikely to yield any results," Polozhy said.

In the southwestern Siberian region of Tuva, the rate reaches a staggering 120 suicides per 100,000 teenagers, while the nearby region of Buryatiya has an average rate of 77 per 100,000. Both regions are impoverished and have high crime and alcoholism rates.

'Better kill me'
Two 14-year-old girls, Liza Petsylya and Nastia Korolyova, killed themselves this week by jumping off the roof of a 14-story building while holding hands. They had skipped classes for two weeks and were terrified of what their parents would do to them once they found out, Russian media quoted their friends as saying.

Several other recent teen suicides have been reported elsewhere in Russia.

Experts say that domestic violence and problems in schools are among the main reasons why adolescents take their lives.

Relations between Russian children and their parents are often "notable for their cruelty," said Natalya Sinyagina of the Education Ministry's Center for Education Issues in Moscow. "(But) school is also not the safest place for kids."

Russia's public schools are underfunded, are staffed with poorly paid teachers and have been widely criticized for neglecting the issue of bullying among children.

"We've seen cases when a child says, 'Better kill me, I'm not going to school,'" Sinyagina said.

'Lend a helping hand'
Internet-savvy and handy with cell phones and computers, Russian teens spend hours on social networking websites and idolize pop stars just like teens elsewhere in the world. Experts say some teens romanticize early death and suicide, perceiving them as games, and are attracted by online suicide clubs that list the best ways to take your life.

"Video games and information found online have devaluated death," said Urvan Parfentyev of the Moscow-based Center for Safe Internet.

"I have seen websites that offer a thousand ways of killing oneself," said Zurab Kikelidze, Health Ministry's chief psychologist.

Pavel Astakhov, the government-appointed children's rights ombudsman, said school psychologists should find and help suicidal teenagers on social networking websites and crack down on cyber-bullying, another widespread cause of teenage suicides.

"Each suicide case must be thoroughly investigated to find out what caused it: whether it was the situation inside the family, problems at school or conflicts with classmates," Astakhov told Itar-Tass, Russia’s news agency. "In critical situations, children cannot be left alone, face to face with their problems. The entire society must lend a helping hand, and first of all, professionals –- psychologists and psychiatrists. No preventive efforts will be successful without their help."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Some 50 people a year kill themselves on London’s subway, and in order to keep the trains running their bodies are often stored in cleaning closets until someone can claim them, a new television documentary reveals.

Several subway workers, disgusted with the practice, spoke to the documentary filmmaker on condition of anonymity, Britain’s Telegraph reported on Thursday.

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The documentary, called "Confessions from the Underground" quotes one disturbed emergency worker as saying he put a body in area where industrial trash containers are stored.

“Putting a body in there, not in the bin, in with the bins, it’s not really respectful,” the man said, according to the Telegraph. “However, do I keep the station shut until the coroner and his guys gets there and inconvenience the rest of London?”

In other interview, a worker said janitors who went to a closet to use a mob or a bucket sometimes encounter a “poor unfortunate person’s body there.”

A spokesman for London’s Underground told the Telegraph that counseling was made available to workers if needed.

The documentary was scheduled to be broadcast Thursday night in Britain.

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