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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives defied President George W. Bush by passing legislation on Thursday that would set the end of 2009 as the goal for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday defeated legislation that would have funded the war in Iraq for another year, in a surprise move that the Senate could overturn.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Gunmen opened fire on a car carrying two Iranian diplomats in Baghdad on Thursday, wounding them and two other people in the vehicle, an Iranian embassy official said.

IJEGUN, Nigeria (Reuters) - At least 100 people were killed and scores injured when fuel from a pipeline ruptured by a bulldozer caught fire and exploded on Thursday in a village near Nigeria's biggest city of Lagos, the Red Cross said.

BOGOTA (Reuters) - Colombian guerrilla computer documents that Bogota says are proof Venezuela and Ecuador supported the Marxist rebels are authentic and show no evidence of tampering, Interpol said on Thursday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate gave final congressional approval on Thursday to a $289 billion farm bill that expands programs to help feed poor Americans, and lawmakers said Congress could easily override a presidential veto.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - As the U.S. economy slowed in 2007, President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney saw their assets stay stable, according to financial disclosure reports released by the White House on Thursday.

PARIS (Reuters) - Hundreds of thousands of French teachers and other public sector workers went on strike on Thursday to protest against job cuts and reforms announced by conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy's government.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush on Thursday decried his critics' calls for negotiations with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as comparable to the "appeasement" of Adolf Hitler before World War Two.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Sixty nine percent of Americans see gasoline prices as a serious problem for their families but only 41 percent favor a temporary repeal of the gasoline tax as proposed by presidential candidates John McCain and Hillary Clinton, a poll released on Thursday said.

LAGOS (Reuters) - Several people were burnt to death and scores injured when fuel from a pipeline ruptured by an earthmover building a road on the outskirts of Lagos caught fire, the Red Cross said on Thursday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United Steelworkers Union, a politically powerful U.S. labor group with 600,000 members, endorsed Barack Obama for president on Thursday as the Democratic Party began to rally around the Illinois senator.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House on Thursday dropped its resistance to putting a halt on filling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, saying that President George W. Bush will not veto a final bill from Congress that suspends oil deliveries while crude prices are very high.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki vowed on Thursday to impose law and order in northern Iraq and said an offensive against al Qaeda militants would end the "dark days" of shootings and bomb attacks.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Leaders of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee have reached a deal on a broad housing rescue plan in which Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would provide funds to support a federal mortgage insurance fund, two industry sources said on Thursday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The top Republican on the U.S. Senate Banking Committee on Thursday said he was working with the White House as he negotiated with Democrats on a housing bill, adding that the two sides were close to a deal.

ABYEI, Sudan (Reuters) - Thousands of civilians fled clashes between Sudan's former north-south civil war foes in the oil-rich central town of Abyei on Thursday before a ceasefire was agreed, officials said.

TIJUANA, Mexico (Reuters) - A decade ago, economists hailed Tijuana as a place where cheap Mexican labor and U.S. financing could meet, attracting Asian firms eager to set up manufacturing plants to export to the United States.

COLUMBUS, Ohio (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain said on Thursday that, if elected, he would like to take a page from the British government and appear in question-and-answer sessions with lawmakers.

KIGALI (Reuters) - A 90-year-old Rwandan genocide survivor has been stabbed and burnt to death by a gang that included four assailants who had confessed to taking part in the 1994 slaughter, a body representing genocide survivors said on Thursday.