Moscow - The deputy prime minister of the Russian province of North Ossetia and his driver were fatally shot in an attack Wednesday, reported the Interfax news agency, citing the North Ossetian Interior Ministry.

No details were available about the attack on North Ossetian Deputy Prime Minister Kasbek Pagiyev. The attack in the north Caucasian province is believed to be linked to the November murder of Vitali Karayev, the mayor of Vladikavkaz. Pagiyev held that position before Karayev.

Geneva - The ongoing violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo, which has caused the displacement of over 250,000 people, has put children at particular risk of recruitment into armed groups, the UN's Children Fund said Wednesday.

UNICEF called on "all armed groups to end the recruitment and use of children," Pierrette Vu Thi, the agency's chief in the DR Congo, said in a statement. They must "immediately release the children within their ranks."

Hamburg - The unrest in Tibet took the International Olympic Committee by surprise and it could only react with crisis management to the rising tensions around the Beijing Games, IOC president Jacques Rogge said in an interview.

But the Olympic supremo also told Saturday's edition of Germany's Sueddeutsche Zeitung that the Games would have been a disaster had the International Olympic Committee openly criticised hosts China over human rights issues instead of conducting a silent diplomacy.

"We achieved the maximum. The Games would have been a fiasco if we had dealt more aggressively with China," said Rogge four months after the Olympics in the Chinese capital.

Lahore, Dec. 31 : The Jamhoori Watan Party chief, Talal Bugti has demanded Musharraf's arrest, so that the killers of his father, Akbar Bugti and the former Pakistan PM Benazir Bhutto, could be exposed.

Bugti said that he does not support the separatism and the movement of militancy, which started due to the policies of former President General Pervez Musharraf.

He also accused Musharraf for dividing Pakistan and bombing Balochistan with tanks and missiles.

He said the people of Balochistan were patriots, and his party's manifesto was that the Baloch people should control Baloch resources.

Ulm, Germany - An 18-year-old sleepwalker who climbed out his own bedroom window while asleep has died of his injuries after falling seven storeys, German police said Wednesday.

Beijing - China on Wednesday agreed to begin issuing licences for third-generation, or 3G, high-speed mobile telephone networks, state media said.

The State Council, or cabinet, said it took the decision because "conditions for handing out the licenses were mature," the official Xinhua news agency reported.

The issue of 3G licences is expected to spur an investment spree and fierce competition for customers between three major network operators next year.