Christmas cheer came early to Sweden's Arctic mining town of Gaellivare this weekend, where Santas from around the world gathered to compete in one of the world's most important but little known sporting events, the Santa Winter Games.

"We're getting into shape before delivering all the Christmas presents and we want to make all the children happy today," said the only Mother Christmas taking part in the competition, who traveled from France and donned her red suit to compete for the second year in a row.

Britain's Ministry of Defense on Sunday defended its practice of shooting pigs and giving the wounded animals to military surgeons to practice treating common battlefield injuries.

Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals spokesperson Klare Kennett said the training exercises, which take place twice a year in Denmark, were "abhorrent and shocking".

A call by two Dutch sexologists for "virtual" child pornography to be legalized so as to assuage paedophiles' desires has sparked fierce debate in the Netherlands.

Sexologists Rik van Lunsen and Erik van Beek of Amsterdam University Hospital (AMC) last month floated the idea of creating child pornography using drawings or computer-generated images.

The demand of dozens of citizens has been denied in the Ecuadorean city of Guayaquil: There will be no jackass running for the legislature.

At least 40 people paraded their candidate through the city's streets to the electoral council offices. Mr. Burro even wore a tie. But officials refused to even let them in the door on Thursday, even though backers had dummied up a mock voter registration card showing the candidate's photo superimposed on a man wearing a business suit.

A football fan who had a Paris Saint-Germain replica shirt printed with the name of Osama Bin Laden on the back found himself in court Friday, charged with defending terrorism.

The 21-year-old, who bought the shirt in the club store on the Champs-Elysees, was arrested after a shop assistant reported him saying he wanted to honor the memory of the late al-Qaida leader.

Tired of bird droppings on the city's most famous monuments, local authorities in Rome are resorting to unusual measures to try and scare off a million starlings that migrate to the Eternal City every year.

Armed with loudspeakers and light projectors, workers dressed in white overalls and masks have been seen walking around at sunset along the tree-lined embankments of the Tiber River where starlings tend to congregate.

France on Friday dashed the hopes of those who had planned to take refuge in one of the few places on Earth some believe will be spared when the world ends on December 21.

Local officials banned access to the Pic de Bugarach, a mountain in the southwest where rumor has it the hilltop will open on the last day and aliens will emerge with spaceships to save nearby humans.

Forget texting while driving. German police say they nabbed a driver who had wired his Ford station wagon with an entire mobile office.

Saarland state police said Friday the 35-year-old man was pulled over for doing 130 kph (80 mph) in a 100 kph zone while passing a truck Monday.

Celebrity TV chef Guy Fieri was chopping mad Thursday after being sliced and diced in a scathing New York Times review of his soggy fries and "nuclear waste" drinks.

The review was served up Tuesday but the fallout continued to brew Thursday with the dissed chef firing back in an interview on ABC television that the Times had "another agenda."

Health officials on Friday told Thai men size does not matter after a patient had to have his genitals removed following a botched attempt to enlarge his penis by injecting olive oil into the organ.

The risky and unproven method using the oil -- although bees wax, silicone and even paraffin are often also used -- is common in Thailand with one Bangkok hospital receiving about 40 patients a month concerned about side-effects.