Los Angeles  - Aided by lighter winds Monday, firefighters in southern California were gaining the upper hand on three wildfires that have devastated the region. They were hopeful of containing the blazes by mid-week.

The fires have destroyed hundreds of homes since Thursday, including 500 mobile homes in Sylmar, east of Los Angeles. More than 100 homes in the luxurious celebrity enclave of Montecito, northwest of Los Angeles, also went up in flames.

Prague  - Lenka Cilova had been joking when she said she could be in for 15 minutes of fame before boarding her long-planned New York flight on Monday.

Then it happened.

"Can I start over?" the petite, blue-eyed blonde asked a mob of reporters who swarmed the 27-year-old film producer with blinding camera lights at Prague's international airport as she joined four other Czechs, including two government ministers, who hopped a plane to the United States without a visa in their passports.

New York  - US banking giant Citigroup said Monday that it was eliminating about 53,000 jobs from its international workforce and cutting costs by 20 per cent after suffering massive losses as a result of the global financial crisis.

The US bank with the most employees cut more than 23,000 jobs earlier in the year. Monday's announcement would leave Citigroup with 300,000 employees worldwide from 375,000 last year, according to an investor presentation on its website.

Amman  - Jordanian Foreign Minister Salah Bashir met Monday with a visiting delegation of German lawmakers and stressed Berlin's role in pushing forward the peace negotiations between Israel and its Arab neighbours.

"The minister underscored the importance of the European Union's role, particularly that of Germany, both on the international and regional levels, in spurring the Middle East peace process and giving a hand to the Palestinians and Israelis to enable them reach a peace agreement," a Foreign Ministry statement said.

Dhaka  - The leader of one of Bangladesh's major parties warned Monday that groups might boycott national elections scheduled for December unless her party's demands to improve the elections are met within 48 hours.

Kampala  - An agreement expected to end two decades of civil war in the north of Uganda is expected to be signed November 30, now that the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has finally agreed to peace, Ugandan officials said Monday.

"(LRA leader) Joseph Kony has agreed to turn up to sign the agreement," Ugandan army spokesman Major Paddy Ankunda told a news conference.