North Korea's military on Saturday threatened retaliation against "provocative" acts from the South including the scattering of anti-Pyongyang propaganda leaflets across the border.

The warning came as activists in South Korea opposed to the secretive regime plan to float balloons carrying the leaflets across the border in time for the 66th anniversary of the North's ruling communist party inauguration on Monday.

New York police have broken up an international identity theft ring that made fake credit cards using information swiped off real cards in banks, restaurants and retail stores, according to authorities.

More than 111 people have been charged and 86 were detained in the operation, which involved five criminal organizations in the New York borough of Queens with links in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Middle East, they said.

Two Tibetan men set themselves on fire in southwest China in the latest self-immolation protest against the Chinese government, state media and a rights group reported Saturday.

The two former monks, 18-year-old Thongan and 20-year-old Tenzin, set themselves on fire in Aba county in Sichuan province's Aba prefecture Friday, according to the official Xinhua News Agency.

Three major road accidents in China killed 56 people on the last day of a weeklong holiday, including 35 people who died after a bus collided with a car on a northern expressway, state media reported Saturday.

The official Xinhua News Agency said that the bus flipped over after crashing into a car in the port city of Tianjin on Friday afternoon, injuring 18 others.

U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday honored all those killed since U.S. warplanes launched a campaign to oust the Taliban in Afghanistan 10 years ago, and saluted those who have served in the U.S. military.

Obama said in a statement the United States was "responsibly ending" the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq "from a position of strength" and promised to provide veterans with healthcare and job opportunities.

Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Liberian "peace warrior" Leymah Gbowee and Yemen's Arab Spring activist Tawakkul Karman on Friday won the Nobel Peace Prize, the jury said.

The three prizewinners share the 2011 award "for their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women's rights to full participation in peace-building work," Norwegian Nobel Committee president Thorbjoern Jagland said in his announcement.

Turkey has agreed to extend by one year its command of NATO peacekeepers in the Afghan capital of Kabul, the foreign ministry said on Friday.

Turkey had taken over the Kabul regional command of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) for one year on November 1, 2009 after an eight-month stint in 2007.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy urged Turkey on Friday to recognize the World War I-era massacres of Armenians as genocide within a "very brief" period before his term ends in May 2012.

"From 1915 to 2011, it seems to be enough (time) for reflection," Sarkozy told reporters in Yerevan on the second day of his visit to Armenia.

A U.S. diplomat has been charged with assault with a dangerous weapon after allegedly beating his wife while they lived in Dakar, Senegal, the Justice Department said Thursday.

The indictment against Michael Makalou, 40, was handed down Wednesday by a grand jury in Virginia. He faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.

North Korea must shut down its newest nuclear program before long-stalled six-nation disarmament talks can resume, Seoul's top presidential security aide said Friday.

Chun Yung-Woo, senior secretary for foreign affairs and national security, said other parties in the talks would not reward the North for abandoning its "illegal" nuclear activities.