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Candidates sprint to Election Day

COLUMBUS, Ohio, Nov. 2 (UPI) -- The final 48 hours before Election Day had both major-party U.S. presidential candidate making their last-minute pleas for support in key states Sunday.

Democratic candidate Barack Obama has scheduled appearances in the battleground state of Ohio Sunday in Columbus, Cleveland and Cincinnati. The normally Republican stronghold is considered a toss-up.

Republican candidate John McCain was scheduled to visit several cities in Pennsylvania in hopes of carrying the reliably Democratic state. McCain also is scheduled to visit Petersborough, N.H., for a town hall meeting, and travel to Miami for an evening rally.

GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, meanwhile, has several campaign stops scheduled in Ohio.

Obama's running mate Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, have several stops in Florida, another toss-up state, on their Sunday itinerary.

Obama finished the day Saturday with a stop in Springfield, Mo., where CNN reported he urged his supporters to keep up their efforts, saying, "We can't afford to slow down or let up in these next few days."

McCain closed the day in New York, where he made an appearance on "Saturday Night Live." It was his third appearance on the NBC show, but his first this year, CNN said.

Eight troops die in Pakistan truck bombing

WANA, Pakistan, Nov. 2 (UPI) -- A suicide truck bomber killed at least eight Pakistani paramilitary troops when he rammed his explosives-filled vehicle into a base, officials said.

Two other members of Pakistan's Frontier Corps were injured in the blast, which happened Sunday in the county's South Waziristan region near the Afghanistan border, CNN reported.

Pakistani Army spokesman Gen. Athar Abbas said the truck driver first tried to enter the base but soldiers stopped it at a checkpoint, but then returned to ram the vehicle in, the broadcaster said.

The Frontier Corps is assisting the Pakistani Army to fight Islamic militants in the country's northwestern tribal regions, who use it as a launching pad for attacks against U.S.-led coalition troops in neighboring Afghanistan.

N. Korea releases photos of Kim Jong Il

PYONGYANG, North Korea, Nov. 2 (UPI) -- North Korea has released photographs of leader Kim Jong Il watching a soccer game in an apparent bid to assure the world he's healthy, officials said.

The country's official Korean Central News Agency released a photo of a smiling Kim sitting on a sofa in what looks to be a private box of a sports stadium, Yonhap, the South Korean news agency, reported Sunday.

The pictures were released shortly after state-run media reported Kim had attended a soccer game played between two army teams. Korean Central TV showed 14 photos of Kim watching the match and giving instruction to those around him, Yonhap reported.

KCNA, however, did not say when the photos were taken and South Korean officials said they were examining them to determine their authenticity.

The soccer photos were the second set of stills released by Pyongyang, apparently to demonstrate that Kim Jong Il is doing well after reportedly suffering a stroke in August.

Iceland slams Britain's use of terror law

REYKJAVIK, Iceland, Nov. 2 (UPI) -- Icelandic officials say Britain has made their dire financial situation even worse by using antiterrorism laws to freeze British assets in its banks.

Already facing an economic meltdown with faltering banks and a greatly devalued currency, Icelandic officials say Prime Minister Gordon Brown's move to lump the country in with terrorist states -- freezing British assets of one failed bank and seizing the assets of another -- have set the country back years, The New York Times reported Sunday.

Icelandic Prime Minister Geir Haarde accused Britain of "bullying a small neighbor" and said the action was "very out of proportion."

Foreign Minister Ingibjorg Solrun Gisladottir said the move has made it nearly impossible to get foreign currency into or out of the country, with many banks refusing to even transfer money there and importers facing difficulties in paying their foreign bills.

"I must admit that I was absolutely appalled," she told The Times of Britain's decisions. "This is a major crisis. We haven't been in this situation for, probably, ever. We cannot solve it alone. We need solidarity from partners, from friendly countries, and we thought the U.K. was one of them."

Support for U.N. terror blacklist dwindling

UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 2 (UPI) -- The United Nations blacklist of alleged terrorism financiers is facing legal challenges and dwindling support, observers say.

Challenges to the U.N. list, which contains 503 individuals, businesses and groups, are coming from courts in Europe, including the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, which ruled the blacklist is illegal because it lacks accountability and a mechanism for those on it to challenge their inclusion, the Washington Post reported Sunday.

British and French courts have also challenged the blacklist's legal standing, citing the U.N.'s refusal to let the blacklistees see the evidence against them.

"You can be added to the list for political reasons, without any serious evidence of wrongdoing," Armando Spataro, the deputy chief prosecutor in Milan, Italy, told the newspaper. "There is a risk of making many, many mistakes."

U.S. and European diplomats said that while backing for the al-Qaida sanctions was sky-high at first, especially after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, enthusiasm later waned in some countries, partly because of opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq, the Post said.