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BALCILAR, Turkey (Reuters) - A gas explosion killed at least 16 female students and injured 27 others, wrecking a dormitory at a girls' school in southern Turkey on Friday, Interior Minister Besir Atalay said.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush will likely have to walk a careful line when he visits South Korea next week -- pushing to rid the Korean peninsula of nuclear weapons while sidestepping several other tense fights.

YANGON (Reuters) - Myanmar's military junta has charged popular comedian and leading dissident Zarganar with public order offences, which could see him jailed for up to two years, a lawyer said on Friday.

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican police have captured a key Colombian drug trafficker who was a top supplier of cocaine to the fractured Sinaloa cartel, police said on Thursday.

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Malaysia opposition figure Anwar Ibrahim is gathering support to file a no-confidence vote against the government in six weeks, the Financial Times reported on Friday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Legislation aimed at curbing credit card billing practices that surprise borrowers with unexpected interest rate increases and fees was approved on Thursday by a U.S. House of Representatives committee.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The House Energy and Commerce committee wants the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to turn over the results of an analysis about the potential links between cancer and cholesterol drug Vytorin, the Wall Street Journal reported.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican Sen. Ted Stevens pleaded not guilty on Thursday to charges of concealing more than $250,000 in gifts from an oil services company, and he will get a chance to clear his name at trial before the November election.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Congress on Thursday passed legislation smoothing the way for Libya to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to compensate U.S. victims of bombing attacks that Washington blames on Tripoli.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Legislation that seeks to protect college students from lending abuses while boosting student aid was approved by Congress on Thursday.

RACINE, Wisconsin (Reuters) - Republican White House hopeful John McCain accused Democrat Barack Obama on Thursday of playing racial politics in some of the most biting back-and-forth of the presidential campaign.

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has added a large Spanish-owned bank to the list of companies to be run by the government in the oil exporting nation, furthering his plans of building a socialist state.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bill that aims to improve U.S. consumer product safety after millions of Chinese-made toys were recalled last summer cleared Congress on Thursday and now goes to President George W. Bush for his signature into law.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council renewed the mandate for peacekeepers in Darfur on Thursday in a resolution that Washington criticized for raising concerns about moves to indict Sudan's president for genocide.

THE HAGUE (Reuters) - Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic appeared before a U.N. war crimes judge for the first time on Thursday to answer genocide charges and said he had been kidnapped and feared for his life.

DAKAR (Reuters) - Chaotic transport is a part of life in West Africa, but getting to work has become even harder as rocketing fuel prices ignite protests by bus and taxi drivers, squeeze family budgets and encourage fuel smuggling.

KABUL (Reuters) - Violence in Afghanistan has reached its worst level since 2001 with more than 260 civilians killed in July alone, a group of 100 aid agencies said on Friday, calling on all sides to do more to protect the lives of non-combatants.

LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's popularity has slumped to a record low, but a change in leader will not help the ruling Labour Party win the next election, according to an opinion poll published on Friday.

RACINE, Wisconsin (Reuters) - Republican White House hopeful John McCain accused Democrat Barack Obama on Thursday of playing racial politics in some of the most biting back-and-forth of the presidential campaign.

NEW HAVEN, Connecticut (Reuters) - Two prominent evangelical Christians praised their dialogue with Muslim leaders on Thursday at the end of a three-day conference seeking ways to ease tensions between the world's two largest faiths.