The north's invitation to nuclear inspectors is welcomed, but the US and S. Korea say more steps are needed to comply with February's six-party accord.
At the epicenter of a separatist war pitting impoverished nomads against one of the biggest armies in Africa, people said they had been brutalized by government troops.
Minnesota?s $86 million teacher professionalization and merit pay initiative got a lift last week when teachers voted overwhelmingly to expand it in Minneapolis.
Life was going very well for Michael Bloomberg at the millennium. As the founder of one of the great media companies, Bloomberg News, he was ridiculously wealthy, highly regarded, extraordinarily philanthropic, and, it seemed, fully engaged. Then, in 2001, he decided to compete for one of the most challenging jobs in the world-the mayoralty of New York. That would be hard enough in the best of times, but in 2001, just after 9/11, New Yorkers were depressed and fearful. Under the shadow of terrorism, the city faced an exodus of businesses, a collapsing tax base, a decline of city services, and huge budget deficits. Six years on, we barely remember the gloom. Six years of Bloomberg have been like a wonder drug, the city so revived that the man who made it happen is now talked of as a serious candidate for the presidency.
Last autumn, when Liz Adler was eight months pregnant, she was still picking squash at the Easthampton, Mass., farm she runs with her husband. Adler, a former social worker, never thought about being a farmer until she met her future husband, Ben Perrault. He was a farmer, and as Adler got to know his work firsthand, she grew to like it. "It's scary and risky, but I feel really lucky," Adler says now of her new career. "I'm excited to raise our baby on a farm."
The cost of flat-screen TVs has plummeted in just a few years, so Applied Materials CEO Mike Splinter sees no reason why the same can't happen with solar energy panels. After all, it's practically the same technology—and now his company, the world's largest supplier of manufacturing equipment to the semiconductor industry, is involved. Applied Materials moved into solar in 2006 with acquisition of a leader in the process of layering thin-film photovoltaic silicon onto glass or another low-cost support material. Less silicon means less cost. And Applied Materials aims to drive down solar costs from about $4 per watt to $1 per watt within the next two years and to 70 cents by about 2010, bringing closer the day when sunshine is competitive with other energy sources. Growth has slowed for Applied Materials' core business, chip manufacturing. Splinter spoke with Senior Writer Marianne Lavelle about his company's move into this new frontier.
AP - The Bush administration is poised to lift its economic and diplomatic embargo against the Palestinian government in the West Bank now that a U.S.-backed moderate has evicted Islamic radicals from governance.
AP - One day after a drag-racing car careened into a crowd and killed six people, witnesses questioned on Sunday why the driver was allowed to speed down a highway with no guard rails, lined on both sides by hundreds of spectators.
AP - President Nicolas Sarkozy's party won a clear parliamentary majority Sunday in elections seen as crucial to his vision for opening up France's economy, although the opposition thwarted a landslide victory by capitalizing on voter fears of giving Sarkozy too much power.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has sworn in new cabinet members for his emergency government at his headquarters in Ramallah. But Hamas has rejected the new government as a "mistake." Hamas fighters have seized control of Gaza while Abbas and his Fatah allies are trying to consolidate power in the West Bank.
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