WORLD

The United States hopes to reach agreement with China during President Barack Obama's visit on how to record and monitor countries' efforts to fight global warming, a top State Department official said on Tuesday.

The world faces a surge in energy costs, as well as an increase in planet-warming carbon emissions, unless it agrees a climate change deal soon, the International Energy Agency said on Tuesday.

China said on Tuesday it was dissatisfied that India had allowed the Dalai Lama to visit a disputed border region also claimed by Beijing, while also directing its ire at the exiled Tibetan leader.

Pakistani Taliban militants vowed to fight a tough, protracted guerrilla war against the army on Tuesday as a suicide car-bomber killed up to 20 people in a northwestern town, police said.

Navies from the rival Koreas exchanged gunfire for the first time in seven years on Tuesday, damaging vessels on both sides and raising tension just days before President Barack Obama travels to Asia.

Barack Obama this week makes his first trip to Asia as president, leaving behind a host of domestic problems with a visit that recognizes the region's economic and diplomatic importance to the United States.

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd will unveil long-awaited draft legislation on financial regulation reform on Tuesday, his office said on Monday.

Hu Shuli, the chief editor of Caijing, China's most influential business magazine, has submitted resignation with parent company Stock Exchange Executive Council (SEEC) agreeing to her request.

Poor nations battered by record food prices last year need international help to raise agricultural output given conditions are still ripe for another food crisis, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation's chief said.

A weakened Tropical Storm Ida drenched the U.S. Gulf Coast and oil installations on Monday, shutting down nearly 30 percent of Gulf energy production.

Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri formed a new unity government on Monday that includes two ministers from Syrian- and Iranian-backed Hezbollah.

Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leaders hailed the human courage that toppled the Berlin Wall, saying the historic events of 20 years ago showed the world could tackle new challenges, from poverty to climate change.

Chancellor Angela Merkel hailed the courage of easterners who helped bring down the Berlin Wall as the city celebrated the 20th anniversary of the events that marked the end of the Cold War and the beginning of a reunited Germany.

The United States is willing to give Iran time to decide whether to accept a U.N.-brokered deal meant to allay suspicions it is after atomic bombs but which has drawn Iranian objections, a U.S. diplomat said on Monday.

The Vatican said on Monday its plan to allow married Anglican priests to convert to Catholicism does not signal any change to its age-old rule of celibacy for the overwhelming majority of Catholic priests.

President Barack Obama will delay the start of his visit to Asia this week to attend a memorial service for soldiers killed in a mass shooting at a U.S. military base, an administration official said on Sunday.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Monday the United States believed Iran had no reason to detain three American hikers held there and that they should be released

It's not often that a historic announcement comes, as an afterthought, almost by accident, at the end of an otherwise stultifyingly tedious press conference.

Ida weakened to a tropical storm as it churned toward oil and gas facilities in the Gulf of Mexico and was forecast to hit the U.S. Gulf Coast early on Tuesday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said on Monday.

China on Monday praised a U.S. trade panel's decision to reject an investigation into imports of Chinese steel fasteners, saying it was the correct judgment.

After a landmark win in the House of Representatives, President Barack Obama's push for healthcare reform faces a difficult path in the Senate amid divisions in his own Democratic Party on how to proceed.

A suicide bomber in an auto-rickshaw blew himself up in Pakistan on Monday, killing three people while four soldiers were killed in South Waziristan when militants struck back in their captured headquarters.

Myanmar's detained opposition leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, expressed hope on Monday that U.S. engagement with the county's military rulers could spur democratic reforms, her lawyer said.

President Barack Obama was due to hold talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington on Monday amid floundering U.S. efforts to jump-start stalled Middle East peace talks.

China has executed nine people convicted of violent crimes during ethnic rioting in the far western Xinjiang region in July, the first to be put to death over the unrest, the China News Service said Monday.

Iraqis will vote in a general election on January 21 now that parliament has passed a law needed for a vote to take place, the head of the country's electoral commission said on Monday.

Chancellor Angela Merkel hailed the courage of East Germans who helped topple the Berlin Wall as leaders converged on the German capital to celebrate the 20th anniversary of an event which marked the end of the Cold War.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai said in an interview airing Monday he is taking steps to root out corruption in his government, but he also said foreign money was making the problem worse.

After a landmark win in the House of Representatives, President Barack Obama's push for healthcare reform faces a difficult path in the Senate amid divisions in his own Democratic Party on how to proceed.