Ankara and Washington come to an agreement regarding the Kurdish separatist group the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Ankara agrees to send a peacekeeping force to Iraq if US forces assist in rounding up members of the PKK who have fled into northern Iraq.

Six policemen are injured in a petrol bomb attack in the town of Sitra, southeast of Manama. A police patrol carrying 12 police guards came under attack when unknown assailants fired a molotov cocktail at the vehicle.

Algeria's main political party, the National Liberation Front (FLN), chooses its leader and former prime minister Ali Benflis as its presidential candidate for next year's elections.

Hanadi Tayseer Jaradat, a member of Islamic Jihad, kills 19 Israelis at the Maxim D'Or Cafe in Haifa, which is jointly owned by Arab and Jewish families.

Omanis elect candidates to the 83-member Majlis al-Shura (representative council). Initial results show that there has been little change in the make-up of the council.

Israeli aircraft attack an alleged militant training camp in Syria in response to the suicide bombing in Haifa. The Israeli aircraft bomb the Ein Saheb camp, northwest of Damascus. Syrian officials say that the raid hit a civilian area.

US President Bush announces the creation of the new Iraq Stabilisation Group headed by National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. The group is designed to allow the White House to take a more direct role in decision-making on Iraq.

The US Congressional Committee on International Relations passes the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Act, which threatens bilateral sanctions with Damascus if it does not comply with a range of conditions.

A suicide bomb at a police station in the mainly Shiite area of Sadr city, Baghdad, kills three policemen and five civilians. In a separate incident, a Spanish diplomat, Jose Antonio Bernal, is shot dead in the capital.