AP - Four years after a retired FBI agent mysteriously vanished inside Iran, U.S. officials have received proof he is alive, a remarkable development that has dramatically intensified secret negotiations to bring him home, The Associated Press has learned.

AP - Rebels reinforced a key oil port Thursday while facing new regime airstrikes in eastern Libya, and thousands of angry mourners buried victims of a counteroffensive by Moammar Gadhafi's forces, shooting guns in the air, shouting "Down with Gadhafi!" and swearing to take vengeance.

AP - Seeking to repair damaged relations, President Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon agreed Thursday to deepen their cooperation in combating drug violence and declared a breakthrough in efforts to end a long-standing dispute over cross-border trucking.

AP - The number of people requesting unemployment benefits last week plunged to a nearly three-year low, bolstering the likelihood that companies will increase the pace of hiring this year.

AP - Arid Uka grew up in a well-kept immigrant neighborhood in Frankfurt as the son of a relatively prosperous, not all that religious family of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo — a group notable more for their pro-American outlook than for mosque attendance.