AFP - When US Marine Chief Warrant Officer Mike Fay was on patrol with his unit in Iraq, he was armed with an M-16 rifle, a nine-millimeter pistol -- and a sketchbook, watercolors and cameras.

AFP - US officials negotiating a controversial security pact with Iraq have returned to Baghdad to resume discussions which have been deadlocked since early September, a US official said on Wednesday.

Reuters - The Pakistani military said on Wednesday a pilotless aircraft that crashed in the northwestern region of South Waziristan had been recovered, but the Pentagon denied any U.S. drone had been lost in the area.

AP - As of Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2008, at least 534 members of the U.S. military had died in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan as a result of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001, according to the Defense Department. The department last updated its figures Tuesday at 10 a.m. EDT.

AP - An Afghan journalist detained for 11 months at the U.S. military base at Bagram alleged on Monday that his captors kicked him, forced him to stand barefoot in the snow and didn't allow him to sleep for days.

AFP - Iraq's Shiite-led government will assume responsibility for paying 54,000 mainly Sunni militiamen in Baghdad starting next week, in an important test of its commitment to reconciliation, a top general said Monday.

AP - As of Monday, Sept. 22, 2008, at least 525 members of the U.S. military had died in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan as a result of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001, according to the Defense Department. The department last updated its figures Monday at 10 a.m. EDT.

Reuters - The top U.S. military officer pleaded on Monday for continued cooperation with Russia despite Moscow's widely condemned military action in Georgia.

Reuters - The army was called in to rescue tens of thousands of stranded villagers in Uttar Pradesh, officials said on Tuesday, as floods destroyed homes and swamped one of the country's biggest tiger reserves.

Reuters - Two members of the U.S. armed forces were killed in the suicide bomb attack that killed more than 50 people at the Marriott Hotel in Pakistan's capital, the Defense Department said on Sunday.

AP - As of Friday, Sept. 19, 2008, at least 524 members of the U.S. military had died in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan as a result of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001, according to the Defense Department. The department last updated its figures Friday at 10 a.m. EDT.

Reuters - The U.S. military began moving its Cold War command center from deep inside Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado, without fully analyzing potential security threats posed by the relocation, a report said on Thursday.

AFP - The White House on Thursday said negotiations with the Iraqi government on terms of a long-term US military presence were ongoing, but did not offer further details.