Screening system

BALTIMORE, the United States: The Department of Homeland Security unveiled Monday a new checkpoint screening system being tested at Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport. The machines can show potentially hazardous objects that may be concealed under a passenger’s clothing.

34 militants killed

BAGHDAD, Iraq: U.S. forces killed 34 militiamen in fierce clashes in and around a Baghdad stronghold of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr yesterday, the U.S. military said.

Suicide bomb

KABUL, Afghanistan: Taliban militants killed 18 Afghans, including seven civilians, and wounded 31 more in a suicide bomb attack on a drug eradication team in eastern Afghanistan yesterday, the Interior Ministry said.

Israel regret

JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert expressed regret yesterday over the killing of a Palestinian woman and four of her children in an Israeli raid in the Gaza Strip and said an army investigation was under way.