Afghanistan
KABUL — Suicide bombers killed eight people, including two U.S.-led coalition soldiers, in Kandahar Saturday, officials said. A purported Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility for the blasts and warned of more as NATO prepares to take control of the volatile southern region.
Brazil
SAO PAULO — A wealthy young woman, her lover and his brother were convicted Saturday in the deaths of her parents, a crime that riveted Brazil with a tale of love across rigid class lines. Manfred and Marisa von Richtofen were beaten to death at their home in a wealthy district of Sao Paulo on Oct. 30, 2002. Manfred von Richtofen and his wife disapproved of their daughter's relationship with Daniel Cravinhos, who is from a lower-middle-class family.
China
BEIJING — China's death toll from Tropical Storm Bilis rose to 530 on Saturday, more than a week after the storm hit, as officials in southern Guangdong province and the Guangxi region reported an additional 48 deaths, state media said. The country expects more storms than usual this year due to an unusually warm current off its Pacific coast and high temperatures on the Tibetan plateau.
BEIJING — A magnitude-5.1 earthquake hit southwestern China on Saturday, killing at least 11 people, a government news agency said. More than 40 people were injured in the quake, which occurred shortly after 9 a.m. and was centered in Yunnan province's Yanjin county. The report said dozens of homes were destroyed.
England
LONDON — Relatives of an innocent Brazilian man slain by police who mistook him for a terrorist marked the first anniversary of his death Saturday with a memorial service at the Underground station where he was killed. Jean Charles de Menezes, 27, was shot in the head two weeks after four suicide bombers killed 52 commuters and themselves on London's transport system. Police apologized and said the killing had been a mistake.
LONDON — The coroner investigating the death of Princess Diana says he is stepping down from that job because his workload is too heavy. Michael Burgess, the coroner for the royal household and the county of Surrey, said he did not have enough time to do a thorough job on the inquest into the 1997 deaths of Diana and her companion Dodi Fayed.
Haiti
PORT-AU-PRINCE — A new rash of kidnappings has raised fears that well-armed, politically aligned street gangs are seeking to destabilize Haiti's new government, threatening U.N.-led efforts to restore security 2 1/2 years after a crippling revolt. At least 30 people have been kidnapped so far in July, about the same number for all of June, said Leslie Dallemand, chief of the U.N.'s anti-kidnapping unit in Haiti.
Kuwait
KUWAIT CITY — A Kuwaiti court Saturday upheld the acquittal of five returnees from Guantanamo on terror-related charges. In May, a criminal court had cleared the men of belonging to and collecting money for the al-Qaida terror network, but the prosecution appealed the ruling. U.S. officials freed the five men from the prison in Cuba in November. On their return to Kuwait, they were arrested and put on trial.
Mexico
MEXICO CITY — The leftist candidate in Mexico's July 2 election says he has been the victim of a broad conspiracy among the incumbent, election officials, other party leaders and business tycoons to rob him of the presidency. Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said Friday that the vote had been plagued by fraud and widespread human errors. He made it clear he would not accept any ruling from the special electoral court short of an order to recount all 41 million ballots.
Somalia
BAIDOA — Ethiopian troops moved into a second Somali town on Saturday to protect the country's weak, U.N.-backed government, angering the Islamic militia that controls most of Somalia and causing peace talks to collapse. About 200 Ethiopian troops, driving in pickup trucks mounted with machine guns, moved into Wajid and took control of the airport, meeting no resistance, witnesses said.