nation and world news

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan won Turkey's first direct presidential election Sunday, striking a conciliatory tone toward critics who fear he is bent on a power grab as he embarks on another five years at the country's helm. The three-time prime minister will now step down from that post and appoint a replacement. His message of unity was in stark contrast to his mostly divisive campaign.

A suicide bombing killed at least four people, including a woman and two children, and wounded more than 20 on a major commercial boulevard in the Afghan capital just before midday Sunday.The attack, apparently carried out by the Taliban, was aimed at a convoy of NATO forces in Kabul, but Afghan and NATO officials said no foreign forces were killed or injured. Witnesses said a car swerved between two armored vehicles in the convoy and detonated. A spokesman for the Taliban asserted responsibility for the attack in tweets in English to journalists.

A tour bus careened off a highway in Tibet, killing 44 people and injuring 11, China's state news media reported. According to Xinhua, the bus was carrying about 50 passengers Saturday when it crashed into two vehicles on a mountainous highway and then fell 30 feet, landing on its roof. The crash occurred in Nyemo County, about 60 miles from the Tibetan capital of Lhasa. Most of the injured were tourists from China's east.

Ukraine pressed ahead with its military assault to stamp out pro-Russian separatists in the east of the country with its most intensive artillery bombardment of this rebel capital yet. The attack with artillery and ground-to-ground rockets defied Russian threats to intervene as the civilian death toll rose. Ukraine has rebuffed a cease-fire outright, adding to concerns that Russia would intervene with what Moscow is calling a humanitarian mission but which European nations and the United States would view as an invasion.