

By Kareem Raheem BAGHDAD (Reuters) - More than 60 people were killed in a series of car bomb explosions targeting Shi'ite Muslims across Iraq on Monday, police and medics said, part of the worst sectarian violence since U.S. troops pulled out in December 2011. The attacks brought the number killed in sectarian clashes in the past week to over 200, and tensions between Shi'ites, who now lead Iraq, and minority Sunni Muslims have reached a point where some fear a return to all-out civil conflict. No group claimed responsibility for the bombings. ...
By Frank Jack Daniel and Rajesh Kumar Singh NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India and China will study new ways to ease tensions on their ill-defined border after an army standoff in the Himalayas, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said on Monday on his first official foreign trip. The number two in the Chinese leadership offered New Delhi a "handshake across the Himalayas" and said the world's most populous nations could become a new engine for the global economy if they could avoid friction on the militarized border. ...
By Khaled Yacoub Oweis and Dominic Evans AMMAN (Reuters) - About 30 Lebanese Hezbollah fighters and 20 Syrian soldiers and militiamen loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have been killed in the fiercest fighting this year in the rebel stronghold of Qusair, Syrian activists said on Monday. If confirmed, the Hezbollah toll from Sunday's battles in Qusair near the Lebanese border would highlight a deepening intervention in Syria by the guerrilla group set up by Iran in the 1980s to fight Israeli occupation troops in south Lebanon. ...
SOFIA (Reuters) - Bulgaria's Socialists revealed a plan on Monday to speed payments to business and boost support for the poorest in a bid to win support for a technocrat government and end a political deadlock after an inconclusive election. No party won a majority in the May 12 vote, but the center-right GERB party got the most votes so will have the first go at forming a coalition. GERB has been shunned by other parties however after protests against poverty and corruption toppled it from power, so it's of leading a new government are next to zero. ...