• Afghan and NATO-led troops kill 15 Taliban militants in the southern Kandahar Province during a joint operation. (Xinhua)
• Fighting erupts between ethnic rebel groups and Burmese government forces in the east of the country; thousands of people flee into Thailand. (BBC) (Al Jazeera) (Bangkok Post)
• An armed group kidnaps at least two Americans, two Frenchmen and a Canadian from a Transocean oil rig in the Okoro Oilfield off the coast of Niger Delta, Nigeria, injuring two others. (Reuters) (Xinhua). (CNN)
• Bomb attacks in the Iraqi cities of Karbala, Najaf and Basra kill at least nineteen people and injure scores more. (CNN), (BBC)

• American talk show host Conan O'Brien returns to television on TBS ten months after his high-profile exit from The Tonight Show. (CNN)
• The Foreign Minister of Israel, Avigdor Lieberman, denounces the left-wing performers who refuse to perform in a theatre in a Jewish settlement on the West Bank as an "extremist group trying to wage cultural terrorism". (Reuters)
• French novelist Michel Houellebecq wins the Prix Goncourt for his book La Carte et le Territoire (The Map and the Territory). (The Telegraph)

• Global Green Growth conference ends in Copenhagen. (People Daily)
• Qantas Flight 32: Qantas announces that it has found "slight anomalies" in the engines of its Airbus 380 aircraft and is keeping it grounded for the time being. (BBC)
• Express delivery company DHL promises better screening of customers and parcels before they are sent to airports after recent parcel bombs sent from Yemen and Greece. (Reuters)
• A government conservation campaign, and possible hoarding by state oil companies, causes a severe shortage on diesel fuel in the People's Republic of China, disrupting industry and commerce. (CNBC)

• At least 120 people are tested for cholera in the capital of Haiti, Port-au-Prince. (BBC)
• An explosion due to mishandling of explosives kills two in a Copiapó, Chile copper mine. (Wikinews)

• German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle calls on Hamas to free captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit and urges Israel to end its embargo of the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, but does not meet with the Gaza leadership because of group's refusal to renounce violence and recognize Israel. (Reuters) (The Jerusalem Post)
• The annual meeting of the Kimberley Process closes in Jerusalem without finding a solution to the issue of “blood diamond” exports from the Marange diamond fields of Zimbabwe. (The Jerusalem Post)
• President of the United States Barack Obama backs a permanent seat for India on the UN Security Council. (CNN)
• The Obama administration bans cargo shipments from Somalia in the wake of the Yemen bomb attacks. (Yahoo! News)
• Israel has revealed plans to build nearly 1,300 housing units for Jewish settlers in east Jerusalem. (BBC)
• The United States offers to drop Sudan from its list of "state sponsors of terrorism", ending its isolation, if two scheduled referendums take place with respected results. (Al Jazeera)

• Libyan authorities arrest 10 reporters apparently for criticizing Libya's leadership. (The Jerusalem Post)
• Unidentified attackers armed with knives kill 12 people in Kushchyovskaya, Krasnodar krai, Russia. (The Moscow Times)
• U.S. militant Lori Berenson is released from prison in Peru after serving more than a decade for collaborating with the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement. (AP via The Chronicle)

• Human rights organizations say the Palestinian Authority is depriving Palestinians in Gaza affiliated with Hamas of passports; Hamas has retaliated by depriving Gazans belonging to Fatah of their passports. (The Jerusalem Post)
• Parliamentary elections in Azerbaijan were held in accordance with international standards. (Beta Rian)
• Two people are killed and several injured after a protest camp in Western Sahara is broken up by Morocco, hours before talks on the disputed territory begin. (BBC) (Taiwan News)
• An ECOWAS regional court in West Africa orders authorities in Niger to release deposed President Mamadou Tandja who was detained in a coup in February. (BBC)
• Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard announces a referendum to decide whether indigenous Australians should be recognised in the Constitution. (AFP via Yahoo! News Australia)

• The reptile scientist, Ngô Văn Trí of the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, discovers a species of self-cloning lizard later known as Leiolepis ngovantrii when he came across tanks full of them at small restaurants in rural villages in Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu Province. Ngo Van Tri becomes intrigued when he notices that all of the lizards appeared to be female. (Dan Tri)
• Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao unveils pictures of the Moon's Sinus Iridum, or Bay of Rainbows, taken during China's Chang`e-2 lunar probe mission. (Unian) (Xinhua)

• Cycling's world body Union Cycliste Internationale asks the Spanish federation to take action against Tour de France winner Alberto Contador who tested positive for a small amount of clenbuterol. (BBC)