The U.S. Department of Energy said as much as $20 million was available for researchers to examine ways to protect the energy sector from cyberattacks.U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu said the funding would target the development of tools and technology to protect delivery systems for oil, natural gas and electricity from cyberattacks."By developing new cybersecurity tools and technologies specifically designed for the needs of the energy sector, utilities and industry will be better equipped to

The European Union predicted Friday that the economy of the 17 member countries that use the euro will shrink again in 2013 even though it will see its fortunes improve in the second half of the year.In its winter forecast, the EU Commission, the EU's executive arm, said the eurozone is likely to shrink a further 0.3 percent this year, in contrast to November's prediction of 0.1 percent growth.Across the eurozone, it said the debt crisis and the associated belt-tightening are weighing on activit

North Korea staged a huge rally in its capital Pyongyang on Thursday to celebrate its third nuclear test conducted two days ago, hailing it as a "success," according to the North's media.Photos provided by the North's Korean Central News Agency showed huge crowds cheering to mark the underground atomic test, which has drawn a chorus of worldwide condemnation and warnings of tougher sanctions against the North.It was the first nuclear test under young leader Kim Jong-un, who took the helm of Nort

Unemployment in Greece rose to a record 27 percent in November as separate surveys on Thursday showed the country remains stuck in recession and predicted nearly a third of the population would be in poverty by the end of the year.The Statistics Agency said unemployment increased from a rate of 26.6 percent in October and 20.8 percent in November the previous year. More than 30,000 people lost their job in November, the agency said, with the jobless rate accelerating from earlier in the year.Wor

The recession across the economy of the 17 European Union countries that use the euro deepened in the last three months of 2012 as Germany faltered in the face of anemic demand across the debt-ridden region.Eurostat, the EU's statistics office, said Thursday the eurozone economy shrank by 0.6 percent in the final quarter of 2012 from the previous three-month period. The decline was bigger than the 0.4 percent drop expected in markets and represented the biggest fall since the first quarter of 20

President-elect Park Geun-hye on Thursday called for future-oriented ties with Japan, saying historical issues stemming from Tokyo's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula should not get in the way, according to her spokeswoman.Park met with former Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono, who in 1993 made an official apology to women who were forced into sexual slavery for Japan's World War II soldiers. The issue of the former sex slaves, euphemistically called "comfort women," has long been

Delegations from some 140 countries have agreed to adopt a ground-breaking treaty limiting the use of health-hazardous mercury, the Swiss foreign ministry said Saturday.The world's first legally binding treaty on mercury, reached after a week of thorny talks, will aim to reduce global emission levels of the toxic heavy metal also known as quicksilver, which poses risks to human health and the environment."The new treaty aims to reduce the production and the use of mercury, especially in the prod

Serena Williams says Lance Armstrong let all athletes down by doping and lying about it for so long, while No. 1-ranked Victoria Azarenka says the disgraced cyclist ``deserves everything he gets.'' Williams and Azeranka, speaking Saturday after their third-round wins at the Australian Open, said Armstrong's confession after such vehement denials cast doubt over other sports. ``I think a lot of people now look and are like, `OK, if somebody (is) that great, what about everyone else in every other

U.S. lawmakers geared up for a tough budget battle Saturday after Republicans agreed to a three-month increase to the U.S. debt ceiling but made further extensions of the government's borrowing authority conditional on steep spending cuts.   The Republican-led House of Representatives will hold a vote next week on the temporary measure, Majority Leader Eric Cantor announced at the end of his party's two-day work retreat outside Washington.The move could help defuse a fiscal time bomb that Congre

The South Korean stock market is likely to be weighed down by the effects of a U.S. fund manager's decision to gradually exclude Seoul shares from its benchmark index, analysts said Saturday.The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) finished at 1,987.85 this week, down 0.44 percent from a week earlier.The KOSPI, which started this week on the 2,000 level, lost ground, dogged by concerns over U.S. debt ceiling talks and Vanguard Group's move to switch into a benchmark index which ex

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her Japanese counterpart, Fumio Kishida, agreed Friday that the U.N. Security Council should work out a strong measure against North Korea for its December rocket launch "as expeditiously as possible." "On North Korea, we shared our joint commitment to strong action in the U.N. Security Council," Clinton said at a joint press conference with Kishida after their talks here. It was the first meeting between the two since Japan embraced the conservative g

Saudi King Abdullah appointed 30 women to the previously all-male consultative Shura Council in decrees published on Friday, marking a historic first as he pushes reforms in the ultra-conservative kingdom.The decrees, published by the official SPA news agency, give women a 20 percent quota in the Shura Council, a body appointed by the king to advise him on policy and legislation.One decree amended an article in the council's statute to give women representation on the body while the other named

The death of a South Korean diplomat in Saudi Arabia last week has been confirmed to be a result of a car accident, Seoul's foreign ministry said Friday, quoting a Saudi police report.The South Korean consular official, only identified by his surname Kim, was found dead inside his car, which had tumbled down an embankment near a motorway in the Saudi Arabian capital city of Riyadh on Jan. 2."Local police concluded that the consular official's death was caused by the accident," a foreign ministry

South Korea has been working closely with the United States to reclaim its wartime operational command from Washington in 2015 as scheduled, the U.S. Army chief of staff said Friday.Gen. Raymond Odierno was in Seoul for a two-day trip which included a meeting with his South Korean counterpart, Gen. Cho Jung-hwan. The topics included ways to strengthen the allies’ deterrence against North Korea  after the planned transfer of operational command."I'm very confident that South Korea is more than ca