BEIRUT — Two weeks into a cease-fire agreement, there still was no peace in Syria: Security agents in Damascus collected the remains of 10 people killed in a suicide bombing. Activists reported troops firing on protesters. Video showed a crowd carrying a slain boy to U.N. observers as proof of regime violence.
FRANKFURT, Germany — Europe’s plan to fix its debt crisis by imposing budget cuts frayed Monday. Heavy selling rocked financial markets, uncertainty gripped two governments, and the economic outlook darkened across the continent.
WASHINGTON — U.S. military leaders clearly expressed reluctance about using American might to stop the unending violence in Syria, insisting that diplomacy remains the best option to force President Bashar Assad to end the brutal crackdown on his own people.
BEIRUT — Syrian forces used live fire, tear gas and clubs to beat back tens of thousands of protesters who took to the streets across the country Friday in powerful and often jubilant displays of defiance. But a U.N.-brokered truce largely held up without the widespread, bloody offensives that have pushed the nation toward civil war.
PYONGYANG, North Korea — North Korea fired a long-range rocket early Friday, South Korean and U.S. officials said, defying international warnings against moving forward with a launch widely seen as a provocation.
NEW YORK — The stock market suffered its worst loss of the year Tuesday because of uncertainty about coming corporate earnings reports and concerns that the borrowing costs of Spain are creeping close to a crisis level.
NEW YORK — The stock market cleared another barrier Thursday in its long recovery from the Great Recession: The Standard & Poor’s 500 index closed above 1,400 for the first time since June 2008.
WASHINGTON — Determined to show momentum in a war marred by setbacks, President Barack Obama and British Prime Minster David Cameron said for the first time Wednesday that NATO forces would hand over the lead combat role to Afghanistan forces next year as the U.S. and its allies aim to get out by the end of 2014.