Argentina
BUENOS AIRES — Argentina has discovered more outbreaks of highly contagious foot-and-mouth disease, taking the total to 55, a spokeswoman for the food and animal health inspection agency Senasa said.
Benin
COTONOU — Incumbent Mathieu Kerekou took a commanding lead in Benin's disputed presidential runoff — boycotted by two opposition candidates who alleged fraud — preliminary results in the West African country showed.
Canada
TORONTO — Nine people have been arrested and charged in connection with a criminal network that smuggled nearly 1,200 illegal immigrants from China and North and South Korea through Canada into the United States over the past year, Canadian police said.
OTTAWA — Prime Minister Jean Chretien was asked to step down by former prime minister Joe Clark as opposition party pressure mounted on him to explain allegations of conflict of interest and influence peddling.
Ecuador
QUITO — Ecuadorean transport unions called for a 24-hour national strike Monday to protest a controversial government-proposed tax reform package, union leaders said.
Ethiopia
ADDIS ABABA — The secretary-general of the Organization of African Unity backed Kofi Annan who is seeking a second five-year term as U.N. secretary-general.
Germany
RAVENSBURG — A former SS officer accused of killing seven Jewish prisoners is innocent and should be acquitted, his lawyer said at what may be one of Germany's last Nazi war crimes trials.
Guyana
GEORGETOWN — Guyana's President Bharrat Jagdeo, a Moscow-educated economist of East Indian descent, won re-election as head of the racially divided former British colony by a convincing margin, election officials said.
Indonesia
JAKARTA — An outbreak of violence in a town on Borneo island claimed at least 12 lives and prompted police to send in hundreds of reinforcements, authorities said.
Senegal
DAKAR — The Senegalese government and separatist rebels from the west African country's southern Casamance province signed a new peace deal aimed at ending 18 years of violence in the region, state radio said.
South Africa
PIETERSBURG — An elephant trampled a woman to death near a wildlife park in northeastern South Africa, police said.
Trinidad
PORT OF SPAIN — A spat has broken out in Trinidad over the appointment of an American as archbishop of the Caribbean nation, with one prominent priest quitting a senior position in protest and another calling it a "slap in the face" to local clergy.
United Nations
Ethiopia signed an agreement with the United Nations on the rights and privileges of peacekeepers, moving forward a delicate peace process with its Horn of Africa neighbor Eritrea.
Venezuela
CARACAS — Venezuela's defense minister promised to investigate senior military officers accused by government critics of corruption but said he could vouch personally for their honesty.
CARACAS — Two inmates were killed and 31 injured when two grenades exploded in a prison brawl near the Venezuelan capital, an official said.
West Bank
RAMALLAH — Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat allowed the West Bank office of the Arab world's most popular satellite TV station to reopen after a three-day closure.
Zimbabwe
HARARE — Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe said that Britain, the country's former colonial power, would never sway his government from its path to grab white farms for redistribution to blacks.