Seoul - North Korea warned Wednesday that it would conduct another nuclear test if the United Nations Security Council refused to apologize for criticizing the Stalinist state's April 5 rocket launch. "Unless the UN Security Council offers an apology immediately, we will be forced to take additional self-defence measures to protect the highest interests of our republic," a Foreign Ministry spokesman said in a statement cited by the state-run Korean Central News Agency.

Those measures would include nuclear and ballistic missile tests, it said.

Nairobi/Kinshasa - The United Nations peacekeeping force in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) Wednesday dismissed media reports it was working with a former rebel leader facing war crimes charges. The BBC said its correspondent in the DR Congo had seen documents proving General Bosco Ntaganda was taking part in the chain of command in a mission involving MONUC.

Sydney  - The United Nations wi

New York - The Sudanese army and rebel groups in Sudan's Darfur region have turned guns against each other and are purging members of their own groups some two months after signing a ceasefire, a UN official said Monday. All warring parties have killed civilians, said Rodolphe Adada, the representative of the United Nations-African Union peacekeeping mission in troubled Darfur.

"The armed movements fight amongst each another, or violently purge their own members," Adada told the UN Security Council in a review session on the situation in Darfur.

Colombo  - UN Humanitar

New York - The United Nations said Friday that its top humanitarian official would visit Sri Lanka over the weekend as tens of thousands of civilians remain trapped in rebel-held areas. John Holmes, undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs, will be in Sri Lanka for three days, urging the government to facilitate a UN humanitarian mission to the conflict zone and assessing the condition of refugees living in makeshift camps.