OMAGH, Northern Ireland - A heavily pregnant mother is to be buried beside her 18-month-old daughter in the first poignant funeral of victims of the worst guerrilla attack in Northern Ireland`s violent history. Avril Monaghan, expecting twins next month, joined her tiny daughter Maura among the 28 victims of Saturday`s bombing of the busy shopping centre in Omagh.
MOSCOW - Russians sought ways to convert their roubles into dollars or spend excess roubles after news of a de-facto devaluation, but President Boris Yeltsin calmly continued a more than month-long holiday.
BEIJING - Troops prepared to blow up more dikes in central China but were building new ones in the northeast as part of desperate waterworks surgery to defend a major city and the heart of the oil industry from floods.
COLOMBO - Sri Lanka`s Tamil Tiger rebels set free the 17-member Indian crew of a merchant ship hijacked by the guerrillas and destroyed by Sri Lanka`s air force.
UNITED NATIONS - The Security Council gave the go-ahead for full-scale operations by U.N. weapons inspectors in Iraq, despite Baghdad`s continuing refusal to cooperate.
PRISTINA - U.S. diplomats prodded Kosovo Albanians and Serbian authorities towards peace talks after government forces ousted separatist rebels from their last bastions.
