Canada's health agency on Tuesday warned would-be parents not to purchase "fresh" semen online, saying it may be tainted with infectious diseases.

"Health Canada is reminding Canadians of the serious potential health risks of using donor semen for assisted conception obtained through potentially unreliable sources, such as the Internet," the government agency said.

The state of Vermont on Monday battled historic flooding that swamped town centers as the United States limped back to normal from Hurricane Irene, blamed for at least 29 deaths.

Major cities including New York took unprecedented evacuation measures and were largely spared the full wrath of Hurricane Irene, which was downgraded on Sunday to a tropical storm as it drenched a vast stretch of the U.S. East Coast.

Google will pay $500 million to settle charges that it sold advertisements to Canada-based online pharmacies which marketed drugs to Americans in violation of U.S. law, U.S. justice officials announced Wednesday.

The pharmacies broke the law by selling prescription drugs to Americans without complying with U.S. safety standards, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a statement.

Canada's Research in Motion (RIM) is developing a new service that would allow subscribers to play music on their BlackBerry smartphones, the Wall Street Journal has reported.

The option is "designed to work with RIM's BlackBerry Messenger," the newspaper reported, citing unnamed sources who had discussed the service with RIM executives.

Canada's security service identified possible Hizbullah reprisals over Hariri murder indictments as a national security threat, said a report Thursday.

A classified document cited by the Montreal French-language daily La Presse, entitled "Special Tribunal for Lebanon: does Hizbullah have recourse for violence in 2011?" outlines the concerns of Canada's Integrated Threat Assessment Center.

Oil prices retreated on Tuesday as the dollar strengthened, and traders digested downbeat European economic growth data and awaited news of any fresh plan to tackle the Eurozone debt crisis.

New York's main contract, West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude for delivery in September, fell 84 cents to $87.04 a barrel.

Scientists in Canada said Monday that they plan to study whether eating dark chocolate not only satisfies sweet tooth cravings, but protects against sunburn as well.

The study by researchers at Laval University in Quebec will monitor the effects of chocolate consumption on fair-skinned volunteers between the ages of 25 and 65, each of whom will be prevailed upon to eat three squares of chocolate per day for 12 weeks.

Canada said Saturday it had expanded sanctions on Syria, including blacklisting a commercial bank and a mobile phone provider, to protest the government's brutal crackdown on protests.

The new sanctions include travel bans on four officials, including Mohammed Mufleh, head of military security in the flashpoint city of Hama, and Mohammed Makhlouf, an uncle of President Bashar al-Assad.

A fictional red-headed orphan, whose adventures were penned a century ago, is proving a tourist boon to a corner of Canada, even drawing the attentions of Prince William's new bride, Catherine.

"Anne of Green Gables", the Canadian novel by author Lucy Maud Montgomery, has sold more than 50 million copies worldwide since it was published in 1908.

The U.S., French and German leaders pledged to consider new steps to punish Syria after security forces shot dead at least 24 people as tens of thousands staged anti-regime protests on the first Friday of Ramadan.

President Barack Obama spoke separately to France's Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel as Western nations cranked up pressure on Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.