• A Liberian owned cargo vessel with 24 Filipino crew is seized by Somali pirates 550 nautical miles from the coast of India. (Xinhua)

• A 2,400-year-old pot of soup is unearthed in China near the ancient capital Xi'an. (BBC) (People's Daily)

• Brunei and Malaysia sign a deal to jointly explore and produce oil and gas off the coast of northern Borneo. (Malaysia Star)
• Major British supermarkets and online stores stop taking orders in Scotland in the run up to Christmas, because of a backlog of deliveries caused by the recent adverse weather conditions. (BBC)

• A South Korean deep sea trawler sinks in the Southern Ocean two thousand kilometres south of New Zealand with at least five people dead and seventeen missing. (BBC) (Yonhap) (CNN)
• Heavy rains and flooding in Colombia cause up to $5.2 billion in damages. (Reuters Alertnet)

• Woman's arson kills 9 in gambling grievances in east China's Zhejiang Province. (Kunming via Xinhua)
• New Israeli bill would prevent a terror suspect from meeting a specific lawyer for 6 months instead of 21 days as is the case today. The maximum period of time in which a terror suspect can be denied access to a specific lawyer will be one year. (Arutz Sheva)
• A sword-wielding teenager takes up to half a dozen children and a teacher hostage at a nursery in Besançon, eastern France. He is later arrested. (France 24) (BBC)
• Kuwait closes the offices of Al Jazeera, following coverage of a crackdown at an opposition rally. (Straits Times)
• Mark Weston, the first person to face a second murder trial in the United Kingdom following the discovery of new forensic evidence is convicted of killing a woman in 1995. (BBC)
• United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia Judge Henry E. Hudson rules against Barack Obama's health care reform requirement to purchase health insurance. (BBC)
• An American Catholic nun pleads not guilty to charges of embezzling $850,000 from Iona College. (CBS)

• Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat asks the European Union to recognize “two states (Israel and Palestine) along the 1967 borders". (Bloomberg)
• Europe reaffirms its readiness to recognise a Palestinian state at an "appropriate" time, stopping short of outright recognition despite mounting pressure to break the Middle East impasse. (AFP)
• Minni Minnawi, the only Darfur faction leader to sign the Darfur Peace Agreement with the Sudanese government, declares its failure and leaves his post. (Al Jazeera)
• The Philippine parliament blocks a government effort to provide free condoms to poor people, amid a debate over funding for family planning. (Straits Times)
• Protests by garment workers in Bangladesh over low wages spread to other areas of the country. (AFP)
• OpenLeaks, a splinter group rivaling WikiLeaks, launches its website. (CNN)

• Papua New Guinea's Supreme Court unanimously rules the reappointment of Sir Paulias Matane as Governor-General of Papua New Guinea unconstitutional due to the lack of a secret ballot. Matane steps down from his position and Jeffrey Nape becomes acting Governor-General. (Radio Australia)
• Hashim Thaçi, the Prime Minister of Kosovo, claims victory in the Kosovan parliamentary election. (The Telegraph)
• Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad dismisses Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki for unknown reasons. He is replaced by Ali Akbar Salehi in an acting capacity. (BBC) (Sify India) (Press TV)
• U.S. senator Bernie Sanders gives an 8.5 hour senate speech denouncing the extension of tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, citing the very large inequality in income and wealth and its growth, and that America is close to being a Banana republic. (Democracy Now!)

• A new species of fork-marked lemur has been identified in northeast Madagascar. (BBC News)

• In American football, Minnesota Vikings quarterback Brett Favre is sidelined for the Vikings' game against the New York Giants due to an injury to his right (throwing) shoulder. This ends his National Football League record of consecutive regular-season starts, which had run since 1992, at 297. (ESPN)