BALCILAR, Turkey (Reuters) – A gas explosion killed at least 17 girls and injured 27 others, wrecking a dormitory at a school in southern Turkey on Friday, a military rescue official said.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – The number of civilians killed in Iraq last month fell to less than a quarter of the toll in July 2007, government figures released on Friday showed, underscoring a dramatic improvement in security.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iraq’s government called for calm on Friday to dampen a bitter row over the status of Kirkuk, a day after Kurdish councilors called for the city to become part of the largely autonomous region of Kurdistan.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Calling graft a threat to Russia’s security, President Dmitry Medvedev released on Friday his national plan to fight red tape and corruption. The plan, published on the official Web site www.kremlin.ru, calls for sweeping legal and social reform that, fail or flourish, analysts say could define Medvedev’s …

TRIPOLI (Reuters) – In Tripoli’s most deprived areas, Lebanon’s lingering political troubles are being fought out in a sectarian conflict that threatens to cause more bloodshed.

PODGORICA (Reuters) – Montenegro has charged eight former soldiers over their role in the 1999 killing of 23 ethnic Albanian refugees from Kosovo, a lawyer of the victims’ families said on Friday.

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic has said it is unimaginable he could get a fair trial at the U.N. war crimes tribunal because the world’s media have already branded him a war criminal.

KABUL (Reuters) – Violence in Afghanistan has reached its worst level since 2001 with more than 260 civilians killed in July alone, a group of 100 aid agencies said on Friday, calling on all sides to do more to protect the lives of non-combatants.

TEHRAN (FNA)- The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps said Monday it had successfully test-fired a naval weapon which could destroy any vessel within a range of 300 kilometers (190 miles).

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iran’s top nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili on Monday spoke by phone with EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana on the standoff over Tehran’s nuclear program.