HO CHI MINH CITY - The United States opened a new consulate in the former Saigon on Monday, nearly a quarter century after a dramatic airlift from its old embassy marked the end of the Vietnam War.
TEHRAN - Kidnappers holding four European tourists in Iran have demanded the release of two people from an Iranian jail in exchange for freeing the hostages.
DILI - The United Nations said on Monday that it remained concerned about security in East Timor ahead of an August 30 ballot on independence, but would not let "rogue elements or hoodlums" delay the vote.
BEIJING - Sixty-one criminals have been executed in the southwest Chinese city of Chongqing after being convicted of murder, robbery, kidnap, and rape.
MOSCOW - Russian President Boris Yeltsin said on Monday his heart was "working like a clock" and pain he had experienced for about three years was gone.
HEBRON - Palestinian police said on Monday they had arrested two of four brothers suspected of making the bomb that exploded in a mishap linked to the Islamic group Hamas in the West Bank on Sunday.
CAIRO - Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat on Monday began talks on the timetable for implementing the Wye River land-for-security deal with Israel.
TEHRAN - An Iranian court will hold its last hearing in the trial of a German businessman charged with having sex with a Moslem woman on September 29.
ABUJA - The United States will hold a meeting of African energy ministers in December, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said.
NEW DELHI - India and Pakistan will have to find common ground to resume stalled peace talks, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said on Monday.
BANDA ACEH, Indonesia - A man pulling down an Indonesian flag in the restive province of Aceh was shot and wounded by a soldier, as tensions intensified on the eve of the country`s national day.
BANGKOK - A Myanmar dissident group said on Monday the ruling military had detained 33 students, most of them of high-school age, for demonstrating in the far south of the country last week.
MEXICO CITY - Gunmen on two motorcycles opened fire on a pickup carrying Mexico`s anti-drug czar on Sunday but the official, Mariano Herran Salvatti, was uninjured.
BRASILIA - Brazil prepared on Sunday for the trial of 150 military police officials accused of the 1996 murder of 19 landless peasants during a protest in the remote north, in what could become the largest trial of its kind in Brazil`s history.
GROZNY, Russia - The breakaway region of Chechnya declared a state of emergency on Sunday as Russian troops again bombarded Moslem rebels in neighbouring Dagestan, on the Black Sea`s western coast.
WASHINGTON - North Korea`s food situation has improved in two
years and, with aid from outside, the country now gets enough food to prevent starvation.
LONDON - Britain`s Queen Elizabeth made an insurance claim for the cost of bringing the body of Princess Diana back to Britain from France.
CANBERRA - Australia will always have a problem with illegal boatpeople despite recent increases in funding to boost coastal surveillance, Justice Minister Amanda Vanstone said on Monday.
