G-8 leaders focus on global warming

Leaders of the world’s leading industrialized nations are huddling with representatives of up-and-coming powerhouses to tackle global warming at an economic summit Thursday in Italy. U.S. President Barack Obama will lead the Major Economies Forum at the Group of Eight meetings in L’Aquila.

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Pope blasts capitalism ahead of G-8 meeting

Pope Benedict XVI, on the eve of a global economic summit, lashed out at modern capitalism for being shortsighted and short on ethics. “Today’s international economic scene, marked by grave deviations and failures, requires a profoundly new way of understanding business enterprise,” the pontiff said in his third encyclical letter, “Charity in Truth,” which was released Tuesday.

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World watches Michael Jackson memorial service

As the funeral for Michael Jackson got under way in California Tuesday, fans of the King of Pop gathered in locations across the globe to pay homage to their idol. Thousands of fans poured in to Los Angeles en route to the public memorial service at the Staples Center arena, while Jackson’s family and closest friends attended a private gathering at the Hollywood Hills Forest Lawn cemetery before going on to the memorial downtown.

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Jackson’s chimp Bubbles enjoys life out of public eye

Bubbles gained fame over two decades ago as Michael Jackson’s simian companion. Now at age 26, Bubbles has retired to the Center for Great Apes outside Wauchula, Florida. When Bubbles was 5 years old, he and Jackson toured Japan, where the chimp moonwalked for the media.

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Is a China Stock Bubble Forming?

When outlandish stock market events of 2009 are tallied up, the initial public offering in Hong Kong of Chinese herbal shampoo maker Bawang International will be a standout. Within 10 minutes of the June 22 opening of the subscription period for shares, one local brokerage, Bright Smart Securities, was swamped with the equivalent of $129 million in orders

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U.S., EU complain China puts "giant thumb" on trade

The European Union and United States accused China of restricting the export of key raw materials used in the production of steel and other industrial products in a complaint filed Tuesday with the World Trade Organization. China defended the practice Wednesday on environmental and conservation grounds.

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