TORONTO (AP) -- The Canadian former ambassador to Iran who protected Americans at great personal risk during the 1979 Iran hostage crisis says it will reflect poorly on Ben Affleck if he doesn't say a few words about Canada's role if the director's film "Argo" wins the Oscar for best picture Sunday. Man deported to India wants to return to Canada, fight miscarriage of justice
VANCOUVER – The lawyer for a man at the centre of a miscarriage of justice in a gang-rape case says his client wants to return to Canada and appeal the conviction.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Japan's new prim e minister declared Friday he would make his country a stronger U.S. ally and joined President Barack Obama in warning North Korea that its recent nuclear provocations would not be tolerated. 
CAIRO (Reuters) – Egypt's opposition attacked President Mohammed Mursi on Friday for calling elections during a national crisis, but face a test of unity in challenging Islamists who have won every poll since the 2011 revolution. No sooner had Mursi called the parliamentary polls on Thursday than liberals and leftists accused him of deepening divisions between Islamists and their opponents. Some threatened to boycott voting which starts on April 27th and finishes in late June. … 
GAUHATI, India (AP) -- Adolf Hitler is running for election in India. So is Frankenstein. 
MELBOURNE (Reuters) – Olympic gold medalist Melanie Schlanger has called for Australia's head swimming coach Leigh Nugent to be sacked, saying he had not been frank about behavioral problems among his London Games swimmers. Nugent is under fire in the wake of an explosive review into Australia's worst performance in the Olympic pool in 20 years which has sparked an investigation into allegations of drunkenness, abuse of prescription drugs and bullying. … 
SEATTLE (Reuters) – Boeing Co and its engineering union have agreed to resume talks on Wednesday to replace an expired contract for 7,500 technical workers, another step toward settling negotiations that have continued for nearly a year. Boeing said it had agreed to resume the talks with the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA) under the auspices of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, which has been involved in the talks since December. The union also said it had sought talks next week. … 
HAVANA (AP) -- Cuban President Raul Castro has unexpectedly raised the possibility of leaving his post, saying Friday that he is old and has a right to retire. But he did not say when he might do so or if such a move was imminent. 
NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) – Britain suffered its first ever sovereign ratings downgrade from a major agency on Friday, after Moody's stripped the country of its coveted top-notch triple-A rating, dealing a major blow to finance minister George Osborne. Moody's cut Britain's rating by one notch to Aa1 from Aaa, with a stable outlook, blaming weak prospects for Britain's economy over the coming years which have thrown the government's deficit reduction strategy off course. … 
CAIRO (AP) -- Egypt's president set parliamentary elections to begin in April -- a decision that an opposition leader denounced Friday as "a recipe for disaster" because of the ongoing political turmoil in the country. 
Seven artifacts dating as far back as 4,000 B.C. have been returned to Kosovo after German police stumbled on them in an unrelated raid, the country's culture minister said Friday. 
BRASILIA (Reuters) – Brazil's 2014 election season got off to an unusually early start this week with the unofficial launch of President Dilma Rousseff's re-election campaign by her mentor and predecessor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Celebrating his Workers' Party's 10th year in power, Lula laid to rest speculation that he would run again by anointing Rousseff as the party's best option to stay in power. … 
PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) -- Oscar Pistorius walked out of a South African court Friday a free man -- for now -- after a magistrate agreed to release him on bail ahead of his premeditated murder trial over the shooting death of his girlfriend. 
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The autopsy of a 21-year-old Canadian student found dead in a water tank atop a historic Los Angeles hotel turned up no fatal wounds, offering no clear answers to her puzzling last days and death, coroner's officials said on Friday. The inconclusive finding means that further tests must be conducted to determine a cause of death for Elisa Lam, who went missing from the Cecil Hotel in downtown Los Angeles under suspicious circumstances in late January. … 
WASHINGTON/SEATTLE (Reuters) – Boeing Co's proposal for preventing battery problems that have grounde d its entire fleet of 50 787 Dreamliners is not a temporary stop-gap measure aimed at getting the airplanes flying again, three sources familiar with the plan said. he proposal, being made to the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration on Friday, includes specific measures aimed at addressing possible causes of short-circuits that prompted one of the lithium-ion batteries on board a 787 to catch fire at a Boston airport in January, the sources said. … 
SAN VALENTIN, Guatemala (AP) -- A Guatemalan official said Friday there was no evidence that Mexico's most-wanted drug lord, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, had been killed in a shootout in the rural north, calling such reports a misunderstanding.Interior Minister Mauricio Lopez Bonilla told local media that the original account was based on testimony from residents in San Valentin near the Mexican border, but that soldiers and police scanning the area found no sign of any confrontation. 
GAO, Mali (Reuters) – Five people were killed in a remote Malian town on Friday in car bomb attacks by Islamists on Tuareg MNLA rebels with close links to French forces, a spokesman for the Tuareg fighters said. Violence in northern Mali underscores the risk of French and African forces becoming entangled in a messy guerrilla war as they try to help Mali's weak army counter bombings and raids by al Qaeda-linked Islamist militants. … 
ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Torrential rainfall in Greece's capital Friday crippled traffic, inundated basements and streets, and was blamed for the death of woman whose car was trapped in floodwater, authorities said. 
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday said he told President Barack Obama in a meeting that Japan would act calmly in its row with China over tiny islan ds in the East China Sea claimed by both Asian countries. "I explained that we have always been dealing with this issue … in a calm manner," he said through a translator, while sitting next to Obama in the White House Oval Office. "We will continue to do so and we have always done so," he said. Abe said the existence of the Japan-U.S. alliance was a stabilizing factor in the region. … 
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Global equity markets rose on Friday, recovering some of the previous session's sharp losses, but the euro hit a six-week low against the dollar on renewed doubts about the health of the euro zone's financial system. Oil prices edged up as evidence of improving business morale in Germany helped bolster sentiment after two days of heavy losses. Wall Street also edged higher on Friday, rebounding from two days of losses as shares of Dow component Hewlett-Packard surged on strong results. The stock jumped nearly 15 percent to $19. … 
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) -- One of Gregoria Contreras' first childhood memories was the moment she last saw her parents. 
BRUSSELS (Reuters) – European Defense cuts and U.S. budget gridlock are jeopardizing NATO's effectiveness, outgoing U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta warned on Friday. Leaving his last NATO ministerial meeting in Brussels, Panetta joined those warning of the effects of deep Defense cuts in many Western countries and said it would be an "irresponsible act of political dysfunction" if the U.S. Congress permitted sweeping across-the-board Defense cuts to take place. … 
ATMEH CAMP, Syria (AP) -- Turki Abdel Qadir, a burly villager from the northern countryside, fled to this muddy camp amid olive groves three months ago after his 13-year-old daughter Haifa was wounded in the civil war. 
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Democratic Republic of Congo's resource-rich east is again on the brink of a major conflict, a senior U.N. official warned on Friday as he urged the U.N. Security Counci l to urgently approve plans for a peace enforcement unit to combat armed rebel groups. Roger Meece, head of the U.N. mission in Congo known as MONUSCO, told the Security Council that the creation of a peace enforcement unit within the peacekeeping force – which would be a new move for the United Nations – was "an urgently needed and important response to the existing situation on the ground. … 
NEW YORK (Reuters) – At the same time that Citigroup Inc was unsuccessfully trying to convince an arbitrator that the brokerage it owned with Morgan Stanley was worth as much as $23 billion, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in August was as king Citigroup to document the valuation it had placed on the asset. The request was made public on Friday when the agency posted written responses from Citigroup to questions from SEC staff about the bank's financial disclosures. … 
BRUSSELS (AP) -- Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and his NATO counterparts are considering leaving 8,000 to 12,000 troops in Afghanistan after 2014, but a dispute arose Friday between the U.S. and German defense officials over whether that contingent would be an international force or an American one. 
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) – A stagnant economy and one of the world's highest inflation rates are making Argentina's annual wage talks thornier than ever this year just as President Cristina Fernandez turns her attention to mid-term elections. Fernandez, who hails from the left of the Peronist party that has dominated Argentine politics since the late 1940s, has an increasingly difficult relationship with the unions and that is raising the risk of strikes ahead of the October elections. … 
BRUSSELS (AP) -- With cyberthreats escalating, the next meeting of NATO defense ministers will include a major focus on cybersecurity, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta said. 
LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – The Weinstein Company has acquired distribution rights to "Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom" in North America, Australia and New Zealand, the studio said F riday. The biopic of Nelson Mandela's life draws on the anti-apartheid leader's autobiography of the same name and is directed by Justin Chadwick ("The Other Boleyn Girl") and produced by Anant Singh. William Nicholson ("Gladiator") wrote the script. Shot in South Africa, the film stars Idris Elba ("The Wire") in the title role and Naomie Harris as his wife Winnie. … 
BEIRUT (AP) -- Syrian activists say at least 12 people, including children, have been killed in three explosions in the northern city of Aleppo. 
OTTAWA (Reuters) – France is still ready to start pulling its forces out of Mali next month despite a rebel attack on the key town of Gao, the French commander of the defense staff said on Friday. Admiral Edouard Guillaud told reporters after a speech in Ottawa that he was not surprised by Thursday's attack in Gao, when 15 Islamists were killed by French and Malian troops. Asked whether France still planned to start withdrawing troops in March, he replied: "This is obviously conditions-based, that's obvious. But yet, I don't see any reason not to begin some drawdown. … 
VATICAN CITY (AP) -- Pope Benedict XVI is clearing the decks of his pontificate, making last-minute appointments and tweaking the rules of the conclave and religious rites used to launch the next papacy once he has resigned. 
BRUSSELS (Reuters) – NATO Allies are discussing keeping a training for ce of between 8,000 and 12,000 troops in Afghanistan after most foreign soldiers leave in 2014, the United States said on Friday. NATO-led forces are gradually handing over responsibility for security to their Afghan counterparts as the bulk of foreign combat forces prepare to withdraw by the end of next year. "A range of 8-12,000 troops was discussed as the possible size of the overall NATO mission," Pentagon spokesman George Little said after a NATO defence ministers' meeting in Brussels. U.S. … 
JERUSALEM (AP) -- Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to bring a dovish r ival into his Cabinet appears to be backfiring, drawing heavy criticism both in Israel and from the Palestinians and suddenly complicating the task of forming a viable coalition government, to the point where rivals are openly threatening to force new elections. 
TORONTO (Reuters) – Canada's federal housing agency scaled back its forecast for homebuilding in 2013 on Friday, saying that a slowdown in economic growth and job gains will dampen demand for new homes, the latest sign that Canada's housing market is cooling rapidly. The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp said that while it expects the housing market slowdown that hit in the second half of 2012 will continue into 2013, it believes momentum will return later in 2013 and 2014. … 
ROME (Reuters) – Italy's national election this weekend will produce a weak, unstable and probably short-lived government, former economy minister Giulio Tremonti said on Friday. Tremonti, who is running at the head of a small party of his own, said that even if the centre left led by Pier Luigi Bersani confirmed its opinion poll lead and won a majority, it would be too small and fragile to produce an effective administration. … 
HAVANA (Reuters) – Colombia's Marxist FARC rebels charged on Friday that the hos tile attitude of President Juan Manuel Santos threatened peace negotiations under way in Havana and urged him to salvage the talks, in their harshest criticisms since talks began three months ago. Santos infuriated the rebels earlier this week when he said they should be responsible for compensating the of thousands of farmers who were forced to flee their lands during the region's longest and only remaining guerilla war. … 
LONDON (Reuters) – Sheep farmers in Britain and Ireland fear for their future as oversupply of lamb in Europe drags farm-gate prices to three-year l ows while production costs soar, giving efficient New Zealand exporters a vital edge. Most British sheep farmers have been selling at a loss since November because an influx of cheap imports coincided with the delayed sales of home-grown lambs that had been held up by wet weather causing poor feeding conditions. Meanwhile, much of the European Union, the biggest market for British lamb, is in recession. … 
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – The Vatican denied on Friday that Pope Benedict's decision to send a senior offic ial to a new post in Latin America was linked to a secret report about leaked papal papers. Since Benedict announced his resignation on February 11, Italian newspapers have been full of rumors about conspiracies, secret reports and lobbies in the Vatican that they say pushed the pope to abdicate. … 
CAIRO (Reuters) – Egypt's opposition attac ked President Mohammed Mursi on Friday for calling elections during a national crisis, but face a test of unity in challenging Islamists who have won every poll since the 2011 revolution. No sooner had Mursi called the parliamentary polls on Thursday than liberals and leftists accused him of deepening divisions between Islamists and their opponents. Some threatened to boycott voting which starts on April 27th and finishes in late June. … 
OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada's federal budget gap widened slightly in Dec ember from a year earlier, but the deficit for the first nine months of the fiscal year was still down 19 percent, the finance department said on Friday. The monthly Fiscal Monitor said the government spent C$572 million ($561 million) more in December than it took in. The gap in December 2011 was C$538 million . For the period April to December, the deficit shrank to C$12.99 billion from C$16.06 billion in the same period in 2011. … 
MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian lawmakers appealed to U.S. Congress on Friday to help return a Russian boy living with a Texas family, after the death o f his three-year-old brother intensified a dispute over international adoptions. The motion, approved overwhelmingly without any votes against by the lower house, is likely to increase tension between Moscow and Washington in a row that has contributed to a gradual cooling of relations since Vladimir Putin returned to the presidency last May. … 
GAO, Mali (Reuters) – Five people were killed in two car bomb attacks by Islamists on pro-autonomy MNLA Tuareg rebels in a remote Malian town bordering Algeria, a spokesman for the fighters operating said on Friday. The attacks in In Khalil, some 1,700 km (1,050 miles) northeast of the capital Bamako, came a day after a car bomb killed two people in Kidal and French and Malian troops killed 15 Islamists on the streets of Gao. … 
ROME (Reuters) – Silvio Berlusconi's party has invited female supporters to sign a manifesto saying that their de cision to vote for him does not make them worthy of ridicule. "I am a woman, not a doll," begins the manifesto on the party's website and printed in a full-page advertisement in Italy's leading newspaper days before a general election that Berlusconi's centre right looks likely to lose. Critics accuse the former prime minister of picking female politicians based on looks, and for exploiting scantily-clad starlets on his television shows. … 
TUNIS, Tunisia (AP) -- Tunisia's ruling Islamist party has chosen an interior minister seen as a hardliner to form a new government, a top official said Friday, in a signal the government is unlikely to back down to opposition demands to try to smooth over the country's political crisis. 
KHARTOUM (Reuters) – Fighting re-erupted in the north and south of Su dan's strife-torn Darfur region, tribal and rebel officials said on Friday, after clashes last month that killed hundreds of people and displaced more than 130,000. Conflict has plagued the vast arid region since mainly non-Arab tribes revolted against the Arab government in Khartoum in 2003, accusing it of political and economic neglect. Violence has ebbed since 2004 but picked up again in recent months. … 
LONDON (Reuters) – The Food Standards Agency said it had found another 35 positive tests for horsemeat in beef pr oducts, confirming the latest contaminations in a scandal still spreading across Europe. The FSA said on Friday it had conducted 3634 tests, 3599 of which had come back negative for horsemeat levels above 1 percent, with 35 results testing positive for horsemeat at or above 1 percent. It said these products had already been named and withdrawn from sale and added that no tests to date on samples containing horse DNA have found the veterinary medicine phenylbutazone (bute). … 
MULTAN, Pakistan (Reuters) – Police said they arrested the leader of a banned militant group on Friday in connection with sectarian attacks in the northwestern city of Quetta that have killed nearly 200 people this year. Two bombings about month apart targeting the minority Shi'ite community in Quetta, claimed by the Sunni militant group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), sparked demonstrations across the country and the dismissal of the local government. Police said they arrested LeJ leader, Malik Ishaq, in the town of Rahim Yar Khan at his home on Friday afternoon. … 
CAIRO (AP) -- Egypt's president called multi-stage parliamentary elections beginning in April but a key opposition leader warned Friday that the vote may only inflame tensions unless there are serious political talks first. 
BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Germany's Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere said on Friday that U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told NATO allies gathered in Brussels that the United States would keep between 8,000 and 12,000 troops in Afghanistan after 2014, when the NATO combat mission is due to end. "The American defense secretary announced that the United States will be in a magnitude of 8,000 to 12,000 troops involved in Afghanistan" post-2014, the German minister said. Panetta or his aides were not immediately available to comment. He was due to address a news conference shortly. … 
ISLAMABAD (AP) -- Police say they have arrested the former chief of a banned Sunni extremist group in central Pakistan. 
PARIS (Reuters) – The European Commission wants to conclude its investigation into the fixing of lending benchmarks Euribor and Libor this year and has offered several banks under suspicion the possibility of a settlement to reduce hefty fines, sources said. If the banks were to agree to such a settlement, it would allow the EU's antitrust chief Joaquin Almunia to wrap up his investigation as soon as this year and before his term as antitrust commissioner draws to a close in late 2014. … 
VIENNA (Reuters) – Iran appears to be advancing in its construction of a research reactor Western experts say could offer the Islamic state a second way of producing material for a nuclear bomb, if it decided to embark on such a course, a U.N. report showed. Iran has almost completed installation of cooling and moderator circuit piping in the heavy water plant near the town of Arak, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in a confidential report issued to member states late on Thursday. … 
NEW DELHI (AP) -- Police were searching villages in western India on Friday for suspects in the rape and killing of three young sisters, as Indians still angry over the fatal gang rape of a woman on a New Delhi bus in December face another heinous sexual attack.