Mexico City/Geneva  - A spreading lethal virus that has claimed 68 lives in Mexico and infected at least 11 people in the United States prompted the World Health Organisation (WHO) to send out a global alarm Saturday.

WHO officials raised the possibility of an emerging pandemic even as countries in the region, including Nicaragua, Colombia and Brazil, tightened airport controls over people and goods arriving from Mexico.

Mexico City  - The death toll from a spreading wave of influenza in Mexico has climbed to 81, Health Minister Jose Angel Cordova Villalobos said Saturday evening.

Twenty of the lethal infections have been definitively linked to the newly emerging strain of swine flu, he said. All told, 1,324 people have been admitted to hospital for examination.

In the United States, 11 non-lethal cases of a similar strain of influenza have been identified by the Centres for Disease Control, with tests pending on another 10 cases.

Mexico City - A man took hostages on a plane late Sunday at the airport in Montego Bay, Jamaica,

Washington  - The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Friday approved a one-year loan of 47 billion dollars for Mexico to help the country weather the global economic crisis.

Mexico is the first country to agree to a loan under the IMF's so- called flexible credit line, a new programme that was backed by leaders of the world's 20 leading economies during a summit in London earlier this month.

Mexico City  - US President Barack Obama arrived in Mexico Thursday for an overnight visit to meet with Mexican President Felipe Calderon.

"Geography has made us neighbours. History has made us friends. Economics has made us partners and necessity has made us allies," Calderon said as he welcomed Obama, quoting the late US president John F Kennedy.

Discussions are set to focus on drug trafficking and crime, as the death toll in Mexico's drug wars has soared to more than 7,000 since January 2008.