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BILOXI, Mississippi (Reuters) - BP Plc said on Friday it could seal its ruptured Gulf of Mexico oil well by next week as the House of Representatives voted to toughen regulation of offshore energy drilling.

Hundreds of people died when floodwaters swept away their mud homes in Pakistan's Swat Valley. The death toll from flood is now at least 800.

At least 25 people have been killed and thousands left homeless by wildfires sweeping through western Russia, authorities said Saturday.

Thousands of people are expected to gather today for a memorial service a week after a stampede at a German music festival killed 21 people.

The data recorders for the plane that crashed and killed 152 people in Pakistan has been found, a government official said Saturday.

A senior Hamas member was killed during Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, Hamas security forces said Saturday.

The group is working to redefine itself amid falling numbers, a push for diversity and a knock on the door from girls.

Sam and Charles Wyly had been investigated by the I.R.S. and Congress years before the S.E.C. filed its suit.

The focus is more on long-term recovery now that some of the urgent demands of the spill are diminishing.

The congressman who led an inquiry into Representative Charles B. Rangel’s ethics said he and others recommended the relatively moderate punishment.

GAZA (Reuters) - An Israeli air strike has killed a Hamas military commander and rocket maker in the Gaza Strip, the Islamist group that rules the Palestinian territory said on Saturday.

Firefighters continued to battle a wildfire Saturday as flames encroached on power lines that provide electricity throughout the region.

Fidel Castro on Friday accused the United States of "torturing" a Cuban agent imprisoned there, saying Cuba is being pressured to release its spies.

One San Francisco firefighter was injured while responding to a two-alarm fire on the 2500 block of California Street early Friday evening, fire officials said. At least two residents were displaced when two buildings, one a turn-of-the-century, three-story...



San Francisco - United States - San Francisco Bay Area - California - Metro Areas

The United Nations Security Council has renewed the mandate of its mission in the Darfur region of Sudan for another 12 months.

A huge wildfire in the high desert wilderness north of Los Angeles jumped an aqueduct on Friday, rushing toward hundreds of houses as firefighters also tried to keep flames from damaging power lines that bring electricity to Southern California. Some 2,000...



California - Wildfire - Kern County California - United States - Tehachapi California

In a summer of suffering, America's military death toll in Afghanistan is rising, with back-to-back record months for U.S. losses in the grinding conflict. All signs point to more bloodshed in the months ahead, straining the already shaky international...



Afghanistan - United States armed forces - War in Afghanistan - NATO - Death

Investigators were focusing on a group of Pfc. Bradley Manning’s friends and acquaintances in Massachusetts.

The veteran Astros slugger will fill a void at D.H. left by the injured Nick Johnson.

Traffic near a seafood shack is so infamous, officials approved $100 million to build a bypass around the town.