The Korean Peninsula has become tense since the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) announced the imminent launch of a long-range rocket carrying earth-observation satellite.

The death toll from the Philippines' strongest typhoon this year rose on Wednesday to around 230, with hundreds missing in landslides and floodwaters, as the storm continued its destructive path across the island nation.

On 29 November 2012, the United Nations General Assembly voted to admit Palestine as a “non-member observer state” by a vote of 138 to 9, with 41 abstentions. The US, Israel, Czech Republic, and Palau were among the countries that voted against.

Israel's Defence Minister Ehud Barak said on Monday he was quitting politics, a surprise decision that deepens uncertainty over how Israel will confront Iran's nuclear programme.

Simultaneous car bombings killed more than 50 people and left a trail of destruction in a town near Syria's capital on Wednesday, as rebels downed a second military aircraft in as many days.

France on Tuesday said it will back a Palestinian bid for enhanced UN status at a General Assembly vote this week, a move hailed by the Palestinians as a "historic" step in their quest for greater global recognition.

People pay respect to the late King Father.

Taiwan on Friday protested after China started issuing new passports with maps that feature two of the island's most famous scenic spots.

The international community has cast doubt on the sustainability of a ceasefire between Israel and Islamist Hamas as this is not the first time Israel and Hamas have agreed to stop fighting.

Speaking at the closing ceremony, Prime Minister Hun Sen of the host country stressed ASEAN member countries’ tireless contributions to the summits in order to make ASEAN a strong regional grouping under the criteria of “One Community, One Destiny”.  Prime Minister Hun Sen transfers ASEAN Chair to the King of Brunei

Total radioactive forcing, or the warming effect on the climate, of all long-lived greenhouse gases was the carbon dioxide (CO2) equivalent of 473 parts per million last year, a 30 percent increase over that in 1990, said the WMO 2011 Greenhouse Gas Bulletin. CO2, which is the single most important greenhouse gas emitted by human activities, accounted for about 80 percent of the increase; and the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere reached 390.0 parts per million in 2011, or 140 percent of the pre-industrial level, according to the bulletin. It said that since the start of the industrial era in 1750, about 375 billion tonnes of carbon have been released into the atmosphere as CO2. About half of this carbon dioxide remains in the atmosphere, with the rest being absorbed by the oceans and terrestrial biosphere. Michel Jarraud, Secretary-General of WMO, said future emissions will only compound the situation and it's not certain whether the carbon sinks will continue to absorb CO2 at the same level in the future. "There are many additional interactions between greenhouse gases, Earth's biosphere and oceans, and we need to boost our monitoring capability and scientific knowledge in order to better understand these," he said. The WMO bulletin reports on atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases, which represent what remains in the atmosphere after the complex system of interactions between the atmosphere, biosphere and the oceans.

Many adults in the United States are affected by the strain of employment instability, but little is known about the cumulative effect of multiple job losses and unemployment on the risks for AMI, according to the study background. Matthew Dupre and colleagues from Duke University examined the associations between different dimensions of unemployment and the risks for AMI in 13,451 U.S. adults aged from 51 to 75 years in the Health and Retirement Study with biennial follow-up interviews from 1992 to 2010. "Results demonstrated that several features of one's past and present employment increased risks for a cardiovascular event. Although the risks for AMI were most significant in the first year after job loss, unemployment status, cumulative number of job losses and cumulative time unemployed were each independently associated with increased risk for AMI," the authors note.

"We know what it takes to address the challenge of prematurity and we are committed to bringing partners together behind proved, affordable solutions," UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a message to mark the Day which fell on Saturday. Premature babies are referred to as preemies. These babies are born prior to 37 weeks gestation. According to the March of Dimes, 13 million babies are born prematurely each year. In the United States, that is one in every eight births. Some 1.1 million of the premature babies born this year will die. The remaining 12 million will struggle to survive. According to the UN World Health Organization (WHO), preterm birth is the world's largest killer of newborn babies, causing more than one million deaths each year. However, 75 percent could be saved without expensive, high technology care. "Essential newborn care is especially important for babies born preterm," said the director of WHO's Department of Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health, Elizabeth Mason. "This means keeping them warm, clean, and well-fed, and ensuring that babies who have difficulty breathing get immediate attention," she said. Low-cost interventions that are not commonly used but are very effective include steroid injections that help speed up the development of the baby's lungs, kangaroo mother care which helps keep the baby warm and facilitates breastfeeding, and prescribing basic antibiotics, such as amoxicillin to treat pneumonia and other infections. Prevention is also key, WHO said in a news release, stressing that countries work to decrease risk factors for mothers, such as obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, smoking, infection, underweight, and pregnancies spaced too closely together, among others. WHO and partners have also published Born Too Soon: The Global Action Report on Preterm Birth, which presents the first country- by-country estimates of preterm births. World Prematurity Day was started last year by the March of Dimes Foundation, a non-profit organization that works to improve the health of mothers and babies and was founded by U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1938 to combat polio. To mark the Day, many countries were expected to announce commitments to reduce preterm mortality. Malawi, which has the world's highest preterm birth rate, would institute kangaroo mother care and provide steroid injections in almost all hospitals, its health leaders said. In India, the government has been working with the UN Children' s Fund (UNICEF) to outfit 100 hospitals to care for preterm babies. In Uganda, the government has committed to speeding access to steroid injection. The report also included 30 new commitments to the Every Woman Every Child initiative led by the secretary-general, on prevention of preterm birth and care of babies born too soon.