LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Burger King Holdings Inc agreed to sell itself to investment firm 3G Capital for $3.26 billion, giving the No. 2 U.S. fast-food chain breathing room to fix its business and close the gap with leader McDonald's Corp.

LAHORE, Pakistan (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund will give Pakistan $450 million in emergency flood aid, providing some relief for a government overwhelmed by the disaster and facing renewed militant violence.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas claimed responsibility for killing four Jewish settlers in the West Bank in an attack that blighted a Middle East peace summit before it even began in Washington on Wednesday.

MANILA (Reuters) - Philippine police shot dead a sacked former policeman as they stormed a bus on which he was holding 15 Hong Kong tourists hostage in central Manila on Monday, and the government said eight hostages were killed.

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Four decapitated and mutilated corpses were strung from a bridge in a popular getaway outside the Mexican capital on Sunday, the latest atrocity as the country battles an escalating drug war.

MIAMI (Reuters) - A pair of wealthy outsiders who spent their way to prominence in Florida's Senate and governor's races now lag behind the political insiders backed by the party hierarchies in Tuesday's primary election.

DETROIT (Reuters) - Mazda Motor Corp will recall 215,000 Mazda 3 and Mazda 5 vehicles sold in the United States because of the risk that they could lose power steering without warning.

NEW YORK/DETROIT (Reuters) - General Motors Co is unlikely to file for its initial public offering on Tuesday, three people familiar with the situation said.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A manager at Apple Inc has been charged in California with taking kickbacks he received after leaking corporate secrets to Asian companies that supplied iPhone and iPod accessories, court documents showed.

MIAMI (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Colin reformed over the Atlantic Ocean on Thursday and was moving northwest on a path that could take it close to Bermuda, where authorities issued a tropical storm warning, the National Hurricane Center said.

HOUSTON (Reuters) - BP pumped heavy drilling mud into its blown-out Gulf of Mexico well on Tuesday in a "static kill" operation it hopes will help permanently plug the world's worst accidental marine oil spill.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran has rejected President Barack Obama's plea to release three Americans arrested more than a year ago near the Iraq border, the foreign ministry said, insisting that justice would take its course.

GUADALAJARA, Mexico (Reuters) - Mexican soldiers killed drug boss Ignacio "Nacho" Coronel on Thursday, the first major triumph this year for President Felipe Calderon's war against drug cartels but one that is unlikely to end spiraling violence.

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Suspected drug hitmen have kidnapped four Mexican journalists who were reporting on organized crime in northern Mexico, the latest attempt by cartels to silence the media, a Mexican media group said on Wednesday.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Boeing Co reported a higher-than-expected quarterly net profit on Wednesday as the commercial airplane market recovers from a downturn, but its shares slipped 2 percent as revenue fell short of estimates.

OUTPOST NOLEN, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Elite U.S. special forces soldiers are relieving insurgent pressure on American outposts in the volatile Arghandab Valley with a series of night attacks on suspected Taliban hideouts.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Prosecutors portrayed former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich on Tuesday as corrupt and bent on enriching himself but his lawyers said he was a talkative dreamer with no intention of doing anything illegal.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - State tax revenue is improving, but only slightly, and may not be enough to end steep spending cuts or replace the loss of assistance from the federal stimulus plan that expires in December, according to a report on Tuesday.

SAN CRISTOBAL, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuela said it beefed up its troop presence along the border with Colombia as its neighbor's incoming finance minister vowed on Monday to restore trade between the feuding Andean nations.

MANILA (Reuters) - A strong earthquake and a series of aftershocks struck off the southern Philippines on Saturday, officials said, but they occurred at such great depths that their impact dissipated and there were no reports of casualties or damage.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Vice President Joe Biden said on Friday "the hard lifting" is done for the year and now it is time for Democrats to campaign on their achievements ahead of November 2 congressional elections.

HANOI (Reuters) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged Asia on Friday to enforce tough sanctions against North Korea, which hit back by threatening a "physical response" to Washington's plans for joint military drills with South Korea.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Wednesday released former media baron Conrad Black from prison on $2 million bond, while she decides whether to throw out his 2007 conviction for defrauding shareholders.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Several hundred people were briefly evacuated from the Statue of Liberty on Wednesday after a faulty sensor detected smoke.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A "scared" but resolute Lindsay Lohan began a 90-day jail sentence on Tuesday, trading nightclubs and Twitter messages for a small, isolated cell and an orange jumpsuit.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Carte Goodwin, a former top aide to West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin, was sworn in on Tuesday to temporarily replace the late U.S. Senator Robert Byrd, returning Democrats' control of the Senate to 59-41.

BEIJING (Reuters) - A Chinese worker at an affiliate of Foxconn Technology, which has suffered 10 suicides this year, died on Tuesday after falling from the sixth floor of a dormitory building in Guangdong Province, Xinhua news agency reported.

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced more than $500 million in new aid projects for Pakistan on Monday, which Washington hopes will help win over a skeptical public in an ally vital to winning the war in neighboring Afghanistan.

HOUSTON/LONDON (Reuters) - Energy giant BP Plc can extend a test on its capped Macondo oil well in the Gulf of Mexico after determining that nearby seepage is not related to the test, a U.S. official said on Monday.

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Motorola Inc is close to selling most of its wireless-network equipment business to Nokia Siemens Networks for $1.2 billion, a source familiar with the matter said on Sunday.

TORONTO (Reuters) - Apple Inc appears to be deliberately distorting the issues surrounding the iPhone 4's antenna design by asserting that Research In Motion's BlackBerry has similar reception problems, RIM said.

BOSTON (Reuters) - New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, one of the richest men in America, says his views are too polarizing for him to become president of the United States.

OUTPOST JELAWUR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Rising smoke and two muted booms bring the first sign of trouble for Lieutenant Laura Jonikaitis's supply convoy, stalled on a narrow main road in volatile Arghandab district.

CUPERTINO, California (Reuters) - A defiant Steve Jobs on Friday rejected any suggestion the iPhone 4's design was flawed, but offered consumers free phone cases to address reception complaints that have hurt Apple Inc's image and shares.

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Israel must agree to the idea of a third party guarding the borders of a future Palestinian state before direct peace talks can start.

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece's central bank chief said he expected the country's lenders to smoothly pass European Union stress tests to be published next week.

SULAIMANIYA, Iraq (Reuters) - A fire at a hotel in the northern Iraqi city of Sulaimaniya, possibly triggered by a gas leak or electric fault, killed 30 people, including many foreigners, and injured 22, police said Friday.

LONDON (Reuters) - BP confirmed on Thursday it had lobbied the British government in late 2007 over a Prisoner Transfer Agreement with Libya because it was concerned a slow resolution would impact an offshore drilling deal with Libya.

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Pirate attacks globally declined by nearly a fifth in the first half of 2010 from the same period last year due to a strong naval presence in the Gulf of Aden, a maritime watchdog said on Thursday.

LONDON (Reuters) - The European Union's relationship with the United States is not living up to its potential, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said in an interview published on Thursday.

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's economy slowed in the second quarter as the government steered monetary and fiscal policy back to normal after a record credit surge last year to counter the global crisis.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former Vice President Dick Cheney, who has a long history of heart problems, said on Wednesday he has had a new heart pump implanted.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama sought on Wednesday to lift sagging confidence in his economic stewardship by enlisting the help of predecessor Bill Clinton, as a leading business group issued a scathing critique of the administration's policies.

GAITHERSBURG, Md (Reuters) - GlaxoSmithKline Plc's diabetes drug Avandia should be allowed to stay on the market but with additional warnings, U.S. health advisers recommended on Wednesday, easing a threat of further costly litigation that could have followed a ban.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - An Iranian nuclear scientist, who emerged in Washington saying he had been abducted by U.S. agents, was heading for an official welcome in Iran Wednesday in a murky tale that goes to the heart of U.S.-Iranian mistrust.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Democrats on Tuesday appeared to nail down the votes needed to approve a historic overhaul of U.S. financial regulations and set up a final vote by the end of the week.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday he was prepared to discuss "right away" the future of Jewish settlements if Palestinians entered direct peace talks with Israel.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama called for a level playing field for U.S. companies in China on Wednesday and pledged to push ahead with free trade deals with three other nations.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration on Tuesday sued Arizona over the state's strict new immigration law, attempting to wrestle back control over the issue but infuriating Republicans who said the border required more security.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The U.S. military said on Tuesday it had charged a soldier in connection with the leak of a classified video showing a 2007 helicopter attack that killed a dozen people in Iraq, including two Reuters journalists. Army Specialist Bradley Manning, 22, was charged with two criminal counts including allegations he disclosed classified national defense information, exceeded his authorized access to U.S. computers and transferred classified data onto his personal computer, the mili