KHARTOUM, Oct 5, 2008 (AFP) - Sudan has expelled two bodyguards working for the British ambassador after their car injured two security officers in a UN car park, a foreign ministry official said on Sunday.

Japan said Friday it will send two military officers to Sudan to join
UN peacekeepers overseeing a peace deal that ended a two-decade
north-south civil war.

Leaders of the world's poorest nations wrapped up a summit on Friday
calling on the International Criminal Court's top prosecutor to drop
his bid to indict Sudan's president on genocide charges.

ACCRA, Oct 3, 2008 (AFP) - Leaders of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries on Friday called on the International Criminal Court (ICC) chief prosecutor to suspend efforts to indict the Sudanese President on genocide charges.

THE HAGUE, Oct 1, 2008 (AFP) - Prosecutors at the International Criminal Court sought to persuade a panel of judges Wednesday to grant their request for a genocide arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir.

A closed hearing was held at the court's seat in The Hague in the morning for the prosecution to present evidence to back up the request for a warrant.

BERLIN, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Europeans held hostage in the desert by armed bandits for 10 days returned home safe and sound from Egypt on Tuesday with confusion surrounding how exactly their ordeal ended.

BERLIN, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Europeans held captive by bandits for 10 days along with other hostages returned home from Egypt Tuesday amid conflicting accounts of their liberation.

BERLIN, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Europeans held hostage in the desert for 10 days returned home from Egypt Tuesday, with one of them reportedly calling the abductors 'rather kind criminals' who decided on their own to free them.

ROME, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Five Italians who were taken hostage with other Europeans in Egypt on September 19 arrived back home early Tuesday in the northern Italian city of Turin, Radio Rai reported.

The ex-hostages said they were not mistreated by their captors but that they were afraid and at one point lost all hope, the ANSA news agency reported.

NAIROBI, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Somali pirates holding a Ukrainian freighter carrying tanks and other military supplies on Tuesday said the weapons were headed for southern Sudan and not not bought by Kenya as earlier claimed.

KHARTOUM, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Rebels in Sudan's war-torn Darfur region on Tuesday rejected claims they had shot down a helicopter contracted to the UN-peacekeeping force in an incident that killed all four crew members.

BERLIN, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Five Germans who were kidnapped for 10 days along with 14 others returned to Berlin from Egypt Tuesday, the German foreign ministry said, amid conflicting accounts of their liberation.

The five were greeted by their families and by senior German officials after landing in a chartered plane at Berlin's Tegel airport, the ministry said in a statement.

KIEV, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Ukraine again insisted Tuesday that a cargo of 33 tanks on a freight ship hijacked last week was destined for Kenya, and not Sudan as the pirates holding the ship and the US navy have said.

KHARTOUM, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Hundreds of refugees from northeast Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have fled to neighbouring south Sudan after rebels launched brutal attacks, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said on Tuesday.

CAIRO, Sept 30, 2008 (AFP) - Bandits who held 19 European tourists and Egyptians captive in the desert for 10 days were mostly bored teenagers who abandoned the hostages hours before their reported rescue, one of the victims said on Tuesday.

CAIRO, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Egyptian special forces were involved in an operation inside Chadian territory to free a group of kidnapped Western tourists and Egyptians, an Egyptian security official said on Monday.

'Egyptian special forces freed them in an operation inside Chadian territory close to the Sudanese border,' he told AFP, requesting anonymity.

DUBAI, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - A Ukrainian vessel seized by Somali pirates off Somalia last week is carrying tanks and other weapons destined for a client in Sudan and not Kenya as announced by Nairobi, a US military spokesman said on Monday.

A Kenyan defence ministry spokesman on Monday denied a US navy claim
that a Ukrainian ship seized by pirates last week and laden with tanks
and military supplies was in fact destined for Sudan and not Kenya

KHARTOUM, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Thirteen people were killed and 36 wounded on Sunday when three buses collided on a busy road in central Sudan, an interior ministry spokesman said.

The accident happened in the village of Sheikh Bahar, about 145 kilometres (90 miles) south of the capital Khartoum in El-Gezira state, the spokesman said on Monday.

CAIRO, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Bandits who kidnapped 19 European tourists and Egyptians had agreed to release them in return for a ransom before Sudanese troops killed six hostage-takers, an Egyptian security official said on Monday.

BERLIN, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Armed bandits holding European tourists and their guides hostage in the desert fled ahead of a raid by Egyptian special forces, a German newspaper report said.

Bild said in its edition to appear Tuesday that 'elite German police and special force units were ready to intervene near the border between Chad and Sudan' alongside Egyptian troops.

CAIRO, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - A group of European tourists and their guides snatched by armed bandits in a remote desert 10 days ago were freed unharmed in a pre-dawn raid by Egyptian special forces on Monday, officials in Egypt said.

KIEV, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Kiev on Monday denied a Ukrainian vessel seized by Somali pirates off Somalia last week was carrying tanks and other weapons destined for Sudan, as claimed earlier by the US military.

'According to my information, the cargo was intended for Kenya, for its ministry of defence,' Vasyl Kyrylych, a spokesperson for Ukraine's foreign ministry, told AFP.

KHARTOUM, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - A helicopter contracted to UN-led peacekeepers crashed in Sudan's Darfur region on Monday, killing all four crew members, after being fired at, the Sudanese police said.

KHARTOUM, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - A helicopter contracted to UN-led peacekeepers crashed in Sudan's Darfur region on Monday, killing two people with two more feared dead, a UN spokesman said.

A spokesman for the joint African Union-United Nations peacekeeping mission in Darfur (UNAMID) said the helicopter was contracted to carry food to a force team site in South Darfur state.

CAIRO, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - All 19 European tourists and Egyptians who were kidnapped by armed bandits in a remote desert region 10 days ago have been freed and are in good health, Egyptian state television said on Monday.

ROME, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Italy's Foreign Minister Franco Frattini on Monday confirmed the release of 19 European tourists and Egyptians, including five Italians, kidnapped in Egypt 10 days ago, Sky Italia reported.

'Our compatriots are free, and they are with Egyptian forces,' Frattini said, according to the Sky reporter accompanying him on a visit to Belgrade.

CAIRO, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - All 19 European tourists and their Egyptian gudies who were kidnapped by bandits in a remote desert region 10 days have been freed and are in good health, Egyptian state television said on Monday.

'The hostages have been freed, and are in good health. They are being brought to Cairo airport,' the television quoted an official as saying.

CAIRO, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - A group of European tourists and their Egyptian guides who were kidnapped by armed bandits in a remote desert 10 days ago have been freed unharmed, officials said on Monday.

'The hostages have been freed and are in good health. They are being brought to Cairo airport,' Egyptian state television quoted an official as saying.

BELGRADE, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - Italy's Foreign Minister Franco Frattini told AFP on Monday that 19 European tourists and Egyptians, including five Italians, kidnapped in Egypt 10 days ago were 'in a good shape.'

'They are in a good shape, they are on their way to Cairo, and then from Cairo to Italy,' Frattini told AFP at the end of his visit to Belgrade.

CAIRO, Sept 29, 2008 (AFP) - No ransom was paid to secure the release of a group of European tourists and Egyptians kidnapped in the desert 10 days ago, Egyptian state television quoted an official as saying on Monday.

'No ransom was paid to the kidnappers to free the hostages,' a news alert said on state television, quoting an Egyptian official after the group of 19 was released.

KHARTOUM, Sept 28, 2008 (AFP) - Bandits who kidnapped 19 tourists and Egyptians in the desert nine days ago have taken their hostages back to Sudan but are now heading towards Egypt, Sudanese officials said on Sunday.

KHARTOUM, Sept 28, 2008 (AFP) - Sudanese forces have killed six people who kidnapped 19 tourists and Egyptians in a remote desert nine days ago, and arrested two, Sudanese presidential advisor Mahjoub Fadl Badri told AFP on Sunday.

KHARTOUM, Sept 28, 2008 (AFP) - Sudanese forces have killed six bandits who kidnapped 19 European tourists and their Egyptian guides in a remote desert nine days ago, a top official told AFP on Sunday.

KHARTOUM, Sept 28, 2008 (AFP) - Sudanese forces on Sunday killed six heavily armed bandits who kidnapped 19 European tourists and their Egyptian guides in a remote desert nine days ago, the army said.