France's upper house elected its first socialist speaker by a clear majority Saturday, a week after the left-wing opposition gained control of the Senate in a new blow to President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Jean-Pierre Bel, 59, leader of the Socialist Party group in the Senate since 2004, was elected by 179 votes to 134 for outgoing rightist speaker Gerard Larcher and 29 for centrist Valerie Letard.

A senior commander of the Taliban-allied Haqqani network in Afghanistan who is also the uncle of its leader has been captured, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force said Saturday.

The announcement of Haji Mali Khan's capture comes as the U.S. steps up pressure on Pakistan to act against the Haqqanis, linked to Al-Qaeda and blamed for a string of attacks on Western targets.

An ultra-light plane crashed into a ferris wheel at a small town fair in Australia, narrowly missing two children, and dangled from the structure for hours before its occupants could be rescued.

Locals were stunned on Saturday to see the Cheetah S200 fly into the ferris wheel at the Old Bar Festival near Taree, about 250 kilometers (155 miles) northeast of Sydney, and become wedged in its metalwork.

All 18 people aboard a plane that crashed on Indonesia's Sumatra Island were found dead Saturday, an official said, after two days of hampered efforts to reach the remote jungle site.

Hopes that some on board the aircraft might be alive had been raised when a victim's mother reported that her daughter had called her from the plane after the crash Thursday, and aerial photos showed the main cabin largely intact.

The second typhoon in a week battered the rain-soaked northern Philippines on Saturday, adding misery to thousands of people, some of whom still perched on rooftops while several other Asian nations also reeled from flooding.

Typhoon Nalgae slammed ashore midmorning Saturday south of northeastern Palanan Bay in Isabela province with winds of 100 miles (160 kilometers) per hour and dangerous gusts of 121 mph (195 kph).

China's top leaders marked national day Saturday with an appearance on Tiananmen Square in central Beijing after Prime Minister Wen Jiabao pledged greater "democracy" and rights for the people.

President Hu Jintao, Wen and top Communist Party leaders descended on the vast square and bowed before the monument to revolutionary martyrs, as they marked the 62nd anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.

Iran's offer to halt production of low enriched uranium is not credible because the Islamic republic has a record of making "empty promises," the United States said Friday.

U.S. President Barack Obama said Friday the killing of U.S-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaqi was "major blow" to Al-Qaida's Yemeni franchise and vowed to be relentless in destroying global terror networks.

Heavy fighting broke out Friday close to Somalia's border with Kenya as extremist Shehab fighters launched a dawn attack on the town of Dhobley but were later repelled, fighters on both sides said.

"The fighting was very heavy but we emerged victorious, there are casualties on both sides," a senior commander of the Azania militia group controlling the area told Agence France Presse by phone from the battleground.

A U.S. drone Friday killed at least two militants when it fired missiles on a vehicle in a restive Pakistan tribal area bordering Afghanistan, security officials said.

The strike took place at Baghar village of South Waziristan tribal district, two security officials said.