Washington  - Car sales in the United States remained very weak in March, plummeting more than 38 per cent on average from 2008, but carmakers pointed to signs that the market may be bottoming out as they struggle to survive the global recession.

General Motors Corp reported a 45-per-cent decline in sales in March compared to the same month a year earlier. Ford Motor Co said sales fell 41 per cent and Chrysler LLC reported sales dropped 39 per cent.

San Francisco  - Confiker, the April Fool's worm, began contacting pre-designated websites for instructions on Wednesday, and while no malicious instructions had been downloaded, security researchers warned that the virus could still wreak havoc at any time.

"It's like a loaded gun that could go off anytime," said Patrik Runald, chief security advisor of technology security firm F-Secure.

Washington - The United States on Wednesday said it would continue to work towards a two-state solution to the Israeli- Palestinian conflict, but stopped short of criticizing incoming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

President Barack Obama called Netanyahu to congratulate him on being sworn in as prime minister Wednesday and "reaffirmed the United States' steadfast commitment to Israel and its security," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said in a statement.

London  - US President Barack Obama and Chinese Prime Minister Hu Jintao moved Wednesday to lay aside a recent round of tensions between Washington and Beijing by committing themselves to working together to combat the global recession.

The relationship between China and the United States said Obama following his meeting with Hu "is not only important for the citizens of both our countries, but will help to set the stage for how the world deals with a whole host of challenges in the years to come."

Munich, Germany  - US authorities are to extradite Ukrainian- born John Demjanjuk to Germany next week to answer charges that he helped put at least 29,000 Jews to death at a Nazi death camp, a German newspaper said Wednesday.

Demjanjuk would arrive on Monday in Munich, where a warrant was issued three weeks ago for his arrest, the newspaper Abendzeitung said, quoting the accused's German lawyer, Guenther Maull.

A German Justice Ministry spokeswoman in Berlin said, "We can neither confirm nor deny this."

Washington  - The situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating and the country's Taliban and al-Qaeda insurgency are gaining strength, the top US commander for the region warned Wednesday as the US prepares to send thousands more troops to Afghanistan.

General David Petraeus, head of US Central Command, said in congressional testimony that insurgents had expanded their control over the southern and eastern parts of the country but vowed they would be fought "aggressively and relentlessly" by US forces.