World

With an estimated 10,000 people looking on, Afghanistan's assassinated vice president was buried in his hometown. Haji Abdul Qadir was the second member of the government to be murdered this year. Reports said further violence may have been prevented at Qadir's funeral, as police arrested a man in the throng who was carrying a bomb. An official investigation into the assassination Saturday was under way, although there was no immediate claim of responsibility.

Pressure mounted against Yasser Arafat as hundreds of Palestinian police refused to obey his choice for new West Bank security chief. Zuheir Manasra was appointed to replace the fired Jibril Rajoub, who often has been described as Arafat's possible successor. Rajoub initially denied he'd been fired, calling Arafat's handling of the matter "disrespectful."

No new date was set for a resumption of talks between Iraqi diplomats and the UN after negotiations late last week ended without agreement on the return of weapons inspectors. Leaders in Baghdad blamed the US and Britain for the lack of a breakthrough because they wanted to "block the legitimate demands of Iraq [from] being met." The New York Times on Friday published details of what it said was a top-secret US document outlining a massive land, sea, and air attack against Iraq.

Despite heavy security, two policemen and a protester were hurt at a flashpoint in the "Drumcree Sunday" march by the Protestant Orange Order in Northern Ireland. The parade annually is the most volatile of the summer marching season, although for the fifth straight year it was banned from taking a route through a hostile Catholic neighborhood.

The seven-month-long struggle for power in Madagascar appeared over as defeated presidential reelection candidate Didier Ratsiraka left for exile in France. As he fled, troops loyal to his successor, Marc Ravalomanana, were poised to accept a white flag of surrender from defenders of Ratsiraka's last stronghold on the Indian Ocean island.

An estimated 1 million people were driven from their homes in Bangladesh and parts of India as the annual monsoons built toward their full impact. The rains and river flooding were blamed for at least 23 deaths there, plus 11 more in the Philippines and one in South Korea. Authorities were watching India's Brahmaputra River closely because it had yet to rise to its official danger level.