World

BEIRUT, (Reuters) – Syrian President Bashar al-Assad rejected peace talks with his enemies on Sunday in a defiant speech that his opponents described as a renewed declaration of war.

OSLO, (Reuters) – Green schemes to fight climate change by producing more bio-fuels could actually worsen a little-known type of air pollution and cause almost 1,400 premature deaths a year in Europe by 2020, a study showed yesterday.

BEIJING,  (Reuters) – In September, the largest factory in the northeastern Chinese coastal city of Yantai called on the local government with a problem – a shortage of 19,000 workers as the deadline on a big order approached.

JOHANNESBURG,  (Reuters) – Former South African President Nelson Mandela has recovered from a lung infection and surgery to remove gallstones that kept him in hospital for nearly three weeks, the government said today.

BEIRUT,  (Reuters) – A defiant President Bashar al-Assad presented what he described as a new initiative today to end the war in Syria but his opponents dismissed it as a ploy to cling to power.

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan lawmakers re-elected a staunch ally of Hugo Chávez to head the National Assembly yesterday, putting him in line to be caretaker president if the socialist leader does not recover from cancer surgery.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – The most senior member of the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s entourage still at large has urged Sunni Muslim anti-government protesters to stand their ground until the Shi’ite prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, is toppled.

AURORA, Colo. (Reuters) – A gunman who barricaded himself inside a townhouse after killing three people in the home was shot to death by police yesterday in Aurora, Colorado, the same Denver suburb where 12 people were slain in a movie house massacre last July, police said.

]BEIRUT (Reuters) – The Syrian army fired rockets at a district of Damascus yesterday to try to drive out insurgents fighting their way closer to the seat of President Bashar al-Assad’s power.

TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) – Honduras has removed its ambassador to Colombia amid reports his personal aide was involved in a wild party held at the embassy of Honduras in Bogota which, according to media, was attended by prostitutes and where cell phones and computers were stolen.

AURORA, Colo., (Reuters) – Four people, including the gunman, were dead following a hostage-taking incident today in Aurora, Colorado, the same town where a man shot dead 12 people and wounded 58 more in a movie theater last July, police told reporters.

CARACAS,  (Reuters) – Venezuelan lawmakers re-elected a staunch ally of Hugo Chavez to head the National Assembly today, putting him in line to be caretaker president if the socialist leader does not recover from cancer surgery.

NEW YORK, (Reuters) – A New Jersey man offered to pay $5,000 to the so-called “cannibal cop” to kidnap a woman and deliver her to be raped, U.S.

NEW DELHI, (Reuters) – Passers-by left a gang-raped Indian student lying unclothed and bleeding in the street for almost an hour, a male friend who was assaulted with her said yesterday in his first public comments on the case that provoked a global outcry.

NEW YORK, (Reuters) – World shares rose yesterday and the S&P 500 index marked its highest close in five years after data on the services sector and labor market data signaled the U.S.

OTTAWA, (Reuters) – Canada’s prime minister will meet with native leaders next week to discuss social and economic issues, an olive branch to an angry aboriginal movement that has blockaded rail lines and threatened to close Canada’s borders with the United States.

WASHINGTON,  (Reuters) – U.S. employers kept their pace of hiring steady in December, falling short of the levels needed to bring down a still lofty unemployment rate and pointing to lackluster economic growth in 2013.

CARACAS, (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is still suffering a “severe” respiratory infection that has hindered his breathing as he struggles to recover from cancer surgery in Cuba, the government said yesterday.

COLOMBO, (Reuters) – Sri Lanka’s Supreme Court said yesterday parliament does not have the legal authority to investigate accusations of misconduct against senior judges and an impeachment proceeding against the chief justice was against the law.

NEW DELHI,  (Reuters) – Five Indian men were formally charged in court yesterday with the gang rape and murder of a physiotherapy student in a case that has generated widespread anger about the government’s inability to prevent violence against women.