U.N. disarmament opens in Liberia\nCAMP SCHIEFFELIN, Liberia -- Thrusting AK-47s in the air one last time, Liberia's fighters started surrendering weapons to U.N. peacekeepers on Sunday, a major step toward ending 14 years of bloodshed and one of West Africa's most vicious conflicts.\nThe U.N.-supervised campaign to disarm 40,000 rebel and government forces nationwide opened with government forces lined up at an army barracks outside the capital, Monrovia.\nOne by one, 1,000-plus government and allied militia fighters handed automatic rifles to blue-helmeted U.N. peacekeepers from Bangladesh.
Pro-Putin party holds big lead in elections\nMOSCOW -- The main party supporting President Vladimir Putin led rivals by a large margin in Russia's parliamentary elections Sunday, according to partial official results, putting Putin on the path to the solid majority he seeks to increase his hold on the country.\nMore might in the State Duma, Russia's lower parliament house, would make it easier for Putin to push through the sometimes unpopular market-oriented economic reforms he has promised and cut the bureaucracy that stifles Russian growth. It could also let him pass constitutional changes giving him a third term in office.\nExit polls also indicated a big win for Putin and his allies as he heads into what seems sure to be a second term after the presidential ballot next March. Kremlin critics fear too much power could prompt a drift closer to authoritarianism in a country still setting its course for the future after seven decades of Soviet rule.
U.S. airstrike kills 9 Afghani children \nHUTALA, Afghanistan -- Children's hats and shoes littered a bloody field cratered by gunfire Sunday after a U.S. airstrike, aimed at a wanted Taliban commander, mistakenly killed nine children in an Afghan mountain village.\nThe American warplane was targeting Mullah Wazir, once a local commander for the hard-line Islamic militia. U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and a U.S. military official said Wazir was killed in the attack, but residents and local officials said Wazir escaped -- or was not in the village at all.\nThe residents reported at least one adult man, possibly a Wazir relative, was killed along with the children.\nThe strike was the latest U.S. air attack to kill Afghan civilians as American-led forces hunt for remnants of the Taliban and al Qaeda who have stepped up violence in southern and eastern Afghanistan.
