President Barack Obama arrives in Arizona to pay tribute to six people killed in a shooting and visit US lawmaker Gabrielle Giffords in hospital.

A gang which trafficked mainly Afghan migrants into Europe is smashed and 26 members are arrested, the European police force Europol says.

Mexican officials release a detailed list of people killed over the past four years in the country's battle against powerful drug gangs, revising the figure of those killed up to 34,612.

The Japanese prime minister's wife, Nobuko Kan, says she would choose someone quite different in another life.

The number of ongoing investigations into Nazi war criminals increased last year, says a report by the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

The US military's top officer Adm Mike Mullen warns that there will be an increase in bloodshed in Afghanistan this year.

Queensland Premier Anna Bligh says the state is reeling from the worst natural disaster in its history, after floods left swathes of its capital under water.

Italy's Constitutional Court is to give a ruling on whether the Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, can be tried on corruption and fraud charges.