Rome  - Handiwork is making a big comeback in the Italian capital as the global financial crisis pinches pocketbooks, the La Repubblica newspaper reported.

Rome (Italy), Dec. 10 : US Central Command chief, General David Petraeus has said that the Mumbai attacks were of more significance for Pakistan than India, as these attacks help comprehend the magnitude of challenges confronting Islamabad.

Addressing at American Studies Centre in Rome, General David Petraeus said that the terrorist attacks in Mumbai were although quite horrible for India also, but for Pakistan this situation was more dangerous than the one that had emanated in the aftermath of 9/11.

"It doesn't mean that these attacks were less dangerous for India, but these attacks have brought to the fore the challenges facing Pakistan", The News quoted him, as saying.

Vatican City - The Vatican announced Tuesday the retirement of Nigerian-born Cardinal Francis Arinze, who was touted by many as a strong candidate for the papacy ahead of the 2005 conclave that eventually elected Benedict XVI.

Benedict has accepted the "for age limits" resignation of Arinze as prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, the Holy See said in a statement.

Rome - The number of hungry people in the world soared to 963 million in 2008, an increase of 40 million over the previous year largely due to higher food prices, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said Tuesday.

The Rome-based FAO warned that the current economic crisis could tip even more people into hunger and poverty.

On Thursday, the scientists reported that an analysis of rings on a stalagmite from a cave near Jerusalem reveals a drier climate in the region at a time in history when the Roman and Byzantine empires were in decline.

The chemical composition of individual rings as small as one-hundredth of a millimeter across was analyzed by University of Wisconsin geologists, which formed the stalagmite growing up from the floor of the Soreq Cave near Jerusalem between 200 BC and 1100 AD.

“The climate was drier in the eastern Mediterranean between 100 AD and 700 AD, with steep drops in rainfall around 100 AD and 400 AD.; a period of waning Roman and Byzantine power in the region,” said Geologists John Valley and Ian Orland.

Rome  - Around 260 refugees from various African countries landed on the southern Italian island of Lampedusa on Sunday, officials reported.

The would-be immigrants - all were men - were in good health, the authorities said. Their arrival brings to more 1,200 the number of persons in the island's refugee reception centre, a facility designed to contain only 700.