Within hours of President John F Kennedy’s assassination, most Americans were familiar with the name Lee Harvey Oswald. Certain images of him — posing with a rifle, recoiling from Jack Ruby’s gun — have been ingrained in memory. Yet he remains an enigma.

Iran’s supreme leader has strongly rejected proposals for direct talks with United States on its nuclear programme and other issues.

A blind Chinese activist whose escape from a rural village set off a diplomatic tussle between Beijing and Washington said today that he was at an airport waiting to leave for the United States.

US officials have said they are still trying to help a blind Chinese activist who says he fears for his family's safety, and denied he was pressured to leave the American Embassy to resettle inside China.

Four radical Islamists have admitted plotting a major pre-Christmas terror attack on the London Stock Exchange.

Four radical Islamists have admitted plotting a major pre-Christmas terror attack on the London Stock Exchange.

Four radical Islamists have today admitted an al-Qaida-inspired plot to detonate a bomb at the London Stock Exchange.

John Lee reports from Seoul on a 20-year protest by ‘Comfort Women’ and a nation’s refusal to forget

The American Embassy is warning an imminent terror attack in Kenya is possible.

The Taliban attacked the US Embassy, Nato headquarters and other buildings in the heart of Kabul today while suicide bombers struck police buildings.

Frequent bombings, assassinations and a resurgence in violence by Shiite militias have made Iraq more dangerous now than it was just a year ago, a US government watchdog concludes in a report released today.

AMONG some of the carefully selected gifts to be given to President Barack Obama on his first official visit to Ireland will be an oil painting by artist and former Miss Ireland Nuala Holloway.

Police in the Philippines have arrested a militant who is accused of involvement in a 2003 airport bombing in the country.

Two ferries evacuating some 4,500 Chinese nationals from Libya are heading for the island of Crete, authorities say.

WITH his leather jackets and messy, bleached hair, Julian Assange could be the edgy one in a fashionable indie band. In more ways than one, the WikiLeaks founder is the poster boy for today’s unthinking, whistleblowing brand of newsmaking, which is what currently passes for investigative reporting.

The American Embassy insisted today there is "nothing confirmed" about a visit by US President Barack Obama to Ireland.

THE US and Britain closed their embassies in Yemen yesterday in the face of al-Qaida threats, after both countries announced an increase in aid to the government to fight the terror group linked to the failed attempt to bomb a US airliner on Christmas.

Paris jazzed up the Eiffel Tower with a multicoloured, disco-style light display as the world basked in New Year’s festivities with hopes that 2010 and beyond will bring more peace and prosperity.

With the curtain poised to fall on his 24-year career in the saddle, Dale Gibson provided a fitting end to his penultimate act by visiting the winner's enclosure at York aboard Jeannie Galloway.

The Vietnamese dignitary who was credited with breaking Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban's baby adoption news is planning to sue the Australian magazine behind the scoop - insisting he was misquoted.

Nicole Kidman has taken aim at an Australian news magazine for suggesting she and husband Keith Urban are planning to adopt a Vietnamese baby.

The US and Libya sealed a historic turnaround after decades of terrorist killings, American retaliation, suspicions and insults with Condoleezza Rice’s peacemaking visit to mercurial strongman Muammar Gaddafi.

In a rare English-language message believed to be from al-Qaida’s No 2 leader, Ayman al-Zawahri claimed Pakistan was now “virtually ruled from the American Embassy”.

1986 is not a year most Irish people would like to relive. But the ESRI says we are on our way there, writes Caroline O’Doherty.

Chinese state media today accused the Dalai Lama of slamming the door on talks over Tibet’s future, an apparent response to rising international calls for Beijing to negotiate with Tibet’s exiled Buddhist leader.

Amy Winehouse will perform at Sunday's Grammy Awards via a live satellite TV link-up, after immigration officials banned her from travelling to the US.

A women wearing a suicide vest blew herself up near a popular market and a Shiite mosque in restive Diyala province north of the capital Baghdad today, killing eight civilians and wounding seven others, police said.

Developer Sean Dunne tonight unveiled ambitious plans for a 37-storey diamond shaped tower in Dublin 4.

ENDA KENNY delivered what many people considered his finest speech ever at the recent Fine Gael ard fheis during which he promised “a contract for a better Ireland.”

Gunmen carjacked a US Embassy vehicle on the outskirts of the Kenyan capital today, killing two women in the car, police said.

SEVERAL death threats were made against President John F Kennedy ahead of his official visit to Ireland in 1963, Government papers have revealed.

Armed Islamic militants attempted to storm the US Embassy in Damascus, Syria, today in a bold attack using automatic rifles, hand grenades and at least one van rigged with explosives.

Gunmen apparently blew up a car outside the US Embassy and exchanged fire with Syrian guards in a bold attack inside the diplomatic neighbourhood in Damascus today.

THE United States expects to evacuate more than 6,000 of its citizens fleeing Israeli air raids against Lebanon by Friday, the commander of the operation said yesterday.

AN American mother-of-two, who believes her missing son is in Ireland, has issued an appeal to the public to watch out for him this summer as they visit various holiday spots in the country.

HUNDREDS of foreign troops struggled to keep East Timor from tipping into civil war yesterday amid widening violence, including a mob attack that killed six relatives of a government minister and set his house ablaze.

The US Embassy and consulates in Saudi Arabia will close today and tomorrow because of a threat against US government buildings, the embassy has said.

Ireland and the United States today signed an international treaty in a bid to step up the fight against global crime and terror gangs.

Pressure was mounting on the US authorities today to lift the ban on American Air Force personnel entering London after last week’s terror attacks.

US citizens living in a residential compound in western Saudi Arabia have been put on high alert after the American Embassy issued an increased threat level warning, officials said today.

Three people were killed today after security forces stormed a building in a residential neighbourhood of Kuwait City and exchanged gunfire with suspected terrorists.

A team of US Marines have arrived in the Red Sea port of Jeddah to assist in security at the US Consulate that came under attack by Islamic militants, a American Embassy official said today.

Former US marine Toby Studabaker, who had sex with a 12-year-old British girl after “grooming” her on the internet, was jailed for four-and-a-half years today.

SOME 4,500 more American sailors and Marines have been ordered to position themselves closer to Liberia after at least 70 people were killed when heavy fighting engulfed the capital Monrovia yesterday.