By Poornima Gupta and Nicola Leske Tue Nov 20, 2012 5:19pm EST (Reuters) - Hewlett-Packard stunned Wall Street by alleging a massive accounting scandal at its British software unit Autonomy that will cost the company the majority of $8.8 billion in charges. It was the latest in a string of reversals that have renewed questions about the basic competence o...

By Jason McLure LITTLETON, New Hampshire | Tue Nov 20, 2012 5:15pm EST LITTLETON, New Hampshire (Reuters) - Former Senator Warren Rudman, a moderate New Hampshire Republican known for a budget deal that helped slash government deficits in the 1990s, died on Monday at age 82, state officials said. Rudman, who had been undergoing chemotherapy for c...

WASHINGTON | Tue Nov 20, 2012 5:11pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic Senator Mark Warner said on Tuesday he would not run for governor of Virginia next year, a job he held from 2002 to 2006. Warner's announcement leaves Terry McAuliffe, a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, as the party's only announced nominee to replace current ...

By Karen Freifeld NEW YORK | Tue Nov 20, 2012 4:37pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman brought a lawsuit on Tuesday accusing Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN.VX) of deceiving investors in mortgage-backed securities. Credit Suisse, Switzerland's second-largest bank, misrepresented the quality of loans underlying resi...

By Lucia Mutikani WASHINGTON | Tue Nov 20, 2012 4:30pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Housing starts rose to their highest rate in more than four years in October, suggesting the housing market recovery was gaining steam, even though permits for future construction fell. The Commerce Department said on Tuesday housing starts increased 3.6 percent to ...

By Genevra Pittman NEW YORK | Tue Nov 20, 2012 4:24pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - People who had access to their medical records online also came into their doctor's office for more appointments and used the emergency room more often than those who didn't log on, in a new study from Colorado. One theory supporting online access to health reco...

Tue Nov 20, 2012 4:10pm EST (Reuters) - The Kansas City Royals, trying to build a starting rotation to complement their promising young hitters, signed starting pitcher Jeremy Guthrie to a three-year, $25 million deal, the American League team said on Tuesday. Guthrie, who turned in a strong second half last season after joining Kansas City in a trade with the Co...

By Jessica Wohl Tue Nov 20, 2012 3:44pm EST (Reuters) - Move over computers, your sleek siblings are the prized gift of the holidays. One-third of U.S. consumers are thinking about buying an electronic tablet this holiday season, according to a new Ipsos poll conducted for Thomson Reuters. And 22 percent of those who want one of the hot devices said they ...

By Tim McLaughlin BOSTON | Tue Nov 20, 2012 3:39pm EST BOSTON (Reuters) - Lawyers for New England Compounding Center's owners told a federal judge on Tuesday there is no evidence that any of them directly participated in the events that led to a deadly U.S. meningitis outbreak. "Due process should not be washed away in a sea of newspaper articles...

By Kate Kelland LONDON | Tue Nov 20, 2012 2:13pm EST LONDON (Reuters) - An end to the worldwide AIDS epidemic is in sight, the United Nations says, mainly due to better access to drugs that can both treat and prevent the incurable human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes the disease. Progress over the past decade has cut the death toll and ...

By Jane Sutton MIAMI | Tue Nov 20, 2012 2:10pm EST MIAMI (Reuters) - Republican U.S. Representative Allen West, a favorite of the conservative Tea Party movement, conceded defeat on Tuesday after two weeks of challenges and partial recounts that only widened his Florida congressional opponent's victory in the November 6 election. West, a former A...

By Estelle Shirbon LONDON | Tue Nov 20, 2012 1:58pm EST LONDON (Reuters) - UBS trader Kweku Adoboli was jailed for seven years on Tuesday for the biggest fraud in British history, which cost the Swiss bank $2.3 billion. The 32-year-old had admitted trading far in excess of authorized risk limits and booking fictitious trades to hide his true posi...

Tue Nov 20, 2012 1:43pm EST (Reuters) - Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc (GMCR.O) appointed Coca-Cola Co (KO.N) executive Brian Kelley to its top post, betting on a products specialist to replace Lawrence Blanford who has led the company since 2007. Kelley's appointment follows an almost eight-month CEO search after Blanford told the board in February he planne...

By Chris Michaud NEW YORK | Tue Nov 20, 2012 1:28pm EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - She won Oscar gold for her uncanny performance as Britain's Queen Elizabeth, but Helen Mirren's latest portrayal finds her as the power behind the throne -- or, more precisely, the director's chair. In "Hitchcock," Mirren stars opposite Anthony Hopkins as legendary direc...

By Leigh Thomas and Daniel Flynn PARIS | Tue Nov 20, 2012 1:16pm EST PARIS (Reuters) - France said on Tuesday it would respond to a Moody's credit downgrade by pushing on with reforms, complaining that the ratings agency had overlooked steps already taken to revamp the euro zone's second-largest economy. France lost its prized triple-A badge from...

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis AMMAN | Tue Nov 20, 2012 12:56pm EST AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian government troops backed by tanks battled to oust rebel forces from an opposition stronghold in a Damascus suburb on Tuesday in the heaviest fighting in the capital for months. In the country's north, rebel fighters stormed an air defense base that President Bash...

By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Jeffrey Heller GAZA/JERUSALEM | Tue Nov 20, 2012 12:36pm EST GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - A Hamas official said on Tuesday Egypt had brokered a Gaza ceasefire deal that would go into effect within hours, but a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "we're not there yet". "An agreement for calm has been...

By Joe Brock ABUJA | Tue Nov 20, 2012 12:35pm EST ABUJA (Reuters) - Britain has failed to make major improvements to schools in Nigeria despite spending millions of pounds on the West African state's education system, a British aid watchdog said on Tuesday. Britain has spent 102 million pounds ($162 million) in the past seven years on a project t...

Tue Nov 20, 2012 11:52am EST (Reuters) - The Toronto Blue Jays will feature a slew of new players in 2013 but a familiar face steering them from the bench with John Gibbons returning as manager of the American League club. Gibbons, who served as Blue Jays manager from August 2004 to June 2008 with a record of 305-305, replaces John Farrell, who left Toronto to ma...

KABUL | Tue Nov 20, 2012 11:50am EST KABUL (Reuters) - France withdrew its combat troops from Afghanistan on Tuesday, marking the end of its battlefield role in the NATO-led war after a presence of more than 10 years. Four hundred French troops returned to the Afghan capital after four years of combat operations in nearby Kapisa province and Kabul's Saro...

Tue Nov 20, 2012 11:22am EST Nov 20 - France is in talks with Google over an ongoing tax audit and payment of back taxes, the country's budget minister said on Tuesday, adding the administration had "convincing" proof to back up its claims. Tax authorities are examining whether Google's practice of charging French advertisers via its European headquarters in Ire...

By Dagmara Leszkowicz and Marcin Goettig WARSAW | Tue Nov 20, 2012 10:57am EST WARSAW (Reuters) - Polish authorities have arrested a radical nationalist who planned to blow up parliament and had links to the right-wing extremist who murdered dozens of people in Norway last year, they said on Tuesday. The suspected plot - to detonate a bomb outsid...

By Euan Rocha TORONTO | Tue Nov 20, 2012 10:49am EST TORONTO (Reuters) - Research In Motion Ltd, for months enveloped by a wave of negative sentiment, got a boost on Tuesday when one of its most influential critics raised his rating on the stock ahead of the launch of RIM's make-or-break new line of BlackBerry 10 devices. The upgrade by Jefferies...

By Matt Spetalnick and Jeff Mason PHNOM PENH | Tue Nov 20, 2012 8:25am EST PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - It may have sounded good on paper: Win re-election, fly to Asia, soak up the adulation of fellow world leaders, then go home with at least a few tangible rewards to show for a legacy-shaping U.S. strategic shift eastwards. But U.S. President Barack O...

By Jonny Hogg GOMA, Democratic Republic of Congo | Tue Nov 20, 2012 8:09am EST GOMA, Democratic Republic of Congo (Reuters) - Rebels widely believed to be backed by Rwanda claimed control of Goma in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo on Tuesday, walking through the frontier city of one million people past U.N. peacekeepers who did nothing to st...

By Dagmara Leszkowicz and Marcin Goettig WARSAW | Tue Nov 20, 2012 8:04am EST WARSAW (Reuters) - Polish officials said on Tuesday they had arrested a radical nationalist who planned to detonate a vehicle loaded with four tonnes of explosives outside parliament, possibly when the president and prime minister were in the building. Prosecutors said ...

By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Maayan Lubell GAZA/JERUSALEM | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:59am EST GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The U.N. chief called for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton headed to the region with a message that escalation of the week-long conflict was in nobody's interest. Nevertheles...

DUBAI | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:56am EST DUBAI (Reuters) - Leading Iranian opposition figure Mehdi Karoubi, under house arrest since 2011, was hospitalized briefly after showing symptoms including weight loss, dizziness and nausea, his website said on Tuesday. Karoubi, 75, and fellow reformist Mirhossein Mousavi ran for election in June 2009 and became figure...

BEIRUT | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:52am EST BEIRUT (Reuters) - Two mortar rounds struck Syria's Information Ministry building in the capital Damascus on Tuesday, state television said, causing some damage but no casualties. Syrian TV blamed "terrorists" for the attack, referring to insurgents who have been battling t...

LONDON | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:50am EST LONDON (Reuters) - Britain has officially recognized the fledgling Syrian National Coalition opposition group, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said on Tuesday. "Her majesty's government has decided to recognize the national coalition of Syrian revolution and opposition forces as the sole legitimate representat...

By Jeff Mason and James Pomfret PHNOM PENH | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:46am EST PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - President Barack Obama urged Asian leaders on Tuesday to rein in tensions in the South China Sea and other disputed territory, but stopped short of firmly backing allies Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam in their disputes with China. The comments illu...

Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:41am EST (Reuters) - Hewlett-Packard Co's quarterly revenue fell short of Wall Street expectations as the company's share of the personal computer market shrank and sales of its printers declined. The Silicon Valley technology company, which is in the midst of a multi-year turnaround plan, said net revenue fell 6.7 percent to $29.96 billion for...

By Tarmo Virki Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:41am EST (Reuters) - Silicon Valley remains the world's most attractive spot for technology start-ups with other locations around the world catching up, according to a report published on Tuesday. Silicon Valley-based start-ups raise, on average, a third more capital than those in other areas, the report, conducted by res...

By Jill Serjeant LOS ANGELES | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:32am EST LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Making a movie about Elizabeth Taylor takes courage. Casting wayward starlet Lindsay Lohan as the Hollywood screen legend was both daring and asking for trouble. And indeed, trouble is what producers got during the shooting of Lifetime TV movie "Liz & Dick" - b...

By Chuck Mikolajczak NEW YORK | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:17am EST NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stock index futures were little changed on Tuesday, indicating the S&P 500 index may pause after a two-day rally as a credit downgrade of France by Moody's reminded investors of the problems plaguing the global economy. The benchmark S&P index had risen more ...

By Catherine Bremer PARIS | Tue Nov 20, 2012 7:13am EST PARIS (Reuters) - After six months keeping the world guessing about whether he had a vision for fixing France's sickly economy, President Francois Hollande has unveiled a battle plan "à la française" to ease companies' labor costs and trim public spending. But the softly-softly pace of adjus...

By Ori Lewis JERUSALEM | Tue Nov 20, 2012 6:57am EST JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Europe's national Olympic committees scrapped a congress they were due to hold in the Israeli city of Eilat next month because of fighting between Israeli forces and Gaza militants, an Israeli spokeswoman said on Tuesday. Eilat, a southern resort city on the shores of the ...

TEL AVIV | Tue Nov 20, 2012 6:54am EST TEL AVIV (Reuters) - A man apparently suffering from mental health problems stabbed a security guard at the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv on Tuesday and was apprehended, police said. "A Mazda car stopped next to the U.S. embassy and a man got out carrying a red bag and a pitchfork," said David Cohen, 48, who told Reuters...

ANKARA | Tue Nov 20, 2012 6:50am EST ANKARA (Reuters) - NATO member states have agreed to supply Turkey with an advanced Patriot missile system to defend against Syrian attacks and talks on its deployment are in the final stage, Turkey's foreign minister said on Tuesday. Turkey has been talking to NATO allies about how to shore up security on its 900-km ...

MANACOR, Spain | Tue Nov 20, 2012 6:21am EST MANACOR, Spain (Reuters) - Rafa Nadal returned to the training court and started hitting balls again on Tuesday for the first time since the latest in a series of knee injuries forced his withdrawal from the U.S. Open at the end of August. The 11-times grand slam singles champion, who has not competed since be...