World briefs

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, thought to be the No. 3 figure in the terror network, told interrogators he met bin Laden just weeks ago in a rendezvous set up through a network of phone calls and intermediaries, an intelligence official said.

At least two raids have been carried out in Pakistan's southwestern Baluchistan region based on information from Mohammed since his capture last weekend, another Pakistani intelligence official said, also speaking on condition of anonymity. There were no major arrests from the raids, the official said.

11 Palestinians killed in Israeli raid of Gaza camp

JABALIYA REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip -- In the most intense battle in Gaza in months, an Israeli army raid left 11 Palestinians dead Thursday, including eight who witnesses said were hit by an Israeli tank shell fired at a crowd. Israel insisted it targeted only armed men.

More than 140 Palestinians were hurt, 35 of them seriously, doctors said.

The crackdown at the Jabaliya refugee camp -- the largest and most heavily armed Palestinian shantytown -- came a day after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed 14 Israelis and an American teenager on a bus in the Israeli port city of Haifa.

Also Thursday, Israeli troops in the West Bank killed three Palestinians: a gunman, a 16-year-old boy and a 55-year-old mother of eight cutting grass for her sheep.

After nightfall Thursday about 100 Israeli tanks and other military vehicles moved toward the Jabaliya camp again, signaling the second large-scale incursion in the area in as many days.

Ex-NASA official blames problems he warned about

HOUSTON -- A former NASA official who led a study three years ago that faulted the way the agency dealt with safety risks told the Columbia investigation board Thursday that the same problem appears to have played a role in the shuttle disaster.

Henry McDonald, an engineering professor, appeared as a witness as the board held its first public hearing on what caused the shuttle to break up over Texas on Feb. 1, killing all seven astronauts. He noted that the same type of communication breakdown he warned about seems to have hindered engineers who evaluated damage to Columbia's left wing by launch debris and concluded the shuttle and its astronauts were safe.

Air Algerie plane crashes in southern Algeria, killing 102

ALGIERS, Algeria -- An Air Algerie passenger jet, one of its engines ablaze, crashed shortly after takeoff deep in the Sahara Desert on Thursday, and 102 people were killed, officials said. A young soldier survived.

The Boeing 737, flight 6289, crashed after taking off from Tamanrasset bound for the Algerian capital, Algiers, 1,000 miles to the north.

Terrorism was not suspected, said an airline spokesman, Hamid Hamdi.

"There was a mechanical problem on takeoff," he said. "There is no element that leads us to think there was a terrorist attack."

Witnesses at the Tamanrasset airport and airline officials said one of the plane's two jet engines caught fire as it was taking off.

Pope explores life and death in new poetry book

VATICAN CITY -- Pope John Paul II's new book of poetry, a three-part meditation on nature, life and death -- including his own -- makes clear he has no plans to step down.

"Roman Triptych" is the first book of poetry John Paul has written since becoming pope in 1978. Vatican officials said the poems came out of a trip to his beloved Poland last summer.

The slim burgundy-covered volume was published Thursday in John Paul's native Polish, although translations in English, French, Spanish, Italian and German are ready, papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls told reporters. The frail 82-year-old pope has spoken about his own mortality in recent years, referring to the "twilight years" of his papacy and, during the trip to Poland last year, asking for "a prayer for the pope during his lifetime and after his death."

U.S. bombers arrive in Guam to deter hostility in Korea

SEOUL, South Korea -- A group of long-range bombers deployed as a show of U.S. military might have landed in Guam, and more bombers were scheduled to arrive Thursday as tensions increased in the standoff over North Korea's nuclear programs.

North Korean state radios on Thursday condemned the reinforcement as a preparation for invading the communist state, South Korea's national Yonhap news agency said.

Russia and China both urged Washington to hold direct talks with Pyongyang to defuse the standoff peacefully, saying they opposed military or other pressure on the isolated country.<