World News

GENEVA (AP) — The Syrian civil war contributed to pushing the numbers of refugees and those displaced by conflict within their own nation to an 18-year high of 45.2 million worldwide by the end of 2012, the U.N. refugee agency said Wednesday.Tho ...more

LONDON (AP) — Britain's Girl Guides have dropped a reference to God in their pledge.Gone is the reference to loving God, replaced by a call to "be true to myself and develop my beliefs." The new pledge unveiled Wednesday retains a reference to s ...more

LE BOURGET, France (AP) — Air France-KLM is ordering 25 Airbus A350 jets, saying the wide-body plane that flew for the first time last week is key to plans to expand long-haul flights.Wednesday's announcement at the Paris Air Show was a boost fo ...more

LUCKNOW, India (AP) — A joint army and air force operation has evacuated nearly 12,000 Hindu pilgrims stranded in a mountainous area by torrential monsoon rains and landslides in northern India, but nearly 63,000 people remain cut off, a senior officia ...more

PARIS (AP) — Heavy floods in southwest France have forced the closure of the Catholic pilgrimage site in Lourdes and the evacuation of pilgrims from nearby hotels.Floodwaters swirled Wednesday in the grotto where nearly 6 million believers from ...more

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Philippines says UN, US worry of 'maximum volatility' in Golan Heights if peacekeepers leave. ...more

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — The new form of resistance that is spreading through Turkey has received a nod of approval from the country's deputy prime minister.Bulent Arinc told reporters Wednesday that the protest by hundreds of people standing motio ...more

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghan president suspends talks with US on security deal to protest US-Taliban negotiations. ...more

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — A serial sex offender was sentenced to life in prison on Wednesday for raping and murdering an Irish woman while he was free on parole after previous convictions for raping five women.Adrian Ernest Bayley, 41, was sen ...more

SINGAPORE (AP) — Singaporeans rolled back military training, kept cough-stricken children indoors and considered wearing protective masks to work after a smoky haze triggered by forest fires in neighboring Indonesia caused air pollution to briefly hit ...more