Algeria censored two dailies over reports that President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, hospitalised in Paris since April 27, will return home in a coma after his health took a turn for the worse, their chief said on Sunday. The reports in the two newspapers referred to a "deterioration" in Bouteflika's health, said managing editor Hichem Aboud, citing French medical sources and relatives of the Algerian president.

A Japanese minister Sunday defended a surprise visit to North Korea by one of the prime minister's aides which Washington and Seoul said could not help efforts to forge a united front against Pyongyang. Akira Amari, state minister of economic revitalisation, said the four-day trip by Isao Iijima reflected Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's resolve to have North Korea come clean on its kidnapping of Japanese nationals in the 1970s and 1980s.

HALIFAX - A small New Brunswick community was mourning the loss of a young fisherman Saturday as search efforts continued for two other crew members who were aboard a vessel that went aground off the province's northeast coast. Military efforts to find the two missing crew members were called off around 3:45 p.m., about 10 hours after the boat issued a distress call after heading out to sea offshore of Tabusintac.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel met Pope Francis for private talks at the Vatican Saturday which addressed the state of Europe and its role in the world, the Vatican said in a statement. Merkel flew in especially to meet the new pontiff, an encounter that lasted 45 minutes -- unusually long for a private papal audience. "These discussions covered the long relationship between the Vatican and Germany as well as common concerns including the social, political, economic and religious situation in Europe and the world," the Vatican said.