Istanbul - The second in command of the al-Qaeda terrorist franchise, Ayman al-Zawahri, has lashed out at the Saudi royal house and the president of Yemen in a new audio taped message carried by Islamist websites on Monday.

The person on the tape, his voice sounding not unlike earlier authenticated recordings of al-Zawahri, says: "The rulers of the house of Ibn Saud and (Yemeni President) Ali Abdullah Salih have sold out their religion." He accuses them of being "agents" of the United States.

Geneva - There have been over 325,000 announced layoffs in the financial sector since August 2007, the International Labour Organization said Monday, noting that 40 percent of those cuts, or about 130,000 jobs, were made since October of last year.

More job cuts in the financial sector were to be expected as the full extent of the economic crisis became clear, the ILO said. The numbers did not include independent contractors and subcontractors.

Dubai, UAE - Croatian seeds split the difference on Monday's opening day at the Barclays Championships, with Marin Cilic fighting back as Ivo Karlovic crashed out to a qualifier.

Cilic, seeded fifth, met up with Serbian Janko Tipsarevic and handed his familiar rival a third defeat over seven weeks in their series, 2-6, 7-6 (7-3), 6-4.

Swiss qualifier Marco Chiudinelli began putting in a bid for a place on next week's Swiss Davis Cup team to face the US.

London - Everton will be without midfielder Mikel Arteta for the rest of the seas

Berlin - German Chancellor Angela Merkel rejected Monday pressure to decide about a controversial museum appointment which has raised tension with Poland in recent weeks.

Ethnic Germans expelled from eastern Europe after the Second World War have demanded that their national leader, Erika Steinbach, be appointed to the board of a planned taxpayer-funded museum in Berlin depicting the refugee ordeal.

There was "no urgency" on the issue, Merkel's deputy spokesman Thomas Steg told reporters Monday in Berlin.

Paris - The trial opened Monday in the southern French city of Toulouse of the former head of the fertilizer manufacturer AZF, for his responsibility in the 2001 explosion of an AZF chemicals factory that killed 30 people and injured some 2,500.

Also on trial in the worst industrial accident in post-war France is a subsidiary of the oil giant Total, which owned the factory. All the accused face charges of manslaughter.

The explosion of 296 tons of ammonium nitrate on September 21, 2001, was so powerful that it registered 3.4 on the open-ended Richter scale and left more than 70,000 people homeless.