World News Host

AP - The country that gave the world chewing gum is getting gummed up: The average square yard (meter) of Mexico City sidewalk has 70 blobs of discarded chew.

AP - I live alone in my office. My wife and two young children moved in with her father after our apartment was shattered. The neighborhood mosque, where I have prayed since I was a child, had its roof blown off. All the government buildings on my beat have been obliterated.

AP - “Keep your phone switched on,” a handler instructs a gunman by phone in the midst of the Mumbai siege, “so that we can hear the gunfire.”

AFP - Alex Ferguson said Manchester United were lucky to still be on course for five trophies this season after their shock 1-0 League Cup semi-final, first leg defeat against Derby County.

AP - Israel resumed its Gaza offensive Wednesday, bombing heavily around suspected smuggling tunnels near the border with Egypt after a three-hour lull to allow in humanitarian aid. Hamas responded with a rocket barrage. Despite the heavy fighting, strides were made on the diplomatic front with the U.S. throwing its weight behind a deal being brokered by France and Egypt.

AFP - The United States is in preliminary talks with India over the sale of missile shield systems to help New Delhi guard against nuclear threats, the Financial Times reported Thursday.

AP - President Hugo Chavez on Wednesday criticized the U.S. government for not stopping Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip and expressed hope the conflict will ease under the incoming administration.

AP - The Security Council failed to agree on action to end the escalating crisis in Gaza on Wednesday, but the U.S. threw its weight behind a cease-fire initiative and Egypt announced it will host separate talks with Israel and Hamas on the proposal.

AP - As of Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2009, at least 4,223 members of the U.S. military had died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

AP - Seven members of Zimbabwe’s main opposition party were the first of dozens of jailed dissidents to be formally charged Wednesday, and they pleaded not guilty in a bombing plot.