The World in Brief

Indian villagers lead their cattle and make their way towards safer area, at Jora Farm village in the India-Pakistan border Ranbir Singh Pura region, about 35 kilometers (22 miles) from Jammu, India, Saturday, Aug. 23, 2014. India and Pakistan traded gunfire in the disputed Kashmir region on Saturday, killing two villagers on each side and wounding several others, officials said. Tensions have escalated in Kashmir since India earlier in the week called off diplomatic talks with Pakistan because the Pakistani ambassador in New Delhi met with separatist leaders from the disputed region. (AP Photo/Channi Anand)
Indian villagers lead their cattle and make their way towards safer area, at Jora Farm village in the India-Pakistan border Ranbir Singh Pura region, about 35 kilometers (22 miles) from Jammu, India, Saturday, Aug. 23, 2014. India and Pakistan traded gunfire in the disputed Kashmir region on Saturday, killing two villagers on each side and wounding several others, officials said. Tensions have escalated in Kashmir since India earlier in the week called off diplomatic talks with Pakistan because the Pakistani ambassador in New Delhi met with separatist leaders from the disputed region. (AP Photo/Channi Anand)

4 die in India-Pakistan border volleys

SRINAGAR, India — India and Pakistan traded gunfire in the disputed Kashmir region on Saturday, killing two villagers on each side and wounding several others, officials said.

Dharmendra Pareek, a top official with India’s paramilitary force, said Indian forces retaliated after Pakistani troops fired guns and mortar rounds on more than a dozen Indian border posts and at least three villages in the Ranbir Singh Pura region.

Pareek said two Indian villagers were killed, including an 8-year-old boy. One Indian border guard and three civilians were wounded, but their injuries were not life-threatening, he said.

The region is about 185 miles northwest of Srinagar, the main city in the Indian portion of Kashmir.

In Pakistan, a senior army officer said two villagers were killed when the Indian border security force “resorted to unprovoked firing” along the border near the city of Sialkot in the Pakistani portion of Kashmir.

The officer spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

Costa Rica investigates USAID projects

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — The Costa Rican government will investigate undercover U.S. programs that operated from the Central American country and used its citizens in a ploy to destabilize the government in Cuba, the director of intelligence and security said Friday.

Mariano Figueres said that the new administration, which took office May 8, has found no records or information from its predecessors about the U.S. Agency for International Development project, which starting in 2009 sent young Venezuelans, Costa Ricans and Peruvians to Cuba in hopes of stirring opposition to the island’s communist government.

Figueres said Costa Rica’s only information came from an Aug. 4 news article, which said USAID and a contractor, Creative Associates International, used the cover of health and civic programs, some operating out of Costa Rica, in hopes of provoking political change in Cuba. The article said the program continued even as U.S. officials privately told contractors to consider suspending travel to Cuba after the arrest there of contractor Alan Gross, who remains imprisoned, accused of smuggling in sensitive technology.

The travelers worked undercover, often posing as tourists, and traveled around Cuba scouting for people they could turn into political activists.

Indian hunger-strike protester arrested

GAUHATI, India — Police re-arrested a frail Indian activist who has been on a hunger strike for nearly 14 years to protest alleged military brutality in India’s remote northeast, her attorney said Saturday.

Police again charged Irom Sharmila, 42, with attempted suicide on Friday, two days after she was released from detention by a court order and the charge against her dropped, said attorney Khaidam Mani.

Attempted suicide is a crime in India.

The court ruled Tuesday that she was not fasting to kill herself but to protest the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, which gives security forces the right to shoo to kill suspected rebels without fear of possible prosecution and to arrest suspected militants without a warrant.

On Friday, television footage showed the activist caught in a scuffle between her supporters and police officers taking her away to the same government hospital in Imphal, the capital of Manipur state, where she had been force-fed for years.

Airstrikes against Libyan militia kill 15

CAIRO — Two unidentified airstrikes targeting Islamist militia positions in Tripoli, Libya’s capital, killed 15 fighters and wounded 30 on Saturday. A senior militia leader accused Egypt and the United Arab Emirates of being behind the attacks on their posts.

The mysterious airstrikes were the second last week to target Islamist militia posts in the capital. They have fueled speculation that foreign powers are covertly intervening in Libya’s militia violence because Libya’s air force does not possess the guided ordnance apparently used in the strikes.

A militia leader said the warplanes targeted the Interior Ministry and several militia positions, setting fire to a warehouse. He said two sons of the head of the military council of Misrata militias, Ibrahim Bin Rajab, were among the wounded. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he wasn’t authorized to speak to journalists.

Another militia member, spokesman Mohammed al-Gharyani, said more than 30 fighters were wounded in the airstrikes but that the militia had not abandoned its positions, including the Interior Ministry, the army headquarters and the military police headquarters.

— COMPILED BY DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE STAFF FROM WIRE REPORTS

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