Iraq Aid worker Margaret Hassan, who spent much of her life helping the Iraqi people, was feared murdered by her Iraqi kidnappers after a video emerged showing a blindfolded woman hostage being shot in the head. Iraq US marines said they expect to allow civilians back into Fallujah soon as they seek to restore normalcy to the battered city after more than a week of combat between US forces and rebels. Russia President Vladimir Putin said that Russia would in the coming years acquire new nuclear weapon systems which other nuclear powers do not yet have and are unlikely to develop in the near future. Iran Iran warned that its agreement to suspend sensitive nuclear activities in order to ease fears it is seeking the bomb was subject to rapid progress in a new round of negotiations to begin next month. ights-children Sudan As the UN Security Council prepares for a rare meeting in Nairobi focusing on Sudan's main civil war, both sides in the devastating conflict said a comprehensive peace deal is likely to be signed within days of high-level talks resuming next week. Mideast New Palestine Liberation Organisation leader Mahmud Abbas was wrapping up a visit to the Gaza Strip after failing to persuade the radical Islamist group Hamas to join the political mainstream. North Korea North Korea's leader Kim Jong-Il has ordered the removal of his portrait from display throughout the Stalinist state, signalling a scaling back of the decades-old personality cult built around the supreme ruler, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported. India-Kashmir Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh offered Kashmiris peace and prosperity as he pulled an army battalion out of the troubled state and held out hope of further troop cuts. US US President George W. Bush is beginning his second term with a volatile intelligence crisis on his hands as resignations of senior CIA officials underscored the low morale at the intelligence agency amid fears of a purge. Thailand Thailand's respected queen has made a rare public appeal for the nation to unite to end violence in the troubled Muslim-majority south where nearly 550 people have died this year. Namibia Namibia prepared for a change of guard after its third elections since independence, with founding president Sam Nujoma's heir apparent set to take over the top job in the vast southern African nation.