Australia's former prime minister Julia Gillard said Thursday that the United States sent a "really bad message" to a fast-changing Asia when President Barack Obama canceled a visit.

Obama, who has pledged a "pivot" policy of putting a greater U.S. focus on Asia, called off a four-nation trip this month that would have included two regional summits after lawmakers of the rival Republican Party forced a shutdown of the federal government.

U.S. President Barack Obama Thursday sought to capitalize on a moment of sharp Republican unpopularity by pressing his foes in Congress to pass a stalled immigration bill this year.

Obama demanded action in the knowledge that the Republican Party is under pressure to improve its standing among Hispanic voters for whom immigration reform is a cherished political goal.

U.S. President Barack Obama promised Wednesday to consider Pakistan's concerns in post-war Afghanistan, but stayed mum on a call by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to end drone strikes.

Obama welcomed Sharif to the White House after releasing $1.6 billion in aid -- mostly for the military -- that had been blocked amid high tensions over the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden.

U.S. President Barack Obama stressed on Wednesday commitment to promoting Lebanon’s stability and supported the Lebanese people in their effort to form a new government as the U.S. marks 30 years since the deadly Marine barracks bombing in Beirut.

In a statement on the anniversary of the attack that left 241 Americans dead in 1983, Obama condemned the “despicable act of terrorism,” which was the deadliest single-day death toll for the U.S. Marine Corps since the World War II Battle of Iwo Jima.

French President Francois Hollande condemned U.S. spying on French citizens in a call with President Barack Obama on Monday, as a row escalated over U.S. eavesdropping on millions of French phone calls.

Hollande's office said in a statement that he had expressed "deep disapproval of these practices, which are unacceptable between friends and allies because they infringe on the privacy of French citizens."

President Barack Obama said Monday there was "no sugarcoating" the problems clouding the online launch of his health care law, but mounted a firm defense of a system that will help define his legacy.

Obama struggled to assert control over a mounting political storm over the rollout of Obamacare websites, which gleeful Republicans are using to argue the system is fatally flawed and will never work.

Governments that try to force citizens to decide between a free press and national security create a "false choice" that weakens democracy, and journalists must fight increasing government overreach that has had a chilling effect on efforts to hold government accountable, the president and CEO of The Associated Press said Saturday.

Gary Pruitt told the 69th General Assembly of the Inter American Press Association that the U.S. Justice Department's secret seizure of records of thousands of telephone calls to and from AP reporters in 2012 is one of the most blatant violations of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution the 167-year-old news cooperative has ever encountered. The First Amendment guarantees basic rights such as freedom of speech and the press.

The U.S. Congress must stop stumbling from crisis to crisis and join together to create jobs and get things done, President Barack Obama said Saturday in his weekly radio address.

Speaking just two days after Congress reached an 11th-hour accord to end a 16-day government shutdown and avert a debt default by extending the Treasury's authority to borrow money, the president said lawmakers have little to be proud of.

U.S. President Barack Obama will on Friday nominate Jeh Johnson, formerly the Pentagon's top lawyer, to lead the Department of Homeland Security, an official said.

Johnson, who will succeed Janet Napolitano who left earlier this year, was in his previous job responsible for a prior legal review of every military operation ordered by the president or the secretary of defense.

Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta became the first world leader Thursday to meet President Barack Obama after the end of a debt default showdown and declared: "his success is our success."

Letta told Obama that a stable U.S. economy was vital for the globe, only hours after the U.S. Congress staved off a debt default by agreeing to extend the government's borrowing authority.