An explosion damages a major oil pipeline in the central Syrian city of Homs, witnesses and activists say, with the government blaming “armed terrorists”.

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Blast hits key Syria oil pipeline

Search and rescue efforts are continuing for survivors of a 6.7 magnitude quake that shook the central Philippines on Monday, leaving dozens dead or missing.

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Search on for Philippine missing

The Federal Reserve said Wednesday that it would keep interest rates near zero through 2014 or longer to help boost the economy and for the first time set an explicit inflation target of 2 percent, signaling that the central bank is frustrated with the weak pace of growth. Read full article > >

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Fed: Rates likely to remain near zero through 2014; inflation target set at 2%

PALO ALTO, Calif. — Critics began panning the first leg of California’s futuristic high-speed rail network as a “train to nowhere” soon after officials decided to build it not in the major population centers of Los Angeles or San Francisco, but through the state’s Central Valley farming belt. Read full article > >

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Plans for high-speed rail are slowing down

KHANDWA, INDIA — Two months after he lost his wife to Alzheimer’s disease, 80-year-old Sharad Geete made a shocking discovery. The free drugs his wife, Sheela, had been receiving for two years before she died were part of a clinical trial. “The doctor told us that the medicines will be given free and that they were going to be launched soon by a foreign company. Not once did he say it was an experiment or a trial. If I knew, would I have taken the risk?” asked Geete, sitting in his home in Khandwa, a small town in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. lakshmir@washpost.com Read full article > >

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India’s drug trials fuel consent controversy

Ethiopian forces capture most of the central Somali town of Beledweyne from Islamist militants of al-Shabab, reports say.

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Ethiopia army ‘takes Somali town’

President Obama on Tuesday nominated a Republican and a Democrat to serve on the Federal Reserve, as the central bank weighs whether to take additional steps to try to stimulate the economy and reduce unemployment. The Democrat, Harvard professor Jeremy Stein, served previously in the Obama administration in the White House and Treasury Department. The Republican, Jerome “Jay” Powell, was a Treasury official in the George H.W. Bush administration and a former financial executive. Both men would bring specialized knowledge in finance — one from the academic perspective, the other from industry — to the Fed. Read full article > >

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Obama nominates Democrat Jeremy Stein, Republican Jerome ‘Jay’ Powell to Fed

Federal Reserve policymakers said Tuesday that the economy is “expanding moderately” and declined to take any new measures to try to strengthen growth, leaving the central bank’s low-interest-rate policies in place. For the second straight meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, the Fed made no meaningful changes in its monetary policy: The central bank’s target for short-term interest rates will remain near zero, where it has been for three years, and the Fed is continuing its plans to shift $400 billion of its bond portfolio into longer-term securities to try to lower long-term interest rates. Read full article > >

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Fed sees moderate economic growth, takes no new policy action

There are appeals for calm in the Democratic Republic of Congo as disputed elections threaten to plunge the volatile Central African nation into chaos.

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Plea for calm after DR Congo poll

From N.F.L. fields to Central Park to backyards in Omaha, quarterbacks can’t agree on the best way to throw a football.

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Secrets of a Great Spiral: The Grip and the Release

Federal Reserve officials sharply downgraded their forecasts for economic growth and jobs on Wednesday, expecting a sluggish recovery and high unemployment for years to come. In releasing their projections for how the economy will perform in the years ahead, the 17 top officials of the central bank project that the jobless rate, 9.1 percent in September, will fall only to 8.5 to 8.7 percent by the final months of 2012. In June, the last time they released projections, they thought the unemployment rate would descend to around 8 percent. Read full article > >

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Fed downgrades growth forecasts, sees high unemployment for years ahead

The base has been a crucial supply hub for the war in Afghanistan since 2001 and is the only one of its kind in Central Asia.

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Kyrgyzstan Says United States’ Manas Air Base Will Close

When Federal Reserve policymakers meet to decide the nation’s monetary policy, they usually discuss where the economy is heading and how they should adjust interest rates to try to keep prices stable and Americans employed. At their meeting this week , bigger ideas will be on the table. No major policy changes are expected out of the two-day session beginning Tuesday, but the discussion will probably focus on some core questions about how the central bank communicates with the public about its goals and expectations for the economy. Read full article > >

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Fed policymakers mull how to share economic goals and expectations

TASHKENT, Uzbekistan — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton blitzed through the Central Asian republics of Tajikistan and Uzbekistan on Saturday, admonishing the countries’ leaders on human rights while urging closer cooperation on securing their borders with Afghanistan. Clinton sought to reinforce efforts by both countries to crack down on drug smugglers and insurgents slipping into their territories while also encouraging economic integration along what U.S. officials envision as a “new Silk Road” connecting the former Soviet republics to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Read full article > >

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Clinton chides Central Asians on human rights

The Federal Reserve might move toward publicly announcing what economic conditions would lead it to change policies, according to minutes of the central bank’s last policy meeting released Wednesday, which show an institution facing deep internal divides over the direction of monetary policy. At its Sept. 20-21 meeting, the Fed unveiled a new strategy to try to boost the ailing economy: shifting $400 billion of its holdings of shorter-term Treasury bonds into longer-term bonds in an effort to push down long-term interest rates. However, two members of the policy committee “said that current conditions and the outlook could justify stronger policy action,” according to the minutes. Still, they supported the decision to adjust the Fed’s portfolio holdings, “as it did not rule out additional steps at future meetings.” Read full article > >

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Fed divided on monetary policy action, minutes show