British soldiers stand guard near the site of an explosion on the outskirts of Kabul, July 6.

KABUL, Afghanistan, July 6--Afghan and US-led coalition troops, using artillery and airstrikes, killed 33 Taliban fighters after the insurgents attacked a police checkpoint in southern Afghanistan, officials said Friday.
The militants attacked two police vehicles with gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades. Coalition and Afghan forces responded in what the coalition described as a “sparsely populated area“ in Uruzgan province, AP reported.
Gen. Zahir Azimi said 33 Taliban fighters were killed. The coalition reported there were no indications of civilian casualties from the fighting and said no coalition or Afghan forces were killed or wounded.
Violence has spiked in Afghanistan in the last several weeks. More than 3,000 people have died in insurgency-related violence in Afghanistan this year--including more than 2,000 militants, according to an Associated Press count based on figures from Western and Afghan officials. More than 1,000 people were killed in June alone.
Elsewhere, a suicide bomber attacked a NATO convoy east of the capital, leaving two soldiers with minor wounds, Afghan officials said.
The bomber damaged both vehicles in the two-vehicle convoy in the Dah Sabuz district of Kabul province, said Zemrai Bashary, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry.
NATO confirmed the blast, and said that two of its troops were wounded, without disclosing their nationalities. Mohammad Sardar, an Afghan soldier at the site, said the wounded were British.
The attack took place a day after another bomber in the south blew himself up at a checkpoint, killing 10 police and wounding 11, while a roadside bomb and clashes in the east left three NATO soldiers dead, authorities said. The alliance did not release the soldiers’ nationalities. Most foreign troops in the east are American.
The latest NATO casualties raised the number of foreign soldiers killed this year to at least 105.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, July 6--Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf’s plane was fired on as it took off on Friday from a military airfield in Rawalpindi, an intelligence officer said, contradicting official denials.
Musharraf’s plane arrived safely in the southwestern town of Turbat, where the president visited flood victims. The military denied there had been any attack, Reuters reported.
But an intelligence officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there had been an unsuccessful attempt on Musharraf’s life.
“There was an attempt, that was missed,“ said the officer, who declined to be identified.
US ally Musharraf, who came to power in a military coup in 1999, survived two assassination attempts by Al Qaeda-linked militants in Rawalpindi in December 2003.
A Reuters photographer saw two large guns mounted on the roof of a two-story house in the congested area close to the airport, and a neighbor said he heard the firing.
One appeared to be a long barreled anti-aircraft gun and the other a light machine gun.
They were placed between large satellite dishes and a water tank of the flat-roofed house, located directly under the flight path close to the runway. A low wall ran round the perimeter of the roof.
Security is normally deployed in the area ahead of the president’s flights, the timings of which are generally kept secret.
Neighbor Arshad Mehmood said the house had been vacant and up for rent, though a couple with two children had visited it the previous night.
Security forces have cordoned off the area around the house in the garrison town next to the capital, Islamabad, and the owner, a shopkeeper, had been detained.
According to some accounts given by television reporters, a rocket was also fired at the plane.
But the Pakistan military was adamant there had been no attack.

Journalists wait in front of former French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin's apartment in Paris, July 5 as investigators raided his home after fresh evidence came to light in a dirty tricks scandal targeting President Nicolas Sarkozy.

PARIS, July 6--French investigators raided the home of former prime minister Dominique de Villepin on Thursday after fresh evidence came to light in a dirty tricks scandal targetting President Nicolas Sarkozy.
Judges looking into the so-called Clearstream affair were following up new evidence that Villepin may have sought to defame Sarkozy and scupper his bid for the presidency, justice officials said, AFP reported.
“It’s the logical next step,“ one source close to the investigation said.
Judges Jean-Marie d’Huy and Henri Pons visited Villepin’s flat in a fashionable part of the 17th arrondissement in Paris late afternoon, accompanied by police and a representative of the prosecutor’s office, and conducted a six-and-a-half hour search of the premises.
The new evidence against Villepin was widely leaked to the press earlier Thursday and is based on documents retrieved from the computer of retired intelligence chief Philippe Rondot.
These appear to back up claims that in 2004 Villepin encouraged the leaking of information falsely implicating Sarkozy, then interior minister, in a financial scandal, justice officials said.
The documents also suggest Villepin was acting with the clear support of then president Jacques Chirac.
Both Villepin and Chirac have denied involvement in the affair, which revolves around a fake list of account-holders at the Clearstream bank of Luxembourg who supposedly benefited from illegal commissions from arms sales.
Judges in charge of the investigation are looking into allegations that Villepin and Chirac may have tried to secretly publicise the list to wreck Sarkozy’s presidential hopes. His relationship with the two was at the time under great strain.
Chirac, who handed over power to Sarkozy in May, has refused to speak to the judges, arguing that in this matter he is still covered by presidential immunity.

TOKYO, July 6--Japan said Friday it aims to erect a missile defense shield as quickly as possible as North Korea develops increasingly sophisticated weaponry, including long-range rockets.
Japan’s annual defense report warned that North Korea is improving its missile system to cover all east Asia, including Japan, and potentially reach the northern tip of Australia as well as part of Alaska, AFP reported.
The report, approved by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s cabinet, was the first published by the defense ministry, which was upgraded from agency status in January in line with Abe’s initiative to expand the role of Japanese troops.
North Korea’s ballistic missiles “are now regarded as more practical,“ the report said.
“North Korea is improving its capability of managing ballistic missiles. It is considered that North Korea is trying to further extend their firing range.
“It is necessary to finish deploying a ballistic missile defense as quickly as possible,“ the annual paper said, noting the need for Tokyo to strengthen cooperation with the US military.
The defense report comes after a series of missile launches by North Korea that have heightened tensions in the region.
In 1998 North Korea sparked alarm in Japan by test-firing a long-range missile over the country, prompting Japan and the United States to start working on a advanced missile shield.
North Korea also shocked Japan with its first nuclear test last October.
Hopes are rising that a long-stalled pact on North Korea’s nuclear program will finally be realized, with the communist state hinting that it is ready to meet its promise to close a nuclear reactor.
While there is a chance that the reclusive state will take action to freeze its nuclear program, it is expected to continue developing missiles, a direct threat to South Korea and Japan, independent analysts said.
Japan has set aside 161 billion yen ($1.3 billion) on development and deployment of its missile defense for the current fiscal year to March 2008, up 4.4 percent from the previous fiscal year.

PRISTINA, Serbia, July 6--The progress made in Kosovo since a 1998-99 war risks unraveling without a decision on the Albanian majority’s demand for independence from Serbia, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says in a report.
Russia has blocked the adoption of a Western-backed UN resolution that would effectively set Kosovo on the path to independence eight years after NATO wrested control of the province from Serbia, Reuters reported.
Kosovo’s leaders have threatened to declare independence unilaterally, a step that could shatter the unity of the European Union on the major remaining post-war question in the Balkans and send shockwaves across the region.
“If its future status remains undefined there is a real risk that the progress achieved by the United Nations and the Provisional Institutions in Kosovo can begin to unravel,“ Ban says in a report due to be presented at the UN Security Council on Monday.
“The determination of Kosovo’s future status should therefore remain a priority for the Security Council and for the international community as a whole,“ he added in the report made public by the world body.
Kosovo’s 2 million Albanians--90 percent of the population--are growing increasingly impatient for independence, having been promised a decision by the West by mid-year.
NATO powers with 16,000 soldiers in the territory fear unrest, but Russia has threatened to veto any effort to endorse its secession at the United Nations.
In New York, diplomats from several countries said Western capitals were discussing a possible new draft resolution that would appeal more to Moscow. “We are looking at ways of trying to bring Russia into the process,“ one said.
Russia’s main objection to the existing draft is that despite an offer of 120 more days of negotiations between Kosovo Albanians and Serbia, it still effectively makes independence for the province automatic if those talks fail.

BANGKOK, Thailand, July 6--A military-appointed council on Friday approved its final draft of a new constitution that is meant to guide Thailand back to democracy after last year’s coup, but faces stiff opposition.
The document will go to a referendum next month, but campaigning is already underway to reject it, a result analysts fear could prompt fresh upheaval in a country rocked by 18 months of political turmoil, AFP reported.
Noranit Sethaputra, president of the Constitution Drafting Assembly (CDA), said 98 members had approved the charter, with no votes against it or abstentions.
Some 19 million copies of the 150-page charter will now be distributed to every household ahead of the country’s first referendum.
The military, which ousted premier Thaksin Shinawatra last September after months of protests over alleged graft, is pressing hard for voters to approve the charter, which they say will rein in the powers of future premiers.
Elections have been promised by the junta for later this year, but a rejection of the charter could postpone polls.
Although some controversial aspects of the initial draft were watered down, Thaksin’s allies said they were determined to quash the new constitution.
Suebwonglee, spokesman for Thai Rak Thai, the political party formed by Thaksin but officially dissolved in May.
Shortly after the generals seized power, they tossed out Thailand’s 1997 constitution, which had been widely hailed as the most democratic the kingdom had ever known.
The military accused Thaksin of exploiting loopholes in the charter to consolidate power in the prime minister’s office and enrich his business empire.
They say the new 309-article charter will improve the system of checks and balances, limiting the prime minister to eight years in office and making it easier to launch impeachment proceedings.
It would also bar the premier from major holdings in private firms, particularly media companies, and expand financial disclosure rules to cover the entire cabinet and the parliament.
Parliament would be slightly smaller, and the Senate would have nearly half its members appointed by a special panel of judges, election officials and civic groups.