Typhoon Mirinae followed a similar route to a September storm, Ketsana, which dumped the heaviest rains in 40 years on Manila.

At least four people have been killed and several others are missing.

Many regions are still reeling after the worst storm-related floods in decades, which have left hundreds dead.

Mirinae, with winds of 150 km/h (93mph) and gusts of up to 186 km/h (115mph) made landfall on Quezon around midnight Friday, sweeping west, south of the capital and weakening into a tropical storm on Saturday afternoon.

It is thought to be heading in the direction of Vietnam.

‘High as rooftops’

One man was found dead and his one-year-old baby was missing after they were washed away while trying to cross an overflowing creek, news agency AFP reported.

Naval boats were sent to the town of Santa Cruz, where roads were badly flooded

Three people were reported dead and five others were missing in Laguna province just south of Manila.

In the town of Santa Cruz, hundreds of residents were seen wading through stagnant waters after the storm hit. Surrounding roads were flooded and naval boats sent to help with rescue efforts.

“The waters were really high. It was like a flashflood. It was waist deep in our area but in other areas it went as high as the rooftops,” local official Marlon Albay was quoted as saying.

Earlier, the authorities had ordered the evacuation of about 115,000 people in provinces south of the capital.

Flights cancelled

At least 10,000 left their homes in areas near rivers and the active Mayon volcano in Albay province, which the authorities feared might unleash rivers of mud and loose volcanic rock.

Officials also closed schools and grounded ferries, and trucks loaded with relief supplies were sent to northern areas in the storm’s path.

About 180 flights from Manila were cancelled.

Before the storm arrived, residents in Manial were told to prepare supplies to last 72 hours and stay indoors.

Vanessa Tobin, the representative of the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) in the Philippines, told the BBC that the rain had been very heavy in the capital early on Saturday, but that it had been replaced by strong winds.

“The reports from Manila are not as bad as had been expected,” she said. “But we are getting reports from the south… – particularly around Bicol, which was hit in 2006 by mudslides – that there has been heavy rain and has been significant damage there,” she added.

More than 900 people have been killed in the multiple storms, including Typhoon Parma, which have battered the Philippines over the last month.

In an excerpt from an e-mail from Scottish Crown Prosecution Service to the victims’ families, provided to CNN by one victim’s family member, prosecutors say the investigation is still ongoing.

“Throughout the investigation we have, at various times, taken stock of the evidence as a whole with a view to identifying further lines of inquiry that can be pursued,” the e-mail said. “Now that the appeal proceedings are at an end, a further review of the case is underway and several potential lines of inquiry, both through a ‘desktop’ (paper) exercise and consultation with forensic science colleagues are being considered.”

It continued: “Please be assured that this is not simply paying lip service to the idea of an ‘open’ case.”

The December 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, killed 270 people. One person, Abdelbaset al Megrahi, has been convicted for the bombing and was sentenced to life in prison.

In August, Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill released him on compassionate grounds because he had been diagnosed with cancer. MacAskill had authority over al Megrahi because the bomber was serving his sentence in Scotland, which runs its own judicial system.

Al Megrahi, 57, currently is being treated in a hospital in Libya.

On Sunday, a group of victims’ families launched a campaign to get the British government to open a public inquiry into the case. The group handed over a letter to 10 Downing Street, calling on Prime Minister Gordon Brown to look into the matter.

“The relatives believe that a public inquiry offers the last realistic hope of finding out how and why their loved ones perished,” said a posting on the group’s blog. “They are worried that without it their chances of learning the truth could end when Megrahi dies.”

Pamela Dix, who lost her brother in the bombing, acknowledged that the criminal investigation falls under Scottish authorities but insisted that the British government also had a responsibility.

“While the UK government does not have responsibility for the criminal investigation, it does have responsibility for foreign affairs,” Dix told CNN. “The aircraft took off from Heathrow airport, in England, and it just happened to explode over Scottish grounds.

“The previous prime minister, Tony Blair, assured the relatives that he would leave ‘no stone unturned’ in the efforts to get to the bottom of what happened. Our current prime minister should take forward this commitment.”

A spokeswoman for 10 Downing Street acknowledged receiving the letter and said there would be a response, but that “this happened on Scottish soil, thus it is up to the Scottish authorities to handle.”

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband on Sunday rejected claims that his government should get involved.

“This is rightly a matter for the Scottish authorities,” Miliband said. “We’ve always said that this was a terrible crime where justice must be done and every avenue pursued. The investigation was never formally closed and that’s why it’s wholly appropriate that if there are grounds for taking new steps, that they should be taken.”

He went on to say that the case was investigated by the Scottish authorities: “It’s right that they pursue the investigation on a criminal basis and if there’s any suggestion of an inquiry that should be a matter for the Scots, because that’s the way our system works. But you can see from today’s announcement that the commitment in Scotland remains real in respect of justice in this case and that must be right.”

Dix called Miliband’s comments “entirely inappropriate” in attempting to shift responsibility away from his government.

It was followed by a pinch-hit single by Jim Thome — the only ball that left the infield — and a walk by Rafael Furcal that loaded the bases before Matt Kemp struck out. That brought on the left-handed Happ, who was baseball’s best pitcher with runners in scoring position this season, to face Ethier, who batted .194 against lefties this year.

But Ethier has delivered in the clutch, with six game-ending hits this season, including two against the Phillies. And he did this time, too, taking a 3-2 pitch low.

“It just seems like we’ve got that home magic right now,” said Dodgers catcher Russell Martin, recalling the good fortune of Matt Holliday’s dropped line drive against St. Louis in the division series.

For most of the afternoon, the magic belonged in the right arm of Martinez. He outdueled Vicente Padilla, whose only blemish was a home run by Ryan Howard, and turned in the type of I’ll-show-you performance that Martinez has seemed to routinely deliver during his career. And Friday, he had the perfect stage — a playoff game, his first in five years, at Dodger Stadium, the home of the team that devastated Martinez by trading him away as a 21-year-old.

That trade, to Montreal at the end of the 1993 season, in which the Dodgers acquired Delino DeShields, may be the worst in the team’s history. While they got little from DeShields and went through the likes of Kevin Brown, Hideo Nomo, Brad Penny and Jason Schmidt in search of an ace, Martinez won three Cy Young Awards.

Martinez gave the Dodgers — and all the other teams who passed on signing him last winter after his contract with the Mets expired — an afternoon of regret.

“This is the kind of game I want to be here for the team that picked me up,” Martinez said. “This is one classic example of the things I’ve always wanted to do.”

Martinez will turn 38 this month, and his fastball is past its prime. But Martinez has a deep reservoir of guile. The Dodgers were not baited into swinging at pitches that nibbled beyond the edge of the strike zone, often staying ahead in the count, and it was not until the fifth inning that a Dodger swung and missed at a pitch. But they rarely took smooth, balanced swings.

Even Manny Ramirez, his old friend and former Red Sox teammate, was fooled while striking out in the seventh, miles ahead of a changeup.

“Pedro’s that kind of pitcher — he don’t need to throw 95 to get people out,” Ramirez said with a smile. “He showed me that today.”

The only hits the Dodgers managed in seven innings were Martin’s fisted blooper and Kemp’s infield hit that bounced off Martinez’s glove. Martinez did not walk a batter.

“To us, it’s like art,” Martinez said. “You enjoy painting that little piece of wood. I enjoy every little bit of it, and when it gets more difficult, the more we enjoy it. I’m that kind of person. I see the crowd going bananas, and it feels like everything’s going in slow motion.”

The only time Martinez’s heart was sent racing was his final pitch, on which James Loney sent a fly ball to deep left-center field. When Phillies center fielder Shane Victorino, his right hand extended to feel for the wall, caught the ball, it elicited a raised fist from Martinez as he walked off the field.

Manager Charlie Manuel told him that would be enough and gave him a hug, as did several other Phillies.

But when Martinez left, the Phillies’ good fortune vanished with him.

Cindy Hickey, from left, Nora Shourd and Laura Fattal go to New York City to visit the Iranian mission.

Laura, Nora Shourd and Cindy Hickey have been brought together because their children have been held in Iran since July 31. They have had no contact with their families.

The mothers have put their lives on hold to get them freed.

“We are missing our kids very much,” says Fattal.

Hickey adds, “We’re moms, these are our kids … We have to be strong, we have to be grounded, and we have to do what needs to be done.”

The women decided what needed to be done was make a direct appeal through the Iranian mission in New York. To do that, they printed out petitions containing 2,500 signatures.

On the eve of delivering them, they worked in their room with boxes sprawled out on a bed as they stacked the petitions inside of them. They recognize names from preschool carpools and baby-sitting co-ops.

Nora Shourd read some of the message aloud.

“Releasing Sarah and Shane and Josh would be a merciful and compassionate gesture that their families would appreciate greatly.”

Another one reads: “The Iranians need to understand the young people are adventurous and intend no harm to their people.”

Cindy Hickey adds: “Before I go to bed at night, I read the petitions because they help bring strength to me.”

Hickey’s son Shane, a 27-year-old photojournalist, lives in Damascus, Syria with his girlfriend, 31-year-old Sarah Shourd, a teacher.

Pakistani soldiers patrol outside the main gate of army headquarters in Rawalpindi on Sunday.

About 45 people were injured in the explosion in the Shangla district in the volatile Swat Valley, said Syed Altaf Hussein, a senior government official in the area.

The explosion targeted a military vehicle, officials said.

The blast is the latest in a string of attacks in the country.

On Saturday, militants attacked the army headquarters in Rawalpindi, killing 11 military personnel and three civilians, according to the Pakistani military’s press office. Nine militants died in the attack.

A total of 39 hostages were freed Sunday morning after being held by five militants at the army headquarters.

Military officials said they have tightened security around army headquarters.

Baseball will never again be played in the Metrodome because on Sunday night the Yankees did what the Yankees do, and the Twins didn’t do what the Twins are supposed to do. The Twins are supposed to be the most fundamentally sound of organizations, but on Sunday, for the second game in a row, they were doomed by a crushing base-running error. On Friday in New York, it was young Carlos Gomez who was tagged out after overrunning second base a split second before Delmon Young could score a run that would have proven crucial.

On Sunday in Minnesota, it was Nick Punto — a much more experienced player than Gomez, and one whose scrappy style in many ways embodies his organization’s ethos — who thought it might be a good idea to run through his third base coach’s stop sign and try to score from second on a Denard Span infield single, with no outs and a 2-1 eighth inning deficit. Punto soon thought better of it, but it was too late, and he was tagged out as he tried to slide back into third. “This is a game where you can go from hero to goat real quick,” said a red-eyed Punto, who just five days ago made a spectacular run-saving play in the 12th inning of the Twins’ play-in game against the Tigers. “Tonight I was the goat.”

As Punto replayed his blunder over and over in his mind’s eye, the Yankees jumped up and down for a few moments in a huddle behind the pitchers’ mound after Rivera locked down the series, in what seemed to be perhaps the most routine postseason celebration ever conducted. There were no blown calls in this game, as there had been in Game 2, although home plate umpire Mark Wegner’s strike zone at times seemed to be George Soros-ian in its generosity. That high-and-wide zone helped Carl Pavano, the former Yankee free agent bust whom New York fans booed lustily when he was introduced prior to Game 1 — and perhaps the only man alive who can call a four-year stretch in which he earned $39.95 million “a black period in my career” — hold the Yankees scoreless through six and a third innings. Pavano ultimately struck out nine hitters, a Twins postseason record.

But the Yankees never pressed, and it seemed to be only a matter of time until their superior talent would help them break through. It happened in the seventh, when Alex Rodriguez crushed a 92 mile-per-hour fastball 374 feet over the rightfield wall. They took the lead two batters later, when Jorge Posada sent a 91-mile-per-hour fastball over the leftfield wall. Then, after one more out from the magnificent Andy Pettitte (6.1 innings, 3 hits, 1 earned run), manager Joe Girardi called upon his bullpen to close things out — which, with some help from Punto, it did.

“Just kind of the way you draw it up,” Girardi said as he watched his players douse each other in champagne and Budweiser tallboys in the visitors’ clubhouse after the game. “And Alex had an unbelievable series. Game 2, a monster hit. Game 1, big hits. Tonight, monster hit. That’s why he’s so great. He’s such a talented player, and he was a big part of the reason we won here.”

General manager Brian Cashman took that thought a step further: “We didn’t hit as a club, outside of Alex,” Cashman said. “We don’t sweep without him.”

Rodriguez was indeed the hero of this series: he hit .455 (5-for-11) with two home runs, three runs scored and six RBIs. But he is only the most talented and most highly paid member of an extremely talented and highly paid club, one that can simply sit back and wait for good things to happen — which they normally do. This forces opponents to become so concerned with scoring as much as they can, and being as aggressive as they can, that they do uncharacteristic things like overrunning bags in crucial situations.

The Yankees’ next opponent, the Angels, who during the regular season nearly matched them in offensive production (they scored 883 runs to the Yankees’ 915), won’t be as inclined to force themselves into making mistakes. As he fended off sprays of Bud, Girardi noted that the Yankees’ sweep of the Twins will allow them to start CC Sabathia in Friday night’s Game 1 in New York. “It’s nice,” he said. “You can set up your rotation the way you want. You want to be able to throw your ace the first game, and we can do it.” But the Yankees know even with a rotation that will be both rested and set just as they’d like it to be, they will need more consistent production out of their hitters when facing the productive Angels. The Yankees batted just .225 in this series, and Robinson Cano (.167), Johnny Damon (.083), Mark Teixeira (.167) and Hideki Matsui (.222) all struggled.

As the last of the Twins’ fans filed out of the Metrodome for the last time, an advertisement for the club’s next game appeared on the ballpark’s videoboard, which seems almost comically puny by today’s standards. “NEXT HOME GAME: TWINS VERSUS RED SOX, APRIL 12 @3:30 PM,” it read, over a picture of Target Field, the new outdoor stadium that will open in 2010. Minnesota is already looking forward to next year, and another fresh start. For the Yankees, however, the postseason is only now truly beginning.

Socialist George Papandreou is set to become Greece’s next prime minister.

“On this course, nothing is going to be easy — it will take work, hard work,” Papandreou said in his victory address. “And I will always be honest with the Greek people so that we may better solve the problems of the state.”

Sunday’s national elections were held two years before originally scheduled. Karamanlis called the elections in response to pressure from Papandreou’s Panhellenic Socialist Movement of Greece, which threatened to block the election of a president in February if no general election was held. The Greek constitution requires the two major parties to agree on the election of a president, giving either party an effective veto.

Karamanlis’ term was not due to expire until September 2011. But Papandreou insisted on new elections before the end of President Karolos Papoulias’ term as president.

The country’s ailing economy was the focus in the run up to the elections, as both candidates offered conflicting prescriptions to revive it. While Karamanlis called for cuts in spending, Papandreou proposed a massive stimulus.

Karamanlis, of the New Democracy party, congratulated Papandreou in a nationally televised concession speech.

“And like every Greek, I hope that he succeeds at the big challenge of facing up to the economic situation,” Karamanlis said. “Because this challenge, I have said many times, is a national issue.”

If Simon Cowell’s deal with Fox is a success, he’ll be the executive producer of a U.S. “X Factor.”

The Hollywood rumor mill churned all summer long about Simon Cowell’s “American Idol” contract with Fox, and it looks like a U.S. version of the UK’s “X Factor” will be thrown in to sweeten the deal.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Fox and Cowell are now said to be negotiating a deal that will not only lock Cowell in as an “Idol” judge through the 2011-12 season but will allow the acerbic arbiter to bring “X Factor” to U.S. audiences. He would serve as the executive producer.

Michelle Phillips, Denny Doherty and John Phillips, here in 1998, were members of the Mamas & the Papas.

If the song were to be updated today, it might have to be retitled “Creep Alley.”

With the claims by John’s daughter, Mackenzie, that she had an incestuous relationship with her father, the story of Phillips and his group — in music, models of California dreams and California dreamin’ — takes on a darker hue.

The story was already tangled, a motley love- and drug-soaked tale of excess set to the group’s distinctive four-part harmonies.

Phillips left his first wife, Mackenzie’s mother, Susan Adams, for 18-year-old Michelle, whom he’d met in a San Francisco club while touring in the early ’60s, according to the band’s biography on Allmusic.com.

The band’s lead male singer, Denny Doherty, later had an affair with Michelle; she was forced out of the group for a time. The fourth member, Cass Elliot, had an unrequited crush on Doherty, the biography noted.

After the Mamas & the Papas’ success with such singles as “California Dreamin’ ” and the No. 1 hit “Monday, Monday,” the Phillipses bought a Bel Air mansion from which they ruled over the Los Angeles music scene.