AP - Wall Street pared its losses late Friday as the approaching end of the quarter had investors picking up stocks to close out their portfolios — the practice widely known as window dressing.

AP - Widespread voter intimidation and low turnout marked Zimbabwe's one-candidate presidential runoff Friday, further damaging the vote designed to bolster longtime President Robert Mugabe's credibility.

AP - Defiant residents of this eastern Missouri community lost one struggle against the relentless Mississippi River Friday, but quickly prepared for another.

AP - The gray cooling tower crumbled behind billowing dust clouds in seconds Friday, reducing the structure at North Korea's nuclear reactor into a pile of rubble. It was a choreographed show by the communist regime meant to affirm an intention to stop making atomic bombs.

AP - Rivals turned allies, Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton made a display of unity Friday in a hamlet named for it, their first joint public appearance since the divisive Democratic primary race ended.

AFP - North Korea Friday blew up the cooling tower at its Yongbyon nuclear reactor, according to South Korea's MBC TV.

AFP - Zimbabwe voted Friday in an election which was virtually certain to end in victory for President Robert Mugabe, but dismissed by the opposition as meaningless after it boycotted the poll.

Reuters - Taiwan quietly wrapped up a week of computer-simulated military exercises on Friday, keeping the annual island-wide training event low-key this year as relations improve with its old rival, China.

Reuters - More storms dumped crop-drowning rains on parts of the U.S. Midwest on Thursday, threatening strained levees and slowing recovery from a multibillion-dollar flood disaster in the heart of the world's biggest grain and food exporter.

Reuters - Taliban militants in northwest Pakistan publicly slit the throats of two Afghans on Friday after they were accused of spying for U.S. forces suspected of launching a missile strike in May.

Reuters - The U.S. Senate on Thursday approved $161.8 billion in new funds to continue fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for the next year, without timetables for withdrawing combat troops.

Reuters - Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton take the first step toward healing the wounds of their bruising presidential nominating fight with a joint appearance on Friday in the symbolically named New Hampshire town of Unity.