Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim, Microsoft's Bill Gates and Zara fashion house boss Amancio Ortega of Spain topped the Forbes list of the world's billionaires.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict ended his difficult reign on Thursday pledging unconditional obedience to whoever succeeds him to guide the Roman Catholic Church at one of the most crisis-ridden periods in its 2,000-year history.

As someone who lived in Tehran, Iran back in the 1970’s, I especially enjoyed seeing the movie Argo win the Best Picture Oscar.  It’s a great story, with compelling characters and lots of suspense.  The fact that the story is true makes it even more incredible because the plot is like something that would spring from the mind of Tom Clancy.  Imagine sneaking US embassy personnel out of Iran right under the noses of militants using the far-fetched story that they were there to scout movie locations?  I had no idea the CIA was so creative.  The film also serves as a reacquainting of how America got where we are in our relationship with Iran.

LONDON — The financial magazine Nuqudy highlighted the importance of philanthropy in the acts of the most influential Arab businessmen, through publishing a list of the few Arab philanthropists that have selflessly given the most, relative to their net worth.

One of the most oft-repeated, widely accepted and habitually unquestioned beliefs about the Iranian nuclear issue is that if Iran got a nuclear weapon then Tehran would — merely by possessing such a weapon, even if it never detonated one — throw its weight around in the region in ways that it wouldn’t or couldn’t do without a nuke.

The Washington Post continues to allow former members of the Bush administration, including President George W. Bush, to distort the case for going to war against Iraq in 2003 and to blame the intelligence from the Central Intelligence Agency for the decision to use force.