A friend of Tamerlan Tsarnaev implicated himself and the Boston bombing suspect in an unsolved triple homicide before FBI agents killed him in a violent altercation Wednesday, local media reported.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang praised the Sino-Pakistan relationship to the hilt on Thursday, urging the “all-weather friends” to boost cooperation in business, trade, energy and infrastructure and build a long-vaunted economic corridor.

Islamist militants staged brazen twin car bomb attacks on an army base and a French-run uranium mine in Niger on Thursday, killing at least 19 people and taking several trainee army officers hostage in the impoverished West African nation, the government said.

Former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has blasted the Islamic Republic's clerical rulers, declaring it impossible for them to do a worse job running the country, an Iranian pro-reform website reported Wednesday.

Rioters torched cars and attacked local police stations in 15 immigrant-populated Stockholm suburbs in a fourth night of riots on Thursday, shattering the world's image of Sweden as a peaceful and egalitarian nation.

The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell more than expected last week, pointing to resilience in the labor market despite belt-tightening by Washington.

A British soldier was hacked to death by two men shouting Islamic slogans in a south London street on Wednesday, in what the government said appeared to be a terrorist attack.

President Barack Obama will seek to draw attention away from a series of domestic scandals with a speech on Thursday that defends the U.S. use of drones abroad and lays out a vision for closing the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

An FBI agent shot and killed a Florida man who turned violent while being questioned about the Boston Marathon bombings early on Wednesday, the bureau said.

The Vatican took another step Wednesday to show greater financial transparency by publishing the first annual report from its financial watchdog agency and announcing new regulations to fight money laundering and terror financing.