VIENNA – The U.N. nuclear watchdog director said on Tuesday he expected to sign a deal with Iran soon to unblock an investigation into suspected work on atom bombs, potentially brightening prospects for big-power talks with Tehran to stop a drift toward conflict.
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BEIRUT – Syrian rebels kidnapped 13 Lebanese Shi’ites in the northern province of Aleppo on Tuesday as they returned home from a pilgrimage, triggering protests in Beirut in the latest unrest to spill over from Syria’s 14-month-old uprising.
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PARIS – The United States and Japan are leading a fragile developed world recovery that could be blown off course if Europe fails to contain the damage from its problem debtor states, the OECD said on Tuesday.
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CAIRO – Egyptians vote on Wednesday for the first time to pick their president in a wide open election that pits Islamists against men who served under deposed leader Hosni Mubarak.
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SANAA – Yemeni soldiers marched in a National Day parade on Tuesday as the president watched from behind a bullet-proof glass shield in a show of defiance after a bomber killed more than 90 troops in an attack on the ceremony’s rehearsal.
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TUNIS – Tunisia will extradite former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s prime minister to Libya and the handover could take place in “days or weeks”, Justice Minister Noureddine Bouheiri said on Tuesday.
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MOSCOW – Russian President Vladimir Putin named several trusted former cabinet ministers to Kremlin posts on Tuesday, asserting his authority in a move likely to weaken Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev’s new government and undermine its mandate for change.
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CHICAGO – NATO put on a brave face at its Chicago summit but the reality is that the alliance has been weakened by the euro zone crisis and faces an identity crisis about what its role will be once it ends its intervention in Afghanistan in 2014.
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CAPE CANAVERAL – An unmanned rocket owned by privately held Space Exploration Technologies blasted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Tuesday for a mission designed to be the first commercial flight to the International Space Station.
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FORT MEADE – The National Security Agency is trying to expand U.S. cyber expertise needed for secret intelligence operations against adversaries on computer networks through a new cyber-ops program at selected universities.
