World in brief: Castro on ballot as Cubans hit polls

Cubans ratified a slate of parliamentary candidates on Sunday including Fidel Castro, the ailing 81-year-old leader who has not been seen in public for nearly 18 months.

Only one choice appeared for each post in districts across the country and there was no campaigning. The Communist Party is the only party allowed, but the government says membership is not a prerequisite for the parliament that rubber stamps official party policy.

Still, Cubans lined before dawn to cast their ballots. Some 8.4 million voters were being asked to back 614 top Communists, career politicians, musicians and athletes for posts in the legislature, known as the National Assembly.

Electoral officials said an estimated 95 percent of registered voters had cast ballots as of an hour before polling stations closed Sunday evening. More complete results are expected today.

MUMBAI, India

At least 38 killed in bus plunge

A bus carrying Hindus on a religious pilgrimage skidded off a hill in western India and plunged into a gorge, killing at least 38 people and injuring 40 others, police said Monday.

At least five children and 17 women and 16 men died in the accident just before midnight Sunday in the Nashik district of Maharashtra state, said N. Gupta, police superintendent at the Nashik police station.

The bus was only supposed to seat 45 passengers but was carrying about 80 when it crashed, Gupta said. The driver survived the accident but fled, he said.

“The initial inquiry shows that the driver appears to have lost control of the bus while negotiating a sharp turn,” Gupta said. “There were also more passengers than should have been in the bus. We are investigating.”

KABUL, Afghanistan

Roadside bomb kills 5 civilians

A roadside bomb probably intended for Afghan or NATO forces killed five civilians in southern Afghanistan, while militants killed six Afghans driving a convoy of trucks to a NATO base, officials said Sunday.

The bomb hit a taxi late Saturday in the Panjwayi district of Kandahar province, the site of heavy battles between NATO troops and Taliban fighters over the last 18 months.

Five civilians were killed and three wounded, said Shah Baran, the local government leader.

“Usually the Taliban are planting mines for Afghan and NATO forces, but this time it exploded on civilians,” Baran said.

In neighboring Helmand province, militants attacked a convoy of trucks carrying gravel to a NATO base, killing four drivers and two security guards, said Koka, an Afghan who goes by one name and owns the security company that employed the guards.

In Zabul province, the director of the province’s Peace and Reconciliation Commission – which helps former fighters renounce militancy and re-enter lawful society – was killed by gunmen on the highway.