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Suicide attack, fighting claim 47 lives in Afghanistan

AFP, Kabul

At least 47 people were killed in suicide attack and fighting in Afghanistan on Thursday.

A suicide car bomber rammed a convoy carrying foreign troops near the airport in the Afghan capital Kabul Thursday, killing six civilians and wounding another 18, police said.

The extremist Taliban movement claimed responsibility for the blast, which happened during the morning rush-hour on one of the city's busiest roads and damaged around a dozen vehicles.

"Six civilians were martyred and 18 other civilians were wounded in the suicide car bomb attack against coalition forces," Kabul police chief General Salim Ahsas told AFP, referring to the US-led coalition.

Ahsas told AFP the blast did not harm foreign troops who were travelling on the road to Kabul's international airport when the bomb exploded.

A spokesman for the US coalition could not immediately comment on the incident.

Two armoured vehicles, apparently the target of the attack, were damaged, an AFP reporter at the scene said. Blood and scraps of human flesh littered the road along with the wreckage of cars, some of which were on fire.

The force of the blast damaged about 10 cars, General Ali Shah Paktiawal, head of the police criminal investigation branch told AFP.

The wounded were rushed to different hospitals in the city, he added.

AP report adds: A provincial governor in Kandahar says Afghan and international forces have killed 41 Taliban militants in a battle in southern Afghanistan.

Nimroz Gov. Ghulam Dastagir Azad said the insurgents were traveling Wednesday through neighboring Helmand province when the joint forces attacked them.

Azad says the troops employed airstrikes during the four-hour battle in Helmand province, killing 41 militants.

He says 17 of the dead were from Nimroz, including a commander named Mullah Tor Jan. Their bodies have been transferred to the province.

The Taliban, an Islamic militant group that was in government in Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001, said it was behind the blast -- similar to scores of others carried out by the insurgents.

"We claim responsibility for the suicide attack in Kabul today," Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a telephone call from an unknown location.

"The attack was against two foreign military vehicles which killed all the soldiers in the two vehicles."

The Taliban have often made claims about casualties from attacks which subsequently prove exaggerated.

Israeli troops kill 5 Palestinians in West Bank raid

AP, Jerusalem

Israeli troops killed five Palestinian militants in the West Bank on Wednesday in a move that set back attempts to secure a cease-fire with armed groups firing rockets from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

Three of the dead were Islamic Jihad militants, and the group retaliated by firing 12 rockets overnight toward the Israeli town of Sderot, causing minimal damage.

Abu Ahmed, a spokesman for Islamic Jihad in Gaza City, said the barrage was only the start of the group's response.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry on Wednesday also announced sanctions against Al Jazeera, the Qatar-based Arabic-language news channel, in response to what it charged was biased coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Israeli soldiers and police launched a joint operation Wednesday in Bethlehem to capture Mohammed Shehada, a senior West Bank military leader of Islamic Jihad.

An Israeli army spokeswoman said the soldiers spotted Shehada and three other men in a car, concluded they were armed and opened fire, killing all four.

3 more US soldiers killed in Iraq rocket attack

AP, Baghdad

Three U.S. soldiers were killed in a rocket attack in southern Iraq on Wednesday, bringing to 12 the number of Americans who have been killed in Iraq over the past three days.

With the overall U.S. military death toll in Iraq nearing 4,000, the latest killings mark a significant rise in deadly attacks against Americans.

At least 3,987 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an AP count. The figure includes eight military civilians.

Navy Lt. Patrick Evans, a military spokesman, told The Associated Press that three soldiers were killed Wednesday in a rocket attack on Combat Outpost Adder near Nasiriyah, about 200 miles southeast of Baghdad. Two other soldiers were wounded.

The attack came a day after an American soldier died when a roadside bomb hit his patrol near Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad.

Eight soldiers were killed in a pair of bomb attacks on Monday, the heaviest single day of U.S. casualties since September. Three of those soldiers died in a roadside bombing in Diyala, a violent province where al-Qaida in Iraq has been active.

US invasion of Iraq greatest humanitarian disaster: China

AFP, Beijing

China on Thursday accused the United States of human rights hypocrisy, as it branded the US invasion of Iraq the "greatest humanitarian disaster" of the modern world.

In an annual response to Washington's criticism of China's human rights record, the Chinese government labelled the United States arrogant, and highlighted what it said were widespread US failures at home and abroad.

"(America's) arrogant critique on the human rights of other countries are always accompanied by a deliberate ignoring of serious human rights problems on its own territory," said the report, released by the state Xinhua news agency.

"This was not only inconsistent with universally recognised norms of international relations, but also exposed the double standards and downright hypocrisy of the United States on the human rights issue, and inevitably impaired its international image."

The US-led war in Iraq that began in 2003 was one of the many issues of concern highlighted by China in the report, entitled.

Flu outbreak shuts Hong Kong schools for two weeks

Reuters, Hong Kong

More than half a million Hong Kong schoolchildren stayed at home on Thursday after the government shut all kindergartens and primary schools for two weeks to contain an outbreak of flu.

A government-appointed panel of experts is probing the deaths of three children, aged 2, 3 and 7, over the last two weeks. The two older children were infected with seasonal flu, while the cause of illness in the youngest child is unknown.

The health scare has not been linked to H5N1 bird flu but the government's decision on Wednesday night to close the schools brought back memories of 2003, when an outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome hit Hong Kong.

Health Secretary York Chow said the government closed the schools because the numbers of young children getting infected seemed higher this year.

"Our main concern is the infection of young children. The percentage of young children getting influenza this season seems to be higher," he said at a press briefing.

One in 4 teenage girls in US has sexual disease

AP, Chicago

At least one in four teenage girls nationwide has a sexually transmitted disease, or more than 3 million teens, according to the first study of its kind in this age group.

A virus that causes cervical cancer is by far the most common sexually transmitted infection in teen girls aged 14 to 19, while the highest overall prevalence is among black girls - nearly half the blacks studied had at least one STD. That rate compared with 20 percent among both whites and Mexican-American teens, the study from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found.

About half of the girls acknowledged ever having sex; among them, the rate was 40 percent. While some teens define sex as only intercourse, other types of intimate behavior including oral sex can spread some infections.

For many, the numbers likely seem "overwhelming because you're talking about nearly half of the sexually experienced teens at any one time having evidence of an STD," said Dr. Margaret Blythe.

'Islamophobia' a threat to world security, say Muslim states

AFP, Dakar

The world's Muslim countries warned Wednesday that an "alarming" rise in anti-Islamic insults and attacks in the West has become a threat to international security. The Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) called on Europe and America to take stronger measures against 'Islamophobia' in a report prepared for a summit of the group's 57 members in Dakar on Thursday and Friday. The report by a special OIC monitoring group said the organisation was struggling to get the West to understand that Islamophobia "has dangerous implications on global peace and security" and to convince western powers to do more. Islamic leaders have long warned that perceptions linking Muslims to terrorism, especially since the September 11, 2001 Al-Qaeda attacks on the United States, would make Muslims more radical.

Hillary backer quits over race row

AFP, Chicago

A key Hillary Clinton ally quit her White House campaign Wednesday after comments about Barack Obama stirred an ugly race row, as the Democratic foes dug in for a testy six-week haul to their next nominating clash. Obama, vying to become the first African-American president, expressed frustration that race kept emerging as a campaign issue, and also rejected the former first lady's claims he is not ready to be commander in chief. Fresh tensions simmered between the camps a day after Obama's landslide victory in Mississippi's primary -- the last showdown before Pennsylvania votes next month -- extended his lead in their epic White House struggle. Geraldine Ferraro, a Democratic party icon, severed ties with Clinton's finance committee, campaign sources said, after a two-day row sparked by her comment that: "if Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position." Obama on Wednesday branded the remarks "ridiculous" and "wrong headed" and his campaign had previously demanded Ferraro's ouster, after one of its aides last week was forced to quit after calling Clinton a "monster."

NY Governor quits after sex scandal

Reuters, Washington

New York Governor Eliot Spitzer has resigned after being caught paying for a high-priced prostitute at a luxury Washington hotel. After being disgraced by his links to a prostitution ring, the 48-year-old has bowed to days of pressure and resigned. "In the past few days, I've begun to atone for my private failings with my wife, Silda, my children and my entire family," he said. "I am deeply sorry that I did not live up to what was expected of me. "To every New Yorker and all those who believed in what I tried to stand for, I sincerely apologise." Known as 'Mr Clean' for taking down organised crime and tackling Wall Street corruption, Republicans had given the Democrat 48 hours to quit or face impeachment. He announced his resignation at his Manhattan office, with his wife standing by his side. He left without answering any questions from the media. Mr Spitzer will be replaced by his deputy, David Paterson, who will take over on St Patrick's Day and will become the first legally blind governor in the US.

Serbian President dissolves parliament, calls early vote

AFP, Belgrade

Serbian President Boris Tadic on Thursday dissolved parliament and called elections for May 11, following the collapse of the ruling coalition in a policy rift over EU integration and Kosovo. "The elections are a democratic way for citizens to say how Serbia should develop in years to come," Tadic said in a statement. The dissolution of parliament was requested by nationalist Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica's government, which said it was unable to overcome differences over Serbia's integration in the European Union and Kosovo independence. "In accordance with the constitution of Serbiat I signed the decree on dissolution of the parliamentt and the decision to call the elections for May 11," Tadic said. Last weekend Kostunica announced that his Democratic Party of Serbia had failed to solve the dispute with its pro-European coalition partners from Tadic's Democratic Party. The rift came less than a month after ethnic Albanian majority Kosovo unilaterally proclaimed independence from Serbia, which considers the territory a cradle of its history and culture.

100 Tibetan marchers arrested in India

AFP, Dehra

Indian police Thursday arrested a group of 100 Tibetan exiles trying to walk to their homeland as part of a major protest ahead of the Beijing Olympics, although the demonstrators vowed their march would go on. The marchers were rounded up as they approached the border of Himachal Pradesh state's Kangra region in defiance of a restraining order banning them from heading further north into the Himalayas and towards Chinese-governed Tibet. "We have arrested 100 people," police official Atul Fulzele told AFP, adding that five women were among those arrested. The march began on Monday in Dharamshala in the northern Indian district of Kangra, home to the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government-in-exile, and had reached Dehra, around 56 kilometres (35 miles) away, when the arrests took place. Tibetan activists, who have vowed to step up their protests in the run-up to the Beijing Olympics, said they were saddened by the Indian government's position but insisted the arrests were only a temporary setback. "We appeal to the government of India not to appease China by restraining us," said Sonam Dorje, spokesman of Tibetan Youth Congress, one of five pro-independence groups sponsoring the trek to Tibet.