J.J. McGrath

Most of the Republican presidential candidates laid out their credentials as social conservatives in a debate on Saturday as the 2012 campaign prepares to move from New Hampshire to South Carolina. With another debate to be hosted by NBC's Meet the Press, they can do it all over again on Sunday.

Venezuela's oil minister said on Saturday he does not expect a ruling in World Bank arbitration with the Exxon Mobil Corp. this year, after another tribunal awarded the U.S.-based company $908 million last week.

South Korean President Lee Myung Bak will ask China's leaders this week to use their influence to lean on North Korea to show restraint amid a delicate transition to a new leadership.

Iran's underground uranium-enrichment facility will begin operations soon, a senior official was quoted by Iranian media on Sunday as saying, The move is likely to boost tension between the Islamic state and the West over Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

Signs the U.S. recovery is gaining strength indicate the Federal Reserve may not need to buy any more bonds to spur growth, James Bullard, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, said on Saturday: I don't think it's very likely right now because the tone of the data has been pretty strong recently.

The Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. has agreed to acquire Inhibitex Inc. for about $2.5 billion to gain access to its promising hepatitis C treatment, the companies said on Saturday.

Three top Federal Reserve officials aggressively pushed on Friday for more stimulus for the U.S. housing market, saying the government should be looking at ways to help the sector for the purpose of speeding the country's economic recovery.

The knives will come out at back-to-back debates this weekend as Republican presidential hopefuls frantically jockey for position days before New Hampshire's key primary.

U.S. President Barack Obama kicked off an effort to encourage businesses to keep jobs at home instead of outsourcing them overseas, as he rolled out a new election-year theme on Saturday aimed at courting middle-class voters.

The Dutch government has appointed Credit Suisse to advise on a potential sale of its 33 percent stake in UK-based uranium enrichment company Urenco, people familiar with the situation told Reuters on Friday.

The Exxon Mobil Corp. and the U.S. government struck a deal on Friday that would allow the company to move ahead with development of a field in the Gulf of Mexico estimated to yield tens of billions of dollars of oil.

Iran has successfully produced and tested fuel rods for use in its nuclear power plants, state television reported on Sunday, in a snub to international demands that it halt sensitive nuclear work.

An international arbitration panel has awarded the U.S. oil giant Exxon Mobil Corp. $908 million in compensation for Venezuela's 2007 nationalization of assets, less than 10 percent of what the company sought in a dispute.

Dysfunctional politics threatens to deliver a protracted period of slow global growth, possibly lasting well beyond 2012, which will only deepen the political and economic problems for the West.

An Arab League advisory body on Sunday called for the immediate withdrawal of the organization's monitoring mission in Syria, saying it was allowing Damascus to cover up continued violence and abuses.

The United States will continue to be the top choice of most global commercial real-estate investors in 2012, but the country has lost ground to Brazil, which ranked No. 2 this year, according to a survey released Sunday.

North Korea called on its people to rally behind new leader Kim Jong Un and protect him as human shields while working to solve the burning issue of food shortages by adhering to the policies of his late father, Kim Jong Il.

Throngs of revelers in and around New York's Times Square gave a boisterous welcome to 2012 on Sunday amid tight security, sending off a year marked by the grim 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the city.

Firefighters in Los Angeles were steeling themselves for a busy New Year's Eve on Saturday, following a rash of arson fires that saw more than 30 cars torched in recent days.

Iran dismissed on Sunday the United States' move to impose new sanctions on financial institutions dealing with the Islamic state's central bank over the country's disputed nuclear program, the Students news agency reported.

Mitt Romney narrowly leads rival Ron Paul in Iowa three days before the state kicks off the Republican Party's presidential nominating race, according to a Des Moines Register poll released on Saturday.

A strong earthquake with a magnitude of 6.8 jolted eastern and northeastern Japan on Sunday, according to the U.S. Geolegical Survey. However, there were no immediate reports of injuries or damages, and no tsunami warning was issued.

Greece faces another tough year in 2012, but the country must stick to its program of austerity and reform to stay in the Eurozone, Prime Minister Lucas Papademos said in a prerecorded New Year's Eve address.

Iran said it had delayed its promised long-range missile tests in the Persian Gulf on Saturday and signaled it was ready for fresh talks with the West on its disputed nuclear program.

U.S. White House hopeful Mitt Romney brought in help from New Jersey on Friday to bolster his prospects for a win in Iowa next week that would put him in the lead in the Republican presidential race.

Hackers affiliated with the Anonymous group published hundreds of thousands of email addresses belonging to subscribers of private intelligence-analysis firm Strategic Forecasting Inc., along with thousands of customer credit-card numbers.

Shaky Europe. Political gridlock. Volatile markets. Familiar themes for those who lived through this year, and investors should be ready to revisit them next year.

The Boeing Co. beat out the Lockheed Martin Corp. to retain its position as the prime contractor for the U.S. long-range missile shield, the Pentagon said on Friday.

U.S. President Barack Obama's campaign set a goal of raising $60 million in the fourth quarter of the year to benefit the Democratic incumbent's re-election and the Democratic National Committee, a campaign official said on Saturday.