WASHINGTON - The four remaining candidates for the U.S. Republican Party’s presidential nomination met in a sometimes heated debate in Jacksonville, Florida, Thursday ahead of that state’s January 31 primary.
The debate quickly produced fireworks on issues like immigration and foreign bank accounts. Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney reacted angrily to former Speaker of the House […]

SEOUL - The United States and South Korea are to hold two military exercises on the Korean peninsula soon. They will be the first such war games since the recent change of leadership in North Korea.
There had been speculation one or both of the joint U.S.-South Korean military drills might be postponed or called off […]

ISTANBUL - Turkey’s observance of International Holocaust Remembrance Day began with a broadcast of a French documentary on the Holocaust on state run television.
Filmmaker Claude Lanzmann’s Shoah was shown late Thursday, on the eve of the observance.
Lanzmann says the broadcast marked the first time a predominantly Muslim country has shown his 1985 biographical film of […]

WASHINGTON - The sluggish U.S. economy produced mixed signals Thursday about how fast it is advancing.
The U.S. government reported that orders for durable goods, those designed to last at least three years, surged three percent in December, suggesting that manufacturing is a strong segment of the national economy.  Orders for cars, commercial airplanes, machinery, communications […]

WASHINGTON - As presidential contenders campaign for the Republican Party nomination, advertising that supports or attacks each of the candidates is already costing millions of dollars.
In an interview former President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat who defeated Republican President Gerald Ford in the 1976 election, but who lost to Republican Ronald Reagan in 1980, says negative […]

WASHINGTON - The U.S. central bank says it will keep its benchmark interest rate near zero at least until late 2014, a new move to try to spark the sluggish growth of the world’s largest economy.
The Federal Reserve had previously said it would keep its key lending rate low through mid-2013.  But on Wednesday, officials […]

WASHINGTON - Britain, France and the United States condemned Russia’s sales of weapons to Syria on Tuesday, saying it is contributing to violence in that country.
 
Without naming Russia directly, but making it clear that it was the country they were speaking about, the three ambassadors separately criticized Moscow’s arms deals with Damascus during a meeting […]

WASHINGTON - A U.S. military operation has freed two aid workers – an American woman and a Danish man – who were kidnapped by gunmen three months ago in central Somalia.
 
In a statement Wednesday, President Barack Obama praised U.S. special operations forces who hours earlier freed Jessica Buchanan and Poul Hagen Thisted during a daring […]

WASHINGTON - Newly released recordings reveal many of President John F. Kennedy’s private conversations and meetings during the final months of his administration.
 
The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston on Tuesday declassified the final 45 hours of White House audio recordings the president secretly taped.
 
The tapes include meetings with then Russian Foreign […]

WASHINGTON - The four remaining candidates for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination met for a testy debate in Florida late Monday, just one week before a crucial primary vote in that southern state.
 
There were a number of heated exchanges during the NBC debate between the two top contenders, former U.S. House speaker Newt Gingrich and […]

TEHRAN - Iran has denounced the European Union’s decision to ban new purchases of Iranian oil and freeze the assets of the country’s central bank, calling the moves “illogical and unfair.”
Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said Monday the world’s long-term need for energy means it is “not possible to impose sanctions on Iran,” with its […]

LONDON - The European Union has imposed an oil embargo on Iran, effective July 1 - taking away 20 percent of Iran’s current oil sales. The embargo is intended to increase pressure on Iran’s government to allow inspections to ensure its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes, as Iran’s leaders say it is.
The ban […]

WASHINGTON - U.S. Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney says he will release his tax returns for the past two years this week, saying it was a mistake for his campaign not to do so earlier. 
The former Massachusetts governor said in an interview Sunday with Fox News that not releasing the returns has been a distraction […]

WASHINGTON - The United States says it will allow outgoing Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh to come to the U.S. for a limited time to undergo medical treatment.
A State Department release Sunday noted that Mr. Saleh’s travel request had been approved for the sole purpose of such treatment, and that his expected stay in the […]

WASHINGTON - Saudi Arabia says it is withdrawing its observers from Syria in protest at what it calls the Syrian government’s failure to respect an Arab League plan to end a violent crackdown on a 10-month old opposition uprising.
Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal announced the pullout of the Saudi observers Sunday, at a meeting […]

WASHINGTON - U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords has announced she will resign from Congress, a year after she was seriously wounded in a shooting spree in her home state of Arizona.
In a video statement posted on the Internet Sunday, Giffords said she is getting better, but that work remains for her recovery. She said she is […]

WASHINGTON - Legendary former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno, who was fired in the wake of a child sex abuse scandal, died on Sunday from lung cancer. He was 85.
 
Paterno’s family said in a statement that he “fought hard until the end, stayed positive, thought only of others and constantly reminded everyone of how […]

WASHINGTON - Former U.S. congressman Newt Gingrich is projected to have won the Republican presidential primary in the southeastern state of South Carolina, shaking up the party’s campaign to find a candidate for this year’s presidential election.
With more than 75 percent of the precincts reporting, vote tallies showed Gingrich with about 40 percent of the […]

DAMASCUS - Syrian state media and activists say at least 14 people have been killed in a roadside bomb blast in the northwestern part of the country.
The SANA news agency says a string of explosions hit a prison truck carrying detainees in Idlib province on Saturday. The attack wounded 26 people, including a number of […]

WASHINGTON - A series of coordinated bombings in the northern Nigerian city of Kano has killed well over 100 people.  Many of the victims were police or soldiers.
One of the three hospitals where victims of Friday’s blasts were taken reported a death toll of at least 131 people, and other reports from the predominantly Muslim […]

CAIRO - The party of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has won a sweeping victory in the country’s parliamentary election, taking 47 percent of the seats in the new assembly.
The head of Egypt’s election commission, Abdel Moez Ibrahim, announced the final results on Saturday.
The Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) won 235 of the 498 seats in […]

WASHINGTON - American blues singer Etta James, best known for her early-1960s hit “At Last,” has died of leukemia.
 
The singer’s manager said the 73-year-old James died Friday at a hospital in California with her husband and two sons by her side. Her manager described her death as a “tremendous loss” for her fans around the […]

WASHINGTON - The United States and Germany say Iran will face tougher international sanctions on oil revenues if it does not abandon its pursuit of nuclear weapons.
With the European Union moving closer to a vote on an embargo of Iranian oil Monday, German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said the international community must not allow Iran […]

WASHINGTON - Newt Gingrich, during Thursday night’s Republican presidential debate in South Carolina, faced tough opening questions about his former marital status,  denying he asked his ex-wife to allow him to have an “open marriage” while he had an affair with a staff member in 1999.
Gingrich, the former speaker of the House of Representatives, told […]