World News: Armed gang abducts wife and teens

At least 14 armed men abducted the Filipino wife of a German national and her teenage son and nephew today in the southern Philippines near a stronghold of al-Qaida-linked militants, officials said.

Police said the assailants seized Gerfa Yeatts Lunsmann, 50, her 14-year-old son and her 19-year-old nephew from a house in Zamboanga city's Tictabon island village before dawn, fleeing in two motorboats.

Pro-Assad thugs attack US embassy in Damascus

Hundreds of Syrian government supporters have attacked the US embassy in Damascus, smashing windows and spray-painting walls with obscenities and graffiti that called the American ambassador a "dog."

Guards at the French embassy fired in the air to ward off another group of protesters.

Yesterday's trouble followed a visit last week by the US and French ambassadors to the city of Hama, a stronghold of opposition to authoritarian President Bashar Assad.

Syrian authorities were angered by the visit and American Ambassador Robert Ford's harsh criticism afterward of the government crackdown on a four-month-old uprising.

Ford's residence was also attacked yesterday.

The US and France both accused Syrian forces of being too slow to respond to the attacks and demanded the government abide by its international obligations to protect diplomatic missions and allow envoys freedom of movement.

The U.S. formally protested, calling the attacks "outrageous".

US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton said Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had "lost legitimacy".

Chavez tells of cancer fight

Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez has told how he turned to German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche in his efforts to beat cancer.

"I find myself before my highest mountain and my longest walk," Chavez said on Twitter, quoting Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

Gunmen blow up terminal

Masked gunmen blew up a terminal of the Egyptian natural gas pipeline to Israel and Jordan this morning, security officials said.

The attackers ordered the guards on duty to leave and then blew up the terminal, starting a huge fire that sent flames shooting into the air that lit up the night sky, according to the officials. There were no casualties, they said.

The terminal is located in the city of El-Arish in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula.

Iraqi vice president quits

One of Iraq's three vice presidents resigned in an apparent attempt to distance himself from what is seen as an increasingly dysfunctional government.

Shia vice president Adel Abdul-Mahdi, a member of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council gave no formal reason was given for his resignation after four years in office.

Snow traps thousands

The worst snow in Bolivia in the last 20 years has left thousands of people stranded.

The Bolivian government has appealed for help from neighbouring countries.

It says it needs helicopters to drop aid to isolated communities in the usually dry highlands of Potosi in the south-west.