Wars, death, austerity, protests:  At least a brave little doggy stayed with a wandering toddler to keep her safe and warm during a cold night she was lost in the woods.  Here’s the news:

NATO is apologizing for the deaths of two Afghani boys, apparently shot to death in an attack conducted by Aussie Troops last month in rural Uruzgan province.  The local governor says the deaths were accidental, but Afghan president Hamid Karzai repeatedly admonishes NATO forces to be more careful to avoid civilian deaths.

Philippine President Benigno Aquino is calling on members of a clan from the island of Sulu to give up their occupation of a village in Malaysia and surrender to avoid further bloodshed.  The followers of self-style “Sultan” Jamalul Kiram III got into a gun battle with Malaysian commandos and 14 people were killed.  The intruders believe their leader has a claim to the village, which is on Borneo.

Syria, Iran, and Russia are condemning the United States plan to supply non-lethal aid to “carefully vetted” rebel groups seeking to topple the regime of Bashar al-Assad.  Moscow said it would only make the 2-year old civil war even worse. 

Russia is expressing doubt about the latest autopsy done on a little boy who was adopted from a Russian orphanage. Four doctors in Texas have now concluded the boy’s injuries were consistent self-injury and the parents maintain 3-year old Max Shatto had difficult behavioral issues.  It’s the latest in a series of episodes in which Americans adopt a Russian child and everything goes wrong.  Meanwhile, 12,000 people marched in Moscow calling for a halt in all foreign adoption.

Hundreds of thousands of people protested in Lisbon and other parts of Portugal, demanding the government resign over Eurozone-mandated austerity measures.  The conservative government has introduced steeply higher taxes and service cuts to please what protesters say is a “Troika” made up of the IMF, European Central Commission, and European Central Bank.

Northeast Brazil is suffering it worst drought in more than five decades, and its hitting dairy farmers the hardest.  Thousands of heads of cattle in the region are dead or dying of starvation.  Farmers are losing their livelihoods and selling out.  The COOAFRA Dairy Cooperative says production is down more than half, and retail prices are rising, too.

A new poll shows Hugo Chavez’s choice to succeed him, Venezuelan Vice President Nicolas Maduro, has 50 percent support among voters in the South American nation.  Perennial conservative candidate Enrique Capriles polls at 36 percent.  At a church service last night, Maduro said that Chavez is undergoing yet another round of chemotherapy for cancer, and denies swirling rumors that Chavez is close to death.

Firefighters say a small dog saved the life of a missing 3-year-old girl.  The toddler wandered from her home in the village of Pierzwin, and got lost several kilometers in the forest.  The dog stayed with her the whole time and kept her warm overnight as temperatures dipped to -5C.  Searchers eventually heard her crying for her mother and rushed to her location, only for the little black stray dog to run off.  Little Julia was taken to the hospital where she is being treated for frostbite.