WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Israeli and Palestinian leaders agreed to a series of direct talks on Thursday, seeking to forge the framework for a U.S.-backed peace deal within a year and end a conflict that has boiled for six decades. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who hosted the first session of ...

Soldiers were sent to the location after an airborne patrol sighted armed men outside a building. Fighting began when the men opened fire on the troops. Three people who presumably had been kidnapped by the gang were freed following the fighting. Two soldiers were ...

TOKYO (Reuters) - The Bank of Japan is expected to hold off on easing monetary policy next week but is gearing up for further action in October as the strong yen threatens to derail its forecast of a moderate economic recovery, sources said. Having just loosened policy at an emergency meeting on ...

CANBERRA (Reuters) - One of three independent MPs needed by Australia's Prime Minister Julia Gillard to form a minority government hinted on Friday he could negotiate on Labor's mining profits tax he has previously opposed. Maverick outback MP Bob Katter gave Gillard and conservative Opposition ...

SURBAKTI (Reuters) - An Indonesian volcano that lay dormant for 400 years erupted yet again on Friday, shooting a mushroomed-shape plume of smoke 3 km (2 miles) into the air and prompting the second evacuation of terrified residents. Friday's eruption, the third this week, was three times stronger ...

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghanistan's government sought to avert a run on the country's top private bank by nervous investors after directors at Kabulbank resigned, ostensibly to meet new rules but also amid media allegations of graft. Long queues were seen outside several Kabulbank branches in the ...

LISBON (Reuters) - A Portuguese court will render its verdict Friday in one of the country's highest profile legal cases, a shocking story of alleged child abuse at a state orphanage that has gripped the nation for over half a decade. Seven defendants, including a well-known television presenter, ...

LAHORE, Pakistan (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund will give Pakistan $450 million in emergency flood aid, providing some relief for a government overwhelmed by the disaster and facing renewed militant violence. IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said in Washington on Thursday ...

Fernando Azcarraga Lopez, a former mayor of the port city of Tampico in northeastern Tamaulipas state, was seized as he left a coffee shop in Tampico, El Norte and El Sol de Tampico newspapers reported. He was later released and returned to his residence, which was under heavy guard by Mexican ...

ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Ivory Coast's electoral commission said Thursday it had produced a final voter list for the first time, raising the chance that an election which has been delayed six times in five years might go ahead. The poll, now scheduled for October 31, is needed to end years of turmoil ...