In brief: Five NATO troops slain; envoy freed

KABUL, Afghanistan – The Western military on Sunday suffered its most lethal day in a month in Afghanistan, with five troops killed in the south and east, the NATO force said.

Meanwhile, the Afghan government said an Afghan diplomat kidnapped by insurgents two years ago in Pakistan’s tribal areas had been freed a day earlier.

A brief statement from the presidential palace credited his release on “persistent efforts” on the part of both the Pakistani and Afghan governments but gave no details.

The envoy, Abdul Khaliq Farahi, was released in eastern Afghanistan – across the border from where he had been seized. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization force gave no details about the three fatalities in the east and the two in the south.

Qantas jumbo jet has electrical fault

SYDNEY, Australia – Qantas says a Boeing 747 jumbo jet bound for Argentina has returned to Sydney after experiencing a suspected electrical fault.

No one was injured in today’s incident, which comes after a Rolls-Royce engine on one of the airline’s Airbus A380s superjumbos disintegrated in flight early this month.

Qantas spokesman Tom Woodward said the Boeing flight carrying 119 passengers and 22 crew developed “a technical issue” an hour after it left Sydney.

Gunmen kill five in border city bar

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico – Gunmen burst into a bar called “Desesperados” in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez and opened fire on Sunday, killing five people and wounding nine others, authorities said.

Assailants also killed the state’s prisons director and his son in a second attack in the area, which has turned into a deadly battleground for warring drug cartels.

Gunmen opened fire on the vehicle carrying Chihuahua prison director Gerardo Ortiz and his son in Chihuahua city, the state capital, located south of Ciudad Juarez.

Authorities offered no motive for the attack in the “Desesperados” – or “The Desperate Ones” – bar early Sunday. The nine wounded were listed in serious condition at hospitals.

Also Sunday, police in the Pacific coast resort of Acapulco found the bound, bullet-ridden bodies of five men on the outskirts of the city, according to police in Guerrero state, where Acapulco is located.

Also in Guerrero state, detectives reported they had found the bodies of two more men buried in a clandestine grave in a coconut grove where 18 bodies had been unearthed last week.

The 18 were among 20 men from the western state of Michoacan who were kidnapped Sept. 30 while visiting Acapulco. Two men remained to be found.