Eyder Peralta

(Updated at 8:40 p.m. ET)

When Secretary of State John Kerry cut short a trip to the Middle East on Friday to head to Geneva for negotiations over Iran's nuclear program, it set up expectations that a historic deal may have been at hand.

Today, reality set in and as ...

"Yes I have smoked crack cocaine... Probably in one of my drunken stupors."

That's what embattled Toronto Mayor Rob Ford just dropped on the media during a surprise press conference just after noon ET on Tuesday.

According to The Toronto Star, Ford qualified:

" 'I am not an ...

With the approval of the Statehouse, same-sex marriages are one step away from being legal in Illinois.

The Chicago Tribune reports the bill received 61 votes, just one more than necessary to send the bill to the Senate, which is expected to pass it.

The House was the bill's biggest ...

After a seven-month grace period expired on Monday, Saudi authorities began rounding up thousands of illegal immigrants in cities across the kingdom.

Reuters reports the government hopes that deporting the immigrants will open up jobs for citizens of Saudi Arabia. The wire service reports:

"'Since early (Monday) morning, ...

When a Brazilian newspaper published a report that the U.S. had spied on Brazilian President Dilma Rouseff, the country complained bitterly. Rouseff even postponed a state visit with President Obama.

On Monday, the Brazilian paper Folha de S. Paulo published a report that revealed a government operation "modest ...

Perhaps Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is taking a hint from big U.S. retailers: For the sake of happiness, Maduro said, he declared an early beginning to the Christmas season.

"Today, on this first day of November, we decided to declare the arrival of Christmas, because we want happiness for all ...

Around lunchtime today, residents in Chicago's western suburbs felt the earth shake. As WLS-TV reported, they assumed it was an earthquake and the United States Geological Survey reported it as a 3.7 magnitude quake.

While rare, earthquakes do happen in this part of the country. This would have ...

Reaching a plea deal with federal prosecutors, the hedge fund firm SAC Capital Advisors has agreed to plead guilty to insider trading, pay a $1.8 billion fine and end its investment advisory business.

Reuters reports:

"U.S. prosecutors on Monday filed a letter describing the deal to the judges in ...

Google's Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt says reports that the NSA circumvented the Internet giant's efforts to protect its users' data are "outrageous."

Schmidt made the comments in an interview with The Wall Street Journal.

"It's really outrageous that the National Security Agency was looking between the Google data centers, if ...

BlackBerry says it is abandoning a $4.7 billion deal to sell the struggling mobile company to a consortium of investors lead by Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited.

The tentative deal was announced in September. The Globe and Mail reports today that the company will instead raise $1 billion ...

If you were on the East Coast and got up very early this morning, you may have gotten a celestial treat.

As the Capital Weather Gang explained, this eclipse was a hybrid event, appearing as a total eclipse or annular eclipse in some places on Earth. The Weather Gang ...

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford says he is "going to ride this storm out."

Of course, he is referring to the scandal that has overtaken his term as mayor of Canada's largest city. As Mark reported, for months now, there have been reports that there is a video out there ...

Congressional leaders and the White House had one message for Edward Snowden on Sunday: There will be no clemency for illegally leaking documents that have revealed some of the U.S. government's most secret programs.

Senate intelligence committee chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat of California, and her House counterpart, Mike Rogers, ...

Two prominent Bangladeshi expats — one a Muslim leader in the U.K. and the other a U.S. citizen — have been sentenced to death for war crimes committed during the country's fight for independence in 1971.

The BBC reports:

"UK-Bangladeshi Muslim community leader Chowdhury Mueen Uddin and Ashrafuzzaman ...

My father — ever the optimist — always told me that a game is never over until the final second expires. You never know, he said, when an act of utter desperation will beat the odds.

Last night, with Nebraska trailing Northwestern 24-21 with four seconds left in the fourth, ...

This Post Was Last Updated At 12:06 p.m. ET.

Two Kenyans running similarly tactical races came from behind to win the New York City Marathon on Sunday, marking the third time Kenyans have won both the men's and women's 26.2-mile road race.

Geoffrey Mutai, of Kenya, stayed pretty quiet for ...

Secretary of State John Kerry is in Egypt this morning, marking the highest level visit by a U.S. diplomat since the military ousted President Hosni Mubarak in July.

The visit also comes at a time when relations between the two countries are frayed. Reporting from Cairo, NPR's Leila Fadel sent ...

First, Bassem Youssef, a satirist known as "Egypt's Jon Stewart," angered the Islamists; now he's angered the military that ousted them.

Here's how The Wall Street Journal tells the story:

"Mr. Youssef, currently one of the most widely watched comedians in the Arab world, was taken off air ...

Pakistan is blasting the United States for a drone strike that has allegedly killed Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud.

Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said Pakistan's ties with the United States would be reviewed, after what he called "an attack on regional peace by America."

Pakistan's Dawn reports:

The World Series Championship parade in Boston on Saturday was full of everything you might expect: Crowds, cheering and confetti.

But as the world champion Boston Red Sox made their way on Boylston Street toward the finish line of the Boston Marathon, the celebration gave way to a moment ...