Briefly

Afghanistan

Official: Member of elite military team rescued

One member of an elite military team missing in the Afghan mountains since last week has been rescued, a U.S. Defense Department official said Sunday.

The American serviceman was being rushed to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of ongoing search and rescue operations.

He declined to say when the rescue occurred or provide other details, including reaction to specific reports that three U.S. Navy Seals were being sought.

The small special operations unit was reported missing Tuesday in mountains in Kunar province, near the border with Pakistan, setting off an extensive U.S. military search.

A rescue effort the same day ended in tragedy when a transport helicopter seeking to extract the team was shot down, killing 16 troops aboard. It was the deadliest single blow to American forces who ousted the Taliban in 2001.

The deaths brought to 45 the number of U.S. forces killed in Afghanistan over the last three months as a revitalized Taliban has stepped up its insurgency ahead of fall elections.

Saudi Arabia

Security forces kill top al-Qaida militant

In a swift and telling victory, Saudi anti-terror forces killed al-Qaida’s top leader in a gunbattle Sunday.

The 90-minute battle in the eastern Rawdah district, an upscale neighborhood in the capital Riyadh, was the latest blow dealt to Osama bin Laden’s group in Saudi Arabia, whose leaders have either been killed or captured since authorities launched an unrelenting offensive against it in 2003.

Moroccan Younis Mohammed Ibrahim al-Hayari was killed in a dawn raid by security forces in an area where suspected militants were hiding, an Interior Ministry official was quoted by Saudi Press Agency as saying.

Three other suspected militants were arrested, a security official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. He said the three men were on a recently issued list of 36 most-wanted terrorists.

SPA, quoting an unidentified official, reported that al-Hayari headed al-Qaida in the kingdom.

Beijing

Blast at illegal coal mine kills 19 workers

A gas explosion at an illegal coal mine in central China killed 19 workers, the official Xinhua News Agency said Sunday.

Thirty-four miners were underground when the accident occurred at Jiajiapu Coal Mine in Shanxi province Saturday, the report said. Fifteen workers escaped unharmed. The mine was operating without official permits, it said.

China’s mines are the world’s most dangerous with mishaps killing workers nearly every day. Lax rules and the lack of safety equipment are often to blame.

Mexico

Former ruling party claims election victory

The party that governed Mexico for seven decades claimed victory Sunday in Mexico state’s key governor race, the most important contest before next year’s presidential vote.

Victory in Mexico state would bolster the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, but it doesn’t guarantee it a return to the presidency it lost in 2000: Its potential candidates all trail Mexico City Mayor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in the polls.

With 39 percent of the vote counted, the PRI’s Enrique Pena Nieto had 47 percent of the vote to 26 percent for Ruben Mendoza of President Vicente Fox’s National Action Party and 24 percent for Yeidckol Polevnsky of Lopez Obrador’s Democratic Revolution Party.

Pena vowed to heal the wounds of the campaign and praised Mendoza for telephoning to concede defeat. But Polevnsky vowed to challenge the election, alleging the PRI vastly overshot legal spending limits.