Britain
LONDON — Fighter jets escorted a commercial plane carrying 172 people to an airport in Scotland on Wednesday after a passenger passed the captain a note saying there was a bomb on board. The plane landed safely, authorities said.
Chad
N'DJAMENA — Chadian rebels based in the western Darfur region of Sudan launched their first attack deep inside Chad, reaching hundreds of miles into the country to attack government forces. Police said that rebels were 180 miles from the capital, N'djamena, and hoped to capture it.
Congo
GOMA — Government troops and U.N. peacekeepers launched a fresh military offensive Wednesday in Congo's restive east, targeting Rwandan Hutu rebels blamed for attacking civilians at home and in Congo, officials said.
France
PARIS — France's lower house of parliament on Wednesday approved a compromise youth job plan to replace a measure that triggered nationwide protests and plunged the country into crisis. Unions, whose protest movement forced President Jacques Chirac to scrap the law on Monday, have said they would remain vigilant until the new compromise plan is approved. The National Assembly voted 151-93 in favor of the plan, which now goes to the Senate.
India
BANGALORE — Raj Kumar, a onetime child actor who became one of south India's most beloved movie stars and later was kidnapped by a notorious bandit, died of cardiac arrest Wednesday at age 77.
Iraq
BAGHDAD — The trial of Saddam Hussein adjourned after only five minutes Wednesday when handwriting experts scheduled to testify failed to appear. Chief judge Raouf Abdel-Rahman lectured prosecutors for not ensuring the experts were on hand and set a new session for Monday. Neither Saddam nor the seven other defendants were in court.
Kyrgyzstan
BISHKEK — A leading pro-democracy activist was shot and slightly wounded Wednesday in an apparent assassination attempt, the latest sign of persistent tension in Kyrgyzstan a year after the ouster of the longtime president. Edil Baisalov, leader of a coalition of civic groups called For Democracy and Civil Society, suffered a gunshot wound in the back of the head when he was leaving his office in the capital, Bishkek.
Pakistan
KARACHI — Youths rioted in this southern city for a second day Wednesday to protest a suicide bombing that killed 56 people, which a top Pakistani official said was aimed at "eliminating" the leadership of a moderate Sunni Muslim group. Police confirmed that a lone unidentified suicide bomber detonated an 11-pound bomb near Sunni dignitaries seated in a Karachi park Tuesday at a religious service with 10,000 other worshippers.
Serbia-Montenegro
BELGRADE — Flooding threatened thousands of people in northern Serbia on Wednesday, prompting plans for massive evacuation. The Danube and Tisa rivers submerged hundreds of acres of fertile plains. Thousands of army troops were dispatched to help municipal workers reinforce embankments with sandbags.
Sicily
CORLEONE — The reputed boss of the Italian Mafia, Bernardo Provenzano, maintained his jailhouse silence Wednesday as forensics experts searched his hideout and police arrested three men suspected of aiding the former fugitive. Investigators spent the night reviewing notes found in the dilapidated farmhouse in Provenzano's hometown of Corleone where his four decades on the run ended Tuesday, the ANSA and Apcom news agencies reported.
Sri Lanka
COLOMBO — Two explosions and subsequent violence Wednesday killed 16 people in a restive town of northeast Sri Lanka that the military has placed under curfew, authorities said. Army and navy units were patrolling the streets of Trincomalee to enforce the curfew.