AFP - Washington on Wednesday sent an envoy to Beijing and US and South Korean negotiators prepared to meet in New York to help break a deadlock over a mechanism to verify North Korea's nuclear weapons program.

AFP - Russian forces started withdrawing Thursday from the flashpoint Georgian city of Gori, officials said, adding a new twist to the campaign for a permanent peace between the neighbours.

Reuters - A New Orleans judge on Wednesday dismissed charges against seven policeman accused of killing two people on a bridge amid the chaos that followed Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Reuters - The chairman of the Arkansas Democratic Party, Bill Gwatney, died in a hospital after being shot by a lone gunman at the party's headquarters in Little Rock, officials said on Wednesday.

Reuters - Americans scaled back their driving during June by almost 5 percent in response to soaring fuel costs, the government said on Wednesday -- a day after announcing the biggest six-month drop in U.S. petroleum demand in 26 years.

Reuters - The U.S. military was so eager to get the sluggish Guantanamo war crimes trials moving that the legal adviser to the Pentagon overseer adopted a "spray and pray" approach to pursuing charges, a U.S. general testified on Wednesday.

Reuters - Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf, under mounting pressure to resign, called on Thursday for reconciliation to tackle economic problems and Islamist militancy.

Reuters - U.S. presidential rivals Barack Obama and John McCain target religious voters on Saturday when as guests of one of America's foremost evangelists they discuss faith in public life, AIDS, the environment and other issues.

Reuters - Japanese swimmer Kosuke Kitajima led a golden day for Asia in the pool and the gymnastics arena on Thursday, underlining the continent's growing might.

Reuters - U.S. military planes began delivering aid to Georgia as Washington stepped up support for a shaky ceasefire with Russian troops around the breakaway region of South Ossetia.

AP - Brett Favre took it easy on his rocket right arm after firing a few duds earlier in the day.

AP - On the seventh day of the Olympics, Michael Phelps rested, and other swimmers made their splash.

AP - J.R., Bobby, Sue Ellen and other members of the Ewing clan are getting back together for a "Dallas" reunion party.

AP - Passengers and a pilot testified Wednesday they never saw or heard anything that indicated the wife of megachurch evangelist pastor Joel Osteen assaulted a flight attendant before the start of a 2005 flight.