A video released on jihadist websites shows four French hostages kidnapped by a North African al-Qaida group last September.

The U.S.-based SITE intelligence group says the video was posted on Tuesday. It shows photos of the hostages with armed militants standing behind them.

In an audio message accompanying the pictures, the hostages call on French President Nicolas Sarkozy to respond to al-Qaida's demands that he withdraw French troops from Afghanistan. French forces are part of the international coalition battling the Taliban.

Mexican Attorney General Marisela Morales says 183 bodies have been uncovered so far from mass graves in the northeastern part of the country, near the U.S. border.

Morales made the comment Tuesday as she announced that 74 people, among them 17 police officers, have been arrested in connection with the investigation. The corpses were discovered recently around the community of San Fernando, in Tamaulipas, the state where 72 Central American migrants were found shot to death last August.

Eight International Security Assistance Force service members and an ISAF civilian died today following a shooting incident in Afghanistan’s capital of Kabul, military officials reported.

Marine Corps Col. Dave Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman, said ISAF has confirmed that the service members and civilian were Americans. Because next of kin had not yet been notified, he would not provide the service affiliations of the service members who were killed.

The shooter reportedly was an Afghan air force officer who was killed during the incident, Lapan said.

Pakistani officials say bombs have exploded near two buses carrying navy personnel in Karachi, killing at least four people and wounding more than 50 others.

Authorities said the remote-controlled blasts Tuesday happened minutes apart in different areas of the southern port city.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attacks and vowed more strikes against security forces in the future.

Victims of the blasts included naval officers and other employees of the navy.

Venezuela has deported to Colombia a man authorities say has ties to the FARC rebel group, in a sign of warming relations between the two countries.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos told reporters Monday that he had called Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to alert him that suspect Joaquin Perez was on a flight to Venezuela.

Santos said Chavez had complied with his request to have Perez arrested when he arrived in Venezuela Saturday.

Perez is accused of running a website promoting the FARC rebels and being a liaison in Europe for the militant group.

Police in Nigeria say casualty totals have risen to three dead, 14 wounded from Sunday's bomb blasts in the northeastern city of Maiduguri.

Authorities are blaming the radical Islamic sect Boko Haram for the attacks, which occurred ahead of nationwide gubernatorial elections Tuesday.

A total of three bomb blasts went off at a hotel and a motor park. Authorities say all the casualties resulted from the hotel attack.

Nigerian officials suspect a radical Islamic group is responsible for bomb blasts in a northeastern Nigerian city that killed two people and wounded eight Sunday.

Authorities say Maiduguri has experienced violence blamed on the Islamic sect Boko Haram, whose name means "western education is sinful," for the past two years.

Officials say the explosions ripped through a hotel and a motor park.

Police say the victim count is for the hotel. The casualties for the blast at the motor park have not yet been determined.

Article by VOA News

Mexican police say the brutally murdered bodies of four women and a teenage girl have been found in the Pacific coast resort of Acapulco.

Authorities say all the victims apparently had a connection to a local beauty parlor.

Officials say the semi-nude and bound bodies of two of the women and a 14-year-old girl were found with their throats slashed early Saturday in the salon.

Police say the other victims, who also had their throats cut, were found later in the day in other parts of the resort town.

Indonesia is under a state of high alert after police say they foiled a plot to blow up a church as worshippers gathered for Good Friday services.

On Friday, the police said they had arrested 19 suspects and a day earlier defused five bombs around the Christ Cathedral in the Jakarta suburb of Tangerang. The bombs had been set to go off at 9 a.m. on Friday, when the church would have been filled with worshippers on one of Christianity's holiest days.