Asiapcf [10]

The United States is ready to grant asylum to around 1,000 refugees who say they have fled persecution in Vietnam for Cambodia, in a move unlikely to find favor with Hanoi.

With Afghan fighters taking the lead on the ground in the mountains of Paktia province in eastern Afghanistan, U.S. troops prepared to turn their attention to pockets of opposition elsewhere in the country, officials said Tuesday.

When Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji addressed the National People's Congress, he added fighting terrorism to the list of ways of ensuring social stability in China.

Nearly a day after declaring victory in a sustained battle with Taliban and al Qaeda fighters, coalition forces came under attack overnight Wednesday in the eastern Afghan town of Khowst, a U.S. Central Command spokesman said.

U.S. bombers, fighter jets and gunships unleashed a non-stop bombardment on suspected al Qaeda and Taliban forces battling Afghan, coalition and U.S. troops Sunday in eastern Afghanistan.

Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has appealed for peace following the country's worst religious bloodshed in a decade that has left nearly 300 people dead.

Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has appealed for peace on Saturday following the country's worst religious bloodshed in a decade.

Fresh religious violence has flared in western India as Hindu mobs stalked and burned Muslims in their homes, pushing the death toll from separatist attacks in the past week towards 300.

Afghan officials said Tuesday that an accurate death count may be weeks away after a devastating earthquake in the mountains of northeastern Afghanistan, where early reports indicated the town of Nahrin may have been destroyed.

Zimbabwe's last non-black judge on the Supreme Court, which three days ago struck down a new law seen favouring President Robert Mugabe, has quit, the official Herald newspaper reported.