Colombia: Property seized
BOGOTA — Colombian police seized $25 million in properties Wednesday from a paramilitary warlord extradited to the U.S. on drug-trafficking charges.
Authorities occupied luxury ranches, farms and plots of land that warlord Salvatore Mancuso owned across much of northwest Colombia, police said in a statement.
Mancuso was one of 14 paramilitary leaders extradited Tuesday to the U.S., which has filed charges including cocaine trafficking, money laundering and conspiracy to provide material support to a designated terrorist group.
Mexico: 2 officers shot dead
MEXICO CITY — Officials say two police officers were shot and killed in northern Mexico when they tried to stop gunmen from kidnapping a family.
State prosecutor Carlos Centeno says the attackers also threw grenades Wednesday at the officers in the city of Torreon. Torreon is in Coahuila state, which borders Texas.
In a separate attack, assailants opened fire and threw grenades at a police station in Guamuchil in the northern state of Sinaloa. No one was injured.
Russia: Supplies are launched
MOSCOW — An unmanned Russian cargo ship blasted off Thursday with supplies, equipment and gifts for the international space station, an official said.
Mission Control spokesman Valery Lyndin said the ship is carrying about 2.5 short tons of oxygen, water and food for the crew — U.S. astronaut Garrett Reisman and Russian cosmonauts Sergei Volkov and Oleg Kononenko.
Lyndin said Progress M-64 lifted off as scheduled early Thursday morning from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
The ship is set to dock at the station Saturday.
S. Africa: 2 die in mob violence
JOHANNESBURG — Mob violence against Zimbabweans and other foreigners this week has killed at least two people and injured about 60 in an impoverished Johannesburg neighborhood, authorities said Wednesday.
The nightly attacks first began Sunday night and officials appealed for an end to the violence.
On Wednesday, African National Congress leaders including Winnie Madikizela-Mandela visited Alexandra, the crowded township where the attacks occurred, to urge more compassion for foreigners.
Venezuela: U.S. editors visiting
CARACAS — A delegation of U.S. newspaper editors is meeting with government officials and others in Venezuela this week to learn more about how to handle news from the South American country.
American Society of Newspaper Editors president and Orlando Sentinel editor Charlotte Hall said Wednesday the group's aim is to "meet with people across the spectrum of political and social views."
The group of about 20 editors toured a state-run health clinic and a textile manufacturing cooperative on Wednesday, Hall said. They also have met with Venezuela's information minister, as well as members of nongovernment organizations and the news media.