BRUSSELS | Fri Oct 19, 2012 9:07am EDT BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union will further tighten economic sanctions if Iran does not curb its nuclear activities, EU leaders said on Friday, urging Tehran to engage in "meaningful" negotiations. Europe imposed new sanctions on the Islamic Republic this week, targeting trade, energy and shipping, as part ...

By Benjamin Kang Lim and Ben Blanchard BEIJING | Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:50am EDT BEIJING (Reuters) - China's three most powerful men have come up with preferred candidates to head up the nation's new leadership, sources said, in a group that includes financial reformers but leaves a question mark over its commitment to political reform. The seven-mem...

LONDON | Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:44am EDT LONDON (Reuters) - A Pakistani girl shot in the head by Taliban gunmen is "not out of the woods" but is doing well and has been able to stand for the first time with some help, doctors at the British hospital treating her said on Friday. Malala Yousufzai, who was shot for vocally opposing the Taliban, was flown from P...

By Mubasher Bukhari ISLAMABAD | Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:44am EDT ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - In a rare challenge to Pakistan's powerful generals, the country's Supreme Court ruled on Friday that the military should stop interfering in politics. In connection with a case dating back to 1996 in which a retired air marshal filed a petition against the army for...

Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:28am EDT (Reuters) - At least seven brokerages cut their price targets on Google Inc's shares after the company missed Wall Street earnings expectations, but analysts said growing mobile advertising revenue points to better times ahead. The earnings report, released hours ahead of schedule due to an error on Thursday, revealed slowing sales in ...

By Nastassia Astrasheuskaya MOSCOW | Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:01am EDT MOSCOW (Reuters) - The sole member of anti-Kremlin punk group Pussy Riot freed on appeal has taken her case to the European Court of Human Rights, her lawyer said on Friday, accusing Russia of violating her right to freedom of speech and illegally detaining her. Yekaterina Samutsevi...

ABU DHABI | Fri Oct 19, 2012 7:41am EDT ABU DHABI (Reuters) - A Bahraini policeman was killed and another critically injured in a bomb attack while on patrol south of the capital Manama, security officials said on Friday, in further unrest plaguing the Gulf Arab kingdom and close U.S. ally. Bahrain, where the U.S. Fifth Fleet is based as a bulwark agains...

TOKYO | Fri Oct 19, 2012 4:02am EDT TOKYO (Reuters) - Sony Corp said it will cut staff in its headquarters by a fifth and shutter a factory making camera lenses and mobile phones in Japan, providing new details of a previously announced plan to trim its global headcount by 10,000 by end-March. In addition to 1,800 at a chemical business it sold to a stat...

By Piya Sinha-Roy LOS ANGELES | Thu Oct 18, 2012 10:33pm EDT LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Country-pop star Taylor Swift has won over a legion of devoted fans in the past six years with her raw, honest lyrics of romance and heartbreak. Now, at the grand age of 22, the five-time Grammy winner is says her new record "Red," to be released on Monday, "the ...

By Sarah Mills LONDON | Thu Oct 18, 2012 5:15pm EDT LONDON (Reuters) - Singer Mick Jagger said the Rolling Stones had rehearsed around 70 songs for a series of 50th anniversary concerts later this year, and guitarist Keith Richards assured fans the veteran British rockers would "deliver". The four Stones appeared on the red carpet on Thursday for...

Thu Oct 18, 2012 3:19pm EDT (Reuters) - Stanford R. Ovshinsky, the Michigan-based inventor whose development of the nickel-metal hydride battery helped the Toyota Prius become the world's first successful hybrid car, died on Wednesday evening, aged 89. Ovshinsky, a self-taught scientist, also developed -- and often patented -- a wide variety of breakthrough produ...

HURDAL, Norway | Thu Oct 18, 2012 10:24am EDT HURDAL, Norway (Reuters) - Colombia's government and Marxist FARC rebels will move to Cuba in mid-November to start substantive peace talks after nearly five decades of war, according to a joint declaration in Norway on Thursday. The talks are the latest in a long history of attempts to end the conflict which...

BEIRUT | Thu Oct 18, 2012 10:17am EDT BEIRUT (Reuters) - At least 28,000 Syrians have gone missing since they were abducted by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad during the 19-month-old revolt, activist group Avaaz said on Thursday. Quoting statements from Syrian human rights lawyers and families, Avaaz...

DHAKA | Thu Oct 18, 2012 10:09am EDT DHAKA (Reuters) - The father of a Bangladeshi man accused of attempting to blow up the New York Federal Reserve Bank denied on Thursday that his son was involved and said he was the victim of a "racist conspiracy". Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, 21, was arrested on Wednesday and faces charges of attempting to us...

By Harry Papachristou and Lefteris Papadimas ATHENS | Thu Oct 18, 2012 9:46am EDT ATHENS (Reuters) - Greek police clashed with anti-austerity protesters hurling stones and petrol bombs on the day of a general strike that brought much of the near-bankrupt country to a standstill. In the second major walkout in three weeks on Thursday, almost 40,00...

By Suleiman Al-Khalidi AMMAN | Thu Oct 18, 2012 8:55am EDT AMMAN (Reuters) - The international mediator on Syria will go to Damascus in the next few days to try to broker a brief ceasefire in the war between President Bashar al-Assad's government and rebels during the Islamic Eid al-Adha festival. Lakhdar Brahimi, the U.N.-Arab League envoy, told...

ADEN | Thu Oct 18, 2012 8:38am EDT ADEN (Reuters) - Nine suspected al Qaeda militants were killed in what a local security source and residents said was a U.S. drone attack on a farmhouse outside a town in southern Yemen. The farmhouse just west of Jaar, one of two southern towns that Yemen's army took back from rebel control this summer, was hit by thre...

BEIJING/TOKYO | Thu Oct 18, 2012 8:30am EDT BEIJING/TOKYO (Reuters) - China condemned a visit by two Japanese ministers to a controversial shrine for war dead on Thursday, further straining already tense relations between Asia's two largest economies. Sino-Japanese relations have soured sharply in the past month when a row over disputed islands led to vi...

By Mirwais Harooni and Adrian Croft KABUL | Thu Oct 18, 2012 8:29am EDT KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai suggested on Thursday that foreign members be removed from the country's election watchdog, in a step that could be aimed at bolstering his grip on power. Two members of the five-member Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) are ...

ISLAMABAD | Thu Oct 18, 2012 7:48am EDT ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - The alleged organizer of the Taliban shooting of a Pakistani schoolgirl was captured during a 2009 military offensive against the hardline Islamist group but released after three months, two senior officials told Reuters. They identified the man who planned the attack on 14-year-old Malala You...

By Sherilee Lakmidas JOHANNESBURG | Thu Oct 18, 2012 7:38am EDT JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Striking miners at one of Gold Fields' South African operations returned to work on Thursday, but there was no end in sight to the country's worst wildcat walkouts since the end of apartheid due to renewed unrest at Lonmin's Marikana mine. More than 80,000 mi...

Wed Oct 17, 2012 11:26pm EDT (Reuters) - A new theory put forward by Harvard scientists suggests the Moon was once part of the Earth that spun off after a giant collision with another body. In a paper published on Wednesday in the journal Science, Sarah Stewart and Matija Ćuk said their theory would explain why the Earth and Moon have similar composition and chem...

LONDON | Wed Oct 17, 2012 9:00pm EDT LONDON (Reuters) - An international consortium of scientists has published a high resolution draft of the barley genome in a move that could not only improve yields and disease resistance but may also hold the key to better beer. "This research will streamline efforts to improve barley production through breeding for ...

By Corrie MacLaggan AUSTIN, Texas | Wed Oct 17, 2012 4:55pm EDT AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - Lance Armstrong stepped down as chairman of the Livestrong cancer support charity he founded, as Nike Inc dropped the disgraced cyclist over the doping scandal that will likely cost him his seven Tour de France titles. Armstrong's Livestrong foundation is be...

NEW YORK | Wed Oct 17, 2012 5:06pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Federal Bureau of Investigation on Wednesday arrested a person suspected of plotting to explode a bomb in New York, a source familiar with the situation said. The person was arrested in lower Manhattan on Wednesday morning on terrorism charges, a person familiar with the matter said. The per...

Wed Oct 17, 2012 4:05pm EDT (Reuters) - New York City will speed up spending on more than $1 billion of infrastructure projects to take advantage of record-low interest rates, Mayor Michael Bloomberg told a news conference on Wednesday. The road, bridge, school building and other projects are part of the city's long-term capital plan after fiscal 2014, and some o...

Wed Oct 17, 2012 4:14pm EDT (Reuters) - Former Democratic Senator George McGovern, who lost to Richard Nixon in the 1972 presidential election, is "no longer responsive" and is surrounded by family and friends at a hospice center in South Dakota, his family said on Wednesday. McGovern, 90, was admitted to hospice in Sioux Falls "with a combination of medical cond...

SAN FRANCISCO | Wed Oct 17, 2012 4:54pm EDT SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California lawmakers in their next session will discuss small steps the state can take to help local governments avert bankruptcy, focusing on the use of controversial capital appreciation bonds, State Treasurer Bill Lockyer said on Wednesday. Lockyer said he expects state officials to...

By Svea Herbst-Bayliss and David Morgan BOSTON/WASHINGTON | Wed Oct 17, 2012 4:46pm EDT BOSTON/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The number of deaths from a meningitis outbreak linked to contaminated steroid medications rose to 19 on Wednesday, just hours after federal agents raided the offices of the company at the center of the scandal and took away docum...

By Corrie MacLaggan AUSTIN, Texas | Wed Oct 17, 2012 4:15pm EDT AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - The state of Texas is seeking to intervene in a lawsuit on behalf of a high school cheerleading team fighting to continue featuring religious messages on banners at football games, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said on Wednesday. The cheerleaders and th...

By Jane Sutton GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba | Wed Oct 17, 2012 4:39pm EDT GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba (Reuters) - - The alleged mastermind of the September 11 attacks told the Guantanamo courtroom on Wednesday that the U.S. government had killed many more people in the name of national security than he is accused of killing. Khal...

By Barbara Liston ORLANDO, Florida | Wed Oct 17, 2012 11:33am EDT ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) - A Florida judge set a tentative date of June 10 next year for the second-degree murder trial of George Zimmerman, the former neighborhood watch captain who killed unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in a gated subdivision near Orlando. Judge Debra Nel...

By Edith Honan NEW YORK | Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:33pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - In Maryland, Maine and Washington, voters appear to be warming to the idea of legal marriage of same sex couples, raising the likelihood that come Election Day at least one of those states will join six others that have approved gay marriage. That is, if the polls are to b...

By Chris Wickham and Irene Klotz LONDON/CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida | Wed Oct 17, 2012 2:12pm EDT LONDON/CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - Astronomers have found a new planet, the closest yet outside our solar system and just an astronomical stone's throw away at four light years, raising the chances of finding a habitable planet in Earth's neighbo...

MADRID | Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:31pm EDT MADRID (Reuters) - Spanish unions are considering launching a general strike against austerity measures on November 14, union sources said, eight months after the last walk-out and coinciding with strike action in neighboring Portugal. Workers in both Spain and Portugal are...

By Balazs Koranyi and Helen Murphy OSLO/BOGOTA | Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:29pm EDT OSLO/BOGOTA (Reuters) - Historic closed-door talks between Colombia and Marxist rebels began on Wednesday in Norway after FARC rebel and government negotiators arrived secretly in Oslo in a bid to end almost half a centur...

ISTANBUL | Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:29pm EDT ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey's armed forces fired back over the border into Syria on Wednesday after a mortar shell shot from Syria landed just inside Turkey's Hatay border province, the provincial governor's office said. Nobody was killed or wounded by the mortar shell, t...

By Sam Cage BUCHAREST | Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:29pm EDT BUCHAREST (Reuters) - A bitter dispute between Romania's president and prime minister resurfaced on Wednesday, raising doubts over the running of the country with an election due in December. Leftist Prime Minister Victor Ponta tried to remove Tr...

JERUSALEM | Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:24pm EDT JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The United States and Israel will hold a major missile defense exercise in Israel this month, sending a message of close cooperation as both countries weigh their options over Iran's nuclear program. The three-week exercise, the largest the allies h...

By Dominic Evans BEIRUT | Wed Oct 17, 2012 1:36pm EDT BEIRUT (Reuters) - The international mediator on Syria said on Wednesday its civil war risks spilling across borders to engulf the Middle East and appealed for a temporary truce he said could mark a small step towards defusing 19 months of conf...