The Palestinians head to the United Nations on Thursday in a bid to upgrade their status in a move likely to bring them new global recognition but also harsh repercussions.

President Mahmoud Abbas will personally submit the request seeking to upgrade their rank from an observer entity to that of a non-member observer state before the U.N. General Assembly.

Ever since her father had his heart attack years ago, 76-year-old Maria has been fiercely devoted to Spain's public hospitals. Now that authorities are planning to privatize parts of them, she is outraged.

"At half past three I saw he was not well. I called our private healthcare provider and they told me they had no doctors available," she said, standing in her local Madrid hospital, festooned with angry red-painted banners.

Spain has six midfielders from its European Championship-winning team competing for selection in a FIFPro World XI.

FIFA says Barcelona quartet Andres Iniesta, Xavi Hernandez, Cesc Fabregas and Sergio Busquets, plus Xabi Alonso of Real Madrid and Manchester City's David Silva are among 15 candidates for three midfield places.

Catalan leader Artur Mas scrambled for allies to govern Monday after a snap election slashed his majority, hobbling his campaign for nationhood and a split from Spain.

Mas' decision to call the vote two years early looked like a gamble gone horribly wrong after voters turned out in massive numbers to trim his majority, not to boost it.

Catalonia's leader Artur Mas says the powerful region's economy can stand tall in Europe without Spain. But could Spain survive without Catalonia?

The prospect of an independent Catalonia of 7.5 million people lying to the northeast of Spain seems distant with Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's government vowing to block any referendum.

Spain's right-leaning government flatly rejected Sunday an offer by armed Basque group ETA to negotiate its disarmament and dissolution.

ETA, blamed for 829 killings in more than four decades of fighting for a Basque homeland, said Saturday it was ready to discuss disarming and disbanding with France and Spain under certain conditions.

Whipped up in a pro-independence fervor, millions of Catalans vote Sunday in a snap election that could result in a redrawing of the map of Spain.

Artur Mas, president of the northeastern region, is promising a referendum on self-determination if the vote goes his way.

Spain's armed Basque separatist group ETA said Saturday it was ready to discuss disbanding and to negotiate with France and Spain if certain conditions are met, in a statement published on a Basque news site.

The group, which last year said it had abandoned violence after a four-decade campaign for an independent homeland that claimed more than 800 lives, said one outstanding issue was the transfer of Basque prisoners to jails closer to home.

Paraguay's most successful movie of all time will miss out on a chance to win an Oscar because the country doesn't have a selection committee recognized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Tana Schembori, the director of "7 Boxes" -- seen by more people in this South American country than Hollywood blockbuster "Titanic" -- told Agence France Presse that culture officials had called for the creation of such a panel and asked the academy to make an exception in the meantime.

Spain's 74-year-old King Juan Carlos had successful hip replacement surgery late Friday, the royal palace said, after two operations on the other hip caused by a fall during a controversial African elephant-hunting safari.

"The operation, which lasted 90 minutes, was carried out under general anesthetic and was completely satisfactory," the palace said in a statement.