Only days after retiring from professional cycling, Stuart O'Grady admitted to using a blood-booster during the scandal-plagued 1998 Tour de France. The 39-year-old Australian rider, a six-time Olympian who wore the leader's yellow jersey for

Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling spent a whole weekend practicing a fake signature for her crime-writing alter-ego Robert Galbraith, she revealed Wednesday. Sales of "The Cuckoo's Calling", a critically-acclaimed detective novel supposedly by rookie novelist

Late American actor Peter Falk, best known for his portrayal of disheveled police detective Columbo in the long-running television series of the same name, was honored with a star on Hollywood's "Walk of Fame"

Lady Gaga will perform at the MTV Video Music Awards next month. It will be one of her first appearances since having hip surgery in February. The 27-year-old pop star will perform her new single

Britain's Prince Harry on Thursday promised to use his expertise to make sure his new nephew George "has fun". The fast-living prince said he had met and cuddled brother William's new baby George Alexander Louis,

Loans to businesses in the debt-mired eurozone tumbled in June, the European Central Bank said Thursday, weakening a key component of any economic recovery. Private sector loans dropped 1.6 percent last month in a year-on-year

Spanish unemployment has fallen for the first time in two years, official data showed on Thursday, a day after the central bank said the recession-hit country seemed close to a recovery. The positive figures add

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange Thursday officially launched his political party to contest Australian elections this year, saying a victory for this candidates would be akin to planting the country's "best investigative journalists" in the

Kuwaitis head to the polls Saturday for a second parliamentary election in eight months that opposition groups are boycotting and that is not expected to heal years of bitter divisions. The election -- the

Gunmen killed 14 truck drivers and stole their vehicles on a highway north of Baghdad on Thursday, while dozens of other militants attacked a nearby town, a local administrative official said. The gunmen killed the