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BEIJING - China executed a dairy farmer and a milk salesman Tuesday, the only two people sentenced to death in a scheme to water down infant formula with an industrial chemical that left at least six children dead and sickened more than 300,000.

GENEVA - Scientists running the world's largest atom smasher used the $10 billion machine's accelerator to speed up proton beams for the first time Tuesday, in a step toward experiments about the makeup of the universe.

AMPATUAN, Philippines - The Philippine president placed two southern provinces under emergency rule Tuesday as security forces unearthed more bodies, pushing the death toll to 46 in some of the deadliest election violence in the nation's history.

BRUSSELS - For 23 torturous years, Rom Houben says he lay trapped in his paralyzed body, aware of what was going on around him but unable to tell anyone or even cry out.

NAIROBI, Kenya - The bullet hit mother and son as they walked through Somalia's capital. She felt a sharp pain in her palm. Then she saw her 8-year-old: The bullet tore through his cheekbones, nose and mouth. Blood gushed down to his waist.

BEIJING (AFP) - Two men were executed in China on Tuesday for their roles in a contaminated milk powder scandal that led to the deaths of at least six infants and sickened up to 300,000, state media said.

BRASILIA, Brazil - Iran's leader got a welcoming bear hug from the Brazilian president, who urged Western nations to drop threats of punishment over the Iranian nuclear program and instead negotiate a fair solution.

BEIJING - China will send two giant pandas to an Australian zoo this Friday as part of a joint research program.

LONDON (AFP) - A long-awaited public inquiry into Britain's role in the Iraq war opened on Tuesday, as its chairman vowed not to "shy away from criticism" of individuals or institutions over the controversial conflict.

LONDON - In the most sweeping inquiry on the Iraq war, a panel investigating Britain's role in the conflict began questioning witnesses Tuesday in hearings that critics hope will humble ex-Prime Minister Tony Blair and expose alleged deception in the buildup to fighting.

JERUSALEM - Israel TV reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is proposing a 10-month freeze in construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank.

TEHRAN, Iran - Iranian authorities have banned the country's largest-circulation newspaper for publishing a photo of a Baha'i temple, state media reported Monday.

SANIAG, Philippines (AFP) - The Philippines declared a state of emergency in parts of the volatile south on Tuesday as anger spiralled over a savage political massacre that left at least 46 people dead.

BRASILIA (AFP) - Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Monday began a controversial visit to Brazil, the key leg of a tour to sympathetic Latin American and African countries he sees backing Tehran's vision of "a new world order."

LONDON (AFP) - A long-awaited public inquiry into Britain's role in the Iraq war held its first hearing Tuesday, six and a half years after Tony Blair controversially led the country in backing the US-led conflict.

JERUSALEM (AFP) - The man named as Israel's new ambassador to Egypt is the son of a spy who had been sentenced to death in Lebanon but was eventually part of a prisoner swap, a foreign ministry official said on Monday.

Opposition activists want the U.S. to focus more on human rights, and they fear a nuclear deal with the West will boost the regime's domestic standing


JERUSALEM (AFP) - Two rockets were fired from the Islamist Hamas-run Gaza Strip into southern Israel on Monday, without causing casualties or damage, an Israeli military spokesman told AFP.

BERLIN - A German newspaper is reporting that Adolf Hitler's original Mercedes has been sold to an unidentified Russian billionaire for several million euros.

BAGHDAD - Iraq cannot hold a national vote scheduled for January on time, Iraq's election panel said Tuesday, even as a vice president signaled he would again veto an election law in a dispute whose roots lie in Iraq's ethnic and sectarian divisions.

KABUL - A remote-controlled bomb planted in a water station exploded in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing six members of a family, including four children, authorities and a relative said.

Palestinians said Monday that negotiators were close to exchanging an Israeli soldier held by Gaza militants for 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. Israel has carried out such swaps in the past:

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - For years just an obscure fight raging in remote desert mountains, Yemen's war with Shiite rebels has been dragged up to a new level, inflaming the rivalry between the Middle East's two powerhouses Saudi Arabia and Iran.

LONDON (AFP) - The government will this week announce details of an inquiry into the alleged torture and murder of Iraqi detainees by British troops, a spokeswoman said on Tuesday.

LONDON - Britain's defense ministry says it will formally order a public inquiry this week into the alleged abuse and killing of Iraqi civilians by British soldiers.

MELBOURNE, Australia - A kangaroo startled by a man walking his dog attacked the pair, pinning the pet underwater and slashing the owner in the abdomen with its hind legs. The Australian, Chris Rickard, was in stable condition Monday after the attack, which ended when the 49-year-old elbowed the kangaroo in the throat.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh offered a hand to the United States to help build an "open and inclusive" Asia as President Barack Obama prepared to toast him Tuesday with his first state dinner.

BEIRUT (Reuters) - A forensics team has found the remains of a British journalist kidnapped by Palestinian militants in Lebanon 24 years ago, the British embassy said on Monday.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India issued solar power targets on Monday, with plans to boost ouptut from near zero to 20 gigawatts (GW) by 2022, but tied chances of the plan's success to availability of international finance and technology.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand - Ships in the south Pacific Ocean have been alerted that hundreds of icebergs believed to have split off Antarctic ice shelves are drifting north toward New Zealand, officials said Tuesday.