BAGHDAD, Iraq -- The U.S. military, acting on a tip, raided an isolated farmhouse outside the capital Wednesday and rescued an American held hostage for 10 months. The kidnappers, who had kept their captive bound and gagged, escaped without a gun battle.\nThe rescue came on a day that saw two deadly bombings around the southern city of Basra, fueling fears the bloody insurgency was taking deeper root outside Sunni-dominated territory. A roadside bomb killed four American security guards, and police said a suicide bomber later blew up his car outside a restaurant, killing at least 10 people and wounding 15.\nRoy Hallums, 57, was "in good condition and is receiving medical care," a military statement said after U.S. forces freed him and an unidentified Iraqi from the farmhouse 15 miles south of Baghdad.
2. North Korean nuclear talk to restart Tuesday
\nBEIJING -- China said Thursday that six-nation talks on dismantling North Korea's nuclear program will resume next week, even as Pyongyang raised a possible obstacle to progress by renewing calls for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the Korean Peninsula.\nChina appealed to all sides to be "flexible and practical" in seeking a resolution to the long-running dispute.\nThe latest round of discussions involving the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia recessed on Aug. 7 after a failure to agree on a statement of principles despite 13 days of negotiations. The talks resume Tuesday and will be open-ended, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said at a regular press briefing.\nNorth Korean Premier Pak Pong Ju said Pyongyang would seek a "negotiated peaceful settlement" to the issue, according to the North's official Korean Central News Agency.\nPak was also quoted as saying the North would "exert tireless efforts to realize the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula," which was a "dying wish" of Kim Il Sung, the North Korean leader who died in 1994.\nsujh: Sept. 11 recovery loans went to many who didn't need them
The government's $5 billion effort to help small businesses recover from the Sept. 11 attacks was so loosely managed that it gave low-interest loans to companies that didn't need terrorism relief -- or even know they were getting it, The Associated Press has found.\nAnd while some at New York's Ground Zero couldn't get assistance they desperately sought, companies far removed from the devastation -- a South Dakota country radio station, a Virgin Islands perfume shop, a Utah dog boutique and more than 100 Dunkin' Donuts and Subway sandwich shops -- had no problem winning the government-guaranteed loans.\nDentists and chiropractors in numerous cities, as well as an Oregon winery that sold trendy pinot noir to New York City restaurants, also got assistance.\n"That's scary; 9/11 had nothing to do with this," said James Munsey, a Virginia entrepreneur who described himself as "beyond shocked" to learn his nearly $1 million loan to buy a special events company in Richmond was drawn from the Sept. 11 program.\n"It would have been inappropriate for me to take this kind of loan," he said, noting that the company he bought suffered no ill effects from Sept. 11.
