China has transferred two destroyers and nine other ex-navy vessels to its maritime surveillance fleet, reports said Monday, as it moves to beef up its position in bitter territorial rows with Japan and other neighbors.

Beijing renovated the ships and transferred them to surveillance operations to "alleviate the insufficiency of vessels used to protect maritime interests", said a report on Tencent, one of China's major news portals.

Several dozen protesters occupied the offices of the Vatican's embassy in Paris on Monday to support a group of undocumented migrants on a hunger strike who were this month thrown out of a church.

The embassy, known as the Apostolic Nunciature, confirmed the occupation but made no other comment.

South Korea's high-tech sector won't be taking the spotlight at Taiwan's biggest annual extravaganza.

The New Year's fireworks display at Taipei 101 has long been among the world's most spectacular. This year, South Korean electronics giant Samsung Electronics Co. reportedly had offered 40 million New Taiwan dollars ($1.4 million) to light the building's top stories with the Samsung name and logo after the fireworks.

Nearly 90 percent of those who have died in Syria's 21-month conflict were killed in 2012, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Monday.

More than 45,000 people have been killed since the conflict broke out in March 2011, but 39,362 of those perished during the past 12 months, the majority civilians, said the Britain-based watchdog.

Nearly 300 Palestinians staged a demonstration in the northern West Bank town of Nablus Monday, protesting against the economic situation and against Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad.

An Agence France Presse correspondent said the protest came after Fayyad on Sunday announced that the Palestinian Authority would as of 2013 enforce the payment of electricity bills by refugee camp residents, who have so far not had to pay them.

The family of an Indian gang-rape victim said Monday they would not rest until her killers are hanged as police finalized their investigation before charges are laid against suspects this week.

As the ruling Congress party reportedly pushed for tougher punishments for sex crimes, including chemical castration, authorities in New Delhi launched a hotline to improve safety for women in a city dubbed "India's rape capital".

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has again spoken out against the use of pressure to impose Islamic values on people, especially university candidates, media reported on Monday.

"You cannot impose things by issuing decrees and directives -- a choice imposed by force has no value whatsoever," Ahmadinejad said in a speech on Sunday.

The Iraqi authorities on Monday called for an end to what a senior official said were illegal and illegitimate protest rallies in Sunni-majority provinces that have cut key trade routes.

The remarks released by the office of Ali al-Alaak, cabinet secretary general, came as protests blocking a key highway linking Iraq to Syria and Jordan entered a ninth day and authorities north of Baghdad declared general strikes.

Syria's government on Monday welcomed any initiative for talks to end bloodshed in the country, after U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi said he had a peace plan acceptable to world powers.

The regime's stand, expressed by Prime Minister Wael al-Halaqi, came amid a flurry of diplomacy led by Brahimi to find ways to end the 21-month conflict.

A speeding passenger train killed five elephants when it ploughed into a herd crossing the track in eastern India, a railway spokesman said Monday.

The train struck the animals on Sunday near the Khallikote forest range in Orissa state's Ganjam district, some 120 kilometers (74 miles) south of the state capital Bhubaneshwar.