JERUSALEM — Israel’s prime minister says a new report by the U.N. atomic agency shows that international pressure is having no effect on halting Iran’s suspect nuclear program. In a confidential report, the International Atomic Energy Agency said this week that Iran has upgraded its uranium enrichment facilities and advanced in building a plutonium-producing reactor. [...]

BEIRUT — Lebanese supporters and opponents of Syrian President Bashar Assad fired heavy machine guns and lobbed mortar shells at each other Thursday in some of the worst fighting in the port city of Tripoli in years. The battles raised the five-day death toll to 16 and fed fears of the Syrian civil war spreading [...]

LONDON — The soldier brutally murdered in a suspected terrorist attack in London was a popular 25-year-old ceremonial military drummer and machine gunner, a father and a passionate fan of the Manchester United soccer team, the British military said Thursday. Lee Rigby, of 2nd Battalion The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, who had joined the army [...]

A look at the key known facts about attack in south London in which two men killed a British soldier near military barracks Wednesday. Q: What happened? A: Two men with butcher knives, a machete and a meat cleaver attacked and killed a soldier near military barracks in the south London neighborhood of Woolwich. Two [...]

LONDON — A man seen with bloody hands wielding a butcher knife after the killing of a British soldier on the streets of London was described as a convert to Islam who took part in demonstrations with a banned radical group, two Muslim hard-liners said Thursday. Police raided houses in connection with the brazen slaying [...]

AMMAN, Jordan — The U.S. and several key allies looked again Wednesday for a strategy to end Syria’s civil war, their united efforts unable at the moment to stem the Assad regime’s military gains and Washington still unwilling to join those providing the rebels with lethal military aid. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry allowed [...]

CAIRO — The safe release Wednesday of seven conscripts kidnapped by suspected militants in Sinai brought a victory for Egypt’s Islamist president after months of criticism that his government is mismanaging the country. Seated with top military brass and senior officials, an animated Mohammed Morsi lauded the release as a show of how unified and [...]

Main domestic and international issues facing Iran ahead of its June 14 presidential election: ___ NUCLEAR QUESTION: Four rounds of revived talks between Iran and world powers since last year have produced no important headway in the Tehran’s impasse with the West. The U.S. and allies worry Iran’s uranium enrichment could lead to atomic weapons, [...]

TEHRAN, Iran — By now, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is well-accustomed to enduring blows from Iran’s ruling clerics as his reputation fell from favored son to political outcast. But their intended parting shot — barring his chief aid from the presidential race — may be just the opening act in Ahmadinejad’s reinvention as a self-styled opposition [...]

VIENNA — The U.N. atomic agency on Wednesday detailed rapid Iranian progress in two programs that the West fears are geared toward making nuclear weapons, saying Tehran has upgraded its uranium enrichment facilities and advanced in building a plutonium-producing reactor. In a confidential report obtained by The Associated Press, the International Atomic Energy Agency said [...]

WARSAW, Poland — A 33-year-old Polish man received a face transplant just three weeks after being disfigured in a workplace accident, in what his doctors said Wednesday is the fastest time frame to date for such an operation. It was Poland’s first face transplant. Face transplants are extraordinarily complicated and relatively rare procedures that usually [...]

With its ranks deeply divided, the Boy Scouts of America is asking its local leaders from across the country to decide whether its contentious membership policy should be overhauled so that openly gay boys can participate in Scout units. The proposal to be put before the roughly 1,400 voting members of the BSA’s National Council [...]

BOSTON — Federal prosecutors say they’ll ask for more time to indict Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Prosecutors said Friday they will not indict Tsranaev within the 30-day period prescribed the Federal Speedy Trial Act. Sunday marks 30 days since Tsarnaev was arrested following the April 15 bombing. Prosecutors didn’t specify under which exception [...]

JOHNS CREEK, Ga — A college student in suburban Atlanta is accused of faking his own kidnapping to avoid telling his parents he was failing a class. John’s Creek city spokesman Doug Nurse says 19-year-old Aftab Aslam bought a cellphone and texted his parents a story about being kidnapped April 27. Nurse says Aslam camped [...]

LAS VEGAS — O.J. Simpson’s former lawyer defended himself point-by-point Friday against allegations he botched the former football star’s armed-robbery trial, and he testified Simpson actually knew his buddies had guns when they went to a hotel room to reclaim some sports memorabilia. Miami attorney Yale Galanter took the stand at an often combative weeklong [...]

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A mother who chased down an abductor and ran into his car after he grabbed her 4-year-old said Friday her “mother’s instincts” kicked in when she launched her pursuit. Melissa Torrez told The Associated Press that she began her chase “without any feeling” as soon as other children in the Albuquerque apartment [...]

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria — Mobile phone service was cut off Thursday in areas of northeast Nigeria as jet fighters streaked through the sky and more soldiers were deployed to fight Islamic extremists waging a brutal insurgency. Witnesses saw low-flying Nigerian jet fighters over Yola, the capital of Adamawa state, which President Goodluck Jonathan placed under emergency [...]

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — The ceiling of a Cambodian factory that makes Asics sneakers collapsed on workers early Thursday, killing two people and injuring seven, in the latest accident spotlighting the often lethal safety conditions faced by those toiling in the global garment industry. About 50 workers were inside a workroom of the factory south [...]

BEIRUT — Syrian government troops on Thursday flushed out rebels who had stormed a prison compound in the northern city of Aleppo in a bid to free hundreds of political prisoners inside. The forced retreat was the latest setback for fighters seeking to topple President Bashar Assad, whose forces have been gaining ground in the [...]

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Sitting on a dirty straw mat on the parched ground of southern Afghanistan, Masooma sank deeper inside a giant black shawl. Hidden from view, her words burst forth as she told her side of what happened to her family sometime before dawn on March 11, 2012. According to Masooma, an American soldier [...]