Endurance swimmer Diana Nyad stroked through the Florida Straits early Monday, trying to accomplish at 61 years old what she failed to do at 28: swim more than 100 miles from Havana to Key West.

If she makes it to the Florida Keys after an estimated 60-hour swim, Nyad would become the first person to traverse the strait without the aid of a shark cage, relying instead on technology and divers to fend off the finned predators.

Mexican federal police say they have captured five members of a kidnapping and extortion ring that operated in the Mexico City region and was known for leaving the heads of pigs outside homes and businesses as a warning.

A police statement Sunday says the "Pig's Heads" gang was toppled thanks to information gleaned from a gang member who was arrested in February.

She waited 1 1/2 hours at the hospital, only to see a nurse who yelled that she was "lying about being in labor." Three hours later, her baby was born dead.

Another woman gave birth on the street, steps away from a clinic that twice turned her away, saying her time had not come.

Archaeologists say artifacts discovered in an ancient drainage tunnel under Jerusalem are left over from war 2,000 years ago.

On Monday archaeologists presented a Roman legionnaire's sword and sheath found in the tunnel late last month. They believe it dates to around 70 A.D., when Rome put down a Jewish revolt, razing the second biblical Jewish Temple and much of the city.

Towering waves from a tropical storm threatened to hit a chemical plant in a Chinese port city, raising fears it might lead to a toxic chemical spill, a Chinese state media report said Monday.

Waves as high as 65 feet (20 meters) broke a dike in Dalian in northeastern Liaoning province and threatened to hit the compound of Fujiahua chemical plant where toxic chemicals were held, Xinhua News Agency said, citing soldiers at the scene.

Police arrested 160 people after a weekend of riots and looting, as scattered copycat violence spread from a disadvantaged north London neighborhood to other parts of the city, authorities said Monday.

Groups of young people looted shops, attacked police officers and set fire to vehicles in violence that has raised questions about security ahead of the showcase 2012 Olympics and revealed pent-up anger against the city's police.

A northeast Ohio man ran through his small town neighborhood Sunday shooting eight people, including his girlfriend and her brother, before he was shot and killed in an exchange of gunfire with police, authorities said.

Eight people, including the gunman, were killed. Witnesses told reporters at least one of the victims was a child.

Philippine troops killed three Abu Sayyaf gunmen in a clash with the al-Qaida-linked militants blamed for killing seven marines and wounding 26 others in a recent gunbattle, officials said Monday.

Army chief Lt. Gen. Arturo Ortiz said a soldier was wounded in Sunday's brief but fierce clash with about 30 Abu Sayyaf gunmen in Patikul town in the mountains of southern Sulu province. Troops have been scouring the jungle area in search of the militants who killed seven marines in a July 28 clash, including two who were beheaded.

Sydney will host one of Australia's 2014 World Cup Asian qualifying matches in October, with Oman to face the Socceroos at a yet to be named venue, officials said Sunday.

Football Federation Australia (FFA) said that under an agreement with the New South Wales government, the Socceroos will play two more qualifying matches in the state if they progress out of the third round in which they are grouped with Saudi Arabia, Oman and Thailand.

Stocks are tumbling across the Middle East as most of the region's markets open for their first day of business following a historic downgrade of the United States' credit rating.

The main market index in the regional financial hub Dubai led the declines Sunday, plunging over 5 percent before rebounding slightly to a 4.4 percent drop by midday local time. Other Gulf markets also opened sharply lower.