World

MIAMI, (Reuters) – Miami police arrested Outkast  rapper and “Hey Ya” singer Big Boi yesterday for possessing  ecstasy and other drugs that the performer’s lawyer later  characterized as “contraband.”

PARIS/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Global leaders yesterday arranged a round of emergency calls to discuss the twin debt crises in Europe and the United States that are causing turmoil in financial markets.

BRASILIA (Reuters) – A top official at Brazil’s agriculture ministry tendered his resignation  yesterday following corruption allegations, the latest blow to President Dilma Rousseff’s seven-month old government.

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Somali President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed said yesterday his military had defeated Islamist rebels battling to overthrow his Western-backed government after the al Shabaab group began withdrawing fighters from the capital Mogadishu.

SANAA (Reuters) – Yemen’s president Ali Abdullah Saleh will leave hospital soon, a government source said yesterday, as clashes between his loyalists and opponents flared in the capital he left when protests against his rule turned into open warfare.

KABUL (Reuters) – A NATO helicopter crashed during a battle with the Taliban in Afghanistan, killing 31 US soldiers and seven Afghans, the Afghan president said yesterday, the deadliest single incident for foreign troops in 10 years of war.

(Reuters) – Former Beatle Paul McCartney said on Thursday that he appears to be a victim of the newspaper phone hacking scandal in Britain and will be talking to police when he finishes a U.S.

NEW YORK, (Reuters) – The United States lost its  top-notch AAA credit rating from Standard & Poor’s yesterday  in an unprecedented reversal of fortune for the world’s  largest economy.

NEW YORK, (Reuters) – U.S. stocks closed out their  worst week in more than two years yesterday in a volatile  session that saw the major indexes whip back and forth before  the S&P 500 ended down less than a point.

LONDON, (Reuters) – Carbon offsets neared all-time  lows yesterday, confirming their status as the world’s worst  performing commodity, as slumping demand meets rising supply of  the U.N.

MIAMI, (Reuters) – Tropical Storm Emily killed four  people in the Dominican Republic and Haiti, authorities said yesterday, as remnants of the storm drifted over the Caribbean  with a “high chance” of restrengthening into a tropical  cyclone.

NEW DELHI, (Reuters) – The illness of Sonia Gandhi,  India’s most powerful political leader, may have set off a risky  succession that could propel her inexperienced son Rahul to  government just as the ruling Congress party battles corruption  scandals and high inflation.

NEW YORK, (Reuters) – Investors around the world  dumped stocks and commodities yesterday and rushed to the  security of cash and government bonds, hammering equity indexes  to their lowest levels of the year on fears of a spreading debt  crisis and slowing growth.

SOCHI, Russia, (Reuters) – Russian President Dmitry  Medvedev made a new appeal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad  yesterday to carry out reforms and reconcile with his  opponents, saying he risked a “sad fate” if he failed to do so.

BENGHAZI, Libya, (Reuters) – Muammar Gaddafi’s son has  made a bid to divide the fractious Libyan rebellion, telling a  newspaper he was forging an alliance with Islamist rebels  against their liberal allies.

SANTIAGO, (Reuters) – Protesters clashed violently  with police in Chile’s capital yesterday to decry President  Sebastian Pinera’s policies, as a poll showed him the least  popular leader in two decades since the Augusto Pinochet  dictatorship.

BOSTON, (Reuters) – Security experts have discovered  an unprecedented series of cyber attacks on the networks of 72  organizations globally, including the United Nations,  governments and corporations, over a five-year period.

CAIRO,  (Reuters) – Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, accused of  corruption and involvement in killing protesters, went on trial  yesterday, delighting those who overthrew him and ringing an  alarm bell for other autocrats around the Arab world.

 SYDNEY, Aug 4 (Reuters) – A young Australian woman was  freed from a suspected bomb collared around her neck early on  Thursday after 10 hours of drama that lasted past midnight and  captivated the nation with police saying they were still  investigating the incident.

UNITED NATIONS, (Reuters) – In its first substantive  action on Syria’s five-month-old uprising, the U.N.