Chinese-American Faces Trial in China Over Business Dispute

BEIJING — As his family tells it, Vincent Wu is an industrious Chinese-American immigrant who sold his family’s suburban Los Angeles home to finance the construction of a shopping center in China he thought would allow him to retire early. To the police in Huizhou, a city in the southern province of Guangdong, Mr. Wu, 54, is a Mafia kingpin and illegal casino operator who dispatched his enemies through...

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Facebook’s SnapChat-Style Sexting App Is Called Poke (Seriously)

Oh, well would you look at Facebook, trying to make a Christmas funny with its SnapChat copycat app. It’s called Poke! Get it? Because SnapChat is what the kids are all using for their sexting these days, apparently, and Poke — you know, that once kinda flirty Facebook future that’s now pretty much useless — can kind of do the same thing, and it kind of sounds like some bad sexual pun, too! Funny,...

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Falcons top Lions 31-18 for home-field advantage

DETROIT (AP) — Matt Ryan got what he wanted.Calvin Johnson was forced to settle for what he could get.Ryan matched a career high with four touchdown passes, two to Roddy White, to help the Atlanta Falcons beat the Detroit Lions 31-18 Saturday night and earn home-field advantage throughout the NFC playoffs."It's great," Ryan said. "Our confidence is high and our experience — good and bad — has helped...

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Genetic Gamble : Drugs Aim to Make Several Types of Cancer Self-Destruct

C.J. Gunther for The New York TimesDr. Donald Bergstrom is a cancer specialist at Sanofi, one of three companies working on a drug to restore a tendency of damaged cells to self-destruct. For the first time ever, three pharmaceutical companies are poised to test whether new drugs can work against a wide range of cancers independently of where they originated — breast, prostate, liver, lung. The drugs...

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Preoccupations: When Relocation Is a Way of Life

ON New Year’s Day, the company I work for, Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, will move me from Washington to Paris, where I will become a regional vice president of the company and general manager of the Hotel George V, which it manages. Daniel Rosenbaum for The New York TimesGathering the frequent-mover miles: From left are Christian and Meg Clerc, and their daughters, Eleanor and Georgia,...

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Ben Ali’s Possessions to Be Auctioned in Tunisia

TUNIS — It could be the Middle East’s most opulent yard sale. Just in time for Christmas, Tunisia’s Finance Ministry has organized a public auction of cars, jewels, carpets and trinkets that once belonged to the deposed president, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, the first autocrat to fall in the Arab Spring revolution incubated here two years ago. The monthlong sale and exhibition of 12,000...

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Google working on “X Phone”, “X” tablet to take on rivals – WSJ

(Reuters) – Google Inc is working with recently acquired Motorola on a handset codenamed “X-phone”, aimed at grabbing market share from Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.Google acquired Motorola in May for $ 12.5 billion to bolster its patent portfolio as its Android mobile operating system competes with rivals such as Apple...

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Douglas wins AP female athlete of the year honors

When Gabby Douglas allowed herself to dream of being the Olympic champion, she imagined having a nice little dinner with family and friends to celebrate. Maybe she'd make an appearance here and there."I didn't think it was going to be crazy," Douglas said, laughing. "I love it. But I realized my perspective was going to have to change."Just a bit.The teenager has become a worldwide star since winning...

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Vernice D. Ferguson, Leader and Advocate of Nurses, Dies at 84

Vernice D. Ferguson, who fought for greater opportunities, higher wages and more respect for nurses as a longtime chief nursing officer for the Veterans Administration, died on Dec. 8 at her home in Washington. She was 84. NYU PhotobureauVernice D. Ferguson served at the Veterans Administration. Her niece Hope Ferguson confirmed her death. America...

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World Briefing | The Americas: Canada: Court Seeks a Balance on Veils

The Supreme Court of Canada ruled Thursday that witnesses could cover their faces for religious reasons while testifying in court under some circumstances. A Muslim woman, who cannot be named under a court order, asked to wear a niqab, a full-face veil, for religious reasons when testifying in an Ontario court against two men whom she has accused of sexual assault. The Supreme Court did not specifically...

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