Nigeria joins space age through Russian rocket

LAGOS, Nigeria -- A Nigerian satellite blasted into orbit Saturday aboard a Russian rocket, propelling one of the poorest nations on earth into space for the first time.

Millions of Nigerians watched the launch -- at Russia's Plesetsk Cosmodrome -- on live television.

"It makes me proud to be a Nigerian," said Prosper Sunday, a 27-year-old security guard in Lagos. "It shows our nation is progressing. We've joined the space age."

The government plans to use the $13 million satellite to monitor water resources, soil erosion, deforestation and disasters, space agency spokesman Solomon Olaniyi told The Associated Press.

It will be used to watch military facilities and the country's oil pipelines and infrastructure. Nigeria is one of the world's largest exporters of oil, but thieves siphon off hundreds of thousands of barrels everyday.

U.S. soldiers battle attackers in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Suspected Taliban fighters attacked a U.S. military patrol in eastern Afghanistan, but there were no reports of casualties or damage, the military said Saturday.

The attack occurred Friday near a U.S. base at Gardez, in eastern Paktia province near the border with Pakistan, the military said in a statement from Bagram air base. Bagram is the headquarters for the U.S.-led coalition.

The soldiers returned fire and the attackers retreated.

Also Saturday, Afghan police defused two anti-personnel mines planted just yards away from Kabul's Blue Mosque, the capital's police chief Gen. Baba Jan said.

He accused Taliban insurgents of planting both bombs. Police immediately sealed off and searched the area, but no arrests were made, Jan said.

On Friday, coalition forces found three unexploded rockets in the Gardez area and destroyed them, the military said. The military was investigating whether an explosion occurred in the area.

Brazil, Cuba cement ties with business deals

HAVANA -- Linked for decades as fellow icons of Latin America's left, Brazil's president and Fidel Castro cemented their relationship Saturday as they talked business and ignored Cuba's human rights record.

Presiding over the signing of $200 million in new business deals in Cuba by private Brazilian enterprises, the Cuban leader put his arm around President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva as he talked about the possibilities of future trade between their nations.

"This is an exceptional step for Cuba and Brazil," said Silva, a former labor leader known throughout the region simply as "Lula."

Silva traveled to Cuba more than 20 times in his labor organizing days and has known Castro for decades. Elected Brazil's president nine months ago, he made his first visit to the communist island as leader of Latin America's largest country and the world's 12th-largest economy.

Mussolini suggested excommunicating Hitler

ROME -- Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini once privately suggested the Vatican consider excommunicating Adolf Hitler, a historian said Saturday, citing a document recently disclosed by the Holy See.

Experts were surprised by the document, but noted that Mussolini's remark came in April 1938, the year before he sealed a wartime alliance with the Nazi leader.

Prof. Emma Fattorini pointed out that Hitler had invaded Austria shortly before Mussolini's reported remark. The Italian dictator was worried about his own borders, she said.

She speculated that Mussolini's aim was "to weaken Hitler and have more power himself, to do it in a way that the Church would stop Hitler a bit."

The Hitler-Mussolini relationship was always ambivalent, she said. "They love each other, they hate each other, they study each other," she said.

-- From wire reports