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TEHRAN,Iran - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, already at the center of a post-election crisis, came under criticism from his own hard-line supporters Sunday for appointing a first vice president who once caused an outcry by saying Iranians were friends of Israelis.

JERUSALEM - Israel on Sunday rejected a U.S. demand to suspend a planned housing project in east Jerusalem, threatening to further complicate an unusually tense standoff with its strongest ally over settlement construction.

KINGSTON, Jamaica - Even now, about three years after a near-fatal gay bashing, Sherman gets jittery at dusk. On bad days, his blood quickens, his eyes dart, and he seeks refuge indoors.

KABUL - A Russian-owned civilian helicopter crashed and burst into flames shortly after takeoff at southern Afghanistan's largest NATO base Sunday, killing 16 civilians in the latest in a string of deadly aircraft crashes in the country.

BEIJING (AFP) - Deadly ethnic unrest in China's Muslim Xinjiang region was planned and coordinated in a bid to ignite violence across the regional capital Urumqi, state media reported on Sunday.

Viewpoint: Zacarias Moussaoui may not be a likeable character but that doesn't mean American justice is served by putting him away after a farcical trial

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AFP) - Senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat met Iran's foreign minister in Egypt in the first such talks since the 1993 Oslo accords, a senior Palestinian official told AFP on Sunday.

TEHRAN (AFP) - Iran on Sunday released on bail a British embassy staffer, who was among a group of nine arrested following disturbances after the hotly disputed June 12 presidential election, his lawyer said.

ROMANO CANAVESE, Italy - A beaming Pope Benedict XVI raised his cast-encased right arm to bless thousands of faithful Sunday during his first public appearance since surgery to set a wrist fractured in a fall.

JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel on Sunday rejected a United States demand to stop a building project in annexed Arab east Jerusalem, in the latest dispute between the close allies over the prickly issue of Jewish settlements.

ADELAIDE, Australia - A British teenager who was found dehydrated and freezing after 12 wintry days lost in Australia's wilderness said he wrote farewell notes to his family and expected to die of starvation.

BEIJING (AFP) - Members of a British student group quarantined by Chinese authorities over swine flu were "shocked" by their detention but were being treated well, one of their teachers said on Sunday.

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - The Taliban have released a video of a visibly-shaken captive US soldier who was snatched by the Islamist militants in Afghanistan late last month, officials and witnesses said Sunday.

TURNBERRY, Scotland (AFP) - For Stewart Cink and his family it might be different but for everyone else, Turnberry 2009 will be remembered as the Open that Tom Watson and, to a lesser extent Lee Westwood, failed to win.

SEOUL (AFP) - Torrential rain battered North Korea's capital and other regions over the weekend, state media said on Sunday amid concerns that flooding may aggravate the country's food shortages.

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica - Talks on resolving Honduras' leadership crisis broke off Sunday after the interim government rejected a proposed compromise, saying a provision calling for ousted President Manuel Zelaya to serve out his term was "unacceptable."

SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea has put cloned dogs on patrol to sniff out drugs at customs. Six genetic duplicates of a single Labrador retriever have been working at the country's main Incheon international airport and three other customs checkpoints to deter drug smuggling after completing 16 months of training, the Korea Customs Service said in a statement Sunday.

MARSEILLES, France - Madonna on Sunday visited some of the eight workers who were injured in an accident in which two more were killed while assembling a music stage for the singer in the French port of Marseilles.

ANKARA, Turkey - Patrons of a usually smoke-filled hookah bar stepped outside to light up Sunday as Turkey extended a ban on indoor public smoking to bars, restaurants and coffeehouses.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan - Gunmen ambushed a police patrol in Pakistan's volatile northwest Monday, killing four officers, while a roadside bomb killed a member of another security unit elsewhere in the region, officials said.

A quasi-religious, cult-like drug cartel lays siege to the police in western Mexico and shakes the national government

As of Sunday, July 19, 2009, at least 4,327 members of the U.S. military had died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

JAKARTA (AFP) - Indonesian police on Sunday confirmed that regional terror outfit Jemaah Islamiyah were behind the twin suicide blasts that tore through luxury Jakarta hotels.

RAMALLAH, West Bank - Palestinian authorities on Sunday allowed Al-Jazeera to resume operations in the West Bank, four days after banning the Arab satellite station over the airing of a claim linking President Mahmoud Abbas to the death of his legendary predecessor, Yasser Arafat.

NOUAKCHOTT, Mauritania - Nearly a year after seizing power in a military putsch that ousted Mauritania's first freely elected leader, Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz won the presidency Sunday in a landslide vote his opponents decried as a fraudulent "electoral coup."

SHANGHAI (AFP) - Banquets, karaoke and drinks have long played a part in Chinese deals but the high-profile arrests of Rio Tinto executives may force companies to rethink how they do business, experts said.

ZURICH (AFP) - Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey on Sunday defended Switzerland's decision to meet with a Hamas delegation, saying the militant Palestinian group is "an important player" in the Middle East.

BERLIN (AFP) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel hit out at Swedish nuclear operator Vattenfall on Sunday over a series of problems at an ageing reactor near Hamburg.

CAPE TOWN, South Africa - South Africa is launching clinical trials of the first AIDS vaccines created by a developing country, a feat by scientists who forged ahead even when some of their political leaders shocked the world with unscientific pronouncements about the disease.

SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea's coast guard said Monday it is drawing up guidelines on how to inspect North Korean ships suspected of carrying banned items — a move expected to enrage Pyongyang, which has warned it would consider such inspections a declaration of war.