Over 3.2 million voters throughout Laos on April 30 cast their ballots to elect 132 new deputies for the seventh National Assembly, Laos’ legislative body.

 Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden 

Syrian Prime Minister Adel Safar said Saturday his cabinet was to set a complete plan for political, economic and administrative reforms, official SANA news agency reported.

Dazed Southerners on April 28 comforted one another and began the process of rebuilding after a barrage of storms claimed nearly 300 lives and reduced once-familiar neighborhoods to piles of bricks and lumber.

Russia's defense and space industries would get huge investments under current development programs, President Dmitry Medvedev said Wednesday.

U.S. President Barack Obama plans to nominate CIA director Leon Panetta to succeed Robert Gates as the new defense secretary, media reported Wednesday.

 The firing began at 1:40 p.m. at the 11th century Preah Vihear temple and spread to burst out at the Ta Moan temple and Ta Krabei temple at 2:10 p.m.

Surging food prices could push millions of people in Asia into extreme poverty and threaten the durability of the region's world-leading economic recovery, the Asian Development Bank said on Tuesday.

Japan launched a massive search Monday using 25,000 troops to scour its tsunami-ravaged northeast coast for thousands of bodies still missing more than six weeks after the disaster struck.

Cambodia on Monday accused Thailand of damaging ancient jungle temples at the centre of their bloodiest fighting since a bitter border dispute flared up almost three years ago.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is expected to mark the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster on Tuesday after he visited the site of the former nuclear plant, calling for efforts to "continue to build an enduring legacy of safety for the future," a UN spokesman said here Monday.

Japan's cabinet approved on Friday almost $50 billion of spending for post-earthquake rebuilding, a down payment on the country's biggest public works effort in six decades.

Fierce clashes on the Thai-Cambodia border have left 10 dead and forced thousands to flee the worst bloodshed since a UN ceasefire appeal in February, officials said Saturday.

Some 90 million people worldwide live within 30km of a nuclear reactor, equivalent to the exclusion zone around Japan's crippled Fukushima plant, according to a study released on Friday.

France and Italy announced on April 21 that they will send military officers to Libya to advise rebels fighting for the ouster of leader Moammar Gadhafi and his regime.