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SIBUYAN ISLAND, Philippines (Reuters) - The Philippines halted a search for hundreds of bodies feared trapped inside a capsized passenger ferry on Friday after authorities learnt that 10 metric tons of pesticide was on board.

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea toppled the cooling tower at its plutonium-producing reactor on Friday in a symbolic move to show its commitment to an international nuclear deal, a day after submitting an inventory of its atomic program.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States hopes a promise by Pakistan not to let militants use its territory to attack Afghanistan will lead to a crackdown on the fighters by Islamabad, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Thursday.

Finbarr O'Reilly, Reuters chief photographer for West and Central Africa, was born in Swansea, Wales in 1971 and started as an Arts correspondent. He joined Reuters in 2001, turning to photography in 2005 and winning the World Press Photo Award for picture of the year in 2006. In the following story, he describes a recent encounter with rebels in eastern Chad.

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A Mexican police chief and his bodyguard were shot to death as they ate lunch in Mexico City on Thursday, the latest police slaying in a drug war that has killed more than 1,600 people this year.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States hopes a promise by Pakistan not to let militants use its territory to attack Afghanistan will lead to a crackdown on the fighters by Islamabad, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Thursday.

MADRID (Reuters) - Prostitutes held colorful fashion parades in central Madrid on Thursday to demonstrate against plans by property developers to buy up premises in which they have long plied their trade.

CARACAS (Reuters) - The United States Embassy in Venezuela received a bomb threat on Thursday, an embassy spokeswoman said, though the embassy has only closed the parking lot and not the embassy itself.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Narcotics supplies have increased sharply in parts of Afghanistan and Colombia where insurgents are in control, helping them fund their activities, the United Nations said on Thursday.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Conservative Anglican leaders meeting at a rebel summit expressed frustration with the church's leadership on Thursday but indicated that an outright schism might be avoided.

RIYADH (Reuters) - A prominent Sunni Muslim Saudi cleric met with minority Shi'ite Muslim leaders this month in an attempt to soothe anger over an edict by radical sheikhs calling Shi'ism a heresy, Shi'ite sources said on Thursday.

ROME (Reuters) - After years of speculation that Pope Benedict wears shoes by Prada, the Vatican's official newspaper denied such talk as "frivolous".

KYOTO, Japan (Reuters) - The Group of Eight wealthy nations put pressure on Myanmar to let in more foreign relief workers after a devastating cyclone last month, after accusations it had obstructed aid, a Japanese official said on Thursday.

MITROVICA (Reuters) - Serbs in Kosovo's divided city of Mitrovica will establish their own assembly on Saturday in the latest challenge to the authority of the new state's ethnic Albanian leadership, officials said.

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - The Afghan government sacked the police chief of Kandahar on Thursday for negligence after some 400 Taliban prisoners and 700 criminals escaped this month in one of the biggest jail breaks in history.

LONDON (Reuters) - Nelson Mandela uttered just four words criticizing Zimbabwe's leadership, but they were enough to resonate around the world.

VIENNA (Reuters) - The United States on Thursday welcomed a U.N. check of a Syrian site said to have harbored an almost-built secret nuclear reactor before Israel destroyed it, but called on Damascus not to restrict the investigation.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - North Korea handed over a long-delayed account of its nuclear activities on Thursday, prompting a still-wary U.S. President George W. Bush to ease some sanctions on a country he once branded part of an "axis of evil."

TEHRAN (Reuters) - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Thursday Iran's "enemies" would never succeed in stopping its nuclear activities, the official IRNA news agency reported.

PARIS (Reuters) - The leader of a breakaway traditionalist Catholic group has rejected a Vatican offer to rejoin Rome, accusing Pope Benedict of trying to silence dissenting voices.