World News

U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates says U.S. commanders in Afghanistan are recommending increased troop levels to help combat the growing Taleban insurgency. The recommendation comes on top of President Bush's decision to send an additional 20,000 U.S. troops to Iraq. Gates' comments came the same day NATO-led forces said they had captured a "prominent" Taleban commander during a raid in southern Afghanistan.

Democratic Senator Barack Obama, a rapidly rising star on America's political scene, has taken a first step toward a possible run for president in 2008.

Modern humans who first arose in Africa had moved into Europe as far back as about 45,000 years ago, according to a new study by an international research team led by the Russian Academy of Sciences and the University of Colorado at Boulder.

U.S. President George Bush is sending more troops to Iraq as part of what he says will be a new way forward. VOA White House Correspondent Scott Stearns looks at the president's changing approach to the conflict.

Blanket assertions that immigrants remain closely tied to their homelands and only partly integrate are questioned in a new study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. Researchers asked Arab community activists in Britain and the United States to share their views on citizenship, integration and multiculturalism.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has threatened to review relations with any country that criticized his government's execution of deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

Police in Spain have discovered a container with 100 kilograms of explosives in the northern Basque region. The discovery came five days after a car bomb, blamed on Basque separatists, destroyed a parking garage at Madrid airport, killing at least one person and injuring about 20.

A British Muslim on trial for soliciting murder and inciting racial hatred says he regrets urging bomb attacks on the United States and Denmark at a protest last year against cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad.

Romania and Bulgaria welcomed the New Year as the newest members of the European Union, expanding the bloc to 27 members.

Citizens of Romania and Bulgaria have celebrated the start of their European Union membership with fireworks, music and dancing in the streets.

The president of Iran dismissed U.N. sanctions imposed against his country as, in his words, "superficial" and "unimportant." He spoke in Tehran Sunday, one day after the U.N. Security Council unanimously approved measures aimed at persuading Iran to suspend its uranium enrichment program.

Iranian leaders have condemned the U.N. Security Council for imposing sanctions on its controversial nuclear program, vowing to speed up the development of it nuclear capabilities.

The U.N. Security Council has imposed sanctions on Iran for its suspect nuclear program. The vote came nearly four months after Iran defied an earlier Council deadline to halt uranium enrichment.

The United Nations Security Council has unanimously approved a resolution imposing sanctions on Iran for its nuclear program. Soon after Saturday's vote, a spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, called the resolution "illegal." He called Iran's nuclear programs "peaceful" and said they will continue.

The United Nations Security Council has unanimously approved a resolution imposing sanctions on Iran for its nuclear program.