AP - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama celebrated the Fourth of July with his family in Montana.

AP - President Bush invoked the memory of Thomas Jefferson Friday in welcoming new U.S. citizens at a naturalization ceremony at Monticello, saying "I'll be proud to call you a fellow American."

AP - "I cry with joy," Ingrid Betancourt said. And she did. After six years as a hostage in the Colombian jungle, the former Colombian presidential candidate and French citizen flew back to her beloved France to be embraced Friday as an icon by the country that raised her.

AP - Former Sen. Jesse Helms, who built a career along the fault lines of racial politics and battled liberals, Communists and the occasional fellow Republican during 30 conservative years in Congress, died on the Fourth of July. He was 86.

AFP - China and Taiwan resumed regular direct flights Friday for the first time in six decades, ushering in what Beijing called a "new start" in their tense and testy relations.

AFP - Dozens of people were injured in an explosion at a gala concert in Minsk attended by Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko, Belarus officials told Russian news agencies.

Reuters - The Williams name will once again be engraved on the Wimbledon trophy in 2008.

Reuters - The investigation of a salmonella outbreak in the United States is shifting to the southern border to encompass produce imported from Mexico, CNN reported on Thursday.

Reuters - California firefighters made a desperate stand as darkness fell on Thursday to save more than 4,000 homes and other structures from a pair of out-of-control wildfires burning about 170 miles apart along the California coast.

Reuters - A U.S. judge's order to Google Inc to turn over YouTube user data to Viacom Inc sparked an outcry on Thursday from privacy advocates in the midst of a legal showdown over video piracy.

Reuters - Ingrid Betancourt began each day in captivity at 4 a.m. -- cold and depressed but awake in the dark waiting to hear her mother's words of encouragement over the radio.

Reuters - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama waded into controversy on Thursday over his plans to withdraw U.S. combat troops from Iraq, first saying he might "refine" his views but later declaring his stance had remained unchanged for more than a year.

Reuters - World stocks slipped back towards this week's five-month low on Friday as oil prices near record highs kept inflation concerns alive a day after the European Central Bank raised interest rates.

AP - A spot in her seventh Wimbledon final already secured, Venus Williams headed back to Centre Court to catch the end of the next match.