The World - Dec. 17, 2009

THURSDAY

President Barack Obama defended the right of the United States to wage “just wars” in his speech accepting the Nobel Peace Prize. His speech comes just nine days after he ordered 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan in a major expansion of the eight-year-old war.

The Centers for Disease Control announces the swine flu has killed nearly 10,000 Americans, including 1,100 children and 7,500 younger adults, and infected one in six people in the United States since arriving last April.

The world’s first water-powered touring boat begins taking tourists around the canals of Amsterdam. The...