Nation

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Afghan and NATO forces, backed by helicopter gunships, moved into villages outside Kandahar on Wednesday, killing at least 36 suspected Taliban fighters as part of an assault on insurgents holed up in the valley in southern Afghanistan.

A car bomb exploded in a crowded market area in a Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad on Tuesday, killing more than 50 people and wounding 75 others, officials said. It was the deadliest such attack in the Iraqi capital in months.