Pakistan's government came under renewed pressure on Saturday to bring stability to the country after one of the bloodiest bombings in more than two years killed at least 89 people.

The attack at volleyball game on Friday suggested al Qaeda-linked Taliban insurgents were focusing more on bombing large crowds of civilians to inflict maximum casualties and spread terror, instead of attacking hard targets such as security forces.

A suicide bomber blew up a Shia Muslim procession in Pakistan's commercial capital Karachi on Monday, killing at least 22 people, the latest in a series of attacks across the country which have killed hundreds.

The assault on the religious march, the third in Pakistan's biggest city in as many days, underscored the multiple security challenges facing the country.

China pressed into operation the world's fastest passenger train on Saturday, which covered a 10 and half hours journey in three hours at 350-km per hour.

According to Xinhua news agency, the passenger trains – one rolled out from the Wuhan Railway Station and the other from Guangzhou North Railway Station at about 9 a.m. and reached each others' terminal at the speed.

The United Nations unveiled a website on Thursday aimed at improving transparency about sexual misconduct allegations and other charges leveled against members of its missions.

The website (cdu.unlb.org/) tracks the number of alleged offenses by UN personnel over the last three years, collected from political and peacekeeping missions across the globe.

A woman the Vatican described as unstable jumped over a barricade, lunged at Pope Benedict and knocked him to the floor at the start of his Christmas Eve mass in St Peter's Basilica.

The 82-year-old pope was apparently not harmed and went on to finish the two-hour service late on Thursday, but an elderly

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Lal Krishna Advani stepped down on Friday months after he led the Hindu nationalists to heavy defeat in the general election, officals said.

Party stalwart Advani will move to a largely ceremonial role specially created for him and will be replaced by Sushma Swaraj, a former cabinet minister, as party leader in the Lok Sabha.

A car bomb near the home of a Pakistani provincial government minister killed 20 people on Tuesday, a police official said, in another sign authorities are struggling against Taliban militants bent on grabbing power.

Militants who want no Western influence in nuclear-armed Pakistan, which Washington sees as critical in the battle against Islamist hardliners in Afghanistan, have not let up attacks, despite security crackdowns in their strongholds.

President Barack Obama received the gold Nobel Peace Prize medal and diploma in a lavish ceremony in the Norwegian capital on Thursday.

He said the use of force was sometimes justified, especially on humanitarian grounds, and in the case of al Qaeda, negotiations would not cause them to lay down their arms.

At least 31 miners were killed and 78 remain trapped 500 meters (yards) underground following a gas blast at a mine in China, state media said on Saturday.

The blast ripped through the mine around 2.30 on Saturday morning, when there were 528 people at work, but 419 got out safely, the official Xinhua news agency said.

Chinese President Hu Jintao said on Tuesday that he had agreed with US President Barack Obama to increase international cooperation, after "frank, constructive and fruitful" talks in Beijing.

There are signs of revival, but still no firm recovery in the international financial situation, Hu said, adding that the two sides had reiterated commitments to increase dialogue on macroeconomic issues and resolve economic and trade frictions.

Britain has offered to host an international conference early next year to set a timetable for transferring security responsibilities to Afghan forces from 2010, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Monday.

The bloodiest year for British troops in Afghanistan has fuelled public opposition to the campaign, creating another headache for Brown as he tries to close a big gap on the opposition Conservatives ahead of an election due by June.

Barack Obama this week makes his first trip to Asia as president, leaving behind a host of domestic problems with a visit that recognizes the region's economic and diplomatic importance to the United States.

The trip, which starts on Thursday, will take Obama to an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Singapore.

A bicycle loaded with explosives killed five people and wounded 37 at a market in Mussayab, south of Baghdad, on Sunday and a bomb on a bus killed at least three more further south in Kerbala, police and health officials said.

The explosives in the first attack were stored in a water cooler attached to the bicycle, and women and children were among the dead and wounded, police said.

A car bomb ripped through a crowded market killing 87 people in Pakistan's city of Peshawar on Wednesday, just hours after Washington's top diplomat arrived pledging a fresh start in sometimes strained relations.

Wednesday's bomb, the latest urban attack since the army launched a major assault on rural Taliban strongholds two weeks ago, was the deadliest since 2007 when around 140 died at a procession to welcome home former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated just weeks later.

Japan will inform US President Barack Obama during his visit to Tokyo next month that it will come up with a new plan by the end of the year to relocate a US air base within the southern island of Okinawa, the Sankei newspaper reported on Friday.

The report comes days after the US defense secretary bluntly called for a planned realignment of US troops in Japan to be implemented, sparking concern about worsening ties between Washington and Japan's new government.

A top UN official suggested a 2020 greenhouse gas goal for developing nations on Thursday as part of a new UN climate pact as China and the United States sought common ground to fight global warming.

Many nations expressed worries about a lack of urgency in the negotiations, less than two months before 190 nations are meant to agree a new UN pact in Copenhagen to succeed the existing Kyoto Protocol.

US President Barack Obama on Monday unveiled a new strategy toward Sudan, offering incentives if the Khartoum government worked toward peace, but said it faced tougher steps if it failed to act.

Warning that Sudan was "poised to fall further into chaos if swift action is not taken,", he also said he would renew sanctions on Sudan this week.

Russia and four former Soviet republics staged war games on Friday to showcase a a new NATO-style rapid reaction force designed to cement Moscow's hold over allies in Central Asia and the Caucasus.

Dressed in combat fatigues, the leaders of Russia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan looked on as the force carried out a mock attack to destroy "insurgents" who had taken control of a chemical plant.

Militants launched a string of attacks on police in Lahore in the Pakistani heartland and in the troubled northwest on Thursday, killing 24 people after a week of violence in which more than 100 people died.

An exchange of gunfire was continuing at an elite police academy in Lahore, capital of Punjab province, where two policemen were killed.

Pakistani commandos stormed a building near army headquarters on Sunday and freed 25 hostages being held there by suspected Taliban militants, a military spokesman said. Three hostages and four of the gunmen were killed, said the spokesman, Major General Athar Abbas.

Saturday's brazen attack on the tightly guarded headquarters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi came as the military prepared a major offensive against the militants in their northwestern stronghold of South Waziristan on the Afghan border.