Germany defender Jerome Boateng has extended his contract with Bayern Munich in a deal that will keep him at the Champions League titleholder through mid-2018.

The Bundesliga champion's chairman, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, said Boateng has become one of the club's "important players" and that it was only "logical" for Bayern to seek to keep him.

A law under consideration in South Korea's parliament has sparked vociferous debate by grouping popular online games such as "StarCraft" with gambling, drugs and alcohol as an anti-social addiction the government should do more to stamp out.

The bill is winning support from parents, religious groups and doctors but has alarmed the Internet industry and enraged gamers. The legislation includes provisions to limit advertising while a separate bill would take 1 percent of the gaming industry's revenue to create a fund to curb addiction.

Comet ISON, once optimistically called the comet of the century, is dead, the victim of a way-too-close brush with the sun. It was barely a year old.

The comet, which excited astronomers and the media as it zipped within 730,000 miles of the sun on Thanksgiving Day, was pronounced dead at a scientific conference Tuesday. Astronomers who had followed the ice ball mourned the loss of the sky show that once promised to light up during December.

MTV's college channel has gone in two wildly different directions in naming Pope Francis and pop singer Lorde as its man and woman of the year.

MTVU said Tuesday that both figures challenged their followers with unexpected stands.

While she's excited her ballad "Just Give Me a Reason" is nominated for the song of the year Grammy, Pink says she believes her husband deserves some credit for its success.

The track, which topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart for three weeks, is about holding on to a troubled relationship.

Indiana showed it is a legitimate challenger to Miami for the NBA Eastern Conference crown by beating the Heat 90-84 on Tuesday, pulling off an impressive second-half rally in a clash of the East's top two teams.

Among the day's other games, Oklahoma City made it 11 wins from 12 games by beating Atlanta, San Antonio recovered from a big early deficit to run down Toronto, and Phoenix was too good for the Los Angeles Lakers even with Kobe Bryant getting back near his old self.

It's a good thing the mayor of World Cup city Manaus has a sense of humor. Because some of the stuff being said of late about this historic city deep in the heart of the Amazon jungle is laughable.

Last week, it was England coach Roy Hodgson, expressing misgivings about the city's taxing high heat and humidity.

Indian athletes have been cleared to compete in the Winter Games in Sochi after the country complied with the IOC's ethics rules and avoided becoming the first country expelled from the Olympics in more than 40 years.

Still to be determined is whether the few Indian athletes who have qualified for Sochi compete for their country or under the Olympic flag.

Olympiakos and Bayer Leverkusen reached the last 16 of the Champions League on Tuesday, with either Juventus or Galatasaray set to join them after their match in Istanbul was abandoned because of a snowstorm.

Match officials stopped play after 31 minutes, ruling the field was too dangerous to play on. The last hour will now be played on Wednesday, kicking off at 3pm local time (1300 GMT).

The Champions League match between Galatasaray and Juventus was abandoned due to poor weather on Tuesday with the remaining 59 minutes to be played on Wednesday.

Play was halted in the 31st minute with the score at 0-0 as hail and snow began to fall heavily in Istanbul.