Portugal will accept a financial bailout “within the next few weeks” as the cost of issuing debt becomes unsustainable, said Axa Investment Managers, which oversees $714 billion in assets. “The borrowing costs are just too high” for Portugal, Christopher Iggo, London-based chief investment officer for fixed income at Axa, France’s fourth-largest fund manager, said in a telephone interview two da...

WEST HOLLYWOOD, California (AP) _ Fresh from a stumble at the Grammys and muffing the national anthem at the Super Bowl, singer Christina Aguilera was arrested early Tuesday near the Sunset Strip on suspicion of being drunk in public but will not be prosecuted, authorities said. Aguilera, 30, was ``extremely intoxicated'' when a car driven by her boyfriend was stopped, Los Angeles County sheriff...

Iran threatened to boycott the 2012 London Olympic Games unless its logo is changed, insisting that the games’ logo symbolizes Israel, according to news reports. A formal letter of complaint was sent to the International Olympic Committee by the Iranian committee over the logo which it claims spells out “Zion,” a biblical term referring to Jerusalem. Iranian Students News Agency, a government-s...

SANAA (AP) ― Yemen’s embattled president Tuesday accused the U.S., his closest ally, of instigating the mounting protests against him, but the gambit failed to slow the momentum for his ouster. Hundreds of thousands rallied in cities across Yemen against the government of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, in the largest of the protests of the past month, including one addressed by an influential fir...

Arab protest wave hurts al-Qaida, Iran: U.S. WASHINGTON (AFP) ― U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Tuesday that protests across the Arab world have dealt a major setback to al-Qaida militants and Iran by endorsing democratic change. “It basically gives the lie to al-Qaida’s claim that the only way to get rid of authoritarian governments is through extremist violence,” Gates told report...

Photoshop works digital wonders, and one piece of striking evidence is illustrated in the unaltered photos of a Chinese girl who created an Asia-wide buzz with her picture-perfect image. The newly revealed photos suggest that the widely circulated pictures showing her doll-like image with impeccable lines might have been highly edited and embellished. The girl, named Wang Jiayun, emerged as an ...

WASHINGTON (AP) _ Defense Secretary Robert Gates says any military action in Libya must be carefully weighed because it will have broad consequences on the region and the U.S. military, including the effort in Afghanistan. Gates says he ordered two ships into the Mediterranean, including the amphibious assault ship USS Kearsarge. And he is sending 400 Marines to the Kearsarge to replace some of ...

TEHRAN (AFP) ― Iranian opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi and their wives have been arrested and put in a Tehran jail, their websites said Monday in reports swiftly denied by a judicial official. The two had been under house arrest after judiciary chief Ayatollah Sadeq Larijani said earlier this month they had committed “treason” and MPs demanded they be hanged. “Mir Hoss...

Chimpanzee meat could be on sale illegally in restaurants and markets in Britain. So-called “bush meat” -- allegedly found by in a raid by U.K. Trading Standards officials -- is believed to have been traded from market stalls in the Midlands. An investigator from Trading Standards told British tabloid The Sun on Monday:“We’ve found things like rat in the past, but it’s really shocking to find...

U.S. pledges assistance as opposition forms its own leadership ZAWIYA, Libya (AP) ― With residents shouting “Free, free Libya,” anti-government rebels who control this battle-scarred city nearest to the capital deployed tanks and anti-aircraft weapons Sunday to brace for an attack by troops loyal to Moammar Gadhafi. The Obama administration offered “any type of assistance” to Libyans seeking to ...

TUNIS (AFP) ― Tunisia’s Prime Minister Mohammed Ghannouchi resigned Sunday and was replaced by Beji Caid Essebsi, a former minister, after anti-government protests left five people dead over the weekend. Security forces again clashed with protesters in Tunis demanding the removal of some ministers of Ghannouchi’s interim government before the premier announced his resignation. “The acts of viol...

ATLANTA (AP) - Shocking as it may seem, U.S. government doctors once thought it was fine to experiment on disabled people and prison inmates. Such experiments included giving hepatitis to mental patients in Connecticut, squirting a pandemic flu virus up the noses of prisoners in Maryland, and injecting cancer cells into chronically ill people at a New York hospital. Much of this horrific history...

Security Council imposes arms embargo, urges asset freeze and travel ban UNITED NATIONS (AP) ― The U.N. Security Council moved as a powerful bloc Saturday to try to halt Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi’s deadly crackdown on protesters, slapping sanctions on him, his children and top associates. Voting 15-0 after daylong discussions interrupted with breaks to consult with capitals back home, the c...

CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand (AP) ― New Zealand’s premier said the Christchurch quake may be the country’s worst disaster ever, as officials raised the toll to 146 dead and more than 200 missing while giving a grim prognosis for the city’s downtown. Residents said prayers for the dead and missing at church services Sunday in Christchurch and across New Zealand. But church leaders canceled a planned...

CAIRO (AP) ― A constitutional reform panel on Saturday recommended opening Egypt’s presidential elections to competition and imposing a two-term limit on future presidents ― a dramatic shift from a system that allowed the ousted Hosni Mubarak to rule for three decades. The changes are among 10 proposed constitutional amendments that are to be put to a popular referendum later this year. The prop...