NEW YORK (Reuters) - Blind Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng soaked up the sun in New York City on Sunday as his children played in a garden, a break in a day of meetings to arrange his studies at New York University. "(Chen) said he hadn't sat in the sun for many, many years," said Jerome Cohen, a China law expert and professor at New York University's law school, where Chen will study. "He wanted to go out in the garden... his kids went out first and then he went out," Cohen, who has become a confidante of Chen's, told Reuters. ...

With his carefully tended hair, tight trousers and perfect harmonies, Robin Gibb, along with his brothers Maurice and Barry, defined the disco era. As part of the Bee Gees — short for the Brothers Gibb — they created dance floor classics like "Stayin Alive," ''Jive Talkin'," and "Night Fever" that can still get crowds onto a dance floor.

Millions of early risers in Asia turned their attention skyward to view a rare "ring of fire" eclipse as it crossed their skies Monday morning.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Newly issued shares in Facebook Inc may have a hard time in the coming week if lead underwriter Morgan Stanley stops supporting the stock and managers lower down in the IPO book who were hoping for an early surge decide to get out before going underwater. Facebook on Friday sold 421 million shares of stock in a deal that valued the company at more than $100 billion. But investors, expecting a first-day pop in price, instead saw it close just 0.6 percent above the IPO price at $38.23. ...

TOKYO (Reuters) - Markets recovered some ground on Monday after heavy losses last week, but investors remained wary about the euro zone despite world leaders calling for Greece to stay in the monetary union and for Europe to balance austerity with growth. G8 leaders meeting at the weekend vowed to take all necessary steps to combat financial turmoil and revitalize a global economy increasingly threatened by Europe's debt crisis, but they offered no specific prescription for debt-crippled Greece which holds fresh elections next month. ...

Millions of Asians watched as a rare "ring of fire" eclipse crossed their skies early Monday.

A magnitude-6.0 earthquake shook several small towns in northeast Italy, killing four people, knocking down a clock tower and other centuries-old buildings and causing millions in losses to the region known for making Parmesan cheese.

Twenty-two states and the District of Columbia are backing Montana in its fight to prevent the U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United decision from being used to strike down state laws restricting corporate campaign spending.

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's deputy foreign minister said on Sunday that military action against Iran over its nuclear program was being considered in some Western countries. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was speaking to reporters on a plane on his way back from the G8 summit in Camp David, where the G8 leaders signaled their readiness to tap into emergency oil stockpiles quickly this summer if tougher new sanctions on Iran threatened to strain supplies. ...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Newly issued shares in Facebook Inc may have a hard time in the coming week if lead underwriter Morgan Stanley stops supporting the stock and managers lower down in the IPO book who were hoping for an early surge decide to get out before going underwater. Facebook on Friday sold 421 million shares of stock in a deal that valued the company at more than $100 billion. But investors, expecting a first-day pop in price, instead saw it close just 0.6 percent above the IPO price at $38.23. ...

(Reuters) - A pledge by leaders of industrialized nations to help the troubled world economy is unlikely to herald quick new action by Europe on its debt crisis, meaning more uncertainty for nervous financial markets. The Group of Eight economies stressed on Saturday that their "imperative is to promote growth and jobs", as they also recognized problems among European banks and gave verbal backing for Greece to stay in the euro. Still, despite U.S. calls for immediate moves to boost growth, no sign emerged that Germany would soften its stance on austerity as the cure for Europe's debt ...

Gunmen fired rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns early Monday in intense street battles in the Lebanese capital, wounding six people as fears mounted that the conflict in neighboring Syria was bleeding across the border.

On paper at least, European leaders agree: They need stronger growth measures to help their economies expand out of their 2½-year-old government debt crisis. Figuring out exactly what those new steps might be will be the hard part.

BELGRADE (Reuters) - Opposition leader Tomislav Nikolic, last in power when Slobodan Milosevic's Serbia was bombed by NATO in 1999, was elected president on Sunday and pledged to keep the former Yugoslav republic moving towards the European Union. In a major upset, rightist Nikolic narrowly defeated liberal leader Boris Tadic, ending his eight years as head of state in a tense run-off election in which fewer than half of Serbia's eligible voters turned out. "There is divine justice," Nikolic told jubilant supporters in the capital, Belgrade. ...

He was the embodiment of one of modern Libya's darkest chapters — a man synonymous with horrifying scenes of wreckage, broken families and a plane that fell out of the sky a generation ago. His name, Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, was little known compared to the single word that his deeds represented: Lockerbie.

SANT' AGOSTINO, Italy (Reuters) - A strong earthquake in northern Italy killed at least six people, injured dozens and damaged historic buildings including a famed mediaeval castle early on Sunday, waking terrified citizens and sending thousands running into the streets. The quake, which the U.S. Geological Survey recorded at magnitude 6.0, struck at 4:04 a.m. (0204 GMT) and was followed by a series of jolting aftershocks. At least two of them reached magnitude 5.1, sowing fresh panic, further damaging already weakened buildings and causing more structures to collapse. ...

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The chief executives of Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd are used to running the show at their global tech empires, but they will be in for a different experience when they arrive at a San Francisco federal courthouse on Monday. Apple's Tim Cook and Samsung's Choi Gee-sung, whose companies are embroiled in bitter patent litigation, have been instructed by a federal judge to appear for court-supervised mediation. A joint court filing in April said that "as directed by the Court, Apple and Samsung are both willing to participate" in the discussions. ...

Nationalist candidate Tomislav Nikolic won the Serbian presidency on Sunday, a result that adds to the political turmoil in the Balkan country and could slow down its attempts to join the European Union.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - New French president Francois Hollande likes to style himself as "Mr. Normal," but his sudden debut on the global stage this week has been anything but. From the Oval Office to a meeting of G8 leaders at the Camp David presidential retreat to the NATO summit in Chicago, Hollande, a life-long party official who has never held a ministerial post, sometimes looked as though he were trying the role of international summiteer on for size. Despite some awkwardness, Hollande appeared to pass his initial diplomatic tests. ...

TRIPOLI (Reuters) - Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, the Libyan convicted of the 1988 bombing of a PanAm flight over Lockerbie, died of cancer on Sunday aged 60, leaving many questions on the attack and its aftermath unanswered. Megrahi, who said he was not responsible for bringing the jumbo jet down on the Scottish town and killing 270 people, was found guilty in 2001 but was freed in 2009 and returned to Libya because he had terminal cancer and was not expected to live long. ...

TANGERANG, Indonesia (Reuters) - There are many ways to describe Indonesia's Aburizal Bakrie: multi-millionaire businessman, global mining tycoon, heavyweight contender for the presidency in 2014. One description that does not spring to mind is man of the common people. So when Bakrie strode into a railway station in south Jakarta last week and slapped the equivalent of one U.S. dollar down on the counter for a ticket, it was a moment of political theatre. It also signaled an early step in the march to presidential elections in mid-2014 in the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation. ...

"The Avengers" continues to muscle out everything else Hollywood throws at it, easily sinking naval rival "Battleship" and other new releases.

DOUMA, Syria (Reuters) - A roadside bomb exploded on Sunday about 150 meters (yards) from a United Nations convoy carrying the head of a Syria ceasefire monitoring mission and a senior U.N. official in the town of Douma, a Reuters witness said. Major General Robert Mood's car was stopped at an army checkpoint when the bomb detonated in an nearby alleyway and the convoy left, the Reuters journalist said, adding that there were no reports of casualties. United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Hervé Ladsous, who is visiting Syria, was also part of the convoy. ...

VIENNA (Reuters) - The U.N. nuclear supervisor flew to Tehran on Sunday voicing optimism he could reach a deal to investigate suspected atom bomb research - a possible breakthrough that Iran may hope could help ease Western sanctions pressure and deflect threats of war. "I really think this is the right time to reach agreement. Nothing is certain but I stay positive," Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said at Vienna airport, adding "good progress" had already been made. ...

Facebook begins selling stock to the public Friday in the most talked-about market debut in years. Two Associated Press business writers are debating whether the stock is a smart buy.

When Dan Fitzsimmons looks across the Susquehanna River and sees the flares of Pennsylvania gas wells, he thinks bitterly of the riches beneath his own land locked up by the heated debate that has kept hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, out of New York.

(Reuters) - Shares in social media company Facebook Inc could fall below the initial public offering price of $38, Barron's wrote in its May 21 edition. Facebook saw its shares rise a scant 0.6 percent to $38.23 on Friday in the first day of trading. The stock stayed above the $38 IPO price, supported in the market by the deal's underwriters. But Barron's said the "big question" this week will be whether they continue to do so. ...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Normally a big decline would set up Wall Street for a technical rebound. But that may not be the case this week, even after the market posted its worst weekly loss for the year and the S&P fell for six straight sessions. With the corporate earnings season drawing to an end and recent U.S. economic data raising doubts about the pace of growth, the S&P 500, which is down 7.3 percent so far in May, could decline further this week as concerns about the financial health of Europe persist. ...

SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics' mobile division chief JK Shin said on Sunday the South Korean technology giant was still seeking to resolve differences in its international patent war with Apple Inc.. "There is still a big gap in the patent war with Apple but we still have several negotiation options including cross-licensing," Shin told reporters at Seoul airport shortly before his departure for the United States. Asked about the prospects for Samsung's memory chip business, Shin said the 4G chip shortage was expected to continue until early in the fourth quarter of this year. ...

For Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, it was quite a week — from birthday, to IPO, to I DO.

(Reuters) - Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg wed longtime girlfriend Priscilla Chan on Saturday, announcing the nuptials through a status update on the social networking site. The 28-year-old billionaire's wedding took place a day after Facebook's initial public offering on the Nasdaq stock exchange on Friday. More than 280,000 people "liked" Zuckerberg's status change, which was accompanied by a photo of the smiling couple in wedding attire in a small, verdant outdoor setting with a string of lights behind them. ...

(Reuters) - Google said on Saturday that Chinese authorities have approved its $12.5 billion purchase of Motorola Mobility Holdings, the last regulatory hurdle to a deal that would allow the world's No. 1 Internet search engine to develop its own line of smart phones. Google, which will be the newest entrant to the handset market, announced plans for the acquisition last year in a bid to secure Motorola's valuable patents and pave the way for a pairing of Google's Android mobile software and Motorola's handset business. U.S. ...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Europe's second largest lender Russia's Sberbank will see some certainty over the planned privatization sale after the new Russian government's lineup is announced on May 21, CEO German Gref said on Saturday. Sberbank initially planned the sale of the 7.6 percent stake, part of Russia's ambitious privatization program, last September but postponed the deal after global risk aversion wiped around $1.5 billion off the stake's value. "It seems to me that, yes, such certainty should emerge (after the cabinet announcement)," Gref said. ...