CHINA

Around 2,000 Syrian troops backed by tanks launched an assault to retake Damascus suburbs from rebels Sunday, activists said, a day after the Arab League suspended its monitoring mission in Syria because of worsening violence.

Iran is considering banning all oil exports to the European Union for five to 15 years, a senior Iranian lawmaker was quoted as saying on Sunday, while the country's deputy oil minister said prices would surge should the EU stop importing Iranian crude.

A new team of U.S. trade enforcers will make countries think twice about building unfair barriers to American exports, said President Barack Obama's top trade official, who noted the team will include intelligence officials as well as representatives of multiple agencies.

The iPad celebrated its second birthday on Friday, adding to the hype and anticipation surrounding the release of the iPad 3.

When severe snowstorms prevented life-sustaining fuel supplies from reaching the frozen Alaskan town of Nome, U.S. officials turned to a Russian company for help.

Apple Inc has never turned a blind eye to the problems in its supply chain and any suggestion it does not care about the plight of workers is patently false, Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook said in an email to employees.

The building took three years to construct and involved 1,200 Chinese and Ethiopian workers.

The Arab League said on Saturday it had suspended its monitoring mission in Syria because of the critical deterioration of the situation as state security forces battled rebels holding three suburbs just outside Damascus.

Demand from emerging markets and financial flows will keep crude prices high and volatile in a range from $105 to $125 per barrel in 2012, Petrobras CEO Jose Sergio Gabrielli said on Saturday.

Fighting sanctions with sanctions in a test of strength with the West over its nuclear ambitions, Iran warned on Friday it may halt oil exports to Europe next week in a move calculated to hurt ailing European economies.

After nearly a year of continued violence in Syria, the UN Security Council will debate a resolution demanding Assad step down.

Apple celebrated the second birthday of the iPad on Friday, but the tablet's success has been overshadowed by a recent report from the New York Times that exposes labor violations at Apple's supply chain in China.

A Twitter blackout aimed at protesting censorship on the social media site is sweeping the web as its proponents urge users to go dark Saturday using the hash tag #TwitterBlackout.

Apple announced its most profitable quarter ever on Tuesday, but now that the bar is set so high, all eyes will be on the next iPad and iPhone to carry the company's success through the year.

Apple Inc. has never turned a blind eye to the problems in its supply chain, and any suggestion it does not care about the plight of workers is patently false, Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook said in an e-mail to employees.

There was no let-up in violence on Friday, when anti-Assad protests again erupted after weekly Muslim prayers.

The Indiana right-to-work bill's supporters trumpeted the argument that making Indiana a right-to-work state would encourage businesses to relocate there. But a survey of the available data suggests that the link between right-to-work and job creation is not as clear as its proponents claim.

Investors in Apple Inc. have a one-word answer for those who wonder whether this corporate juggernaut can maintain its phenomenal momentum in the years ahead: Asia.

For the fashion elite, the Year of the Dragon marked a special inaugural festivity - Dragon Week. Dragon Week, created by Affinity China, was a week-long luxury trip designed specifically for wealthy Chinese travelers.

A cancer-causing cadmium discharge from a mining company has polluted a long stretch of two rivers in southern China, and officials warned some 3.7 million people of Liuzhou in the Guangxi region to avoid drinking water from the river, state media reported on Friday.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner pressed Europe on Friday to boost its bailout fund resources, citing the euro zone debt crisis and oil prices as the two main factors influencing the pace of the United States' economic upturn.