gralopvedkok

A Chinese high-speed train broke a world record Friday for fastest unmodified commercial train, reaching speeds of up to 481.1 kph (298.9 mph), state media reported.

According to China’s official Xinhua news agency, the new-generation CRH380 moved as fast as a low-cruising jet-plane during a trial run on what will become the country’s rail line between Beijing and Shanghai.

The previous world record was set by China in September, when a train on a Shanghai-Hangzhou high-speed line hit a speed of 416.6 kilometers per hour, Xinhua said.

A string of bombings killed 17 people across Iraq’s capital on Saturday, including Iranian pilgrims near a revered shrine and shoppers at a Shiite neighborhood market, authorities said.

The attacks — several roadside bombs and cars packed with explosives — wounded more than 100 people. Most of the casualties were likely Shiite Muslims, a frequent target of Sunni insurgents who have long sought to provoke civil war in Iraq.

Police said the deadliest strike targeted a marketplace in Baiyaa, a Shiite district in southwestern Baghdad. A car parked outside a shopping area exploded around midday, killing six people and wounding 42. Hospital officials confirmed the casualties.

“We were terrified,” said Ali Tuma al-Nidawi, 30, a government employee was shopping with neighbors when he heard three explosions within minutes of each other. “Shops and people were burning, and people were running everywhere. I did mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to many people who were not breathing because of the smoke.”

Near-simultaneous blasts also hit two groups of Iranian pilgrims near the gold-domed Moussa al-Kadhim mosque in the Shiite neighborhood of Kazimiyah, according to security forces. A pair of bombs killed five pilgrims resting near the shrine. A car exploded next to a bus carrying Iranian pilgrims in the nearby Shiite area of Shula, killing another three people.

Police and medical officials said those two attacks wounded 52 people.

Attacks by Sunni extremists on Shiite pilgrims and Iraqi Shiites helped fuel a surge of violence between the two main Islamic sects during the height of Iraq’s bloodshed between 2005 and 2007, as the insurgency against U.S. forces gave way to sectarian fighting.

Shiite pilgrims come from all over the world to visit shrines and mosques in Iraq that are revered by Shiites. The vast majority of those who make the pilgrimage come from neighboring Iran.

Earlier, police said a roadside bomb targeting a judge’s security convoy in downtown Baghdad killed three people, including two guards, and wounded seven passers-by. The judge was not in the convoy as it drove through Karradah, an area of mixed-ethnicity.

All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.

The bombings came as German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle led a group of German lawmakers and business leaders on a one-day trip to Iraq for meetings with senior leaders, including President Jalal Talabani and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. German investment in Iraq’s railways was among the business opportunities that both nations discussed.

Westerwelle told reporters that Berlin considers Iraq “an important partner, and we are determined to continue this support.”

Germany vigorously opposed the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq but began boosting relations with Baghdad over the past few years. Berlin has supported Iraq’s reconstruction with some euro400 million ($535 million) and granted debt relief worth some $6.4 billion.

Westerwelle and al-Maliki also discussed the plight of Iraq’s dwindling Christian community, which was devastated by an Oct. 31 attack on a Catholic church in Baghdad that left 68 dead. Since 2003, Germany has granted asylum to 2,500 Iraqi Christian refugees.

In a statement after the meeting, al-Maliki said he assured Westerwelle “that Christians are our brothers and have the same rights enjoyed by the general populace.”

“We do not accept their departure from our country, and we offer all possible means of protection for them to live in security, stability and prosperity,” al-Maliki said.

President Barack Obama made an unannounced visit Friday to Afghanistan, where he delivered holiday greetings to U.S. troops stationed there and promised continued full support in the war against Taliban and other extremists.

The president, who stayed for almost four hours before heading back to Washington, addressed nearly 3,900 troops at Bagram Airfield. Most of the troops were with the Army’s 101st Airborne Division, though components of all the service branches were represented.

“I wanted to make sure that I could spend a little time this holiday with the finest fighting force the world has ever known,” he told the enthusiastic audience. “On behalf of more than 300 million Americans, we are here to say thank you.”

The president praised the troops for what he characterized as recent military gains in the nine-year conflict.

Our coalition “is strong and is growing,” he said. “You’re going on the offense (We’re) tired of playing defense.”

Obama visited a hospital on the base, where he met with five wounded soldiers and three wounded civilian contractors, reporters traveling with the president said.

He awarded five Purple Hearts and met with the surviving members of a platoon that lost six comrades earlier in the week.

Obama had originally planned to travel to Kabul to meet with President Hamid Karzai and greet U.S. Embassy staffers, but stayed at Bagram because of poor weather. He did, however, speak to Karzai for 15 minutes via secure videoconference.

The president later huddled with National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, Ambassador Karl Eikenberry, and Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan.

It was unclear whether U.S. concerns with the Karzai government publicized this week by the website WikiLeaks were discussed. Two of the cables paint an unflattering portrait of President Karzai’s half brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, who has been accused of dealing drugs.

Prior to the latest WikiLeaks disclosures, Petraeus met with the Afghan president in an effort to ease tensions. Karzai had told the Washington Post he would like to scale back the U.S. military presence in his nation, and criticized the military presence as “intrusive” while calling Special Operations raids a problem.

In response, Petraeus told Karzai aides that the president’s view could make his relationship with the United States “untenable.”

A major U.S. military review of the war in Afghanistan is due this month, a year after Obama ordered additional U.S. troops to the country as part of a strategy that could bring some forces home as soon as July 2011. Officials have said the goal is to end combat operations in Afghanistan in 2014.

Friday’s trip was Obama’s second to Afghanistan since he became commander-in-chief. He visited Afghanistan in 2008 as a presidential candidate.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon made an urgent appeal Friday for more money to fight the cholera epidemic in Haiti that has claimed more than 1,800 lives.

The United Nations had asked for $164 million in mid-November. Ban said that only 20 percent had materialized.

The water-borne disease has not spread to all 10 departments or provinces of the impoverished Caribbean nation, but the latest data from the Ministry of Public Health reported 1,882 cholera deaths and almost 85,000 people sickened. The Pan American Health Organization said the good news is that a smaller proportion of infected people are dying.

In the first weeks of the cholera epidemic, which began in late October, the proportion of hospitalized patients dying of cholera was as high as 9 percent, the health organization said. That number is now down to 3.5 percent.

“This is progress,” said Deputy Director Dr. Jon K. Andrus. “There are still too many deaths, and we face many challenges. But the hard work of Haitian doctors, nurses, and community workers and their partners in the international community is, in fact, saving many lives.”

But Ban warned that the numbers were rough estimates at best and the outbreak is projected to sicken as many as 650,000 people in the next six months.

“Clearly, it will continue to spread. Unfortunately,” Ban said, “this is a function of a particularly virulent strain of cholera as well as underlying issues: a weak national health system, poor sanitary conditions, and the lack of clean water and other basic services.”

“Without a massive and immediate international response, we will be overwhelmed,” he said.

Symptoms of cholera, an acute, diarrheal illness caused by infection of the intestine, can be mild or even nonexistent. But sometimes they can be severe — profuse watery diarrhea, vomiting and leg cramps, which can cause rapid loss of body fluids and lead to dehydration and shock.

If left untreated, a person can die within hours.

Ban said the most immediate need was for more cholera treatment centers and more trained personnel to run those facilities.

That includes an estimated 350 doctors, 2,000 nurses and 2,200 support staff over the next three months and about 30,000 community health workers and volunteers to run an estimated 15,000 oral rehydration points.

“This will not be a short-term crisis. We cannot think short-term in our response,” Ban said. “The people of Haiti deserve nothing less.”