AP - ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Police officer Absar Ali was talking with colleagues near the busy Islamabad market when the suicide bomber attacked, rattling Pakistan's usually quiet capital. The next thing the 37-year-old saw was "a bed of corpses."

AP - The South African Reserve Bank says 5 million coins featuring a smiling Nelson Mandela will go into circulation on July 18, the former president's 90th birthday.

AP - Israel has signed an agreement to swap prisoners with the Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas, according to a statement released Monday, as Israeli forces began digging up the bodies of Lebanese fighters to be exchanged in the deal.

Reuters - A Russian man who described local police as "scum" in an Internet posting was given a suspended jail sentence on Monday for extremism, prompting bloggers to warn of a crackdown on free speech online.

AP - Iraq's prime minister said Monday his country is now proposing an interim deal with the United States on the presence of American troops instead of a more formal agreement — and wants to include a timetable for a U.S. withdrawal.

AP - President Bush encountered resistance on his climate-change policy as he and other world leaders sought to strike a balance between framing a deal on global warming while coping with inflation and slumping economic growth.

AP - A car bomb ripped through the front wall of the Indian Embassy in central Kabul on Monday, killing 40 people in the deadliest attack in Afghanistan's capital since the fall of the Taliban, officials said.

AFP - Pope Benedict XVI is expected to apologise to victims of sexual abuse by clergy when he visits Australia for World Youth Day next week, the leader of the country's Catholics said Monday.

AP - The top elected official in Indian Kashmir announced his resignation Monday after weeks of violent protests over the transfer of government land to a Hindu shrine in the Muslim-majority region.

AFP - Robert Mugabe would remain Zimbabwe's head of state but hand real power to opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai as prime minister under a plan proposed by South African President Thabo Mbeki, the Guardian reported Monday.