Tuesday, August 11, 2009 JAKARTA: A 5.7 magnitude earthquake struck the north coast of Indonesia's Papua Tuesday, seismologists said. The quake struck at 1:46 am (1746 GMT) with an epicentre 74 kilometres (46 miles) northwest of the town of Wewak, the US Geological Survey reported. It was measured at a depth of 35 kilometres. Indonesia sits on the Pacific "Ring of Fire," where the meeting of continental plates causes high volcanic and seismic activity.
BAGHDAD: Nearly 500 U.S. Army combat engineers who specialize in clearing roads of explosives started shifting to southern Afghanistan."We are probably going to be the beginning of the influx you are going to see to Afghanistan," Lt. Col. Kevin Landers, commander of the Fort Carson, Colo.-based 4th Engineer Battalion, said as crews packed crates and cleaned vehicles for the flight to Kandahar.Obama has ordered 17,000 more U.S. soldiers and Marines to Afghanistan to bolster the 38,000 American troops already battling the resurgent Taliban."We are going to take this footprint out of Iraq," said Landers, whose battalion received word of its reassignment last month just after taking command of clearing roads in Baghdad of bombs and debris.
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