Reuters - The death toll in the head-on crash of a commuter train and a freight train outside Los Angeles has risen to 17, officials said on Saturday.

Reuters - Hurricane Ike powered across the densely populated Texas coast and through Houston on Saturday, bringing ferocious winds and a wall of water that flooded hundreds of miles of coastline and paralyzed the fourth-largest U.S. city.

Reuters - At least five bombs exploded in quick succession in crowded markets and streets in the heart of India's capital New Delhi on Saturday, killing at least 18 people and injuring scores more, police said.

Reuters - Government officials resumed meetings with the heads of some of Wall Street's biggest banks on Saturday and were expected to further press the banks to craft a rescue for beleaguered Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.

AP - The Tampa Bay Rays put Evan Longoria in the lineup for the first time since he broke his right wrist last month and recalled highly touted prospect David Price from Triple-A Durham.

AP - Being homeless in this upper crust enclave is not exactly like living on the street in other places. There are handouts of $2,000 and bottles of Dom Perignon, lucky finds of Gucci shoes and diamond-encrusted bracelets, a chance to rub shoulders with rich and famous locals such as Mark Wahlberg and Master P, even empty houses to live in.

AP - Gas prices jumped Saturday as Hurricane Ike pounded the refinery richregions of Texas and Louisiana, threatening to shut down the nation's vast energy complex in the Gulf of Mexico for days.

AP - A Chinese dairy that sold milk powder linked to kidney stones in infants knew it contained a banned chemical weeks before ordering a recall, the health minister said Saturday.

AP - Hundreds of Russian forces packed up and withdrew from positions Saturday in western Georgia, and a Georgian official said Russia had met a deadline for a partial pullout a month after the war between the two former Soviet republics.

AP - Democrats sought on Saturday to drum up support for compromise legislation on offshore drilling, challenging Republicans to break from Bush administration policies that neglect development of alternative energy sources.

AP - Gunmen on Saturday abducted and killed four employees of an Iraqi television station who were filming a program about the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, one of a series of attacks in Iraq that left at least 18 people dead.

AP - With the global financial system holding its collective breath, the U.S. government scrambled to help devise a rescue for Lehman Brothers and restore confidence in Wall Street and the American financial structure.

AP - A spokeswoman for the Metrolink commuter rail service says the probable cause of the collision that killed at least 18 people was the failure of a Metrolink engineer to stop his train at a red signal.

AP - Rescue crews navigated flooded and debris-strewn streets Saturday to search for those who insisted on staying and riding out a fierce Hurricane Ike, which shattered skyscraper windows, cut power to millions and flooded thousands of homes as it sloshed across the Texas coast.

AFP - Russian troops on Saturday left two camps near Georgia's port of Poti, starting a withdrawal pledged by Moscow in a European Union-brokered accord on ending the conflict in the ex-Soviet state.