The United States on Wednesday called for more transparency from China on the arrests of four mining employees, including an Australian national, on charges of stealing state secrets. U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke is raising the question with Chinese leaders, including Premier Wen Jiabao, with whom he is to meet Thursday in Beijing. "These are of great concern to U.S. investors and multinational companies from around the world that have projects here," Locke said in an interview with CNN's Andrew ...

London's Daily Mail newspaper paid for the interview, according to a source close to the Jackson family and another source familiar with the interview arrangements. The amount of money paid was not disclosed. LaToya Jackson was "very candid" throughout the four-hour interview, which took place in Los Angeles, California, last Thursday, said Caroline Graham, the Daily Mail reporter who conducted the interview. Jackson cited no evidence of a murder conspiracy, Graham said, but she did tell the paper the ...

Twenty milligrams; that's the average amount of carbon emissions generated from the time it took you to read the first two words of this article. Now, depending on how quickly you read, around 80, perhaps even 100 milligrams of C02 have been released. And in the several minutes it will take you to get to the end of this story, the number of milligrams of greenhouse gas emitted could be several thousand, if not more. This may not ...

The June 30 vote by a Food and Drug Administration advisory committee to lower the maximum dose of over-the-counter drugs containing acetaminophen and to eliminate prescription acetaminophen-combination painkillers raised questions about what changes consumers should expect in the availability of the popular drug. The commonly used pain- and fever-reliever known as Tylenol is found in several nonprescription cough and cold remedies including NyQuil and Theraflu. Patients also ask what potential dangers their daily use of acetaminophen may pose. ...

Michael Jackson spent the last night of his life doing what he had always done: performing. The singer was in rehearsals at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, running through a full slate of songs from his upcoming 50-concert London event flanked by friends and colleagues. He marveled at the major set pieces that had finally been installed in the rehearsal space. "He was just glowing, and you could see it, that he was finally seeing it all come ...

Members of Iran's influential National Security Council have told opposition leader Mir Hossein Moussavi that his repeated demands for the annulment of the June 12 election results are "illogical and unethical," state media reported. Esmaeel Kowsari told the government-run Iranian Labor News Agency in an interview Friday that the council met with Moussavi, former presidential candidates Mehdi Karrubi and Mohsen Rezaie, and former Iran President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who now chairs the Assembly of Experts. The assembly is ...

Anyone stepping outside in Beijing around midday on June 18 would have noticed something slightly amiss. The sky was dark enough for cars to use their headlights, and the air was as thick as a smoky bar just before last call. After one of the cleanest springs on record, the Chinese capital's air quality took an unhealthy plunge for the worse. You wouldn't have known it by the official numbers. The Ministry of Environmental Protection publishes air quality data online each day at noon, ...

Anti-secrecy campaigners have criticized a decision by UK lawmakers to censor a report on their expenses claims, some of which was leaked earlier amid huge public outcry. The online publication on Thursday is the result of a newspaper filing a freedom of information request to see the claims by MPs, but some of the information is blacked out. The redaction prompted criticism from campaigners seeking transparancy. "A great deal of information has been censored so today's move will do nothing ...

Billy Joel and his wife, Katie Lee Joel, are separating. "After nearly five years of marriage, Billy Joel and Katie Lee Joel have decided to separate," a joint statement on behalf of the pair said. "This decision is a result of much thoughtful consideration. Billy and Katie remain caring friends with admiration and respect for each other." Billy Joel, 60, and Katie Lee Joel, 27, were married in 2004. Billy Joel is the multimillion-selling musician behind such albums as ...

Man-made climate change threatens to stress water resources, challenge crops and livestock, raise sea levels and adversely affect human health, according to a report released by the Obama administration on Tuesday. The nearly 200-page document on global climate change -- released by the White House science adviser and mandated by Congress -- does not include new research, but encompasses several recent studies on the effects of global warming over the last half century. Among the report's key findings are an ...