Madrid - An investigating judge has accused two aviation technicians and a maintenance chief of manslaughter in the Madrid air crash that killed 154 people on August 20, judicial sources said Thursday.

Judge Juan Javier Perez will question the three on suspicion of manslaughter on 154 counts and involuntarily causing injuries on 18 counts.

The judge also ordered the creation of a second investigating commission in addition to a civil aviation commission that has released a preliminary report on the accident.

The Spanair MD-82 jet that crashed immediately after take-off did not have its wing flaps and slats deployed, and the plane's warning system failed to inform the pilots of the problem, according to the preliminary report.

Barcelona - Spanish police detained at least four suspected Islamist extremists Thursday in the north-eastern region of Catalonia, police said.

Vienna - Ending over 400 years of all-male tradition, the Spanish Riding School in Vienna announced Wednesday it had accepted two women as apprentices to train with its famous white Lippizaner horses.

Now that they have passed a one-month trial period, 21-year-old Austrian Hannah Zeitlhofer and 17-year-old Sojourner Morrell from Britain will spend the next three to five years as students of the dressage troupe before they can advance to become "candidate riders."

Madrid - A judicial investigation into the August 20 air crash that killed 154 people in Madrid has begun hearing witnesses, Spanish judicial sources said Wednesday.

Judge Juan Javier Perez will hear witnesses, including a stewardess who saw the accident from another plane, and airport employees for several weeks.

Cordoba, Spain - Cuba is confident that Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero will become the first Spanish prime minister to make an official visit to the island since 1986, Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque said Wednesday.

Zapatero would also be the first Western European leader to visit the island since 1999, when his predecessor Jose Maria Aznar and then Portuguese president Jorge Sampaio attended an Ibero-American summit in Havana.

Perez Roque spoke in the southern Spanish city of Cordoba, which he visited after meeting his counterpart Miguel Angel Moratinos in Madrid on Tuesday.

Madrid - Spain's main Ibex-35 index reacted to the slowdown on Wall Street, slipping 1.2 per cent to 10,103 points as trading opened on Wednesday.