China: Quake death toll could reach 50,000
LUOSHUI TOWN, China (AP) -- Troops dug burial pits in this quake-shattered town and black smoke poured from crematorium chimneys elsewhere in central China as priorities began shifting Thursday from the hunt for survivors to dealing with the dead. Officials said the final toll could more than double to 50,000....

Myanmar junta warns against hoarding cyclone aid
YANGON, Myanmar (AP) -- Myanmar's junta warned Thursday it will punish anyone found hoarding or trading foreign aid meant for cyclone survivors, but relief groups said they had seen no evidence of people selling or stockpiling donated goods....

Survivors from apartment building recount quake
DUJIANGYAN, China (AP) -- Tang Xiaomin had just left her fourth-floor apartment to buy groceries when the building started crumbling around her. An upstairs neighbor was thrown against the kitchen table and grabbed her purse before rushing out. Another resident, who was expecting a baby, was resting and became trapped....

Long wait for medical care after China quake
DEYANG, China (AP) -- After 11-year-old Zhang Jiazhi crawled free of the rubble that remained of his middle school, his parents began a 20-hour ordeal to get medical care for their son, whose arms were crushed to a pulp....

Iraqi forces mount al-Qaida hunt in Mosul
BAGHDAD (AP) -- U.S. and Iraqi troops moved against al-Qaida on two separate fronts Thursday, with house-to-house searches in Mosul and an operation in the desert to stanch the flow of insurgents and weapons to that northern city....

8 killed in Philippine bank robbery
MANILA, Philippines (AP) -- Eight people, most of them bank employees, have been fatally shot in a bank robbery in a town south of Manila, police said Friday....

Security Council wants UN peacekeepers in Somalia
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- The Security Council unanimously approved a resolution on Thursday calling for a U.N. political presence in conflict-wracked Somalia for the first time in years and setting conditions for the deployment of U.N. peacekeepers....

UN: World economy to grow by 1.8 percent in 2008
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- The world economy is "teetering on the brink" of a severe downturn and is expected to grow only 1.8 percent in 2008, the United Nations said in its mid-year economic projections Thursday....

Interpol: Colombia has real rebel data
BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) -- Interpol said Thursday that computer files suggesting Venezuela was arming and financing Colombian guerrillas came from a rebel camp and were not tampered with, discrediting Venezuela's assertions that Colombia faked them....

French workers strike in protest of job cuts
PARIS (AP) -- Teachers, postal workers and other public servants staged a one-day strike and tens of thousands marched through French cities Thursday, a widespread protest against President Nicolas Sarkozy's planned job cuts....