SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP):

A spa has found a use for ash spewed from the volcano that devastated the Caribbean island of Montserrat: A new line of soaps that combine the fallout with rosemary, honey and coconut.

Lorenzo Cassell and his wife Anne, who run the Emerald Spa, say the gritty material belched out every few months by the Soufriere Hills volcano, has a therapeutic quality.

"I have always had a passion for experimenting with the creation of new products based on what is available in the natural environment," Anne Cassell said yesterday.

Currently available in gift shops on the tiny British territory, the couple hopes to make the soap available in other countries and on the Internet this year.

UNITED NATIONS (CMC):

The United Nations says the first batch of an expected 350 additional UN peacekeepers has arrived in the Haiti.

The Nepalese troops join 7,200 military personnel from 17 countries already serving in Haiti.

In a statement, the UN said that the light infantry battalion would be used for operations in Port-au-Prince, as part of the plan by the UN peacekeeping force in Haiti's (MINUSTAH) to intensify efforts against criminal gangs operating in the capital city.

"I am determined to increase the pressure on the gangs who have been holding the innocent people of Haiti hostage for so long," said Force Commander, Major General Carlos Albert Dos Santos Cruz.

ST JOHN'S, Antigua (CMC)

India will conduct feasibility studies in the areas of health and information technology with the aim of assisting the Antigua and Barbuda government in establishing a central sewage system and computer access centres across the island, according to an official statement issued here.

It said that Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer had reached an agreement with India's Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh for the project.

It quoted Spencer as saying that the feasibility studies would "give both governments a better understanding of the levels of assistance that will be needed to establish the sewage system in St. John's and complete the computer access centres expansion programme".

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC)

Police were searching for the killers of an elderly couple, who were found bludgeoned at their home in West Trinidad on Tuesday.

Police said that 70-year-old Clyde Commissiong, a retired auto manager. and his 69-year old wife, Denise, were apparently killed during a robbery and that their bodies had been discovered at their Cascade home by their daughter, Simone, who had returned to the house to collect her two children, aged eight and six and a half months.