CARACAS -- Venezuela's ruling party and parliament recently expressed strong condemnation of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan, saying the visit is a serious provocation.

Carmen Melendez, vice president of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela and mayor of Caracas, on Thursday delivered a statement from the party's national leadership committee to Chinese Ambassador to Venezuela Li Baorong, strongly condemning the visit. (Venezuela-China-Taiwan Question)

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WASHINGTON -- The death toll from the lightning strike near the White House Thursday evening has risen to three.

Washington, D.C. police told reporters on Friday afternoon that a 29-year-old man died from his injuries caused by the lightning strike in Lafayette Square just north of the White House. (US-White House-Lightning)

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JERUSALEM -- Israel's army said early Saturday that it will continue to bomb military sites in Gaza as cross-border fighting continued despite Egyptian efforts to broker peace.

The Israeli Air Force continued to carry out several airstrikes in the Gaza Strip throughout the night, targeting a rocket manufacturing site, mortar shell manufacturing workshops and rocket launchers -- all said belonging to the Islamic Jihad, an armed Palestinian group. (Israel-Gaza-Tension)

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SOFIA -- Four people were killed and eight others were injured in a bus accident on Saturday in Bulgaria, the country's prosecutor's office said in a statement.

The accident took place around 2 a.m. local time near the village of Krusheto, some 250 km northeast of the country's capital Sofia, when a bus with Romanian registration hit a Dutch-registered car which was stopped on the side of the road, the statement said. (Bulgaria-Bus Accident-Casualties)