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Myanmar's Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi on Tuesday began an emotional visit to Britain, where she left her family 24 years ago and took up her famous struggle against the military dictatorship in her homeland.

Twenty-four years ago Aung San Suu Kyi left Europe for what was then a military-controlled nation called Burma. She returns Wednesday the icon of Myanmar's democracy movement to a continent eager to hear from her whether the country's recent reforms truly spell the end of its cruel dictatorship....

Concerns over a slowdown in the world's biggest economies hit world markets on Friday, with weak indicators out of China and Europe's financial turmoil unsettling investors ahead of a crucial U.S. jobs report.

China is keen to contribute to a fund to bail out the euro zone, its trade minister said, underscoring the Asian powerhouse's growing interest in playing a bigger role in the global economy as its financial strength grows.

The European Union might appear a military superpower, at least on paper. It has more uniformed personnel than the United States and overall EU defense spending outstrips Russia or China.

VIENNA (Reuters) - China will remain part of international efforts to help Europe through its crisis, vice foreign minister Fu Ying said on Saturday, dismissing the idea that Beijing was sitting back as the region suffered.

Asian stocks slumped Friday after a spike in Spanish government borrowing costs added to the uncertainty over Europe's debt crisis and investors braced themselves for China.

Protesters in Rome smashed shop windows and torched cars as violence broke out during a demonstration in the Italian capital, part of worldwide protests against corporate greed and austerity measures. The "Occupy Wall Street" protests that began in Canada and spread to cities across the U.S. moved Saturday to Asia and Europe, linking up with anti-austerity demonstrations that have raged across the debt-ridden continent for months.

Sporadic outages of BlackBerry messaging and email service spread to the U.S. and Canada on Wednesday, as problems stretched into the third day for Europe, Asia, Latin America and Africa.