Military Uniforms

KABUL, Afghanistan - Unlike most women in Afghanistan, Sourya Saleh knows how to drive - but she's taken the wheel only with her brother beside her, out of respect for tradition. Her friend Masooma Hussaini is still learning. Both young women, though, are experts in a more demanding mode of travel: They've flown 204 hours each as pilots of military helicopters. The first female chopper pilots in Afghanistan since the Soviets trained a woman as a pilot in the 1980s, these two young Afghans are pioneers in a land where a resurgent Taliban is determined to deny girls the right to an education, and violence against women is on the rise.

Nine robbers, some of them killers, were executed by firing squad Saturday, Ghana's national news agency reported. The nine men had donned fake military uniforms to gain entry to homes and had killed some of their victims.

Police captured six fugitive military officers linked to a 2003 failed mutiny against Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, officials said. The officers, along with a lawyer and another civilian, were seized from a house in suburban Quezon City. Ranulfo Ludovica, village chief of the Batasan Hills district, said the raiders recovered explosives, firearms, ammunition and military uniforms.

Twenty-four people died in an attack in a village 20 miles southwest of the capital, Kigali, the independent Rwanda News Agency reported. The attack brings to 125 the number of people who have been killed in a spate of violence that began Tuesday night. The agency said the attack was believed to have been carried out by Hutu militia. Officials quoted survivors as saying the attackers were dressed in military uniforms.

Tamil separatist guerrillas, dressed in military uniforms, went house to house in a Sri Lankan village, systematically killing 37 Sinhalese with swords, knives and guns, according to survivors and officials. At least 10 children were among the victims in Welikande, a village about 100 miles northwest of Colombo. Officials said that about 30 rebels attacked the village, hacking and slashing people.

Four Cuban coast guardsmen defected after steering their patrol boat to a Key West resort in an apparently spontaneous decision after a conversation about poverty in their communist homeland. The men were still dressed in their military uniforms when they docked, walked into town and surrendered to police. One man had a Chinese handgun holstered to his side. Police found two loaded AK-47 assault rifles along with ammunition on the boat, which was still flying a Cuban flag.

Armed Iraqis abducted two Polish reporters at a checkpoint south of Baghdad, their editors said. Marcin Firlej, 27, a reporter for the private TVN24 news channel, and Jacek Kaczmarek, 31, with Polish state radio, had set off from Nasiriyah with a group of journalists and were stopped near Hillah. TVN24 reporter Marcin Woroch, who was in the same convoy, said the group was driving toward Karbala and hit the checkpoint after leaving the highway.

Wes Jefferies, 93, motion picture costumer who specialized in military uniforms and Native American clothing. A native of Provo, Utah, Jefferies helped dress performers in about 75 movies from Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks in the 1929 silent "The Taming of the Shrew" to Sidney Poitier in 1971's "The Organization." He began developing his eclectic knowledge of military uniforms when he dressed World War I characters for the 1930 Best Picture Oscar-winner "All Quiet on the Western Front."

Community organizations in northeast Los Angeles will sponsor an outdoor welcome-home party Sunday for local men and women who served in Operation Desert Storm. The event will begin at 2 p.m. in the Eagle Rock City Hall parking lot, 2035 Colorado Blvd. Bands from Eagle Rock and Franklin high schools will perform. Local scout troops will lead the audience in singing. The event is open to the public, and refreshments will be provided.

More than 20 years after ElRoy Harworth's C-130 cargo plane was shot down in Vietnam, the remains of the Air Force senior master sergeant were buried in Fergus Falls, Minn., his home town. Harworth's remains were among those identified by the Defense Department from a group of 21 returned to the United States last April by the Vietnamese government. The Rev. Tom Palomaki, addressing about 400 people, said the time of uncertainty for the Harworth family was over.