In the World

ISTANBUL, Turkey - A bomb mounted on a bicycle near a bus stop exploded during the morning rush hour in Istanbul on Thursday, wounding eight people, including a police officer. The government said the attack resembled a Kurdish rebel operation.

Several ambulances rushed to the scene of the bombing on a multilane thoroughfare in a busy commercial area of Turkey's biggest city. Media reports said one woman lost a leg in the blast and another sustained severe burns.

Police Chief Huseyin Capkin said the bomb was not powerful but was still designed to cause moderate destruction. Police were investigating whether the target was a police training school and whether the bomb was time- or remote-controlled.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that an investigation was ongoing but that the attack had hallmarks of Kurdish rebels.

- AP

MORELIA, Mexico - A gun battle between rival drug gangs in western Mexico left 29 bullet-ridden bodies in fake military uniforms heaped across a roadway and inside bullet-riddled vehicles in the Pacific coast state of Nayarit, the army said Thursday.

The bodies, all male, were found Wednesday scattered around 14 shot-up pickup trucks and SUVs.

The army said two suspects wounded in the battle were found at the scene, though there was no information on what gang they belonged to.

Nayarit and the nearby states of Michoacan and Zacatecas have become battlegrounds for drug cartels fighting for control of the area. In Michoacan, officials said more than 700 people had fled their villages amid fighting between rival drug traffickers, which appeared to be unrelated to the Nayarit conflict.

- AP

CAIRO - A Saudi woman detained for defying the ultraconservative kingdom's ban on female drivers will be held in detention for at least 10 more days, a lawyer and rights activist said Thursday.

Manal al-Sherif, 32, was arrested Sunday and accused of "violating public order." She started a Facebook campaign urging Saudi women to get behind the wheel to protest Saudi Arabia's longtime driving ban and did so herself, posting the video on the Internet.

Her case has drawn criticism from international and local rights groups and spurred more women to drive and post videos of themselves.

The prosecutor general extended her detention for 10 days while she is investigated, lawyer Waleed Aboul Khair said. "This is a message that any woman who dares to drive her car will face the same destiny," Aboul Khair said.

- AP

Tunisia's electoral commission said Thursday it wanted the first national election since the toppling of the country's longtime strongman delayed for three months. The commission proposed holding the vote for a constituent assembly Oct. 16, instead of July, to allow organizers more time.