Gingrich appears to have placed second in both contests with narrow leads over RomneyWASHINGTON (AP) ― Rick Santorum won the Alabama and Mississippi primaries Tuesday, helping him lock up his position as the chief conservative alternative to front-runner Mitt Romney in the race for the Republican nomination to challenge President Barack Obama.The victories were a blow to Romney, who was running third in both states and had hoped to show he could muster the support of evangelical Christian voters

ATHENS (AP) ― The Fitch ratings agency on Tuesday upgraded Greece out of “restricted default” after Athens carried out the biggest debt writedown in history in a bond swap with private creditors. International debt inspectors, however, warned the country’s recovery will be slower and harder than expected.The new “B-” rating, which applies to the new bonds issued under Greek law, is still junk status, meaning they are not investment grade despite the huge cut to Greece’s debt pile.Along with the

NEW YORK (AP) ― AT&T is offering to discuss a settlement to an iPhone user who won a small-claims case that alleged the company was slowing down his “unlimited” data service. In a letter dated Friday, a law firm retained by AT&T Inc. is threatening to shut off Matthew Spaccarelli’s phone service if he doesn’t sit down to talk. The phone company doesn’t say if the settlement would involve money beyond the $850 award the Simi Valley, California, resident won from the company in small claims court

Rick Santorum won the Alabama and Mississippi primaries Tuesday, helping him lock up his position as the chief conservative alternative to front-runner Mitt Romney in the race for the Republican nomination to challenge President Barack Obama.The victories were a blow to Romney, who was running third

DAMASCUS (AFP) ― Syrian President Bashar al-Assad responded Tuesday to U.N.-Arab League proposals for an end to the bloodshed in Syria even as monitors said nearly 50 more people were killed and a pro-regime daily reported the capture of a rebel city.U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, who met with Assad in Damascus over the weekend, said he had made “concrete” proposals to the Syrian leader on ways to halt the attacks and secure humanitarian access to cities where the United Nations says thousan

WASHINGTON (AFP) ― British Prime Minister David Cameron arrived in Washington Tuesday, to back President Barack Obama’s bid to cool “loose talk” over war with Iran and as Afghan war policy faces sharp scrutiny.Cameron became the first foreign leader to join Obama on Air Force One as the two leaders headed off to watch a college basketball game in Ohio, in a gesture meant by the White House to highlight a bond between the two men.The meat of the visit will come Wednesday as Obama welcomes Cameron

WASHINGTON (AP) ― The U.S. warned Tuesday that Sri Lanka risks renewed conflict unless it addresses war crimes allegations, while rights groups said that abuses by security forces continue, three years after fighting against Tamil rebels ended.Sri Lanka has reacted angrily to the growing international pressure to account for thousands of civilians suspected to have died in the final months of the quarter-century-long war, when government forces finally crushed the separatist Tamil Tigers.A new d

Jocko Besne, father of hundreds of thousands of the world's most productive dairy cattle, has died in France of natural causes aged 27, the farming cooperative which raised him said.Jocko was the sire -- literally in at least 161,888 and perhaps as many as 400,000 cases -- of the Prim'Holstein race

All but four of 19 major U.S. banks got a green light Tuesday from the Federal Reserve to boost their dividends and take other steps that will make their stocks more attractive to investors. The Fed declared them strong enough to survive a downturn worse than the Great Recession.The Fed’s findings s

NEW YORK (AP) ― PepsiCo Inc. revamped its management structure Monday in a move intended to strengthen its lineup of potential successors to CEO Indra Nooyi and leverage its scale as a global company. The management restructuring puts John Compton, who heads the company’s Americas foods division, in charge of all the company’s global groups in the newly created role of president. PepsiCo said Compton will also work with its regional groups for Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa to build br

TOKYO (AFP) -- The Bank of Japan on Tuesday boosted a loan program by almost $25 billion as part of efforts to kickstart the economy, while leaving the key interest rate unchanged at between zero and 0.1 percent.The central bank also said the country’s sluggish economy has shown signs of picking up as it announced a one-year extension to a loan program for banks in areas hit by last year’s earthquake and tsunami.The Bank of Japan said it would hike a lending program by about 2.0 trillion yen ($2

PARIS (AFP) ― Tentative signs of economic upturn are appearing in the eurozone but business activity is showing signs of flagging in China and Brazil, the OECD said on Monday. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said that the United States and Japan were leading improving growth prospects. “Stronger, albeit tenative” signals were evident in major economies and in the eurozone. But figures for China and Brazil were now below trend. The OECD’s composite index of leading indic