EUROPE - The financial crisis spreading like wildfire across the former Soviet bloc threatens to set off a second and more dangerous banking crisis in Western Europe, tipping the whole Continent into a fully-fledged economic slump.
USA - Uncle Sam has a new name on Wall Street — Sugar Daddy.
HONG KONG — World markets resumed their slide Monday, with Japan's Nikkei stock index falling to a 26-year low, as government rescue measures failed to ease fears of a prolonged global recession.
LONDON - Oil fell to a new 17-month low below $62 a barrel on Monday, driven down by investor pessimism about the deteriorating global economic climate and its likely impact on demand for fuel.
DAMASCUS, SYRIA - US military helicopters attacked an area along Syria's border with Iraq Sunday, killing eight people, the Syrian government said.
FARGO, NORTH DAKOTA - Here is an excerpt of the homily given Sunday by Bishop Samuel Aquila of Fargo at the Cathedral of St Mary.
VATICAN - Beginning with the outreach of Blessed John XXIII to our Orthodox brethren, continuing through the reigns of Paul VI and Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras, both of blessed memory, through the reign of John Paul the Great, and now with Benedict XVI and Patriarch Bartholomew I (both gloriously reigning), no true Christian, Catholic or Orthodox, can but feel the power of the Holy Spirit animating and at work in the growing union in charity of our two Churches.
AUSTRIA - A day after Jörg Haider's protégé stepped down as leader of the far-right Alliance for the Future of Austria - having all but admitted that Haider was gay - reports emerge that the late politician's widow wants a new autopsy to investigate his death.
UK - The Government faces growing calls for a windfall tax as oil giants BP and Royal Dutch Shell prepared to announce profits of nearly £6 million an hour.
USA - General Motors is 100 years old this year, but its chances of reaching 101 as an independent company seem to be diminishing.
WASHINGTON — The bailout is now the hottest lobbying game in town. Insurers, automakers and American subsidiaries of foreign banks all want the Treasury Department to cut them a piece of the largest government rescue in U.S. history.
SHIBAM, YEMEN - Mohammed bin Gohar saw an old woman drowning in flood waters from a deadly tropical storm in southern Yemen, but couldn't save her. He was carrying his two kids and running with his wife to escape the deluge.
USA - The Pentagon has put out a request to contractors to develop teams of robots that can search for, detect and track "non-cooperative" humans in "pursuit/evasion scenarios". The request, which can be read on the Department of Defense Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program website here, calls for a "Multi-Robot Pursuit System" to be operated by one person.
USA - Wall Street clawed back heavy early losses to close down 312.3 points on the 79th anniversary of the Wall Street Crash of 1929 as investors reacted to a global stock market rout driven by rising fears of a worldwide recession.
USA - The banking crisis is upending American dominance of the financial markets and world politics. The industrialized countries are sliding into recession, the era of turbo-capitalism is coming to an end and US military might is ebbing. Still, this is no time to gloat.