Reuters - China and the United States said on Wednesday that their sometimes rocky relationship is sounder after talks in Beijing, with both putting an optimistic face on ties that have been jolted by economic and security tensions.

AP - Mexican prosecutors say two dead bodies found in the northern state of Tamaulipas appear to be those of a state detective and local police chief who were investigating the massacre of 72 migrants in August.

AFP - Australia's newly elected Prime Minister Julia Gillard pledged to serve a full term after scraping back into power but her fragile coalition was immediately at odds over a major new tax Wednesday.

AP - Men armed with assault rifles burst into a shoe factory and opened fire Tuesday, killing at least 18 workers and wounding five, Honduran authorities said.

AFP - British prime minister Winston Churchill deliberately let millions of Indians starve to death, the author of a new book has claimed, alleging he was motivated in part by racial hatred.

AP - A proposed Islamic community center near ground zero will include separate prayer spaces for Muslims, Christians, Jews and people of other faiths, the imam behind plans for the facility wrote in an op-ed piece published online Tuesday.

AP - David Myers knew it was time to leave when he looked out into the forest and spotted bright red flames towering skyward. Then came a blinding cloud of smoke and a deafening roar as the fire ripped through the wilderness.

Reuters - Republicans in Congress showed little willingness to help President Barack Obama approve billions of dollars in measures to boost the economy with midterm elections less than two months away.

AP - The government turned up the pressure Tuesday on the head of a small Florida church who plans to burn copies of the Quran on Sept. 11, warning him that doing so could endanger U.S. troops and Americans everywhere.

AP - Officials hoisted a 70-foot piece of World Trade Center steel at ground zero Tuesday and vowed to open the Sept. 11 memorial by next year, although they acknowledged that the ongoing construction at the site would limit where and how the public could visit.

AP - Mayor Richard M. Daley, who wielded more control over Chicago than anyone but his father decades before, said Tuesday he will not seek re-election, bringing a surprising end to a dynasty whose name became synonymous with the city's legendary political machine.

AP - Weeks of torrential rains have unleashed flooding in huge swaths of southern Mexico, forcing tens of thousands of people from their homes.

AP - The United Nations reported Tuesday that more than 500 systematic rapes were committed by armed combatants in eastern Congo since late July — more than double the number previously reported — and accepted partial responsibility for not protecting citizens.

AP - A magnitude-5.1 aftershock hammered New Zealand's earthquake-hit city of Christchurch on Wednesday morning, freshly damaging buildings, sparking evacuations and prompting the extension of a state of emergency for another week.

AP - Tropical Storm Hermine gave a wet and windy punch to Texas on Tuesday before weakening into a tropical depression, leaving only minor scrapes in the storm-weary Rio Grande Valley, which is proving resilient this hurricane season after taking a third tropical system on the chin.

AP - Billionaire philanthropist George Soros is putting up $100 million, one of the largest donations of its kind, to expand Human Rights Watch and help it court more international support.

AP - The flight attendant accused of onboard antics that captured the nation's attention when he told off a passenger and slid down the plane's emergency chute with a beer will undergo a mental health evaluation with the aim of avoiding jail time in a possible plea deal.

AFP - The United States said Tuesday it has requested 50,000 dollars in emergency aid for flood-hit Guatemala and reprogrammed another 4.38 million dollars in economic aid for recovery efforts.

AP - Merriam-Webster's "Word of the Summer" is not even a word. That's something no one can "refudiate."

AP - The international crossfire over Iran's stoning sentence for a woman convicted of adultery intensified Tuesday with a top European Union official calling it "barbaric" and an Iranian spokesman saying it's about punishing a criminal and not a human rights issue.

AP - Government scientists studying the BP disaster are reporting the best possible outcome: Microbes are consuming the oil in the Gulf without depleting the oxygen in the water and creating "dead zones" where fish cannot survive.

AP - An Iraqi soldier fired a barrage of bullets at American troops protecting one of their commanders during a visit to an Iraqi army base Tuesday and killed two of them, the first U.S. servicemen to die since President Barack Obama declared an end to combat operations in the country last week.

AP - Even if they were enacted soon, President Barack Obama's proposed tax breaks for businesses would hardly be a quick fix to rejuvenate hiring or the economy, analysts say.

AP - Their control of the House in peril, Democrats are playing defense all across the country. Disgruntled voters, a sluggish economy and vanishing enthusiasm for President Barack Obama have put 75 seats or more - the vast majority held by Democrats - at risk of changing hands.

AP - President Barack Obama's proposed tax breaks for business sound like ideas that have enjoyed broad Republican backing in the past. But in today's toxic political atmosphere, he's unlikely to get much — if any — GOP help.