Talk that North Korea's young leader plans to reform the broken economy is already having an impact. It's helping send rice prices even further out of the reach of most families in one of the world's most under-fed societies.

In his first year in office, U.S. President Barack Obama sent a letter to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad seeking a new start to a long-strained relationship.

Bulgaria's centre-right government survived a parliamentary no-confidence vote on Thursday, called over a failure to reform its inefficient judiciary and combat organized crime and corruption that has awakened concerns in Brussels.

Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak called on Wednesday for major powers to speed up efforts to stop Iran's nuclear program, cautioning it would be tougher to confront it once Tehran managed to cross an atomic threshold.

The Syrian army turned its forces on Aleppo on Wednesday, ordering an armored column to advance on the country's second biggest city and pounding rebels there with artillery and attack helicopters, opposition activists said.

Syria sent thousands of troops surging towards Aleppo in the early hours of Wednesday, where its forces have been pounding rebel fighters from the air, engulfing the country's largest city in total warfare to put down a revolt.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said on Tuesday the South American nation is withdrawing from a regional human rights court that Latin America's leftist leaders have increasingly criticized as a pawn of Washington.

Former Indian Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has taken office as the country's 13th president.

Chinese President Hu Jintao has called for unity in the ruling Communist Party and unflinching backing for economic reforms in the face of "unprecedented challenges", as Beijing struggles with a scandal-hit leadership transition and economi

President Ollanta Humala named the justice minister and well-known human rights lawyer, Juan Jimenez, as prime minister on Monday as the Peruvian leader shuffled his Cabinet to try to calm a wave of violent anti-mining protests.

Western states expressed alarm after Syria acknowledged for the first time that it has chemical and biological weapons and said it could use them if foreign countries intervene.

Syrian troops have driven rebel fighters out of two districts of Damascus a week after the insurgents launched a major assault on the capital.

Mystery surrounded the whereabouts of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Thursday, a day after a bomber killed and wounded his security chiefs and rebels closed in on the centre of Damascus, vowing to "liberate" the capital.

Six people were killed in a bomb attack on a bus carrying Israeli tourists at a Bulgarian airport on Wednesday and Israel accused Tehran of carrying out the attack, promising a strong response to "Iranian terror."

The United States has the military capacity to defeat any Iranian attempt to shut down sea commerce in the oil-rich Gulf region and will hold Tehran directly responsible for shipping disruptions, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Wednesday.

Syria's defense minister and President Bashar al-Assad's brother in-law were killed in a suicide bomb attack in Damascus on Wednesday, in the most serious blow to Assad's high command in a 16-month-old revolt.

A bomb planted by the Taliban destroyed 22 NATO trucks carrying supplies to their forces in northern Afghanistan, the Taliban and police said on Wednesday.

As fighting rages in Damascus, and the Assad family that has ruled Syria for four decades struggles for its life against a growing rebellion, a picture is emerging of a tight inner group determined to fight its way out of the crisis, even as support

North Korea's young leader promoted a new army marshal after sacking his top general in what a South Korean official report said was a bid to impose authority on a military that has been the backbone of his family's long rule over the isolate

Syrian government forces encircled rebel fighters in Damascus on Monday, waging a second day of fighting that residents described as the worst to hit the capital since the 17-month-old revolt against President Bashar al-Assad began.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Israeli officials will discuss on Monday Egypt's political upheaval, Iran's nuclear program and the stymied Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Japan's ambassador to China returned to Beijing on Monday after Tokyo summoned him over the weekend to discuss the escalating tension over a group of islands that both countries claim.

Opposition fighters battled Syrian government forces in Damascus into the early hours of Monday in what residents described as the fiercest fighting yet inside the capital.

Southeast Asian nations have failed to reach agreement on a maritime dispute involving China, ending a foreign ministers' summit in disarray after Beijing appeared to split the 10 countries over the contentious issue.

The moderate National Forces Alliance of wartime prime minister Mahmoud Jibril scored a landslide victory over rival Islamist parties in Libya's first free national election in a generation, partial tallies showed on Thursday.

About 220 Syrians, mostly civilians, were killed in a village in the rebellious Hama region when it was bombarded by helicopter gunships and tanks then stormed by militiamen who slaughtered some families, opposition sources said on Friday.

Masked gunmen stormed a house and killed nine police cadets in Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore on Thursday, police said, the second attack on security forces claimed by the Taliban in relatively peaceful Punjab province in four days.

Syria's ambassador to Iraq has defected and urged the army to "turn your guns on the criminals" of President Bashar al-Assad's government, giving the anti-Assad uprising one of its biggest boosts in 16 months of bloodshed.

The United States and China signaled a willingness on Thursday to work together on "sensitive issues" in a move to cool tensions between rival claimants to the potentially oil-rich and increasingly militarized South China Sea.

U.N. peace envoy Kofi Annan waded into big power politics on Tuesday, insisting regional heavyweight Iran should be involved in efforts to find a peaceful solution to the Syria crisis despite the West's firm rejection of a role for Tehran.