Vienna  - German airline Deutsche Lufthansa AG has submitted a valid bid for Austrian Airlines AG (AUA), the Austrian takeover commission confirmed Thursday, but it said it was still uncertain if there would be a deal.

"Against the background of AUA's economic development and an apparent wide gap between the negotiating positions, it is uncertain whether the transaction can be concluded," the commission said in a statement.

The Austrian government is in the process of selling its 42.75-per-cent stake in the country's ailing flag carrier, but Air France has dropped out of the bidding process.

Munich - The chief of the Munich-based BayernLB is to step down in the wake of the financial crisis that has engulfed the state lender, sources told the Deutsche Presse Agentur dpa.

The expected announcement that Michael Kemmer had decided to leave his post comes just one day after Bavarian Finance Minister Erwin Huber said he was resigning in the face of the financial problems confronting BayernLB.

A BayernLB spokesman declined to comment on the reports of Kemmer's possible departure from the Bavarian state-owned bank.

Washington - Former US Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan warned that a "significant rise" in unemployment was unavoidable as the United States works its way through a massive financial crisis that will not ease up for many months.

"We are in the midst of a once in a century credit tsunami," Greenspan said in prepared remarks before the Oversight Committee of the US House of Representatives.

The drop in housing prices, which precipitated the crisis and sparked a record number of home foreclosures, will not stabilize until "many months in the future," he said.

Tegucigalpa  - The number of dead in Honduras as a result of recent heavy rain and subsequent flooding rose to 23, the authorities said late Wednesday.

Most of the dead were believed to have drowned in the currents of overflowing rivers, the country's civil protection authorities said.

In Honduran capital Tegucigalpa, seven people died in mudslides in the hills, where many thousands of poor live in improvised homes.

Honduras has been suffering heavy rain for two weeks, and much of its territory is flooded. The main rivers have flowed over their banks.

Amman- Jordan and South Korea on Thursday initialed an agreement on nuclear cooperation for peaceful purposes.

The accord was signed by the Chairman of the Jordan Atomic Energy Commission (JAEC) Khalid Touqan and the South Korean ambassador in Amman Bongkil Shin.

Touqan said that the deal would be officially signed in Seoul in December.

The agreement provides for cooperation between the two countries in several areas such as technical assistance, site selection, design, construction and nuclear safety, he added.

Kabul- Three soldiers in the US-led coalition were killed in a roadside bombing in western Afghanistan while dozens of militants were killed in clashes between Afghan and international forces elsewhere in the country, officials said Thursday.

The three soldiers were killed and another was wounded when their vehicle was struck by a roadside bomb blast Wednesday night, the US military said in a statement.

The statement did not disclose the nationalities of the victims, but most of the soldiers serving in the coalition are from the United States.