The United States has urged Nepal's leaders to respect promises to pursue peace as a UN mission prepares to leave the fragile nation which suffered a 10-year civil war.

The speaker of Nepal's parliament on Thursday urged lawmakers to find a way to end a political deadlock that has left the country without a government for more than six months.

After 60 years in exile in Switzerland, Duchess Marie-Christine von Habsburg, 87, is living out her golden years as a tenant in two rooms of her family's vast palace in southern Poland.

The head of a departing UN peace mission in Nepal on Monday urged political leaders to agree on new arrangements for monitoring thousands of former Maoist fighters in camps across the country.

A UN mission set up to oversee Nepal's post-war transition will close later this week, as fears rise that a failure to fulfil pledges made at the end of the conflict is threatening lasting peace.

A UN mission set up to oversee Nepal's post-war transition will close later this week, as fears rise that a failure to fulfil pledges made at the end of the conflict is threatening lasting peace.

Violence by Maoist rebels in India peaked in 2010, leaving a record 1,169 people dead, government figures show.

Protesters rallied across Italy Tuesday against the Brazilian president's refusal to extradite ex-militant Cesare Battisti, amid government assurances that relations with Brazil will not be affected.

The wife of a medical doctor sentenced to life imprisonment on charges of helping India's Maoist insurgents said Tuesday she would like to seek asylum in a "liberal democratic country."

On his final day in office, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva sparked a diplomatic row by refusing to extradite an Italian fugitive wanted by Rome for a string of murders in the 1970s.

Nepal's peace process is at crossroads, the head of the United Nations has warned, just two weeks before the planned closure of a UN peace mission in the troubled country.

International academics on Tuesday joined civil rights groups in condemning an Indian court for sentencing a doctor to life imprisonment on charges of helping Maoist rebels.

Indian court sentences human rights activist to life in prison for helping communist rebels. An Indian court has convicted a human rights activist of aiding communist rebels in eastern India and sentenced him to life in prison, his attorney said Saturday.

Amnesty International has attacked the Indian judiciary for sentencing a doctor to life imprisonment on charges of helping Maoist rebels, warning the verdict could further stoke unrest.

An Indian doctor was sentenced to life imprisonment on Friday after being convicted of helping Maoist rebels in a case criticised by rights groups and Nobel laureates.

An Indian doctor was sentenced to life imprisonment on Friday after being convicted of helping Maoist rebels in a case that has drawn widespread international attention.

RAIPUR, India (Reuters) - An Indian court sentenced a doctor accused of links with Maoist rebels to life in prison on Friday, a high-profile case involving appeals by Nobel laureates for the world's biggest democracy to uphold human rights.

An Indian court was expected to hand down a verdict Friday in the trial of a medical doctor accused of helping Maoists rebels in a case that has drawn widespread international attention.

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's opposition accused President Hugo Chavez on Wednesday of a "coup d'etat" after the outgoing parliament gave him the power to rule by decree for 18 months and pushed through a host of new laws.

Young Bulgarian artists are staging an event in Sofia this weekend which pokes fun at a communist past they are too young to remember.