Philippine rescue officials said Wednesday they are losing hope of finding anyone alive among 71 people still buried in landslides set off by a powerful earthquake. So far, 26 bodies have been recovered and identified.

President Benigno Aquino III flew to the disaster area in central Negros Oriental province and gave orders to speed up the reconstruction of roads and bridges that collapsed when the magnitude-6.9 quake struck Monday.

The new president of the Maldives called Wednesday for the formation of a national unity government in his Indian Ocean nation even as police and soldiers kept watch over his predecessor at an undisclosed location.

President Mohammed Waheed Hassan, the former vice president, was sworn in Tuesday when Mohamed Nasheed resigned after police joined widening street protests against his government.

The Vatican has confirmed that Pope Benedict XVI may travel to Lebanon later this year.

The top Roman Catholic official in the Holy Land, Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal, said Tuesday that Benedict was expected in Lebanon in September to present a document on the future of the church in the Middle East.

Chris Brown will perform at this year's Grammy Awards, the event where his career almost ended three years ago.

Brown admitted to assaulting then-girlfriend Rihanna at a pre-Grammy party in 2009 and is serving five years of probation for the felony attack. A source told The Associated Press on Monday that Brown will hit the stage at Sunday's show. The source spoke on condition of anonymity because Brown's performance has not been officially announced.

"The Amazing Spider-Man" dropped in on hundreds of fans Monday.

Sony Pictures teased the latest incarnation of the web-slinging superhero, which doesn't arrive in U.S. theaters until July 3, at preview events held Monday at movie theaters in 13 cities spanning the globe, including Mexico City, Berlin, Rome, Paris and Moscow, with the cast and filmmakers appearing in Los Angeles, New York, Rio de Janeiro and London.

As Jay-Z transitioned from hit song to hit song at a Carnegie Hall concert Monday night, so did the lighting, changing from red to white to blue.

The veteran rapper then performed his latest hit, "Glory," about his 1-month-old daughter with Beyonce, Blue Ivy Carter.

Novak Djokovic won the top individual honor at the 2012 Laureus Sports Awards on Monday, and Barcelona captured the team prize.

The top-ranked Djokovic won sportsman of the year at the ceremony in London, one week after the Serbian triumphed at the Australian Open to become the fifth man in the Open era to win three Grand Slam titles in a row.

At least 400 children have been killed in 11 months of violence in Syria and almost the same number detained, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on Tuesday.

"As of the end of January, 400 children are dead and more than 400 have been detained," UNICEF spokeswoman Marixie Mercado said at a briefing.

A group linked to the hacker network Anonymous on Saturday said it had attacked the Swedish government's website, bringing it down for periods of time by overloading it with traffic.

CyberForce used Twitter to claim responsibility, saying "We have succeeded in the attack against the government."

Figuring out how to pack a processor and other electronics into a machine gun bullet has been a challenge for engineers at Sandia National Laboratories, so weapons experts say the miniature guidance system the lab has developed is a breakthrough.

Three years in the making, the bullet prototype represents another step toward a next-generation battlefield that scientists and experts expect to be saturated with technology and information.