A suicide bomber killed an Afghan policeman and wounded five civilians in Kunduz on Thursday, the second deadly attack on government security forces in the northern city this week.

The attacker walked up to a checkpoint in a crowded area of the city center and blew up a suicide vest strapped to his body, officials and witnesses said.

A Kuwaiti court ruled on Wednesday that Kuwait-based Zain telecom can open its books for due diligence to the Emirati firm Etisalat which has offered to buy a majority stake in Zain.

Al-Fawares Holding, a leading private investor in Zain, had filed a lawsuit against opening the books, on the grounds that it had not seen an official purchase offer from Etisalat.

Roger Federer took the upper hand against Rafael Nadal on Tuesday with a two set to one win in a charity exhibition match in the Swiss city of Zurich.

After losing the first set 4-6, Federer broke back against the world number one early in the second set to take a 6-3, 6-3 lead, watched by a capacity home crowd including Formula One champion Sebastian Vettel, ski-ing champions Lindsey Vonn and Didier Cuche.

The same al-Qaida-linked group that attempted to send bombs on cargo planes earlier this year considered putting poison in food served at U.S. hotels and restaurants, U.S. media reported.

U.S. intelligence officials told CNN on Tuesday that the Yemen-based al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) were considering poisoning food supplies with the deadly chemicals ricin and cyanide.

Saudi King Abdullah has left a New York hospital to convalesce, one month after he checked in for back surgery, the royal court announced on Wednesday.

King Abdullah left the hospital on Tuesday evening "for his New York residence for a period of convalescence and physiotherapy," the court said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg -- on holiday in China where his social networking site is officially blocked -- met Wednesday with top executives from the country's popular web portal Sina.com.

Zuckerberg's meeting with Sina.com chief executive Charles Chao and vice president Peng Shaobin comes two days after the 26-year-old had lunch with the head of search engine giant Baidu to discuss the world's biggest web market.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said the European Union must accept Turkey as a member if it wants to avoid being a "Christian club," in an interview with a German newspaper.

Asked whether Turkey should join the E.U., Assad told Germany's top-selling Bild newspaper: "They simply must ask Turkey to become a member because they need it as an Islamic country so the E.U. does not become a Christian club."

Qatar Petroleum and Royal Dutch Shell agreed on Tuesday to study building a petrochemical project worth six billion dollars in Ras Laffan by 2016.

The two companies signed a memorandum of understanding in the Qatari capital Doha under which they will jointly study development of the project, a statement said.

At least seven people have died and hundreds more were injured in a 6.5-magnitude earthquake which struck southeastern Iran, Mehr news agency reported on Tuesday.

The late Monday quake, with epicenter near the town of Hosseinabad in Kerman province, was followed by 22 tremors, including one of 5.0 magnitude, the agency said quoting the geophysics department of Tehran university.

The number of international troops killed in Afghanistan this year, already by far the deadliest in the nine-year campaign against the Taliban, has passed 700, an independent website said Tuesday.

The number of coalition forces killed fighting the Taliban in 2010 stood at 701, iCasualties.org said, days after U.S. President Barack Obama said the war strategy was "on track."