U.S. officials say the Obama administration is weighing whether to order the National Security Agency to stop spying on leaders of American allies.  

California Democrat Dianne Feinstein, who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee, issued a statement Monday saying she was informed by the White House that "collection on our allies will not continue."  However, administration officials later stressed that a final decision on the matter has not been made.

Caitlin Hayden, a spokesperson for President Barack Obama's National Security Council refused to discuss Feinstein's statement.

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The World Health Organization says it has confirmed 10 cases of polio among young children in northeastern Syria.

A spokesman for the U.N. health agency said Tuesday officials are examining 12 other children who have shown polio symptoms.

The confirmed cases involve babies and toddlers who are not believed to have received full polio vaccinations.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott made a surprise visit to Afghanistan to declare an end to his country’s longest war.Phil Mercer reports.
 
Speaking at a special ceremony at the Australian-run base in Tarin Kot in Uruzgan province, Prime Minister Abbott announced the end of his nation’s longest military engagement.
 
Canberra will order home about 1,000 troops by the end of the year, although Abbott has pledged to support Afghanistan in the future.
 
There is a commitment to train Afghan National Security Forces and several hundred Australians will continue to serve in non-combat roles in the country.

Phil Mercer,VOA News,Sydney,Australia.

A Vietnamese court has convicted a man of using the social media site Facebook to criticize the government.

The court on Tuesday found Dinh Nhat Uy guilty, but suspended his 15-month prison sentence and released him from detention.

Uy's lawyer said his client was convicted of "abusing democratic freedoms" in his one-day trial. This is believed to be the first such case in Vietnam to mention Facebook by name.

Residents along the seaside communities near New York City and in the neighboring state of New Jersey will light candles and flashlights Tuesday evening to mark the one-year anniversary of Superstorm Sandy.

The massive storm wrecked a large portion of the eastern United States, creating a huge surge that swamped New York's subway tunnels, destroyed hundreds of homes and left millions of residents without power for weeks.

Superstorm Sandy is blamed for over causing more than 100 deaths .

U.S. President Barack Obama has installed James Comey as the new director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The 54-year-old Comey served as deputy U.S. attorney general under former U.S. president George W. Bush. During that time, he gained notoriety by defiantly refusing to go along with White House demands for warrantless wiretapping.

Comey replaces Robert Mueller.

A British man has been arrested for allegedly hacking into the computers of several U.S. government agencies and the U.S. military.

Lauri Love has been charged with infiltrating thousands of computer systems, including those of the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, NASA and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

A federal grand jury in New Jersey charged Love, alleging he and his unnamed co-conspirators hacked into computer systems between October 2012 and October 2013.