Roadside bomb kills 7 Afghans

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Officials say a powerful roadside bomb has killed five civilians and two police officers near a police checkpoint in western Afghanistan. The governor of Nimroz province, Mohammad Sarwar Subat, says the blast occurred Thursday as a vehicle carrying the civilians was heading for a court hearing in the provincial capital,...

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Pakistan reports 9th death in polio team attacks

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Another victim from attacks on U.N.-backed anti-polio teams in Pakistan died on Thursday, bringing the three-day death toll in the wave of assaults on volunteers vaccinating children across the country to nine, officials said.Hilal Khan, 20, died a day after he was shot in the head in the northwestern city of Peshawar, said health official Janbaz AfridiSince Monday, gunmen...

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Afghan president welcomes British pullout timeline

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Afghan president on Thursday welcomed the withdrawal of nearly half of the British troops stationed in Afghanistan next year, saying his forces were ready to take up the country's defense.A statement from Hamid Karzai's office said the partial pull-out was an "appropriate" move as NATO forces transfer responsibility for the war against the Taliban to the Afghan military.British...

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Indian women live in fear of violence

NEW DELHI (AP) — It is almost every Indian woman's nightmare, lived daily when in public — a stream of obscene comments, unwanted hands being placed on them and then being blamed for causing the sexual violence. The gang-rape and beating of a 23-year-old student by six men on a bus in New Delhi may have sparked days of protests and demands for authorities to take tougher action, but for...

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SKorea's president-elect faces NKorea uncertainty

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Park Geun-hye promises to reach out to North Korea with more humanitarian aid and deeper engagement after she moves into South Korea's presidential Blue House on Feb. 25. Pyongyang, however, may be in no mood to talk anytime soon.Park's declarations ahead of Wednesday's election that she will soften five years of hard-line policy rang true with voters, even as they rejected...

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"Fiscal cliff" drag on economy less than feared so far

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. economy showed surprising signs of resilience in November despite the approach of the so-called fiscal cliff as consumer spending rose by the most in three years and a gauge of business investment jumped.Consumer spending rose 0.6 percent when adjusted for inflation, while new factory orders for capital goods outside the defense and aerospace sectors - a proxy for business...

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IMF extends zero interest loans to poor nations

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Poor countries with loans from the IMF can continue to pay no interest until the end of 2014, the Fund's board said on Friday, as their economies are still recovering from the global economic crisis.The IMF's zero-interest loan program for low-income countries had been set to expire at the end of this year."The executive board decision to keep interest rates at zero ... is testament...

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Top business story in '12: Sluggish global economy

This would be the year when the global economy finally regained its vigor. At least that's what many had hoped.It didn't happen.The three largest economies — the United States, China and Japan — struggled again in 2012. The 17 countries that use the euro endured a third painful year in their financial crisis and slid into recession. Emerging economies slowed.President Barack Obama defied predictions...

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Russia clashes over energy with Belarus, Ukraine, EU

MINSK/MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia plunged back into the disputes over energy with Ukraine and Belarus that have repeatedly disrupted oil and gas supplies to European Union countries, and it also termed EU energy policy as "uncivilized".Russia on Friday denied remarks by Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko that it had agreed to increase its crude oil supplies to Minsk, vital for the Belarus economy,...

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Two killed as looters raid supermarkets in Argentina

BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - Two people were killed in Argentina on Friday as looters broke into supermarkets in several cities, stirring memories of the country's devastating economic crisis 11 years ago.Police fired teargas and rubber bullets to stop dozens of stone-throwing youths from looting a supermarket owned by French retailer Carrefour near the capital, a day after the unrest erupted in the Patagonian...

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