ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey plans to invest up to $12 billion in its impoverished, mainly Kurdish southeast region as part of efforts to drain support for separatist PKK rebels, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as saying on Wednesday.

MULTAN, Pakistan (Reuters) – Hundreds of students burnt tires and blocked roads in the eastern Pakistani city of Multan on Wednesday in protest at the reprinting in Danish newspapers of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad last month.

(Reuters) – Following are security developments in Iraq at 8:30 a.m. EDT on Wednesday. * NEAR KIRKUK – A roadside bomb targeting a local council member near Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, wounded two of his bodyguards, police said.