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Thousands of protesters streamed down avenues of the capital Thursday, chanting "death to the dictator" and defying security forces who fired tear gas and charged with batons, witnesses said. The first opposition foray into the streets in nearly two weeks aimed to revive mass demonstrations that wee crushed in Iran's postelection turmoil.

Talks to resolve the leadership crisis in Honduras finally got on track Thursday, with both sides showing up at the home of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias for closed-door meetings.

Construction worker Zhang Binkun said Thursday he was enraged because a mob of Muslim minorities beat to death his mother in the worst rioting to hit western China in decades.

Afghanistan's government has revised a law that stirred an international outcry because it essentially legalized marital rape, officials said Thursday. The new version no longer requires a woman submit to sex with her husband, only that she do certain housework.

Bombs killed more than 50 people in Iraq on Thursday in the worst violence since U.S. combat troops withdrew from urban areas last week, and American forces released five Iranian officials suspected of aiding Shiite insurgents.

U.S. troops and contractors inflicted considerable damage on the historic Iraqi site of Babylon, driving heavy machinery over sacred paths, bulldozing hilltops and digging trenches through one of the world' most important archaeological sites, experts for UNESCO said Thursday.

A truck filled with explosives that police believe may have been destined for Kabul blew up on a highway Thursday, killing 25 people — more than half of them children walking to school. Two American soldiers died in combat as the U.S. military reported the number of roadside bombs in Afghanistan lat month was nearly three times the figure for Iraq.

The tricks of the trade of Britain's rambunctious tabloid press came under scrutiny Thursday, after a newspaper reported that a tabloid owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch had illegally hacked into the mobile phones of hundreds of celebrities and politicians.

Leaders of rich and developing nations want to finish a long-delayed world trade deal in 2010 and head off trade wars that could hit world economies as they struggle to emerge from the recession, according to a draft of a joint declaration obtained by The Associated Press.

Pakistan will allow some 2 million people who fled an army offensive against the Taliban in Swat Valley to return home next week, the prime minister announced Thursday, saying the region was now secure and essential services restored.

Riot police fired in the air to disperse pro-reform demonstrators in central Tehran on Thursday, nearly four weeks after a disputed election triggered mass protests across Iran, a witness said.

Bombs in Baghdad and northern Iraq killed at least 50 people on Thursday, police said, underscoring doubts about local forces' ability to keep Iraqis safe after U.S. troops pulled out of city centers.

The two rivals for power in Honduras prepared for talks in Costa Rica on Thursday to try to thrash out a solution to the political crisis triggered by last month's coup in the Central American state.

Chinese President Hu Jintao, forced to abandon a G8 summit in Italy by ethnic violence in restive Xinjiang, said that maintaining social stability in the energy-rich region was the "most urgent task," state television reported on Thursday.

Fourteen Britons who had contracted H1N1 flu have died and the rapid spread of infection in two areas of the country is close to epidemic level, health officials said on Thursday.

The Obama administration is seeking "full partnership" with Moscow to bridge ballistic missile-defense differences that have strained U.S.-Russian ties for years, the head of the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency said Thursday.

Five Iranian officials detained by the U.S. military in Iraq for up to two years were released on Thursday and handed over to Iranian embassy staff by Iraqi authorities, an Iranian embassy official said.

Venezuela is taking dozens of radio stations off the air and putting stricter rules on cable and satellite television, a minister said on Thursday, part of President Hugo Chavez's battle with private media firms.

An explosion outside a school south of the Afghan capital on Thursday killed at least 25 people, including 15 students, officials said, and Taliban fighters overran a district near the Pakistan border after heavy fighting.

Hosting the German foreign minister this week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used an especially tainted term to condemn the Palestinian demand that Israel's settlements in the occupied West Bank be removed.