The Vatican on Friday gave its blessing to a new German website called "Adopt a Cardinal" that is encouraging the faithful to pray for individual cardinals chosen at random by a computer program.

"The cardinals were informed about the website. A lot of people have signed up," Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi told reporters, referring to ongoing pre-conclave talks in the Vatican.

South African police destroyed a mortar bomb unknowingly picked up by a scrap metal collector who planned to sell it, a spokesman said Friday.

Officers rushed to the scene in Durban after a security guard spotted the explosive among a trolley of scrap metal being pushed by the man.

Diners who forked out for a top-notch meal in a Danish restaurant dubbed the world's best eatery got more than they bargained for when dozens came down with a nasty case of food poisoning.

The two-Michelin-star Noma restaurant in Copenhagen prides itself on dishes like pike perch and cabbages or wild duck and pear but in February its delights left 63 punters and some staff members vomiting or suffering from diarrhea, health officials said Friday.

Echoing with joyful song and with a congregation bent on leading better lives, this London church is like any other -- except there's no mention of God.

Britain's atheist church is barely three months old but it already has more "worshippers" than can fit into its services, while more than 200 non-believers worldwide have contacted organizers to ask how they can set up their own branch.

In Poland, speaking out in parliament is a privilege mostly reserved for lawmakers, but the opposition has skirted that regulation with the help of a hand-held tablet computer.

Nationalist opposition party leader and lawmaker Jaroslaw Kaczynski has introduced a non-confidence motion against the Cabinet of Prime Minister Donald Tusk, and a vote is expected Friday.

Police in the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo are baffled by a macabre puzzle: someone has been leaving gift-wrapped human skulls around town.

Investigator Paul Henry Bozon Verduraz described the case to the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper in a story published Thursday.

Officials on the Indonesian island of Bali are considering putting up "no sex" signs at Hindu temples after a lusty Estonian couple were caught in the act.

Police took the pair in for questioning after they were found by youth leaders who had gone to check up on repairs at the temple in the village of Saraseda.

Short, pot-bellied policemen will be banned from traffic duty in Vietnam's capital Hanoi and given office jobs in a bid to improve the force's public image, police said Wednesday.

Details of the new height and weight restrictions were not available but the head of Hanoi's traffic police said they were working on a list of cops who didn't measure up and would be redeployed out of sight.

A Jordanian MP, angered by a fellow deputy accusing the premier of corruption, tried to draw a pistol during a session of parliament on Wednesday but was circled by colleagues who talked him down.

Khalil Atiyeh, a deputy speaker, said MP Shadi al-Adwan was annoyed when fellow MP Zeid Shawakbeh accused Prime Minister Abdullah Nsur of corruption.

A Hong Kong fortune teller who once advised Asia's richest woman but was later embroiled in a high-profile legal battle over her fortune has renounced feng shui for Christianity, a report said Thursday.

Bartender-turned-fortune teller Tony Chan built a career advising clients including the late Hong Kong property tycoon Nina Wang on feng shui, an ancient Chinese belief system based on harnessing natural and spiritual energies.