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By Tony Jimenez VIRGINIA WATER (Reuters) - Sergio Garcia spoke of his unending gratitude to the Wentworth galleries after soaring into title contention at the PGA Championship with a sizzling four-under-par 68 in Saturday's third round. The 33-year-old Spaniard was embroiled in a racism row with Tiger Woods earlier this week and had to issue an unreserved apology after making a "fried chicken" jibe at the world number one. Garcia was almost lost for words as he was asked to describe the reaction he had received from the crowd at the European Tour's flagship event. ...

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Syria's opposition resumed talks on Saturday aimed at closing their fractious ranks, crucial to launching an international peace conference, and government forces pressed an onslaught on a rebel-held town to try to gain the upper hand in civil war. Failure of the opposition to unite could weaken the hand of conference co-sponsors Russia and the United States in ending Syria's conflict, which has killed 80,000 people, threatens to spill across borders and whip up wider sectarian conflict. The U.S. ...

By Alexandria Sage CANNES (Reuters) - An avenging Venus settling the psychological and sexual score is the star of acclaimed director Roman Polanski's "La Venus a la Fourrure" ("Venus in Fur"), one of the Cannes film festival's two final movies in main competition to premiere on Saturday. The French-Polish director is one of 20 vying for the top Palme d'Or prize to be handed out at the festival on Sunday by a jury led by Steven Spielberg. Polanski won the prize in 2002 for "The Pianist", his semi-autobiographical drama about the Warsaw Ghetto, for which he also won an Oscar for best director. ...

By Alan Baldwin MONACO (Reuters) - Germany's Nico Rosberg scorched to his third successive Formula One pole position with team mate Lewis Hamilton completing a front row lockout for Mercedes at the Monaco Grand Prix on Saturday. The pole was the fourth in a row for Mercedes, whose qualifying form has faded in the races so far this season, and second successive sweep of the top two places. Red Bull's triple world champion Sebastian Vettel qualified third, on a drying track after a damp session, with Australian team mate and last year's winner Mark Webber lining up alongside. ...

By Peter Griffiths LONDON (Reuters) - British police arrested a man under anti-terrorism laws at BBC headquarters after an interviewee said security services tried to recruit one of the two men arrested after a soldier was hacked to death in a London street. Michael Adebolajo, 28 and Michael Adebowale, 22, are under armed guard in hospital after being shot and arrested by police on suspicion of the murder of 25-year-old Lee Rigby, a veteran of the Afghan war, on Wednesday. ...

REUTERS - David Beckham was not included in Paris St Germain's squad for their final Ligue 1 game of the season at Lorient on Sunday as the former England captain headed into retirement. The 38-year-old midfielder had expected as much after his special send-off in Paris last weekend, saying he did not think he would play on the artificial pitch at the Brittany side because the surface could aggravate previous Achilles injury problems. Beckham was not among the 19-man squad named by manager Carlo Ancelotti on Saturday on the Ligue 1 champions' website (www.psg.fr). ...

By Jan Harvey LONDON (Reuters) - Gold prices are looking even more vulnerable after April's price crash, as rampant inflation expected from successive rounds of monetary easing fails to materialise. The idea that record-low interest rates would damage paper currencies and boost inflation was a key factor pushing gold to record highs in the wake of the financial crisis. Ultra-loose monetary policies are still in vogue, but gold prices have slid nearly 20 percent since the start of the year and are on track for their biggest quarterly drop in more than 15 years. ...

By Warren Strobel WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Saddled with Middle East problems ranging from Iran to Syria and beyond, President Barack Obama now faces one that is both old and new: Iraq. Unresolved sectarian tensions, inflamed by the raging civil war in neighboring Syria, have combined to send violence in Iraq to its highest level since Obama withdrew the last U.S. troops in December 2011, U.S. officials and Middle East analysts say. A Sunni Muslim insurgency against the Shi'ite-led Baghdad government has also been reawakened. ...

By Jeffrey B. Roth PITTSBURGH (Reuters) - Fifty years after the Battle of Gettysburg, the bloodiest of the U.S. Civil War, a survivor of that fight marched 200 miles (320 km) from Pittsburgh to the site of the battle for a reunion attended by both Union and Confederate veterans. On Sunday, another veteran, Jim Smith, 70, of Hempfield, Pennsylvania, will start out on the same trek as part of the observation of Memorial Day, when Americans honor their war dead. ...

ABUJA (Reuters) - Nigeria's military has freed a number of women and children held hostage by Islamist sect Boko Haram, the army said on Saturday, after its offensive in the northeast of the country overran three of the insurgents' camps. Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau said in a video earlier this month that the group had kidnapped several women and children in retaliation against security forces who, it says, detained the wives and children of its members without cause. ...

By Jason Bush MOSCOW, May 25 - Interpol has refused to include UK-based fund manager William Browder on its international search list after deciding that Russia's tax evasion case against him is "of a predominantly political nature". The decision is the latest twist in a long-running battle between the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Browder, whose investment company Hermitage Capital was once the largest investor in Russia's equity market. ...

ROME (Reuters) - A Sicilian priest gunned down by the Mafia twenty years ago outside his home in Palermo was beatified in a seafront ceremony on Saturday attended by an estimated 100,000 people from all over Italy. Father Giuseppe Puglisi was shot in the back of the head in September 1993 in the crime-ridden Brancaccio district of the Sicilian capital where he preached against the Mafia. School parties, local dignitaries and top government ministers braved a stiff wind as the emeritus archbishop of Palermo read out the formal letter of beatification from Pope Francis in Latin. ...

By Tony Jimenez VIRGINIA WATER (Reuters) - Britain's Justin Rose was relieved to feel the sun on his back again at the PGA Championship on Saturday and the world number four took advantage with a three-under-par 69. Most of the players contesting the European Tour's flagship event at Wentworth struggled to cope with wintry conditions on the first two days. The eight-degree temperatures and winds gusting up to 20-mph finally gave way to blue skies and warm sunshine in the third round and Rose blossomed as four birdies helped him glide gently through the field. ...

Mumbai/New Delhi, May 25 (IANS) Embattled BCCI president N. Srinivasan refused to quit Saturday as his son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan was sent to police custody till May 29 in connection with the raging spot fixing scam in Indian cricket.

Kolkata, May 25 (IANS) Chennai Super Kings coach Stephen Fleming Saturday attributed "loyalty to players" and "consistency in selection" for the success of his team which has played in five IPL finals and won two of them.

Dead Sea (Jordan), May 25 (IANS) US Senator John McCain said Saturday that if the second Geneva conference on the Syria issue failed, his country would act to take out the air power of the Syrian government.

Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), May 25 (IANS) Indian Vice President Hamid Ansari Saturday participated in the golden jubilee celebrations of the African Union at Addis Ababa that is being attended by around 75 heads of state, including of 54 African countries.

Yangon, May 25 (IANS) At least 11 people were killed and 15 others injured Saturday when a passenger bus overturned on Yangon-Nay Pyi Taw highway in Myanmar, reported Xinhua citing state-run radio.

Jaipur, May 25 (IANS) A Kerala Police team Saturday arrived in Rajasthan's capital Jaipur with former Odisha police chief's son Bitti Mohanty, who jumped parole in 2006 while serving a sentence in a jail here for raping a German tourist.

New Delhi, May 25 (IANS) Four people were arrested here for manufacturing and supplying high quality illegal firearms to criminals in the national capital region and Uttar Pradesh, police said Saturday.

New Delhi, May 25 (IANS) Amid widening ambit of investigations into the IPL-6 spot fixing scam, Law Minister Kapil Sibal Saturday said that the government will soon bring a stand-alone law to deal with malpractices in sports.

New Delhi, May 25 (IANS) Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi's proposed visit to Maharashtra Monday to interact with farmers has been cancelled, his office said Saturday.

Kolkata, May 25 (IANS) One of cricket's batting greats, Rajasthan Royals skipper Rahul Dravid has said that he will retire from the Indian Premier League, after the Champions League T20 later this year.

Chennai, May 25 (IANS) Tamil playback legend T.M. Soundararajan, popularly known as TMS, passed away at his residence here Saturday, family members said. He was 91.

Kolkata, May 25 (IANS) The Chennai Super Kings Saturday said its players and support staff have no knowledge of betting and spot fixing, and were distressed by the allegations and news reports concerning the franchise and the Indian Premier League.

Kolkata, May 25 (IANS) Mumbai Indian batsman Sachin Tendulkar who has been nursing a wrist and hand injury is unlikely to play the Indian Premier League final against Chennai Super Kings at the Eden Gardens Sunday.