WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- President-elect Barack Obama's team says it will enhance the U.S. government's networking skills -- make that social networking skills -- on the Internet.
LONDON, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- The New Year's Honors List announced Wednesday includes a controversial knighthood for the civil servant who shaped recent British financial policy.
PRAGUE, Czech Republic, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Czech Vice Prime Minister for European Union Affairs Alexandr Vondra will launch the Czech EU presidency in the first minute of the new year, officials said.
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- The eastern Canadian city of Halifax will stop giving free bus passes to the blind next summer, as officials deem it unfair to people with other disabilities.
CAIRO, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Arab League members met Wednesday in Cairo to formulate a response to Israel's airstrikes against Palestinian militants in Gaza, observers said.
CHICAGO, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Attorney William J. Quinlan, general counsel to Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich for the last four years, said he was resigning to return to private practice.
BRUSSELS, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Flemish Christian Democrat Herman Van Rompuy has been sworn in as Belgium's new prime minister, heading a five-party coalition government, officials said.
BAGHDAD, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- British and Australian troops will leave Iraq in July under withdrawal agreements approved by the countries' leaders, the Iraqi Defense Ministry said.
LONDON, Ontario, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- The presidential inauguration of Barack Obama in Washington next month will be marked by a Canadian fine-dining restaurant gala in London, Ontario.
SEATTLE, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Three of the nine U.S. avalanche deaths during the past 17 days have been on patrolled slopes, prompting forecasters to call condition of the snow pack dicey.
JERUSALEM, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- A big majority of Israelis support launching a ground invasion of the Gaza Strip targeting the militant Palestinian group Hamas, a survey indicates.
WAVELAND, Miss., Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Housing advocates say Hurricane Katrina victims about to be forced out of U.S. government-supplied cottages in Mississippi will have no place to go.
TORONTO, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Seventeen people visiting Toronto's landmark CN Tower spent four hours being buffeted by high winds in a glass elevator that stalled 1,000 feet up.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- U.S. troop deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan were at their lowest combined yearly total since the Iraq war began as 2008 comes to a close, officials said.
KAMPALA, Uganda, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army rebels say they didn't massacre more than 400 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo as has been alleged.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Revelers across the United States mark the beginning of 2009 with a variety of items dropped from the sky, or at least a really tall pole.
NEW YORK, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- A lobbyist says The New York Times falsely implied that she had a romantic relationship with U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and is suing the newspaper.
OTTAWA, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Two people in Ottawa were recovering Wednesday after a single bullet passed through a woman's chest and then struck a friend in the face, police said.
BAGHDAD, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- U.S. troops accustomed to staging mass arrests of suspected Iraqi insurgents will be forced to acquire warrants as part of a new security deal, officials say.
HARARE, Zimbabwe, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- A Zimbabwean judge ordered 14 activists to remain in jail as the African nation's Supreme Court prepares to hear charges against them, observers say.
TORONTO, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- A Canadian charter flight made an emergency landing in the Dominican Republic after a passenger tried to open a door and had to be tied up.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- The U.S. government was properly holding two detainees at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, military prison, a federal judge in Washington ruled.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- If Democratic leaders try to block Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich's appointment to fill a vacant Senate seat they may run afoul of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
GAZA, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- Israel officials said Wednesday its military campaign in Gaza would continue, rejecting a French proposal for a truce for humanitarian reasons.
Former President George W. Bush, joined by his wife Laura Bush, looks at his official White House portrait during it's unveiling ceremony in the East Room at the White House in Washington on May 31, 2012. UPI/Kevin Dietsch
