Iraq At least 20 people were killed when two car bombs ripped through Baghdad and a third exploded in the northern city of Mosul on Monday after US warplanes pounded a rebel enclave in a bid to crush the insurgency. Mideast Eight Palestinians, including a child and a teenage girl, were killed by Israeli fire in the Gaza Strip as the army warned its massive offensive could last for weeks. Nobel Two American researchers, Richard Axel and Linda B. Buck, were awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for pioneering work on our most enigmatic sense, that of smell, which helps us survive and enjoy some of life's subtlest pleasures. Indonesia Retired general Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was confirmed as Indonesia's next leader as final counting from the country's first direct presidential polls gave him a landslide victory over his predecessor. Poland Poland's defence minister sparked confusion by announcing that the country would pull its troops out of Iraq by the end of next year, only to be contradicted hours later by other top government figures. India India ordered extra troops to its troubled northeastern states in a bid to stem a wave of rebel-linked violence which has killed 69 people and injured 210 in the past three days, officials said. SKorea The United States has agreed to delay a deadline for its planned troop reductions in South Korea until 2008 at the request of the Seoul government, a news report said. Cambodia Cambodia's national assembly ratified a law allowing a UN-backed trial of surviving Khmer Rouge leaders to go ahead, clearing a crucial hurdle for a tribunal whose next challenge is raising funds. US US President George W. Bush's campaign was forced further on the defensive by a report that the White House knew before invading Iraq that key intelligence on the country's alleged nuclear weapons program was questionable. Tunisia Seventeen would-be immigrants drowned and 47 were missing after a boat that was to have carried them across the Mediterranean broke up and sank off the Tunisian coast at the weekend. US A privately-owned, manned US spaceship is set to blast off in the final stage of an attempt to clinch a 10-million-dollar prize aimed at launching a new era of space tourism.