PAKISTAN: A powerful car bomb accidentally went off in a house in a former stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban in the restive north-west today, killing at least two children and five suspected militants, police said.

The explosion took place before dawn in the city of Mir Ali in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province when a militant, identified as commander Rasool Jan, was fitting a bomb in a car at his house, said Irfan Khan, a local police official.

SOUTH AFRICA:  South Africa’s government said today it will not help about 4,000 illegal miners inside a closed mine in the country’s north-west province who have been denied access to basic supplies as part of an official strategy against illegal mining.

The miners in the mineshaft in Stilfontein are believed to be suffering from a lack of food and water after police closed off the entrances used to transport their supplies underground.

NEW ZEALAND: Opposition party MPs in the New Zealand parliament forced a temporary halt to proceedings today when they performed a traditional haka ceremony, amid anger over a controversial Bill seeking to reinterpret the country’s founding treaty with the indigenous Maori people.

Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke led the haka after being asked whether her party supported the Bill.

MEXICO: Officials said on Wednesday that they have arrested German Reyes on suspicion of involvement in the brutal murder of Alejandro Arcos, the mayor of the city of Chilpancingo last month.

The beheaded body of Mr Arcos was found just days after he had been sworn in as the city’s new mayor.

Mr Reyes, Chilpancingo’s top security official, denies any involvement in the crime.