NASA: Satellite hits Earth; location unknown

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - NASA says it is not aware of any injuries or property damage from a defunct 6-ton satellite that has fallen from the sky.

The agency posted on its website that the spacecraft crashed through the atmosphere early Saturday morning somewhere over the north Pacific Ocean. An exact location was not known.

Most of it was believed to have burned up.

The Upper Atmospheric Research Satellite was NASA's biggest spacecraft to tumble out of orbit, uncontrolled, in 32 years.

UARS was launched aboard space shuttle Discovery in 1991. NASA decommissioned the satellite in 2005, after moving it into a lower orbit that cut its life short by two decades.

Bits of space junk re-enter the atmosphere often. No injuries have ever been reported from it.

Libyan forces fight for Gadhafi's hometown Sirte

SIRTE, Libya - With NATO jets roaring overhead, revolutionary forces fought their way into Moammar Gadhafi's hometown Saturday in the first significant push into the stubborn stronghold in about a week.

Libya's new leaders also tried to move on the political front, promising to announce in the coming week a new interim government that it hopes will help unite the country. However, disagreements remain about what the Cabinet should look like.

The National Transitional Council led the rebellion that forced Gadhafi into hiding and has taken over the leadership of the oil-rich North African nation even as it continues to fight forces still loyal to the fugitive leader.

The NTC-appointed prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, sought support from leaders at the United Nations on Saturday, telling them that "a new Libya is coming to life" as a nation committed to democracy, equality and reintegration into the international community. He said the council was committed to drafting a constitution that would be put to the Libyans for a referendum.

More than a month after seizing Tripoli and effectively ending Gadhafi's rule, revolutionary forces have been unable to rout well-armed Gadhafi loyalists from strongholds in his hometown of Sirte, Bani Walid and some southern enclaves. Taking the cities is key for Libya's new leaders to extend their control over the large desert nation.

Yemeni troops kill 40 in new battles

SANAA, Yemen - In one of the bloodiest days of Yemen's uprising, government troops backed by snipers and shelling attacked a square full of Yemeni protesters Saturday and battled with pro-opposition forces in the capital, killing at least 40 people and littering the streets with bodies.

The violence signaled an accelerated attempt by President Ali Abdullah Saleh and his loyalists to crush their rivals and tighten his grip on the country after his return a day earlier from Saudi Arabia, where he has been undergoing treatment for the past three months for wounds suffered in an assassination attempt.

One of Saleh's top rivals - Maj. Gen. Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar - called for international help, asking the U.S. and other regional powers to rein him in. He warned that Saleh is pushing the country into civil war and compared him to the Roman emperor Nero, burning down his own city.

In a strongly worded statement, al-Ahmar called Saleh a "sick, vengeful soul" who treats Yemen like his personal estate.

Pope defends traditional values

FREIBURG, Germany - Pope Benedict XVI called Saturday for a common front with Orthodox Christians to defend traditional church values, warning of threats posed by abortion and gay marriage.

Facing discontent within his German flock, the pope said religion must not be banished from public life and that Christian churches "are walking side by side" in the battle.

"They speak up jointly for the protection of human life from conception to natural death," he told a meeting of Orthodox Christians on the third day of a visit to his native Germany.

The Vatican was undeterred by an incident earlier in the day in the eastern city of Erfurt on the edge of the security zone in which a man fired an air gun at a security guard about an hour before a papal Mass.

- The Associated Press