17 Africans arrested in Pakistan: Pakistan's anti-narcotic authorities have arrested 17 African men caught trying to smuggle 1,000 heroin capsules concealed in their rectums, officials said Tuesday, AFP reports from Karachi.

The army-backed Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) has held 16 Nigerians and one Guinean at Karachi airport for the past 10 days, they said. Fifty to 100 capsules were extracted from each of the men's backsides in hospital, yielding a total of five kilograms (10 pounds) of heroin, the officials said. ANF official Brigadier Mukhtiar Ahnied told AFP an investigation was underway to determine whether the men were part of an international drug cartel.

4 soldiers killed in mine blast: Four Zimbabwean soldiers were killed and 32 others were injured in an accidental explosion at a military engineering camp in the Capital Harare on Monday, an army spokesman said Tuesday, reports AFP from HARARE.

An army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Ben Ncube told AFP that of the surviving 32, several were in critical conditions with one still in intensive care unit of Parirenyatwa, a government teaching hospital. The majority were wounded in the face and are receiving specialised treatment especially for eye injuries. Ncube said the blast ripped through a class of 36 engineering recruits at a training session on Monday at Pomona barracks in Harare where an instructor was demonstrating how to arm and disarm an anti-tank mine.

Lankan troops kill 6 rebels: sn Lankan soldiers shot dead six Tamil Tiger rebels in three separate attacks in the country's north, a military spokesman' said Tuesday, ranort AP from Colombo.

Four of the rebels were killed in the Wanni area, 250 kilometers north of Colombo. Military spokesman Major Nishantha Wadugodapitiya said troops deployed in Oddusuddan. in Wanni clashed with a group of rebels Monday and killed two of them. In another attack the same day in nearby Ampakarman, two more rebels were killed. In a third incident, two rebels were killed in the Tamil-majority town of Paranthan. 300 kilometers north of , Colombo, Major Wadugodapitiya said.

SLA militiaman killed in blast: a member of the Israeli-allied South Lebanon Army (SLA) militia was killed and another wounded in a roadside bombing on Tuesday in Israeli-occupied southern Lebanon, security sources said, reports AFP from MARJAYOUN. Lebanon.

Ah explosive charge blew up as a car passed by in Dahr al-Ramle. in SLA-controlled Jezzine district, north of the Israeli-occupied "security zone" in southern Lebanon, they said. At least one SLA militiaman was killed and another wounded, they added.