UNITED NATIONS

A new website has been launched by the Russian government in order to monitor bureaucratic inefficiency and stupidity in the struggling nation.

The health impact of last year's Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan appears relatively small thanks partly to prompt evacuations, the chairman of a U.N. scientific body investigating the effects of radiation said on Tuesday.

Assad has also rejected calls from the Arab League to step down from power.

The Senate Banking Committee is proposing news sanctions on Iran in an effort to stall its nuclear ambitions.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces have taken the upper hand in escalating battles on the outskirts of the capital Damascus while top Western and Arab diplomats are seeking a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for him to go.

The world is running out of time to make sure there is enough food, water and energy to meet the needs of a rapidly growing population and to avoid sending up to 3 billion people into poverty, a U.N. report warned on Monday.

The trial, which is likely to shine a searching light on the adequacy of the bank's management and risk controls, could land Adoboli with a maximum 10-year jail sentence if convicted of the two counts of fraud and two of false accounting.

Russia wants to mediate talks between the Syrian government and protestors, inviting both parties to informal negotiations in Moscow on Monday.

Free Syrian Army fighting President Assad's forces withdraw from eastern suburbs of Damascus after two days of fighting.

Armored forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad took control Sunday of eastern suburbs of Damascus from opposition fighters after two days of bombardment and fighting with rebels, activists said Sunday night.

South Sudan has totally shut down oil output in a dispute with Sudan over export transit fees and will only restart after the two reach a deal covering border security and the disputed Abyei region, its oil minister said Sunday.

Around 2,000 Syrian troops backed by tanks launched an assault to retake Damascus suburbs from rebels Sunday, activists said, a day after the Arab League suspended its monitoring mission in Syria because of worsening violence.

Iran on Sunday declared itself optimistic about the United Nations experts' visit aimed at probing suspected military aspects of its nuclear program, and its lawmakers postponed debate on a proposed halt to oil flows to the European Union watched closely in energy markets.

The building took three years to construct and involved 1,200 Chinese and Ethiopian workers.

The Arab League said on Saturday it had suspended its monitoring mission in Syria because of the critical deterioration of the situation as state security forces battled rebels holding three suburbs just outside Damascus.

Kazimierz Smolen, a 91-year-old Auschwitz survivor, died Friday, in a hospital in Oswiecim on the 67th anniversary of its liberation. After World War II, Smolen became director of the memorial site.

After nearly a year of continued violence in Syria, the UN Security Council will debate a resolution demanding Assad step down.

There was no let-up in violence on Friday, when anti-Assad protests again erupted after weekly Muslim prayers.

Boko Haram threatened Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan this week. Speaking in an audio message that was posted online, rebel leader Imam Abubakar Shekau said that he was willing to martyr himself to make Jonathan see.

Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich blamed Palestinian leadership for the conflict in Israel, claiming that Palestinians refuse to have a two-state solution while Israel does.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has condemned the murder of a senior official of the Syrian Red Crescent.