In Brief

* TALKS – EU foreign ministers resumed last-ditch meetings to break a deadlock preventing the start of membership talks with Turkey, after failing to reach agreement in overnight discussions, diplomats said.

* BLAST – At least 34 miners were killed in a gas explosion at a coal mine in the central province of Henan, state media reported. * ATTACKED – US forces said they killed 12 insurgents in gunbattles and bombing raids in Iraq on the second day of an widening assault against al Qaeda linked fighters near the Syrian border.* UNREST – Two bodyguards of Iraqi Oil Minister Ibrahim Bahr al-Ulum were killed in a bomb attack on his convoy in Baghdad, a ministry spokesman said.* SPACE – The Russian Soyuz rocket carrying American millionaire “space tourist” Greg Olsen together with a Russian cosmonaut and an American astronaut docked with the International Space Station.* NUCLEAR – Russia urged Iran to adopt an agreement allowing snap international inspections of its controversial atomic facilities by the UN watchdog the International Atomic Energy Agency.* ECLIPSE – Northern Portugal got the first glimpse of a rare annular eclipse of the sun, when the moon began to move across the solar face.* RECONCILIATION – Arab ministers decided to send Arab League chief Amr Mussa to Iraq shortly to prepare for a reconciliation conference grouping all factions, amid increasing internecine violence there.* ABUSER – A US soldier convicted of humiliating and abusing Iraqi prisoners said she knew of “worse things” happening at Abu Ghraib and insisted military commanders were fully aware of what was going on in Iraq’s infamous jail.* SUSPENDED – Israel suspended an offensive against militants in the Gaza Strip, including targeted killings, as clashes between Hamas gunmen and Palestinian police trying to enforce an arms ban killed at least three in Gaza City.- Nampa-AFP* ATTACKED – US forces said they killed 12 insurgents in gunbattles and bombing raids in Iraq on the second day of an widening assault against al Qaeda linked fighters near the Syrian border.* UNREST – Two bodyguards of Iraqi Oil Minister Ibrahim Bahr al-Ulum were killed in a bomb attack on his convoy in Baghdad, a ministry spokesman said.* SPACE – The Russian Soyuz rocket carrying American millionaire “space tourist” Greg Olsen together with a Russian cosmonaut and an American astronaut docked with the International Space Station.* NUCLEAR – Russia urged Iran to adopt an agreement allowing snap international inspections of its controversial atomic facilities by the UN watchdog the International Atomic Energy Agency.* ECLIPSE – Northern Portugal got the first glimpse of a rare annular eclipse of the sun, when the moon began to move across the solar face.* RECONCILIATION – Arab ministers decided to send Arab League chief Amr Mussa to Iraq shortly to prepare for a reconciliation conference grouping all factions, amid increasing internecine violence there.* ABUSER – A US soldier convicted of humiliating and abusing Iraqi prisoners said she knew of “worse things” happening at Abu Ghraib and insisted military commanders were fully aware of what was going on in Iraq’s infamous jail.* SUSPENDED – Israel suspended an offensive against militants in the Gaza Strip, including targeted killings, as clashes between Hamas gunmen and Palestinian police trying to enforce an arms ban killed at least three in Gaza City.- Nampa-AFP