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SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Heavy rains and flooding that killed five people and displaced thousands in south-central Chile have collapsed road and rail bridges, closed the world's largest underground copper mine and left many in the capital without drinking water, the government said on Friday.

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Bells clanged, children played and police kept watch as pilgrims clutching rosary beads flocked to one of China's most revered Catholic shrines on Saturday, the day Pope Benedict XVI designated World Day of Prayer for China.

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesia's government jacked up fuel prices on Saturday, sparking protests, but some $1.5 billion of cash handouts intended to cushion the blow for poor families could turn out to be a savvy move, politically and economically.

BUJUMBURA (Reuters) - Burundi's last resisting rebel group has said it will stop sporadic fighting with the government to give a stalled peace deal a chance.

YINGXIU, China (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visited the epicenter of China's huge earthquake on Saturday, meeting victims and drawing an unspoken comparison with the sluggish aid efforts after a cyclone in neighboring Myanmar.

SEVASTOPOL, Ukraine (Reuters) - Ukraine's pro-Western leaders hope to join NATO but the people of this Black Sea port, where Russian warships are moored at the quayside, want no part of it.

YANGON (Reuters) - There was "no time to lose" to help Myanmar's cyclone survivors after the secretive military government promised it would allow in more aid workers, disaster relief officials said on Saturday.

SIOUX FALLS, South Dakota (Reuters) - Hillary Clinton mentioned the June 1968 assassination of Robert Kennedy in explaining on Friday why she had resisted calls to end her White House bid, drawing a rebuke from Democratic front-runner Barack Obama's campaign.

MONTERREY, Mexico (Reuters) - Suspected drug hit men dumped four human heads in ice chests in northern Mexico on Friday in a gruesome killing of rivals, a state attorney general's office said.

BRASILIA (Reuters) - Twelve South American countries founded a union on Friday aimed at boosting economic integration and political cohesion, but the region's bitter rivalries stymied ambitious plans on defense and trade.

SIOUX FALLS, South Dakota (Reuters) - Hillary Clinton mentioned the June 1968 assassination of Robert Kennedy in explaining on Friday why she had resisted calls to end her White House bid, drawing a rebuke from Democratic front-runner Barack Obama's campaign.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain's wife, Cindy, released her 2006 tax return under pressure on Friday, showing she paid $1.7 million in taxes on about $6 million in income.

NAPLES (Reuters) - Police clashed with demonstrators in Naples on Friday night after the Italian government vowed to force open rubbish dumps against locals' wishes in a determined effort to end the city's chronic trash problem.

MONTERREY, Mexico (Reuters) - Suspected drug hitmen dumped four human heads in ice chests in northern Mexico on Friday in a gruesome murder of rivals, a state attorney general's office said.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential front-runner Barack Obama, in a letter released on Friday, urged President George W. Bush not to submit a "badly flawed" free trade agreement with South Korea to Congress for a vote.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The Central African Republic has been hit by an upsurge in attacks by armed bandits, with up to 100,000 people forced out of their homes fleeing such attacks, the United Nations said on Friday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Military officers who denounce policies they helped implement are "cowardly," the top U.S. officer charged on Friday in an apparent reference to retired generals' attacks on Iraq war policy.

DUBLIN (Reuters) - The United States is trying to bully its allies into weakening a treaty banning cluster bombs, Jody Williams, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for leading a campaign against landmines, said on Friday.

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraqi soldiers opened fire to disperse supporters of anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr who were gathering for prayers in Basra on Friday, jeopardizing a fragile peace in the southern city.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Iran's foreign minister and Syria's ambassador to Sweden are among the officials expected to attend next week's ministerial meeting of the Iraq Compact Annual Review, U.N. officials said on Friday.