VoteKansas.org

PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria (Reuters) - Gunmen have kidnapped eight oil workers in three separate incidents in Nigeria's oil-producing Niger Delta in the past 24 hours, security sources said on Friday.

CRETEIL, France (Reuters) - A 16-year-old French girl suspected of holding up seven banks was formally charged with armed robbery on Friday, a prosecutor said.

NICOSIA (Reuters) - Greek and Turkish Cypriots agreed on Friday to launch talks in September to re-unite their island, whose continuing division is damaging Turkey's chances of joining the EU.

KUALA LUMPUR/MANILA (Reuters) - The Philippine government and the largest Muslim rebel group failed to reach a pact on Friday to create an ancestral home for 3 million Muslims in the country's south, both sides said.

KINSHASA (Reuters) - At least 45 people were killed and another 100 were missing after a boat sank on a remote stretch of river in Democratic Republic of Congo, a local government official said on Friday.

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy (Reuters) - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki invited Pope Benedict on Friday to visit Iraq, saying it would help the process of reconciliation.

KATHMANDU (Reuters) - Nepali police said on Friday they had detained 125 Tibetan refugees, including nuns and monks, for trying to storm a Chinese consular office in Kathmandu.

MADRID (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Spain's King Juan Carlos shook hands and made up on Friday in their first meeting since the monarch told the president to "shut up" at a summit in November.

HARARE (Reuters) - The United States expanded sanctions against President Robert Mugabe's government on Friday, increasing pressure on the Zimbabwean leader as his party discusses a power-sharing deal with the opposition.

KOHAT, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pro-Taliban militants freed eight of the dozens of paramilitary troops and government officials they have been holding hostage for nearly two weeks in northwestern Pakistan, officials and a negotiator said on Friday.

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - A Darfur rebel faction that has a pact with Sudan's government accused the army on Friday of bombing a village this week even while President Omar Hassan al-Bashir was in the region making a call for peace.

GAZA (Reuters) - A bomb exploded next to a car used by the armed wing of Hamas in the Gaza Strip on Friday, killing three gunmen and a girl, the ruling Palestinian Islamist group and medical officials said.

TRIPOLI, Lebanon (Reuters) - At least six people were killed on Friday in heavy clashes between rival sectarian factions in Lebanon's northern city of Tripoli, medical sources said.

THE HAGUE (Reuters) - Radovan Karadzic can expect an en suite cell, home-cooked Balkan cuisine and a convivial atmosphere where former enemies play table football when he is transferred to the detention unit of the Hague Tribunal.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian authorities have banned the evening edition of a large circulation newspaper for publishing news they said was harmful to the economy, Iranian media reported.

SANAA (Reuters) - Two people were killed and at least 18 others injured when a car was rammed into a police station in Yemen's Hadramout province early on Friday, a security source said.

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Earlier this month, a Mumbai city official stood up to make a presentation on water meters only to be heckled and jeered into silence by his colleagues.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council was split on Thursday over how to push Myanmar to improve human rights and adopt democratic reforms as a U.N. special envoy prepared for a key visit to the Asian nation.

BOGOTA (Reuters) - Colombia's FARC guerrillas have released eight hostages in the first such handover since the rebel group was tricked in a military operation to free Ingrid Betancourt and 14 other captives on July 2, the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Thursday.

CANBERRA (Reuters) - An Australian lesbian couple have lost a controversial court battle after trying to sue their doctor for having healthy twins from an in vitro fertilisation procedure (IVF), with doctors on Friday praising the verdict.