DUBAI

Foreign medics freed from a Libyan jail were tortured into confessing they deliberately infected hundreds of Libyan children with HIV, a son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadaffi said in remarks broadcast on Thursday. The five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor were freed on July 24 after a deal between Tripoli and the European Union.

Al-Qaeda threatened in an internet statement on Monday to escalate attacks against the ”enemies of Allah” in North African countries, warning Muslims to stay away from government sites. ”The Mujahedin [holy warriors] … have many hidden surprises for the enemies of Allah in the countries of the Islamic Maghreb, which will come in an escalating sequence,” said al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda’s second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahri, on Tuesday threatened more attacks on Britain two weeks after failed bombings in London and Glasgow. ”I say to [former British prime minister Tony] Blair’s successor that the policy of your predecessor drew catastrophes in Afghanistan and Iraq,” he said in a tape posted on a website.

The five cricket officials — including South Africa’s Rudi Koertzen — who caused the final overs of the Cricket World Cup final in Barbados to be played in near darkness have been banned from officiating in the World Twenty20 tournament in South Africa in September.

A critical desalination plant supplying water to Oman’s capital has regained most of its production capacity, easing the cyclone-damaged Muscat’s water shortage, officials and news reports said on Tuesday. Oman lost more than -million in oil revenues when exports were halted by last week’s Cyclone Gonu.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) board has unanimously approved a recommendation for Cricket South Africa to nominate an acting president following the death of Percy Sonn last month. The nominee, once approved, will assume the role of acting president until the ICC’s annual conference of 2008.

A Somali Islamist group on Monday claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing that targeted the Horn of Africa country’s prime minister. Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi has accused al-Qaeda of being behind Sunday’s suicide bombing that killed seven people outside his home in Mogadishu.

An al-Qaeda front group in Europe threatened on Tuesday to launch bloody attacks in France in response to the election of Nicolas Sarkozy as president. ”As you have chosen the crusader and Zionist Sarkozy as a leader … we in the Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades warn you that the coming days will see a bloody jihadist campaign,” the group’s ”Europe division” said.

A militant Islamist group in Iraq has threatened in a videotape showing two purported German hostages to execute them if the Berlin government fails to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan. The Kataeb Siham al-Haq (Righteous Arrows Battalions) said in the videotape posted on Saturday on an Islamist website: "We give the German government 10 days from the date of this statement …"

Roger Federer took over the number one ranking in men’s tennis more than three years ago, and he shows no signs of letting it go. The 10-time Grand Slam champion reached a new milestone on Monday when he broke Jimmy Connors’s 30-year-old mark with his 161st week at the top of the ATP rankings.

Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi has been banned for four one-day internationals (ODIs) after being found guilty of breaching the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) code of conduct during his side’s ODI against South Africa at Centurion. The charge was laid by ICC CEO Malcolm Speed.

Ernie Els got off to a storming start in the first round of the Dubai Desert Classic on Thursday with a run of an eagle and three birdies from the third hole. That more than offset a bogey four at the second and hoisted the three-times former winner into a joint share of the early lead.