Zimbabweans near deal, leaders says

JOHANNESBURG - Zimbabwean negotiators have the basis for a power-sharing agreement and should quickly resolve their differences, southern African leaders said yesterday at the close of a regional summit. Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has proposed taking a powerful prime minister's role, conceding the presidency to Robert Mugabe. But the Zimbabwe military opposes a provision allowing the president to use military power only on the advice of the premier. (AP)

LONDON - Two small planes collided in midair and crashed in central England yesterday, killing five people. The planes slammed into each other near Coventry, about 90 miles northwest of London. The crash involved a Cessna 407 carrying four people, and a light aircraft, with only the pilot on board, police said. The debris from the collision extended across several miles. No one on the ground was reported injured. The cause was not determined. (AP)

BAKU - A grenade exploded during evening prayers at a packed mosque in Azerbaijan's capital yesterday, killing two people and injuring as many as eight others. An unidentified attacker threw the grenade into the Abu-Bekr mosque, one of the largest in Baku, police said. They said the attacker might have had accomplices. Hundreds of people were inside when the blast occurred. Azerbaijan is a mostly Muslim former Soviet republic with a secular government. (AP)

JERUSALEM - Israel confirmed yesterday it would release 200 of the estimated 11,000 Palestinians it holds prisoner in the hope of shoring up support for President Mahmoud Abbas and the peace talks he is conducting with the Jewish state. The longest-serving Palestinian prisoner, in jail for 31 years, may be among those released, but Abbas's prime minister Salam Fayyad said the gesture was not enough. He demanded that Olmert free all the thousands of Palestinians. (Reuters)

MEXICO CITY - Gunmen killed 13 people at a family party in the border state of Chihuahua, authorities said yesterday. A 1-year-old child was among the dead in Saturday's attack in the mountain town of Creel. Witnesses told police that gunmen in three pickup trucks, wearing ski masks and dressed in black, fired on a crowd outside a dance hall. Suspicion focused on drug cartels. (AP)

KHARTOUM - A Sudanese court sentenced to death two senior members of a Darfur rebel group and six others for their role in an military attack near the capital three months ago that killed more than 200 people, court officials said yesterday. The eight include Abdel Aziz Ushar, a senior commander in the Justice and Equality movement. (AP)