Tourists flocking to Guatemala for "end of the world" parties have damaged an ancient stone temple at Tikal, the largest archeological site and urban center of the Mayan civilization.
Hordes of North American moviegoers flocked to theaters to watch "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey," launching the "Lord of the Rings" prequel to box office gold for the second weekend in a row.
The most powerful gun lobby in the United States stood firm Monday against any additional restraints on firearms and ammunition sales -- despite a national outcry in the wake of the Sandy Hook school massacre.
Scientist in the United States on Sunday offered a molecular-level explanation for how a Chinese herbal medicine used for more than 2,000 years tackles fever and eases malaria.
While people around the world celebrate the arrival of Christmas, residents of a refugee camp in Haiti say hunger and want will mark the holiday, like every other day of the year.
Chile issued a top-level red alert Sunday for its Copahue volcano, in the south on the Andean border with Argentina, as it rumbled to register a greater potential threat.
Tens of thousands of petitioners are calling for US President Barack Obama to escalate the diplomatic feud that led Moscow to propose a law barring Americans from adopting Russian children.
Belize has reached a deal in principle with creditors to restructure about half of its unpaid debt after "long and arduous" talks, allowing the country to avoid default.
More than 20,000 people have disappeared in Mexico over the past six years of a brutal crackdown on drugs during the government of former president Felipe Calderon.
British oil giant BP won US court approval Friday of a $7.8 billion settlement with people and businesses who lost money and property due to the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
A US court put on hold Friday a new Californian law banning a form of therapy designed to change the sexual orientation of minors, pending a further appeal.
The United States' most powerful pro-gun lobbying group demanded Friday that armed police be deployed to every school in the country following a mass shooting that left 20 young children dead.
US President Barack Obama Friday nominated Senator John Kerry as his new secretary of state, as he began to reshape his national security team for a second term clouded by overseas crises.
Film, television and music stars including Jeremy Renner, Gwyneth Paltrow and Beyonce have recorded a hard-hitting video urging action on gun control following the Newtown school massacre.
Canada added Iran's Quds Force to a list of terrorist groups on Thursday, saying the elite special operations unit of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard had been arming the Taliban, Hamas and others.
The discovery of the Higgs Boson, an invisible particle that explains the mystery of mass, leads a list of the top 10 scientific advances of 2012 released Thursday by the US journal Science.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is making steady progress after cancer surgery in Cuba and the respiratory infection he developed earlier in the week has been contained.
A global day of lighthearted doom-themed celebration and superstitious scare-mongering culminated Friday at the temples of the Mayan people, whose calendar sparked fears of apocalypse.
US tech leaders and celebrities have joined a call for an "Internet moment of silence" Friday to remember the victims of last week's massacre of 26 people at a Connecticut elementary school.