By Xiaoyi Shao and Michael Martina BEIJING (Reuters) - China's housing inflation accelerated to its fastest pace in April in two years, driven by a jump in prices in Beijing and Shanghai, complicating the task of policymakers trying to cool the property sector while supporting economic expansion. Average new home prices rose 4.9 percent last month from a year ago, after a year-on-year increase of 3.6 percent in March, according to Reuters calculations from data released by the National Bureau of Statistics(NBS) on Saturday. The rise was the sharpest since April 2011. ...

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea fired three short-range missiles from its east coast on Saturday, South Korea's Defense Ministry said, but the purpose of the launches was unknown. Launches by the North of short-term missiles are not uncommon, but the ministry would not speculate whether these latest launches were part of a test or training exercise. "North Korea fired short-range guided missiles twice in the morning and once in the afternoon off its east coast," an official at the South Korean Defense Ministry spokesman's office said by telephone. ...

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc said on Saturday that rockfalls were hampering rescue efforts after a tunnel collapse four days ago at its giant Indonesian copper mine, with hopes fading of finding alive any of the 23 still missing. Freeport closed the world's second largest copper mine on Wednesday, a day after a tunnel fell in on 38 workers undergoing training. Five are known to have died. Several of the 10 rescued are still in hospital. The Grasberg mine in West Papua is in one of the most remote regions of the Indonesian archipelago. ...