Elite Iraqi troops deployed to secure the US embassy Thursday, a day after a pro-Iran mob laid siege to it in dramatic scenes that overshadowed months of anti-government grassroots protests. The unprecedented attack on the American mission in Baghdad -- in which intruders threw rocks, laid...

An Iraqi activist was shot dead overnight in Baghdad, a police source told AFP Thursday, as anti-government rallies carried on despite a separate day-long siege of the U.S. embassy. The activist, Saadoun al-Luhaybi, was shot in the head in a southwestern neighbourhood of the Iraqi capital,...

Four people died as Indonesia's capital was hit by flooding, a disaster agency official said Wednesday, while local media reported landslides sparked by torrential rain on New Year's Eve had killed several more residents. Electricity was switched off in hundreds of waterlogged...

Hong Kong was readying for a massive pro-democracy rally Wednesday after seeing in the New Year with an evening of peaceful protests that morphed into tear gas-choked clashes between hardcore demonstrators and police. The city has been battered by more than six months of unrest with...