The sort of film, it being French, that somehow you feel Hollywood wouldn’t have managed to get right.

Sunni extremists seized control of a remote village north-east of Baghdad in a fierce battle with residents who pleaded for rescue by Iraqi army and police as they tried to defend their homes, the deputy provincial governor said today.

A bomb ripped through a police bus in a crowded civilian area in Afghanistan this morning, leaving about 30 people dead or wounded, an official and witnesses said.

A US soldier and four Afghan police officers were killed in separate rebel attacks, while at least two Afghan civilians were injured by gunfire following the bombing of an American patrol in the east of the country, American and Afghan officials said today.

Israel confirmed its helicopters targeted a Palestinian militant involved in the death of six Israeli soldiers and Israeli media described the attack today as a vengeance killing for flaunting the severed head of an Israeli victim.

SUSPECTED Islamic militants killed four people in their sleep in an upsurge of violence that also claimed three other lives in Indian-controlled Kashmir.

Suspected Islamic militants fatally shot four people in their sleep in an upsurge of violence also claimed three other lives in Indian-controlled Kashmir.

At least 28 Iraqis have died in fighting between British troops and gunmen loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, hospital officials said today.

At least 10 people have been killed in a car bomb blast outside a Baghdad hotel.

TALIBAN fighters ambushed a truck full of government soldiers in the southern province of Zabul, killing several, the provincial governor and a Taliban spokesman said yesterday.

West Ham manager Glenn Roeder today named England Under-19 defender Glen Johnson and Trinidad and Tobago-born midfield prospect Brent Rahim in his squad to visit Chesterfield in the Worthington Cup second round tomorrow.

The head of the London mosque where alleged ‘‘shoe’’ bomber Richard Reid worshipped today warned that other Muslim youths were in danger of falling prey to extremists.