World highlights

¤ Christian youths burned the corpses of Muslims on the streets of Onitsha in southeastern Nigeria, the city worst hit by religious riots that have killed at least 146 people across the country in five days.

Christian mobs, seeking revenge for the killings of Christians in the north, attacked Muslims with machetes, set fire to them, destroyed their houses and torched mosques in two days of violence in Onitsha, where 93 people died.

¤ US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a brief visit to Lebanon under tight security to show support for a government working to shake loose the influence of its former political master Syria.

"The sole purpose of the trip is to express support for the Lebanese people and the Lebanese government as they continue to try to recover fully their sovereignty," Ms Rice told reporters as she flew into Beirut from Saudi Arabia.

¤ Indian authorities cleared 11 out of 12 people quarantined following an H5N1 outbreak in chickens, while EU states tested farm birds as the virus threatened to hit their domestic fowl for the first time.

France found a suspected outbreak of the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus at a turkey farm in the east of the country and was awaiting test results due today. German authorities were still waiting for conclusive results on a farm duck that has been tested twice already.

¤ The Bush administration struggled to convince congressional skeptics that letting a state-owned Arab company take over management at six major US seaports did not represent a security risk.

Senior administration officials from the Departments of Defense, State, Treasury and Homeland Security appeared before a hastily called Senate committee briefing to offer assurances over the deal, for Dubai Ports World of the United Arab Emirates to acquire the US port operations of British company P&O.

¤ Ugandans held their first multi-party election for a quarter of a century, but the opposition accused President Yoweri Museveni's government of fraud in its bid to extend his two-decade rule.

As a predictable row erupted even before all polling booths had closed, the east African nation's ruling party dismissed the complaints as coming from "bad losers".