JERUSALEM (AP) ― Israel’s prime minister on Tuesday ordered new parliamentary elections in early 2013, roughly eight months ahead of schedule, setting the stage for a lightning quick campaign that will likely win him re-election.For nearly four years, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has presided over a conservative coalition that has proven stable in a country where governments rarely serve out a full term. Re-election could grant him a fresh mandate to continue his tough stance toward Iran’s

ROSWELL, New Mexico (AP) ― Extreme athlete Felix Baumgartner canceled his planned death-defying 37-kilometer free fall Tuesday because of high winds, the second time this week he was forced to postpone his quest to be the first supersonic skydiver. The former military parachutist from Austria had planned to ride a pressurized capsule carried aloft by a 55-story, ultra-thin helium balloon into the stratosphere, and then jump in a specially designed suit. But high winds led to the decision shortly

MEXICO CITY (AP) ― The death of the founder and leader of Mexico’s brutal Zetas cartel in a firefight with marines outside a baseball game near the Texas border was perhaps the biggest coup of President Felipe Calderon’s war on drugs. But triumph turned to embarrassment when authorities lost the body. Officials still haven’t found the remains of Heriberto Lazcano, which were snatched from a funeral home and whisked away by gunmen in a hijacked hearse hours after the Zetas strongman died in a hai

NEW YORK (AP) ― A Frenchman and an American shared the Nobel Prize in physics Tuesday for inventing methods to peer into the bizarre quantum world of ultra-tiny particles, work that could help in creating a new generation of super-fast computers. Serge Haroche of France and American David Wineland opened the door to new experiments in quantum physics in the 1990s by showing how to observe individual atoms and particles of light called photons while preserving their quantum properties. Quantum ph

A large accidental explosion of ammunition at a Russian military test site near Orenburg caused more than 10,000 residents to flee from their homes.The explosion of more than 4,000 tons of shells, including bombs and rockets, released giant clouds of smoke over the region and injured one military officer near the site, according to local reports.Russian military prosecutor Yebgeny Ivanov told local media that the enormous blasts were set off by a fire that may have been caused by someone smoking

(MCT)A New York married couple is on trial on a charge they brought the wife's niece from El Salvador to New York to force her to bear a child for them.Angelica and Javier Mencias, who live in the Richmond Hill neighborhood in Queens, were arrested in 2010, the New York Post reported. Their trial on charges of rape and child endangerment began last week.Investigators say the niece, then 15, arrive

RICHLANDS, Australia (UPI) -- An Australian teenager faces an attempted murder charge after she allegedly gave two brothers brownies doused with household cleaners.The mother of the two boys, ages 12 and 13, said one of them realized immediately after biting into a brownie that something was wrong with it, The Courier-Mail of Brisbane reported. Neither suffered any ill effects. The 14-year-old gir

(123rf)WELLINGTON, New Zealand (UPI) -- A New Zealand woman mistakenly taken for being pregnant by an airline attendant got an apology from the airline -- and $100 off her next flight. Kelsey Hughes, 21, was boarding a flight from Wellington to Christchurch in New Zealand when a Jetstar flight attendant asked to see a doctor‘s note saying she was approved to fly while pregnant.Hughes said she was

Brazil‘s Supreme Court convicted three top aides of former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s of graft related to a vote-buying scheme in Congress.Lula‘s ex-chief of staff Jose Dirceu was found guilty by six of the 10 judges in connection with the scheme that ran from 2002 to 2005 during the popular president’s first term, a court spokesman said.The head of Lula‘s ruling Workers’ Party (PT) at the time, former guerrilla Jose Genoino, and its treasurer, Delubio Soares, were also convicted on c

Madhavi, 12, of Hyderabad, the capital of Andhra Pradesh state in southern India, is an aspiring poet.“I love music and poetry,” she says. “When I grow up, I want to teach poetry to little children.”But the girl’s own childhood was far from poetic. Deep scars on Madhavi’s face mark the time a dog mauled her at age 2 while she was living on the streets with her mother, who earned a living as a sex worker.Yet Madhavi’s eyes shine as she smiles and dreams about her future.“To be a schoolteacher and