PARIS - France's former African affairs minister, commenting on domestic press reports, said anti-aircraft missiles which four years ago brought down a plane carrying the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi almost certainly came from American stocks of Russian-made weapons.
JOHANNESBURG - South African President Nelson Mandela sat down for more meetings with his military top brass a day after his chief of defence resigned in a row over a coup report, which was found to be false.
BANGUI - A flash flood in the Central African Republic capital of Bangui killed six people, injured 20 others and left hundreds homeless.
NIAMEY - Niger's president has amnestied prisoners with six months or less of their sentence to serve plus all detained minors, pregnant or breastfeeding women and prisoners with diseases such as leprosy or AIDS.
NEW DELHI - India said it was ready to meet any threat to its security and blamed China for supplying Pakistan with missile technology.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Country music singer Tammy Wynette died in her sleep at her Nashville home. She was the first woman in country music to sell more than a million copies, for her 1968 hit "Stand By Your Man."
UNITED NATIONS - The head of UNICEF said she expected new negotiations with Afghanistan's Taleban officials on women's discrimination to begin next week, before which no new U.N. aid programs would be started.
LOS ANGELES - New documents uncovered in U.S.archives show that the Swiss National Bank knew that the gold it was buying from Hitler's Germany had been looted by the Nazis.
TORONTO - A group of Cuban political prisoners whose release had been sought by Pope John Paul arrived in Toronto, along with nearly two dozen dependents.
BOGOTA - The leader of Colombia's second-largest rebel group, a Spanish-born former Roman Catholic priest, has died.
BELFAST - Northern Ireland talks chairman George Mitchell tabled outline peace proposals and said he believed a final accord could be struck this week.
MOSCOW - Two Russian cosmonauts had to cut short a space walk when an engine suddenly failed, causing the Mir space station to tilt out of line as they floated in space carrying out repairs.
WASHINGTON - The US welcomed a decision by North and South Korea to resume direct talks, but said it would still pursue four-party negotiations on Korean peninsula security.
PARIS - Algerian security forces said Moslem rebels cut the throats of 36 villagers overnight, in two massacres carried out on the eve of the Moslem Feast of Sacrifice.
BAGHDAD - The top U.N. official in Baghdad said the successful completion of the first round of weapons inspections of Iraqi presidential sites had opened a "new chapter" in relations with Iraq.
JERUSALEM - "The Analyser", an Israeli teenager who hacked his way to Internet fame by breaking into the Pentagon's computer, has cashed in on his cyber-assault. He was featured in a full-page advertisement in Israel's biggest newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth for the EIM company's Newron computer.
WASHINGTON - The United States banned the import of 58 types of assault weapons, saying this would stop 1.5 million semiautomatic weapons like Uzi and AK-47 rifles from flowing into the country.
JERUSALEM - A Palestinian inquiry has determined that Hamas master bombmaker Muhyideen al-Sharif was killed in a power struggle within the militant Moslem group.
