AP - Concern over upcoming elections and widening tensions among Iraq's religious and ethnic groups appear behind the U.S. military's recommendation to put the brakes on withdrawing more American troops from Iraq despite improvements in security.

AP - The likely next president of unstable, nuclear-armed Pakistan following Saturday's election is a horse-loving aristocrat who has spent more years in prison than in politics — a novice leader lifted to prominence by his marriage to Benazir Bhutto and propelled into power by her murder.

AP - The bearded, turbaned men gather beneath a large, leafy tree in rural eastern Nangarhar province. When Malik Mohammed speaks on their behalf, his voice is soft but his words are harsh. Mohammed makes it clear that the tribal chiefs have lost all faith in both their own government and the foreign soldiers in their country.

AP - A ship carrying 33 tons of U.N. relief supplies docked in Gonaives on Friday, the first significant aid delivery to tens of thousands of people who have gone with little food or clean water for four days.

Reuters - Australia's 25th governor-general was sworn into office as the representative of Britain's Queen Elizabeth on Friday, with republicans holding out little hope that Australia will abolish the job any time soon.

Reuters - Five Islamist militants were killed on Friday in a missile attack by a suspected U.S. drone in Pakistan's North Waziristan region, in a stepped up campaign against militants near the Afghan border.

AFP - US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was due Friday to make the first visit to Libya by the top US diplomat since 1953 and meet Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi.

AP - Tropical Storm Hanna was accelerating early Friday as it made its way toward the United States' southeast coast.

AP - Tony Blair toured a Palestinian aluminum factory Thursday and was told it runs at one-third capacity because of Israeli import restrictions. He promised he'll take it up with Israeli authorities.

AFP - Chelsea boss Luiz Felipe Scolari insisted Friday that the failure to sign his fellow Brazilian Robinho would be no loss to the Premier League club this season.

AP - The U.S. Embassy says the flagship of the U.S. Navy's Mediterranean fleet is to arrive in the Georgian port of Poti on Friday.

AP - The convoy rumbled out of the U.N. base toward a flooded, starving and seething city Thursday, carrying some of the first food aid since Tropical Storm Hanna killed 137 Haitians and drowned Gonaives in muddy water three days ago.

AP - The real question in Pakistan's presidential election is not who the winner will be but whether the new leader will be any more successful than his predecessor in tackling extremism and economic malaise.

AP - Pakistani officials say an explosion has destroyed at least one house near the Afghan border, killing several suspected foreign militants.

AP - When Condoleezza Rice spends a few hours in Libya and shakes hands with Moammar Gadhafi, she will close a nearly three-decade era of bitter animosity between the United States and the North African nation that has sometimes gotten personal.