World

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Somalia’s al Shabaab rebels retreated from the southern port of Kismayu overnight, abandoning the last major bastion of their five-year revolt to an offensive by African Union and Somali government troops.

VANDALIA, Ohio (Reuters) – Trailing in the must-win state of Ohio, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney asked his running mate Paul Ryan to meet him here this week.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Hundreds of shops were burning in the ancient covered market in Aleppo yesterday as fighting between rebels and state forces in Syria’s largest city threatened to destroy a UNESCO world heritage site.

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Benedict’s butler, accused of using his access to the pope to steal papers that he thought would expose Vatican corruption, suffered a blow on yesterday’s first day of his trial when judges refused to admit evidence from the Church’s own investigation.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Former New York Times publisher Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, who led the company for 34 years in a period of growth that made it a multibillion-dollar media enterprise, died yesterday at the age of 86, the newspaper said.

WASHINGTON,  (Reuters) – President Barack Obama blocked yesterday a privately owned Chinese company from building wind turbines close to a Navy military site in Oregon due to national security concerns, and the company said it would challenge the action in court.

BEIJING, (Reuters) – China’s ruling Communist Party accused disgraced politician Bo Xilai of abusing power, taking huge bribes and other crimes yesterday, sealing the fate of a controversial leader whose fall shook a leadership handover due at a congress from Nov.

MOGADISHU, (Reuters) – Kenyan troops attacked the Somali port city of Kismayu yesterday, seeking to drive al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab militants from their last major stronghold and end a five-year rebellion.

WASHINGTON, (Reuters) – The top U.S. intelligence authority issued an unusual public statement yesterday, declaring it now believed the Sept.

NEW YORK,  (Reuters) – The United States and France announced increased support for opponents of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad yesterday, but there was no sign that the direct military aid the rebels want to create safe havens for civilians is on the way.

(Reuters) – John Travolta has scored another legal victory with the dismissal of a defamation lawsuit filed by a Los Angeles man who wrote a book alleging he had gay encounters with the film star.

-WHO LONDON,  (Reuters) – A new and potentially fatal virus from the same family as SARS which was discovered in a patient in London last week appears not to spread easily from person to person, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said yesterday.

SAN FRANCISCO, (Reuters) – Apple Inc Chief Executive Tim Cook apologized yesterday to customers frustrated with glaring errors in its new Maps service and, in an unusual move for the consumer giant, directed them to rival services such as Google Inc’s Maps instead.

BRUSSELS,  (Reuters) – More than half of the European Union’s projects to provide safe drinking water in sub-Saharan Africa failed to deliver, the EU’s audit watchdog said in a report yesterday.

VATICAN CITY, (Reuters) – An ancient papyrus fragment which a Harvard scholar says contains the first recorded mention that Jesus may have had a wife is a fake, the Vatican said yesterday.

OTTAWA, (Reuters) – Canada said it was aware hackers had breached security at a domestic manufacturer of software used by big energy companies, but declined to comment on a report that a Chinese group could be responsible.

(Reuters) – A Connecticut man responding to his sister’s call for help during an apparent burglary at her home next door, shot and killed a masked intruder who turned out to be his own teenage son, state police said yesterday.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew his “red line” for Iran’s nuclear programme yesterday despite a US refusal to set an ultimatum, saying Tehran will be on the brink of a nuclear weapon in less than a year.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Iran responded to Israel’s “red line” for Tehran’s nuclear programme by declaring it was strong enough to defend itself and said it reserved the right to retaliate with full force against any attack.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – A pair of Canadian radio comedians said yesterday it took them less then an hour to get UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on the phone during international diplomacy’s busiest week – by pretending to be Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.