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Mortgage firm Freddie Mac headquarters are pictured in McLean, Virginia, July 13, 2008. (Larry Downing/Reuters)

Congress approves housing bill

Sat Jul 26, 4:15 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress approved a massive housing market rescue bill on Saturday, offering emergency financing to mortgage titans Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac , and setting up a $300-billion fund to help hundreds of thousands of troubled homeowners.

  • Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown (L) speaks with U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) in the terrace at 10 Downing Street in London, July 26, 2008. (Jim Young/POOL/Reuters)
    Obama defends foreign tour as visit closes Sat Jul 26, 2:13 PM ET

    LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama, wrapping up an overseas tour where he got a rock star reception, defended his decision to take the trip despite mixed signals about its impact on his popularity at home.

  • Yash Vyas, 6, lies on a bed in a ward of the Civil Hospital in Ahmadabad, India, late Saturday, July 26, 2008. Yash lost his father Dushyant Vyas and his brother Rohan was injured in Saturday's blasts. At least 29 people were killed and 88 wounded when a series of small explosions hit the western city on Saturday, a top official said. (AP Photo/Gautam Singh)
    Sixteen bombs hit India's Ahmedabad, 29 killed Sat Jul 26, 2:25 PM ET

    AHMEDABAD, India (Reuters) - At least 16 small bombs exploded in the Indian city of Ahmedabad on Saturday, killing at least 29 people and wounding 88, a day after another set of blasts in the country's IT hub, officials said.

  • World Trade Organization (WTO) Director-General Pascal Lamy smiles before an informal session of the Trade Negociation Committee at the WTO headquarters in Geneva July 21, 2008. (Denis Balibouse/Reuters)
    U.S. ready to talk about temporary visas at WTO Sat Jul 26, 3:43 PM ET

    GENEVA (Reuters) - The United States, responding to a key demand of developing countries, said on Saturday it would discuss giving more temporary access to foreign professionals, injecting renewed optimism into world trade talks.

  • Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice speaks at a news conference at Government House in Auckland July 26, 2008. (Nigel Marple/Reuters)
    Rice meets Pacific ministers in Samoa and presses Fiji 1 hour, 6 minutes ago

    APIA, Samoa (Reuters) - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met Pacific foreign ministers in Samoa on Saturday and said she would press Fiji's military rulers to hold elections as promised in March 2009.

  • A bank employee posts a notice that 1st National Bank of Nevada is in FDIC receivership on Friday, July 25, 2008, after federal regulators closed the bank in Carson City, Nev. Twenty-eight branches of 1st National Bank of Nevada and First Heritage Bank, operating in Nevada, Arizona and California, were closed Friday by federal regulators. (AP Photo/Nevada Appeal, Brad Horn)
    U.S. regulators seize two more banks, engineer sale Sat Jul 26, 12:08 AM ET

    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. regulators took over two banks on Friday and sold them to Mutual of Omaha Bank, the sixth and seventh bank failures this year as financial institutions struggle with a housing bust and credit crunch.

  • Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gestures as he speaks during a news conference after the Eight Developing Islamic Nations summit in Kuala Lumpur July 8, 2008. Iran is running more than 5,000 centrifuges for enriching uranium, its president was quoted as saying on Saturday, in comments suggesting continued expansion of work the West fears is aimed at making bombs. (Zainal Abd Halim/Reuters)
    Iran says expanded nuclear enrichment program Sat Jul 26, 12:26 PM ET

    TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran has more than 5,000 active centrifuges for enriching uranium, its president was quoted as saying on Saturday, suggesting a rapid expansion of nuclear work the West suspects is aimed at making bombs.

  • Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier (L) speaks to the media as Afghan President Hamid Karzai (R) looks on at the Presidential palace in Kabul. Steinmeier pledged 10 million dollars towards presidential elections due next year, a statement from Karzai's office said after the meeting.(AFP)
    NATO force kills four civilians in Afghan south Sat Jul 26, 8:54 AM ET

    KABUL (Reuters) - NATO-led troops killed four Afghan civilians and wounded three more when their vehicle failed to stop at a checkpoint in the southern province of Helmand on Saturday, the NATO force said.

  • A boy walks past grafitti in Santiago de Cuba July 25, 2008. President Raul Castro returns to the birthplace of the Cuban revolution this week for a speech that will be watched for news on what some consider another, quieter revolution now taking place on the socialist island. Castro's speech, to be given in the eastern city of Santiago on Saturday, will mark the 55th anniversary of the July 26, 1953 rebel assault which Fidel Castro led on the nearby Moncada army barracks. The graffiti reads, 'Neighborhood for neighborhood, revolution'. (Claudia Daut/Reuters)
    Cubans anticipate news on reforms in Castro speech Sat Jul 26, 9:33 AM ET

    HAVANA (Reuters) - President Raul Castro will mark the 55th anniversary of the start of the Cuban revolution on Saturday with a speech to a nation waiting to hear how far and how fast he plans to go in reforming the island's struggling state-run economy.

  • Bosnian Serbs hold up pictures of Radovan Karadzic in his wartime stronghold of Pale, near the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo July 26, 2008. Karadzic, who had been indicted for genocide during the Bosnia wars, was captured in Belgrade earlier this week after 11 years in hiding. (Danilo Krstanovic/Reuters)
    Bosnian Serbs pray for Karadzic, say charges unjust Sat Jul 26, 9:03 AM ET

    PALE, Bosnia (Reuters) - Hundreds of people gathered to pray for Radovan Karadzic across the Serb half of Bosnia on Saturday, holding vigils inside churches or marching in protest at his arrest on war crimes charges.

  • Housing developments lie unfinished on the outskirts of Sacramento July 22, 2008. (Max Whittaker/Reuters)
    U.S. house prices overvalued by up to 20 percent: IMF paper Fri Jul 25, 5:52 PM ET

    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The downward spiral of U.S. housing prices still has a way to go and homes were overvalued by between 8 percent to 20 percent in the first quarter of this year, according to research by an International Monetary Fund economist published on Friday.

  • A sketch by a courtroom artist shows Osama bin Laden's driver Salim Hamdan (L) at the Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base July 24, 2008, as FBI agent Craig Donnachie (R) testifies about his interrogations of Hamdan regarding a picture of disguised U.S. agents. (Courtroom Drawing by Janet Hamlin/Reuters)
    French fries helped calm bin Laden driver: witnesses Fri Jul 25, 6:38 PM ET

    GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba (Reuters) - Hot McDonald's french fries and a call home encouraged Salim Hamdan to cooperate under interrogation but Osama bin Laden's driver did not like cold fries and isolation upset him, witnesses said at his Guantanamo war crimes trial on Friday.

  • U.S. Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain (R-AZ) meets with the Dalai Lama in Aspen, Colorado, July 25, 2008. (Jordan Curet/Reuters)
    McCain meets Dalai Lama, presses China on rights Fri Jul 25, 6:18 PM ET

    ASPEN, Colo. (Reuters) - U.S. Republican presidential candidate John McCain urged China on Friday to address human rights concerns and free Tibetan prisoners after he met with the Dalai Lama in Colorado.

  • A grieving parent is assisted by relatives as she cries in front of the rubble of the Beichuan Number One Middle School, located around 150 km (93 miles) north of Chengdu in Sichuan Province June 12, 2008, where around 700 children died during last month's massive earthquake. Couples whose only child was killed or seriously injured in the May 12 Sichuan province earthquake may have another, winning an exemption from China's strict family planning rules, the China Daily said on Saturday. (David Gray/Reuters)
    Parents of China quake victims can have second child Sat Jul 26, 8:37 AM ET

    BEIJING (Reuters) - Couples whose only child was killed or seriously injured in the May 12 Sichuan province earthquake may have another, winning an exemption from China's strict family planning rules, the China Daily said on Saturday.

  • The Pentagon is seen in this aerial view in Washington in this June 15, 2005 file photo. (Jason Reed/Files/Reuters)
    Pentagon auditors request probe after criticism Fri Jul 25, 6:26 PM ET

    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The agency that audits Pentagon contracts said on Friday it had asked for an investigation into allegations that its supervisors pressured employees to alter audits in favor of contractors.

  • Gasoline pumps are seen at a closed-down Alliance gas station in Ventura, California June 19, 2008. (Joshua Lott/Reuters)
    Worst over for drivers as pump prices slide: AAA Fri Jul 25, 2:09 PM ET

    NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. retail gasoline prices have fallen more than 10 cents per gallon in a week and could fall another 25 cents by the end of summer, a sign the worst is over for U.S. motorists this vacation season.

  • Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez takes a sample of crude during his weekly broadcast at a nationalized oil field at Orinoco's belt in the southern strip of the eastern Orinoco River in this February 17, 2008 file photo. (Reuters)
    Iran says oil could reach $500 on dollar, politics Sat Jul 26, 6:43 AM ET

    TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's OPEC governor said world oil prices could reach as high as $500 per barrel in a few years' time if the dollar falls further and political tension worsens, an Iranian weekly said.

  • A boy holds a sign as he walks during a May Day immigration and labor march and rally in downtown Los Angeles May 1, 2008. (Danny Moloshok/Reuters)
    U.S. firms push back against immigration sanctions Fri Jul 25, 5:22 PM ET

    PHOENIX (Reuters) - Arizona steel fabricator Sheridan Bailey was frustrated by a state law that punished employers who hire illegal immigrants so he joined local employers and business owners to change it.

  • Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe waits to welcome his South African counterpart Thabo Mbeki before signing a framework deal committing his party and Morgan Tsvangirai's main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party to talks, in Harare's Rainbow Towers Hotel July 21, 2008. (Philimon Bulawayo/Reuters)
    U.S. expands sanctions against Mugabe's government Fri Jul 25, 2:17 PM ET

    HARARE (Reuters) - The United States expanded sanctions against President Robert Mugabe's government on Friday, increasing pressure on the Zimbabwean leader as his party discusses a power-sharing deal with the opposition.