Iraq US and Iraqi officials said the rebel city of Samarra was largely under their control after one of their largest post-war military offensives in Iraq, while two people were killed and 10 injured after US warplanes pounded the rebel town of Fallujah, another hotspot, for a third time in just over 24 hours. Mideast Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon vowed to press ahead with a vast military offensive in the northern Gaza Strip that has left more than 60 people dead in five days, almost all of them Palestinians. France French media and authorities expressed anger at an unofficial mission to free two French journalists taken hostage in Iraq more than six weeks ago which came up empty-handed after promising imminent success. Britain The family of British engineer Kenneth Bigley, held hostage in Iraq for more than two weeks, said they had asked Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi to help secure his release. US Despite a convincing win in the first debate of the US presidential race, Democrat John Kerry still faces a daunting task trying to catch George W. Bush where it counts, the election "battleground" states. France Police arrested two key members of Spain's armed Basque separatist group ETA and seized heavy weapons in a major operation led by French special forces in southwestern France, officials said. Britain After a weekend in the English countryside to rest up from a minor heart operation, Prime Minister Tony Blair was preparing to return to work amid fevered speculation about his future as leader of the ruling Labour Party. Georgia The breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia voted for its first new leader in a decade, amid simmering tension between the separatist regime and the central government in Tbilisi. SKorea UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei said he wants South Korea to come clean about past unauthorized nuclear experiments and not to repeat its mistake. Iran Iran asserted that it had already acquired the sensitive technology to produce its own nuclear fuel and said it would be "irrational" to agree to surrender such a capability in exchange for supplies from overseas. Sudan Ethnic minority rebels in Darfur have rejected an attempt by the Sudanese government to divide them ahead of a new round of peace talks in Nigeria later this month, a Khartoum daily reported. India India's insurgency-racked northeast reeled from one of its deadliest waves of violence in years, as police reported more killings overnight that brought the death toll to 53 with 161 injured. Thailand Fourteen people were killed and five injured in an explosion at a fireworks factory in Thailand's ancient capital Ayuthaya, officials and witnesses said.