The US has condemned as harassment of journalists an attack by Kenyan police on a newspaper and a television station in Nairobi.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said al-Qaida is trying to establish a presence in the West Bank and Gaza, and he has ordered his security forces to prevent it.

The Islamic Jihad militant group has rejected a call from Mahmoud Abbas to halt rocket attacks on Israeli towns – dealing a new blow to the Palestinian leader and prompting a new round of Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip.

Croatia’s top war crimes fugitive has been jailed in Madrid following his capture at a luxury resort on the Canary Islands after four years on the run, officials said.

Two people were killed as police fought with voters trying to break the police blockades of polling stations in opposition strongholds today, the final day of Egypt’s parliamentary elections.

Spain asked the United States in March and again this week if CIA planes carrying terror suspects made stopovers at Spanish airports, and both times the Americans said they had no record of such flights, the government said.

The discovery of 173 mostly Sunni Arab detainees in an Iraqi Interior Ministry basement lockup – malnourished and showing signs of torture – appeared to validate some of the long-standing grievances and has raised questions about the Shiite-led government’s commitment to democracy and human rights.

US president George Bush called on the United Nations to convene a session as soon as possible to deal with a UN report implicating Syrian officials in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri.

Syria’s interior minister was found dead in his office, days before the release of a UN report that could implicate high-ranking Syrian officials in the murder of Lebanon’s former prime minister.

The European Union has backed away from a direct push to refer Iran to the UN Security Council this week and is now only implicitly threatening Tehran with such action, according to a document obtained today.

The US will provide 50,000 metric tons of food to North Korea in a humanitarian decision that the Bush administration said is unrelated to stalemated efforts to get Pyongyang to end its nuclear weapons programme.

WITH Syria's nearly three decades of military involvement over, Lebanon yesterday announced that the first round of parliamentary elections would be held May 29, two days before the deadline.

At least six people were killed in violent protests that broke out after the son of Togo’s late dictator was declared the winner of presidential elections, officials said today.

At least three soldiers were killed in violent protests that broke out after the son of Togo’s late dictator was declared the winner of presidential elections, officials said today.

With Syria’s nearly three decades of military involvement in Lebanon over, Lebanon today shifted its attention inward, announcing the first round of parliamentary elections would be held May 29, two days before the deadline.

POPE Benedict XVI’s leadership will be “crucial” amid the complexities of the modern world, says President Mary McAleese.

A UN report into the killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri has demanded a new international investigation after determining that Lebanon’s authorities bungled, if not outright manipulated, their probe of the killing.

Palestinian militants declared a halt to attacks on Israel for the rest of this year, their longest ever ceasefire promise and a success for Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas.

Top US and Chinese negotiators met today for discussions on luring North Korea back to nuclear disarmament talks, after Washington dismissed the North’s latest threat to resume long-range missile testing as counter-productive.

At least six Nato allies are refusing to send military instructors to help the United States train Iraqi officers, another impediment in the Bush administration’s drive for support for its effort to pacify Iraq.

At least six NATO allies are refusing to send military instructors to help the United States train Iraqi officers, another impediment in the Bush administration’s drive for support for its effort to pacify Iraq.

The White House praised the Israeli parliament’s approval of removing settlements from Gaza and part of the West Bank as a step forward in peacemaking with the Palestinians.

Troubled former world chess champion Bobby Fischer has won a temporary reprieve from deportation to the US by Japan.

An unusual Israeli attack next to a house in Gaza City killed five people, witnesses and hospital officials said, just hours before prime minister Ariel Sharon faced a crucial party test linked to his plan to pull Israeli forces and settlers out of Gaza.

Former US president Jimmy Carter and other international election monitors pledged to go the extra mile to dispel opposition claims that a failed Venezuelan referendum that sought to oust President Hugo Chavez was rigged, and to prevent further political upheaval.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell, a Republican centrist who is popular with moderate voters, will not attend the Republican convention in New York that will nominate President Bush for a second term.

Muslim countries sounded out by Saudi Arabia about sending troops to Iraq are insisting on a big reduction in US and other coalition troops in any agreement.

Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom told the White House on Friday that Iran was trying to develop longer-range missiles that could pose a threat to European nations.

Six-nation talks on Washington’s demand for North Korea to give up its nuclear ambitions ended today with no breakthrough, but envoys promised to discuss the ”first steps for de-nuclearisation” of the North before meeting again by the end of September.

Human rights groups are angry at a United Nations report that praised the US and its allies for ending years of brutality by Saddam Hussein’s regime, but did not “call coalition forces to account”.

The four westerners “slaughtered like sheep” in Iraq were private security guards hired by a US company that recruits former special forces soldiers, including ex-members of the SAS.

Terrorists and remnants of Saddam Hussein’s former regime were blamed today for the "horrific" attacks on four American contractors whose mutilated and burned bodies were dragged through the streets of the Iraqi city of Fallujah.

Iraq’s constitution was in limbo today after Shi’ite leaders refused to sign it in a last-minute dispute that wrecked a planned ceremony and marred a landmark in US plans to hand over sovereignty.

IRAN’S reformist government threatened to resign yesterday as other reformers accused hardliners of treason for disqualifying candidates in next month’s parliamentary elections.

A former senior White House official who claimed that President George Bush planned the Iraq war days after taking office could find himself at the centre of an investigation into the revealing of a secret government document.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell was undergoing surgery for prostate cancer in Washington today.

The United States reopened its diplomatic missions in Saudi Arabia today, a week after they closed because of terrorist threats.

Faced with furious criticism from the US and Europe over Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad’s assertion that Jews rule the world, Malaysia apologised today for any misunderstanding and claimed that no offence was intended.

IRAN’S powerful former president, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, has accused the US of being anti-Muslim by pressuring Tehran over its nuclear programme, the state news agency IRNA reported.