WASHINGTON – In an especially deadly year in America’s coal mines, President Bush signed a bill into law Thursday designed to give miners a better chance of surviving should disaster strike. “Thanks to modern technology and equipment, we’ve come a long way from the days when a miner would take …

CAIRO, Egypt – Al Qaeda in Iraq vowed Sunday to carry out “major attacks,” insisting in a Web statement that it was still powerful after the death of leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The statement did not name a successor to Zarqawi, who was killed by a U.S. airstrike Wednesday. But …

WASHINGTON – The State Department on Monday sought to distance itself from comments by a U.S. official calling suicides at the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay a “good p.r. move.” “We would not say that it was a p.r. stunt,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters. “We have …

MIRA LOMA, Ca – A high school student sued his school district over his suspension for distributing flyers about an off-campus rally against illegal immigration. The senior at Jurupa Valley High School, said he sought permission to hold the demonstration after a school assembly turned into a virtual rally supporting …

KENNETT SQUARE, Pa. – His coat gleaming and muscles rippling, Barbaro still has the look of a champion. One month after the Kentucky Derby winner’s life-threatening breakdown in the Preakness Stakes, the colt remains cooped up in the intensive care unit at the George D. Widener Hospital for Large Animals …

JERICHO, West Bank – The Palestinian man who befriended a 16-year-old Michigan girl through the MySpace.com Web site and invited her to join him in Jericho said he is heartbroken by U.S. authorities’ decision to send her back home. Abdullah Jimzawi, 20, told The Associated Press that his love for …

WASHINGTON – Families of veterans who die during a bird flu outbreak shouldn’t count on burying their loved ones in any of the 120 national cemeteries. The Department of Veterans Affairs foresees closing the military graveyards in a pandemic because of staffing problems. The VA buries more than 250 veterans …

NEW YORK – When you’re buying a used car, a valuable tool can be a vehicle history report, which can give you important information about a car’s past. A vehicle history report will tell you whether the car has a clean title, whether it has been salvaged, flooded, crashed or …

TOKYO – Japanese authorities got a record 33,408 reports of child abuse in 2004, up 26 percent from last year and more than 17 times the number a decade ago, a government study said Tuesday. The number of child abuse cases reported in the year to March 2005 surged to …

KABUL, Afghanistan – A top Afghan intelligence agent narrowly survived a bomb attack on his convoy that killed three other people near the capital, Kabul, while fighting elsewhere Saturday killed six insurgents and three police, officials said. The coalition, meanwhile, announced the deaths of 44 more militants in firefights in …