Offbeat - AFP

PARIS (AFP) - A leading French business newspaper is launching a multi-lingual version of its website using automatic translation, dispensing with journalists but producing often comic results.

PARIS (AFP) - Penny-pinching, rude and terrible at foreign languages: French people are the world's worst tourists and Japanese the best, according to a study of the global hotel industry.

L'AQUILA, Italy (AFP) - Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper made light of the sex scandals trailing his Italian counterpart Silvio Berlusconi on Friday, saying the 72-year-old was remarkably "energetic".

L'AQUILA, Italy (AFP) - Even if Russia's call for a global currency failed to gain much traction at a G8 summit, President Dmitry Medvedev took home a coin meant to symbolize that the dream may one day come true.

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) - An ecstatic Singaporean millionaire thinks he has discovered his son in Malaysia after putting out an appeal to be reunited with his long-lost family, a report said.

SHANGHAI (AFP) - A group of businesspeople are proposing to build a replica of Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch on an island north of Shanghai as a tribute to the late singer, state media reported Thursday.

RENNES, France (AFP) - A 62-year-old French woman hiker survived 11 days lost in the Pyrenees mountains with nothing but a picnic to eat, her husband said Thursday.

MONTREAL, July 9, 2009 (AFP) - An irked Canadian musician who accused United Airlines of breaking his prized guitar has taken his revenge, writing a song that has become an Internet hit and a public relations disaster for the airline.

OTTAWA (AFP) - Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper accepted and ate a communion wafer at a Catholic mass and didn't pocket it as critics have alleged, according to his spokesman.

MADRID (AFP) - Spanish police briefly detained a drunk British man Wednesday who was handing out money to strangers at the airport at Palma de Mallorca after arriving on a flight from Manchester, police said.