Over 25 killed in Nigeria militant attack, government air strike

 At least 26 people were killed when suspected Islamist Boko Haram militants stormed a village in northeast Nigeria and a government warplane opened fire to repel the attackers, local residents and a security source said on Tuesday.

The warplane strafed Boko Haram fighters fleeing in pick-up trucks after raiding Dille, near Lassa in the south of Borno State, for several hours on Monday. The attackers fired on inhabitants and burned homes and churches.

"I counted 26 corpses yesterday evening," one of the residents, Dauda Illiya, told Reuters.

Most of the deaths occurred during the raid but cannon fire from the government jet also killed at least six civilians - four women and two children, residents said.

"The pilot was just spraying bullets anywhere ... People were running here and there. Many people were injured from the bullets," said a local man, Suleiman Haruna.

U.S. says deportation of Honduran children a warning to illegal migrants

Women and their children walk on the tarmac after being deported from the U.S., at the Ramon Villeda international airport in San Pedro Sula, in this July 14, 2014 handout provided by the Honduran Presidential House.

The White House said on Tuesday that Central Americans trying to cross the U.S. border should know "they will not be welcome to this country," a day after the United States deported a planeload of women and children to Honduras.

A charter flight on Monday from New Mexico to San Pedro Sula, the city with the highest murder rate in the world, transported 17 Honduran women, as well as 12 girls and nine boys between the ages of 18 months and 15 years.

Nigerian President tells Malala missing girls to be home soon

    Pakistani schoolgirl activist Malala Yousafzai speaks during a meeting with the leaders of the #BringBackOurGirls Abuja campaign group,      in  Abuja July 13, 2014

Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan promised on Monday that more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls kidnapped by Islamist militants would soon return home, teenage Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai said after meeting him.

Malala, who became a global celebrity after surviving being shot in the head by the Taliban for campaigning for girls' education, was visiting Nigeria to support an international campaign for the release of the teenage students abducted in mid-April by the Islamist insurgent group Boko Haram.

"The president promised me ... that the abducted girls will return to their homes soon," Malala, who has called the 219 missing students her "sisters", told a news conference after a 45-minute meeting with Jonathan at the presidential villa.

FBI arrests 8 accused of illegal World Cup betting in Las Vegas

Gamblers accused of taking illegal World Cup wagers when the operation was raided by FBI agents 

 Eight people from Malaysia, China and Hong Kong have been acccused of operating a temporary illegal gambling ring from Las Vegas that investigators said logged millions of dollars in bets on World Cup soccer games.

Wei Seng Phua, 50, a suspected organised crime member, and the others were accused in a criminal complaint unsealed minutes before their arraignments in US District Court. They are accused of participating in the scheme to take bets over Wi-Fi and DSL lines they had casino employees install in their suites at Caesars Palace.

Lionel Messi's night of hard labour at the Maracana World Cup final ends in only misery

 A country hoped this was the night when their talisman would join Diego Maradona in the game's pantheon, but Joachim Low's team had very different ideas 

 Germany’s envied culture of planning, skill and intelligence gained its reward on the sacred turf of the Maracana. Lionel Messi watched the dream of international greatness recede in a stadium that Argentina tried to claim as a satellite of Buenos Aires.

Between those two bookends, one of the best World Cups ended with boos for the presidents of Fifa and Brazil, the locals awash with schadenfreude, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Germany’s best player, limping and drained, the flinty Javier Mascherano weeping and Messi stepping up to receive the Golden Ball for the tournament’s best player: a bizarre choice, which even he will be embarrassed about, given the way this game unfolded.