From Wire Reports

Incoming Iraqi fails to settle on candidates for key Cabinet posts

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq's incoming prime minister failed to reach agreement Friday with political leaders on who will run the key defense and interior ministries but said he will present his Cabinet to parliament anyway with temporary heads in those posts.

Nouri al-Maliki's announcement came as roadside bombs and other attacks killed 17 Iraqis. His decision to push ahead with forming a government was yet another sign of his determination to waste no time addressing Iraq's security - his administration's top priority.

Already he has shortened the Cabinet appointment process so that with parliament's expected approval Saturday, ministers can be inaugurated the same day.

After meeting with political representatives, the prime minister-designate said his Cabinet had been settled except for the two contested slots, and that he would present his nominees to the 275-member parliament on Saturday.

Suspect in Egypt blasts killed near Israeli border in clashes with police

EL-ARISH, Egypt - A suspect in five terror attacks that have rocked Egypt's Sinai Peninsula in less than two years died in a clash with police Friday near the border with Israel, security officials said.

The incident came as the Sinai's Sharm El-Sheik resort was preparing to host the regional meeting of the World Economic Forum.

Arafa Auda Ali, 28, was killed while trying to hurl two explosive devices at security forces pursuing him in a village near Rafah, a town on the Egyptian-Israeli border, Lieutenant Hussein Nasr of the northern Sinai police told The Associated Press.

Police identified Ali as the current leader of Monotheism and Jihad - the group allegedly behind three attacks on tourist resorts and two against international peacekeepers since October 2004.

Following Ali's death, only one leading militant in the group, Youssef Mohammed Hamad Hassan, remains at large, officials said.

On Thursday, another leading member of the group, Ouda Khadr el-Shenoub, 47, surrendered to police.

Ali succeeded Nasser Khamis el-Mallahi, whom police killed in a gunbattle earlier this month in clashes in the north of the peninsula.

Coalition praises Afghan police, doubts reported capture of Taliban leader

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Officials of the U.S.-led coalition lauded Afghan security forces Friday for repulsing Taliban militants in fierce fighting, but raised doubts over Afghan claims that a captured man might be a top rebel leader.

A 24-hour storm of violence in southern Afghanistan ended Thursday with about 120 people dead and dozens of militants in custody, coalition and Afghan officials said.

One of the fighters captured in a joint Afghan-coalition operation in Kandahar province Wednesday could be the long-sought Mullah Dadullah, Gen. Rehmatullah Raufi, head of the Afghan military's southern region, said Friday.

The capture of Dadullah - one of the most trusted associates of Taliban leader Mullah Omar and commander of Taliban operations in eastern and southeastern Afghanistan - would be a major setback for the Taliban's operational leadership.

But a U.S. military spokesman, Lt. Col. Paul Fitzpatrick, said that after checking with coalition officials, it appeared the detained man was not Dadullah, who lost a leg fighting for the Taliban during the Islamic militia's rise to power in the mid-1990s.

Afghan asylum-seekers in Dublin cathedral threaten suicide if police move in

DUBLIN, Ireland - Armed with ropes and razors, Afghan asylum-seekers threatened Friday to kill themselves if police try to expel them from a Dublin cathedral where they have mounted a six-day hunger strike.

Mediators, lawyers and human rights activists sought to broker a peaceful solution after police surrounded St. Patrick's Cathedral, determined to end a protest that has shut down a major tourist attraction. About 100 officers deployed inside and around the 13th-century landmark.

About 40 Afghan asylum-seekers, all males aged 17 to 45, occupied the cathedral Sunday and Monday and said they wouldn't eat until Ireland granted them asylum. The Justice Department insisted they leave the church to pursue the proper legal channels.

The confrontation intensified Friday after the Irish Health and Safety Executive, which runs Ireland's hospital system, won a judicial order that designated the seven youngest protesters - all 17 and living in Ireland without their parents - "wards of the court" whose well-being must be protected by the state.