Egypt on Tuesday banned all poultry imports from France and Germany after the potentially fatal H5N1 strain of bird flu was discovered in birds there.

The issue of civilian deaths in Afghanistan is itself becoming a “battleground” with truth often a casualty, showing the difficulty of establishing facts in a war fought in often remote areas.

Taliban guerrillas killed three policemen in an ambush on a convoy of U.S.-led troops in Afghanistan on Wednesday, a provincial official said.