UN nuclear mission to Iran admits new failure - Wed, 22 Feb
The United Nations nuclear agency has acknowledged its renewed failure in trying to investigate suspicions Tehran has worked secretly on atomic arms, in a statement issued shortly after an Iranian general warned of a pre-emptive strike against any nation threatening Iran. The double signs of defiance reflect Iranian determination not to bow to demands that it defuse suspicions...

Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez needs surgery - Wed, 22 Feb
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says doctors in Cuba had found a new lesion in the same place where he had a tumour removed last year and...

China's high-speed rail project runs out of money - Wed, 22 Feb
China's high-speed rail project has run out of money and will be scaled back. More than two-thirds of 23 railway projects have been suspended,...

Witness describes attempt on exiled Rwandan - Wed, 22 Feb
JOHANNESBURG — Days before an exiled Rwandan army general was shot and wounded in South Africa, two of the men charged in the shooting were plotting another attempt on his life, a witness testified Wednesday. Election 2012: Across the nation Roemer leaving GOP, but not presidential campaign Arizona finally gets GOP candidates' attention Gingrich to air energy infomercial in key states Trump records robo-call in Michigan for Romney Unions gearing up to spend big in 2012 election Interactive: Know the candidates More Nation & World stories » Ga. cops: 2 kids missing after helper drives off Ark. man pleads not guilty in death of teen Obama helps break ground on black...

Ark. man pleads not guilty in death of teen - Wed, 22 Feb
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — A man accused of killing a 16-year-old girl he met online has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder after the girl's body was found in a barrel in western Arkansas. Election 2012: Across the nation Roemer...

High court rules for power company over Mont. dams - Wed, 22 Feb
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court sided with a power company Wednesday in a dispute with Montana over who owns the riverbeds beneath 10 dams sitting on three Montana rivers. Election 2012: Across the nation Roemer leaving GOP, but not presidential campaign Arizona finally gets GOP candidates' attention Gingrich to air energy infomercial in key states Trump records robo-call in Michigan for...

Obama helps break ground on black history museum - Wed, 22 Feb
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama heralded a new national black history museum as "not just a record of tragedy, but a celebration of life" as he marked Wednesday's groundbreaking of the long-sought-after museum on the National Mall. Election 2012: Across the nation Roemer leaving GOP, but not presidential campaign Arizona finally gets GOP candidates' attention Gingrich to air energy infomercial in key states Trump records robo-call in Michigan for Romney Unions gearing up to spend big in 2012 election Interactive: Know the candidates More Nation & World stories » Ga. cops: 2 kids missing after helper drives off Ark. man pleads not guilty in death of teen Obama helps...

Geithner: Obama seeks 28 percent corp. tax rate - Wed, 22 Feb
WASHINGTON — Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner says the current business tax system is bad for business and for job creation and says a plan by President Barack Obama to reduce corporate tax rates would make the tax system more globally competitive. President Barack Obama, accompanied by Vice...

High court torn over law banning lie about medals - Wed, 22 Feb
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court appears to be sharply divided over a law that makes it a crime to lie about having been awarded top military honors. FILE - In this undated file photo Gen. George Washington leads his troops across the Delaware River in this painting by Emmanuel G. Leutze, Dec. 1776, during the Revolutionary War. A 2006 federal law, the Stolen Valor Act, aimed at curbing false claims of military valor, is at the heart of a Supreme Court review, and...

Tribe seeks order to limit beer sales in Neb. town - Wed, 22 Feb
Leaders of an American Indian tribe in South Dakota who are suing beer makers, distributors and retailers are now asking a judge...

NC terrorism convict faces new beheading plot case - Wed, 22 Feb
A North Carolina man convicted in a homegrown terrorism plot faces new charges for attempting to hire a hit man to behead three...

With Mardi Gras a memory, New Orleans sobers up - Wed, 22 Feb
By dawn on Wednesday, Mardi Gras was just a memory in New Orleans. Stately St. Charles Avenue was cleared of mountains of trash left...

Wounded French reporter at risk of bleeding to death - activists - Wed, 22 Feb
BEIRUT (Reuters) - A French journalist wounded in Syria is at risk of bleeding to death without urgent medical care, activists said on Wednesday, hours after she and five other journalists were hit by an army bombardment of a rebel stronghold. Edith Bouvier, a freelance journalist who was smuggled into Syria to report for the French paper Le Figaro, suffered severe injuries to her hip and thigh. Activists said Bouvier, 31, was being treated at a poorly- equipped field hospital in Homs' besieged district of Baba Amro, which has been under army...

Chamber of Commerce groups diverge on Democrats' business policies - Wed, 22 Feb
When members of the Charlotte Chamber gather at the U.S. Treasury Department this afternoon, they'll talk economic policy with Obama administration officials - only a few months before the president is renominated in Charlotte for a second term. Meanwhile, a block away, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is orchestrating a $10 million media attack on what it sees as the Democrats' anti-business policies. The tale of the two chambers reflects some businesses' ongoing tension with President Barack Obama and Democratic leaders. It also reflects the administration's efforts to ease that tension, especially in key electoral...

Israeli minister rejects foreign warnings on Iran - Wed, 22 Feb
Israel's foreign minister says the Jewish state will not bow to foreign pressure in deciding whether to attack Iran. In an interview...

West Bank settlement housing gets initial approval - Wed, 22 Feb
Israeli officials say that a committee has given preliminary approval to a plan that could allow construction of 600 new...

Argentine train crash kills 49 people, hurts 600 - Wed, 22 Feb
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - A packed commuter train plowed into the buffers at a Buenos Aires station during morning rush hour on Wednesday, killing at least 49 people and injuring more than 600 others, officials said. They said the train was unable to stop, presumably due to faulty brakes, and it...

Ex-mine official charged in fatal W. Virginia blast - Wed, 22 Feb
(Reuters) - Federal authorities on Wednesday charged the former superintendent of a West Virginia coal mine where 29 workers died in a 2010 explosion with felony conspiracy for impeding mine safety enforcement efforts before the blast. Gary May, 43, of Bloomingrose, West Virginia, was charged with conspiring to impede the...

Nine cleared of murder in Northern Irish supergrass trial - Wed, 22 Feb
BELFAST (Reuters) - Nine men accused of murder in the biggest trial of suspected militants in Northern Ireland for more than 20 years were acquitted on Wednesday after a judge branded the prosecution's so-called chief "supergrass" witnesses as liars. Fourteen suspected members of banned pro-British militant group the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) had been on trial, facing a total of 97 charges mainly linked to the murder of the head of rival group the Ulster Defence Association (UDA). With armed police both inside and outside the courtroom, there was muted...

Tunisia, Egypt Islamists signal bigger religion role - Wed, 22 Feb
PARIS (Reuters)- After months of reassuring secularist critics, Islamist politicians in Tunisia and Egypt have begun to lay down markers about how Muslim their states should be -- and first signs show they want more religion than previously admitted. Islamist parties swept the first free elections in both countries in recent months after campaigns that stressed their readiness to work with the secularists they struggled with in the Arab Spring revolts against decades-long dictatorships. With political deadlines looming, the Tunisian coalition led by the reformist Islamist Ennahda party and the head of Egypt's influential Muslim Brotherhood both made statements this week revealing a stronger...