Pope Benedict XVI urged Catholics on Sunday to refrain from judging sinners a day after he rebuked Irish bishops for their handling of a half-century of sexual abuse of minors by clergy.

A volcano in southern Iceland has erupted for the first time in almost 200 years, raising concerns that it could trigger a larger and potentially more dangerous eruption at a volatile volcano nearby.

It’s officially cherry blossom season again. The Japanese Meteorological Agency said Monday that the country’s capital was officially in bloom.

Iraq’s president on Sunday demanded a recount in this month’s historic parliamentary elections, intensifying the political conflict over the not-yet-completed tally and increasing the chances that the vote will be a long, chaotic test of the nascent democracy.

The Afghan president is walking a knife edge in efforts to bring peace to his war-ravaged country, balancing the interests of his neighbours and the Western countries supporting him, analysts said.

Sandstorms whipped across a wide swath of China on Monday, forcing residents to don masks and scarves to protect themselves from the unhealthy grit.

One restored a Haitian president to power; the other flew him back out again.

Tens of thousands of demonstrators rallied on the National Mall and marched through the streets of the capital Sunday, waving American flags and holding homemade signs in English and Spanish.

A Chilean sailor returned four million pesos ($7,600) in cash he found inside an open safe amid the rubble of a house destroyed by last month’s devastating quake and tsunami.

Two men killed in a shootout between soldiers and gunmen near a prestigious university in this northern Mexican city were graduate students, not suspected drug traffickers, officials said.

Thailand Monday escalated its response to red-shirted protesters as their anti-government rally entered its second week, extending a tough security law and arming military guarding key sites.

Rarely does the government, that big, clumsy, poorly regarded oaf, pull off anything short of war that touches all lives with one act, one stroke of a president's pen. Such a moment has come.

A small earthquake struck northern Haiti early Sunday, collapsing an apartment building and killing at least three people, a U.N. spokesman said.

Triumph in their grasp, Obama and House Democrats demonstrated command of the votes needed to pass landmark health care legislation, a climactic chapter in a century-long quest for near universal coverage.

United States President Barack Obama renewed his administration’s offer of dialogue and diplomacy with Tehran on Saturday, a year after his offer of a new beginning with Iran failed to achieve concrete results.

Raj Kaliya Dhanuk sits on a wooden bench, barefoot, with a tattered sari covering thin arms as rough as bark.

Authorities evacuated hundreds of people after a volcano erupted beneath a glacier in southern Iceland, Iceland’s civil protection agency said Sunday.

Afghans have travelled from across their war-ravaged country to the northern city of Mazar-I-Sharif united behind one wish: That the advent of the new year will bring them peace.

Politicians, diplomats and thousands of supporters lined up for hours at a public stadium Sunday in Nepal’s capital to pay respect to Girija Prasad Koirala, the former prime minister remembered for leading efforts to bring democracy to the Himalayan nation.

The father of a five-year-old British boy held hostage for 12 days in Pakistan said Sunday the kidnappers had threatened to chop off parts of the boy’s body if he did not pay a ransom.