Dubai

Dubai's police chief said today an 11-member hit squad with European passports was responsible for the mysterious killing of a Hamas commander in his hotel room last month and released their photos, names, nationalities and passport numbers.

Visitors on the observation deck of the world's tallest tower heard a loud boom, then saw dust that looked like smoke seeping through a crack in an elevator door 124 floors above the ground.

The world's tallest skyscraper has unexpectedly closed to the public a month after its lavish opening, disappointing tourists headed for the observation deck and casting doubt over plans to welcome its first permanent occupants in the coming weeks.

Dubai opened the world's tallest skyscraper and in a surprise move renamed the gleaming glass-and-metal tower Burj Khalifa in a nod to the leader of neighboring Abu Dhabi - the oil-rich sheikdom which came to its rescue during the financial meltdown.

Dubai World, the cash-strapped conglomerate at the center of Dubai's debt crisis, appears set for an unaccustomed period of retrenchment after the emirate's top finance official says the company may need to change course and unload assets as it struggles to pay back lenders.