SPORTS: AFRIDI brings PAKISTAN home with maiden victort as captain

Pakistan wins by 52 runs with Shahid's outclass performance as captain.

the green shirts outclass the lankan lions in all the departments.

Afridi was given man of the match award.

Costa Rica leader gets swine flu

Costa Rican President Oscar Arias has announced that he has swine flu.

"Apart from the fever and a sore throat, I feel well and in good shape to carry out my work by telecommuting," the 68-year-old said in a statement.

The president is receiving medical care at his residence and is expected to remain there for a week, his brother and chief of staff Rodrigo Arias said.

He had been mediating talks on the Honduran crisis, after President Manuel Zelaya was toppled in a coup in June.

But the negotiations broke down two weeks ago, and Mr Arias's brief absence is not expected to affect the outcome.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner, who suffers from chronic asthma, is the first head of state known to have contracted the H1N1 influenza virus.

He was diagnosed with a mild case of swine flu on Tuesday after having flu-like symptoms for some days.

More than 20 people in Costa Rica have died as a result of the swine flu outbreak, which was declared a pandemic on 11 June by the World Health Organization.

Pakistanis shot at Somali mosque

At least five Pakistanis have been killed in a dawn attack at a mosque in Somalia's semi-autonomous Puntland region, witnesses say.

Armed men in masks entered a mosque in Galkayo and ordered six Pakistanis and one Somali outside, they said.

The gunmen then opened fire, killing five men and seriously injuring two.

Those targeted are said to be preachers from a religious sect. Puntland has been tense recently, but correspondents the reason for the attack is unclear.

The Pakistanis are thought to be missionaries from an Islamic sect called Tabliq who arrived in Galkayo on Tuesday.

Warning

Correspondents say it is common for groups of foreign preachers to spend several months travelling in Somalia on missionary work.

Tabliq is known to be peaceful. Six religious leaders from the sect were killed in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, in 2008, during fighting between Ethiopian troops supporting the government and Islamist militants.

In Galkayo, security forces cordoned off the area after the shooting and were conducting house-to-house searches.

Somalia has been without an effective central government since 1991 and has recently been riven by fighting between Islamist insurgents and government troops.

The security situation in Puntland has been tense after the recent killing of an information minister.

Pirates operating off the Somali coast are based in the northern region, but it has seen less violence than the rest of the country.

However, a report from International Crisis Group released on Wednesday warned that if the government did not enact reforms, the region could break up violently.

It said that friction within the Harti clan had undermined formerly consensual politics in Puntland, meaning that grievances including poverty, poor governance and corruption had not been tackled.

Russian Construction Minister Ingush minister shot dead at work

Two masked gunmen have shot dead the construction minister of the volatile Russian republic of Ingushetia, local officials say.

Ruslan Amerkhanov was killed in his office in the town of Magas on Wednesday. The gunmen then fled by car.

Attacks on government officials have become more common in the troubled, mainly Muslim North Caucasus republic.

In June, Ingushetia's President Yunus-Bek Yevkurov was seriously wounded in an assassination attempt.

The Ingush interior ministry said the gunmen shot and killed Mr Amerkhanov at point-blank range in his office.

His assistant, Magomed Amerkhanov, was wounded in the attack.

Ingushetia has seen escalating clashes between security forces and armed militants in the past year, similar to the violence that continues in neighbouring Chechnya.

Ingush security officials quoted by Itar-Tass news agency said Wednesday's killing might be linked to a recent review of construction projects in the republic. Ingushetia is plagued by corruption, including in the construction sector.

Three employees of Russia's emergencies ministry were shot dead in Ingushetia ten days ago.

In Chechnya, Russian forces were engaged in heavy fighting with separatist rebels until a few years ago, though the fighting has become much less intense recently.