Mexico: Drug war death is 11th of week

A regional director of Mexico’s main intelligence agency was slain in the border city of Tijuana, the 11th person killed last week in what authorities say is an escalating drug war.

Jose Juan Palafox, Tijuana chief for the Center for Investigation and National Security, was gunned down at midnight Friday, said Jorge Campos, the federal deputy attorney general in charge of the case.

On Thursday, Campos announced that Tijuana, which lies across the border from San Diego, and Mexicali to the east had turned into battlegrounds of a turf war between surviving members of the Arellano Felix drug organization and a rival drug trafficker, Ismael Zambada.

Palafox was shot numerous times. His body was found in the passenger side of his car.

South Korea: U.S. military apologizes for deaths of teenagers

The American military said it was deeply sorry for the deaths of two teenage girls struck by a U.S. armored vehicle in South Korea, but anti-U.S. demonstrators said Saturday the apology was not sincere.

The military also defended its decision to prosecute the two soldiers involved in the June 13 accident under military law on charges of negligent homicide, rather than hand them over to South Korean authorities for trial.

“There have been many inaccurate reports that have created false impressions in the Korean public concerning the genuineness of our sorrow and the actions we have taken since the accident,” said the public affairs office of the U.S. military headquarters in Seoul.

Australia: WWI cavalryman dead at age 102

Albert Whitmore, the last known member of Australia’s famed World War I Light Horsemen cavalry, has died, the government said Saturday. He was 102.

Whitmore died late Friday at a nursing home in Barmera, South Australia, Veterans’ Affairs Minister Danna Vale said.

“The passing of Mr. Whitmore marks the end of an era,” Vale said in a statement Saturday. “The Light Horsemen have grown to legendary status for their deeds and daring, and Mr. Whitmore is a part of that legend.”

Pakistan: DNA test confirms remains are reporter’s

A Pakistani DNA test confirmed a decapitated body found in a shallow grave is that of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, a government official said Saturday.

The findings match those conducted in the United States and turned over Thursday to Pakistani officials. A U.S. official speaking on condition of anonymity had said those tests also identified the body as Pearl’s.

Pearl disappeared Jan. 23 in Karachi while researching links between Pakistani extremists and Richard C. Reid, arrested in December after allegedly boarding a Paris-to-Miami flight with explosives in his shoes.

Austria : Grenade blast rips disco; 27 injured

A hand grenade blast sprayed tiny metal pellets and shrapnel through a discotheque filled with young Balkan immigrants Saturday, injuring 27 people, two seriously, police said.

The explosion at 3:20 a.m. ripped through the X-Large Disco in Linz, about 120 miles west of Vienna, leaving patrons most age 15 to 19 with steel balls embedded in their skin and bodies, a doctor said.

Experts said the grenade was designed to injure, not kill. Grenades like it are readily available on the black market in Eastern Europe and the Balkans, they said.

About 40 people were inside the disco at the time.