KAMPALA - Rebels operating in western Uganda have killed eight people in two separate attacks.

LAGOS - At least 11 people, eight of them prisoners, burned to death in a fire which destroyed the market in the northern Nigerian city of Kaduna.

FREETOWN - The commander of Nigerian-led West African peacekeeping troops will visit Sierra Leone on Tuesday for talks on implementing a regional plan to restore the country`s ousted civilian government.

JOHANNESBURG - South African police said they seized seven million rand ($1.45 million) worth of cocaine hidden in thousands of door knobs recovered at Johannesburg`s international airport.

BAGHDAD - The United Nations called off arms inspections in Iraq after Baghdad again banned Americans from taking part.

UNITED NATIONS - Pursuing diplomacy for the time being, the United States wants the Security Council to threaten Iraq with "serious consequences" and impose travel sanctions on officials blocking U.N. inspectors.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - British au pair Louise Woodward was freed after a judge who said he was "guided by conscience" reduced her murder conviction to manslaughter in the death of a baby.

ANKARA - Turkey`s top prosecutor pledged to defend the country`s secular order against political Islam, in tough talking ahead of a constitutional court trial against the Islam-based Welfare Party.

JERUSALEM - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was booed and jeered at a convention of his own Likud party when he stalled on a bid to give more power of grassroots activists.

NICOSIA - Leaders of the divided communities of Cyprus and U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke met in for U.N.-brokered talks on the long-running dispute splitting the island.

JAKARTA - Ribbons of fire along irrigation channels designed to drain a huge peat bog are helping sustain noxious smog across Indonesia`s Kalimantan provinces.

WARSAW - Poland`s new Solidarity-led coalition cabinet of Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek won a confidence motion in parliament, clearing the last hurdle to fully establish itself in office.

FAIRFAX, Va - Mir Aimal Kasi of Pakistan was convicted of capital murder and on all other charges stemming from the killing of two CIA workers and the wounding of three other people outside CIA headquarters.

WELLINGTON - Treasurer Winston Peters left New Zealand`s prime minister designate Jenny Shipley waiting for a decision on whether his New Zealand First party would remain in the country`s coalition government.

HANOI - More than 3,600 people are still missing or unaccounted for a week after the worst storm in nearly a century ravaged the tip of southern Vietnam.

DUBAI - The Middle East`s biggest economic conference due to start on Sunday is unlikely to see any major energy deals between the huge Arab oil and gas producers and import-dependent Israel.