A Canadian bit-part actress barraged Alec Baldwin with lovesick, demanding messages, packed her belongings into a car and showed up uninvited at his homes in Manhattan and the Hamptons, prosecutors said as her stalking trial opened Thursday.

The case is expected to put the "30 Rock" actor in an unsought role: a key witness against a woman who says she had a fling with him some years ago, which he denies. Baldwin is expected to testify next week against actress Genevieve Sabourin, whose lawyer says she was merely trying to get answers after the actor lost interest in her.

Billionaire financier George Soros is pledging $1 million for humanitarian efforts in war-ravaged Syria.

Soros announced the pledge to the International Rescue Committee on Wednesday night after receiving its Freedom Award in recognition of his lifelong support for human rights and an open society.

The European Union moved closer to approving the cultivation of a second genetically modified corn on the continent despite years of objections by environmental groups and widespread apprehension about GMO food among European consumers.

Wednesday's approval by the EU Commission, the bloc's executive arm, now sends the plan to approve DuPont-Pioneer Maize 1507 to the EU's 28 member nations for consideration — and could lead to a decision on the issue within months.

A rocket carrying the Olympic flame successfully blasted off Thursday from earth ahead of the Sochi 2014 Winter Games.

NASA Live TV showed the rocket, emblazoned with the pale blue Sochi 2014 logo, launching from the Russian-operated Baikonur cosmodrome on a clear morning in Kazakhstan.

Indiana's heavy offseason investment in squad development paid off Wednesday when Luis Scola, Donald Sloan and Lance Stephenson combined for all 12 points in a decisive fourth-quarter run, sending the still unbeaten Pacers past division rival Chicago 97-80 and to its best start since 1971-72.

"They brought all of us in to make the bench a little deeper than it was last year, and I think the guys on the bench know their role," Sloan said. "So it just fits."

Lionel Messi returned to form with two goals as Barcelona secured its spot in the knockout stage of the Champions League. Fellow Argentina forward Gonzalo Higuain also had a brace for Napoli. And Samuel Eto'o scored for his fourth different team.

On a night of standout individual performances Wednesday, Schalke goalkeeper Timo Hildebrand had a game he'll want to forget. His failed clearance led to Eto'o's opening goal in Chelsea's 3-0 win, which put Jose Mourinho's side atop Group E.

Lindsey Vonn eased into her first day of downhill training on Wednesday, with the four-time overall World Cup champion holding back on her opening run just to get used to that kind of speed again.

By her fifth and final pass at the U.S. Ski Team's speed center on Wednesday, Vonn was charging so hard through the two-mile course that she bent over in exhaustion soon after finishing, trying to catch her breath.

Chemical weapons inspectors said Thursday that Syria has provided video and photographic evidence that shows a chemical weapons site near war-torn Aleppo has been dismantled and abandoned.

In a mission update by the OPCW, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said photographs and footage provided by Syria showed the building empty and with "extensive battle damage."

With pen and paper in hand, it took Assaad Chaftari five minutes at his home nestled in a cluster of pine trees in the mountains overlooking Beirut to write a public apology for his role in the atrocities committed during Lebanon's civil war.

Thirteen years later, he's still the sole senior figure from the slew of militias that prosecuted that bloody conflict to do so. That Chaftari alone has taken that bold step says as much about his own searing sense of remorse and desire to atone as it does about Lebanon and where it stands more than two decades after the country's 15-year bloodletting claimed the lives of an estimated 150,000 people.

The website of Brazil's biggest news outlet published photos Wednesday it says show pop star Justin Bieber spray painting graffiti on a wall. And it adds that police want to question him about it.

The O Globo newspaper reported that photographers snapped photos of Bieber as he painted graffiti on a wall of the former Hotel Nacional in Rio de Janeiro Tuesday morning.