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Nicki Minaj not Returning to 'American Idol'

Nicki Minaj is following Mariah Carey out the door on "American Idol."

The hip-hop diva announced Thursday on Twitter that it is "time to focus on the music."

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Up Next for Djokovic is Rematch against Dimitrov

Two years ago, Novak Djokovic entered the French Open on a 39-match winning streak dating to the previous December.

Last year, he came to Paris having won 21 consecutive matches at Grand Slam tournaments.

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Heat Beats Pacers 90-79 to Take 3-2 Series Lead

A brilliant third quarter by LeBron James and the Miami Heat turned the game around and lifted the hosts to a 90-79 win over the Indiana Pacers on Thursday, taking a 3-2 lead in the NBA Eastern Conference finals.

James scored 16 of his 30 points in the third, helping to turn a six-point deficit into a 14-point lead and put the Heat within one win of a third-straight trip to the NBA Finals.

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Leonardo Given Nine-Month Ban for Shoving Referee

Paris Saint-Germain's sporting director Leonardo was suspended for nine months by the French league on Thursday for barging a referee just outside the tunnel following a home match — a punishment the club will appeal.

Leonardo was already provisionally suspended by the LFP for appearing to deliberately shoulder-barge Alexandre Castro after the French champions' 1-1 home draw against Valenciennes on May 5.

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German Police Warn of Exploding Ticket Machines

German police are warning rail travelers to be wary when using Deutsche Bahn's automatic ticket machines because criminals attempting to break into them may have left them filled with explosive gas.

Hesse state police spokesman Udo Buehler says since April criminals have successfully blown open 10 ticket machines by taping closed all holes, filling them with gas and igniting it. They then steal the money and blank train tickets.

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French Kiss" Finally Enters French Dictionary

For centuries, there's been no official French word for the sloppy Gallic export "to French kiss" — though that certainly hasn't stopped any citizen from doing so.

Now the oversight has been rectified.

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Austrian Drives Flaming Car to Fire Station

Some Austrian firefighters didn't have to leave their station to deal with a recent alarm. The blaze came to them instead.

Fireman Roland Brandl says that colleagues were doing chores at the station in the town of Pregarten Wednesday when a car sped in with flames shooting from beneath it.

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Photo-Taking Player Fined $2,000 at French Open

The player who used his phone to snap a photo of a ball mark during a French Open match has been fined $2,000 (about 1,500 euros).

Sergiy Stakhovsky of Ukraine was cited for unsportsmanlike conduct for setting aside his racket and taking a picture of the spot in the red clay where a shot landed near a line in his 6-1, 6-4, 6-3 loss to seventh-seeded Richard Gasquet at Roland Garros.

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U.S.: Iran, Hizbullah Support for Global Terror Surged in 2012

Iran last year boosted its support for global terrorism to levels not seen for two decades, the Obama administration said Thursday as it released its annual report on international trends in extremist violence. The report said the core elements of al-Qaida in Afghanistan and Pakistan are headed for defeat but stressed that the network's various affiliates remain severe threats to the U.S.

The State Department's "Country Reports on Terrorism" for 2012 left unchanged the U.S. list of "state sponsors of terrorism." Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria remain on that blacklist, although Iran was singled out as the worst offender and Syria was taken to task for the ongoing brutal crackdown on opponents of President Bashar Assad's regime.

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Three Bid Cities Make Pitches for 2020 Olympics

Less than four months before the IOC vote, the three cities vying for the 2020 Olympics took their campaign to a key international audience on Thursday — with each claiming to be the safest and most financially secure choice at a time of global uncertainty.

Officials from Istanbul, Madrid and Tokyo made presentations to the SportAccord conference in St. Petersburg, their first chance to pitch their bids in public to sports and Olympic officials.

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