AP - President Mikhail Saakashvili said Wednesday that he has offered government posts to political opponents who have been leading street protests for the past two months. But opposition leaders said they have no interest in joining Saakashvili's government and would continue their protests to demand his resignation.

AP - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will make a dramatic attempt to narrow a growing divide with the Obama administration when he delivers a major policy speech in the coming days, his aides say � even at the expense of alienating hawkish coalition partners opposed to territorial compromise.

CQPolitics.com - Speaker Nancy Pelosi is fiercely lobbying fellow anti-war Democrats, crossing off the names of converts from a whip list, as she seeks to build support for a troubled supplemental war-spending bill.

AP - The Obama administration is cautiously watching Iran's presidential election this week for signs that the Islamic Republic may be willing to engage with United States, but U.S. officials have meager expectations for change.

AP - The United Nations' newly toughened penalties on North Korea for its nuclear defiance could hit hardest in an area that worries American officials the most: the North's illicit exports of nuclear and missile technologies.

AP - Prospects have never looked more promising for a bill that would give Native Hawaiians the chance to establish their own government and eventually gain control over valuable land and resources.

AP - President Barack Obama's administration says people who are still using analog television signals are running out of time.

AP - Cuba's U.N. ambassador in Geneva says Human Rights Watch and other groups are 'mercenaries' paid by the U.S. government.

AP - Gunmen shot and killed a top judge as she dropped her children off at school in Russia's violent North Caucasus Wednesday, officials said, the latest episode highlighting spiraling violence in a region plagued by poverty, corruption and the rise of radical Islam.

Reuters - President Barack Obama, trying to prevent the closure of a U.S. air base in Kyrgyzstan, has sent a personal appeal to the Central Asian nation urging it to expand cooperation, Kyrgyzstan said on Thursday.

Politico - Republicans dig for evidence of improper behavior.

Politico - His 30-second ad explains win.

AP - U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates says NATO allies agree with him that progress must be shown in Afghanistan over the next year to 18 months.

AP - U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates says it does not appear that North Korea has made military preparations to follow through on its threat of retaliation for new United Nations sanctions.

AP - President Barack Obama has sent a personal message to his Kyrgyzstan counterpart, officials said Thursday, as Washington tries to keep U.S. forces from being evicted from an important air base in the Central Asian nation.

Politico - In an ideas piece, Pipes says Republicans need to acknowledge that the economy will bounce back.

Politico - GOP�releases a long-awaited energy plan that focuses�on nuclear energy, offshore and Arctic drilling.

Reuters - The Group of Eight industrial nations are collectively off course in delivering on a 2005 pact to more than double aid to Africa through 2010, with France and Italy falling far short of their commitments, according to a new report released on Thursday.

Reuters - Barack Obama has presented a fresh understanding of Islam not shown by predecessors, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said in his first interview since the U.S. president addressed the Muslim world from Cairo.

Bloomberg - June 11 (Bloomberg) -- Senators drafting health-care overhaul legislation, seeking to win Republican support, are weighing whether to create nonprofit cooperatives to expand insurance coverage.

AP - The top U.S. war zone commander says violence hit an all-time high in Afghanistan last week.

AP - Defense ministers from eight nations discussed their troops' progress in battling the Taliban-led insurgency in southern Afghanistan before a NATO meeting Thursday.

AP - An EU court on Thursday voided a 2001 European Union decision to freeze the assets of a suspected Jordanian terrorist held in Britain, saying the case lacked a proper judicial review.

AFP - Former US president Jimmy Carter said on Thursday he believed the new US administration of President Barack Obama could lift sanctions on Syria and upgrade ties by sending an ambassador to Damascus.

AP - District of Columbia officials say an 88-year-old white supremacist will be charged with murder in connection with a deadly shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial and Museum.

AP - The mayor of the District of Columbia is proclaiming the capital city still an 'open and safe' place to visit for tourists in the wake of the deadly Holocaust Museum shooting.

AP - A Democratic senator said Thursday that Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor sees a 2008 ruling affirming Americans' right to own guns for self-defense as settled law.

AP - A ranking FBI official says authorities are pursuing a possible hate crime charge as well as a homicide charge against a white supremacist suspected of murdering a security officer at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial and Museum.

AP - Republicans want the Obama administration to set a deadline for the government to sell its ownership stakes in General Motors Corp., Chrysler LLC and financial institutions.

AP - President Barack Obama has called Lebanese President Michel Suleiman to congratulate him on his country's parliamentary election.

Reuters - Dutch anti-immigrant politician Geert Wilders won enough preference votes for a seat in the European Parliament, but has refused to take up the position, his party said Thursday.

AP - British police have arrested singer Pete Doherty on suspicion of drunk driving and drug possession.

AP - Terry McAuliffe's crushing defeat in Virginia's gubernatorial primary is the latest blow to former President Bill Clinton's political legacy, still reeling from Hillary Rodham Clinton's loss to Barack Obama in last year's Democratic presidential contest.

AP - Authorities are charging an 88-year-old white supremacist with first-degree murder in the shooting death of a guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial and Museum.

AP - CIA Director Leon Panetta says he believes Osama bin Laden is still in Pakistan. The spy agency hopes to close in on the al-Qaida leader as Pakistan's military cracks down on the tribal area where he is thought to be hiding.

Politico - U.S. Chamber of Commerce will tell committee that health�bill will not solve 'real problems.'

Politico - Rep.�opts�not to pursue bid for top GOP Education and Labor slot so he can ponder Senate run.

AP - General Motors CEO Fritz Henderson says he expects to remain as the automaker's chief executive when it emerges from bankruptcy protection.

AP - President Dmitry Medvedev said Thursday that Russia is taking steps toward greater democracy, defending electoral reforms that Kremlin critics dismiss as window-dressing.

AFP - Six people have been arrested on suspicion of planning an attack on the Group of Eight summit next month in Italy after a marathon two-year investigation, police said on Thursday.

Reuters - Republican Senator John McCain urged President Barack Obama Thursday to classify photographs said to depict the abuse of terrorism suspects to ensure they do not become public.

CQPolitics.com - Despite the determined resistance of tobacco-state lawmakers, the Senate was moving toward passage Thursday of sweeping legislation to authorize the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco products

AP - President Barack Obama would be allowed for the next four months to order Guantanamo Bay detainees into the United States to face trial under a compromise reached Thursday by House and Senate negotiators struggling with a war-funding bill.

AP - House lawmakers on Thursday accused federal regulators of a gross misuse of power in orchestrating a 'shotgun wedding' between Bank of America Corp. and Merrill Lynch & Co. that cost U.S. taxpayers $20 billion.

AP - The No. 2 Republican in the House is comparing some of President Barack Obama's economic policies to those of Russia's prime minister and former president, Vladimir Putin.

AP - Members of Congress said Thursday they will try to force regional airlines to fix problems with pilot training and fatigue highlighted by an investigation into an air crash in upstate New York in February.

AP - The Supreme Court on Thursday turned down former media executive Conrad Black's request to be released from a Florida prison while he appeals his fraud conviction.

AP - The Energy Department says its making $240 million available for research into more fuel-efficient large trucks and passengers vehicles. It also is providing about $11 million for nine projects looking into capturing carbon dioxide from coal plants and $49 million for two dozen solar technology projects.

AP - Iran has rebuffed a bid from the U.N. nuclear monitoring agency to beef up its monitoring ability at an important atomic site as it tries to keep track of the country's rapidly growing uranium enrichment capabilities, diplomats said Thursday.

AP - A federal judge on Thursday sentenced a California medical marijuana dispensary owner to a reduced term of a year and a day in prison in one of the nation's first cases since the Obama administration adjusted the federal pot policy.

McClatchy Newspapers - WASHINGTON � This should be labor's big moment: a Democratic White House and Congress poised to overhaul the nation's health care system. Despite spending more than $113 million to help elect their ideological allies last November, unions are having a challenging time getting their way on Capitol Hill.

CQPolitics.com - After years of frustration, the Senate on Thursday passed sweeping legislation to authorize the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco products

AP - Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor said Thursday that she would follow a historic ruling affirming Americans' right to own guns for self-defense, but pro-gun activists said they still believe she'd work to limit gun rights if confirmed for the high court.

Politico - Rev.�Jeremiah Wright tries to step back from a controversial comment he made earlier in the week.

Politico - In Wisconsin, Obama makes his strongest pitch yet for sweeping health care reform by year’s end.

AP - Ten-year-old Kennedy Corpus has a rock-solid excuse for missing the last day of school: a personal note to her teacher from President Barack Obama.

AFP - The US House of Representatives on Thursday voted to ramp up aid to Pakistan but lawmakers still need to resolve deep differences on how many strings come attached.

AFP - A US Supreme Court justice on Thursday denied a request by disgraced media baron Conrad Black to be freed pending an appeal of his conviction for mail and wire fraud.

AP - President Barack Obama is lowering expectations for immediate wholesale changes to the health care system, even if Congress meets his goal of completing a reform bill this year.

AFP - The EU and the United States agreed Thursday on conditions for the transfer of ex-Guantanamo inmates to Europe, stopping short of obliging the US to house any, according to European diplomats.

AP - A female nursery worker has appeared in a British court to face charges of sexually assaulting and disseminating indecent images of children.

McClatchy Newspapers - WASHINGTON � Government would have broad new authority to regulate tobacco products, slash nicotine content and restrict advertising under historic legislation approved overwhelmingly Thursday afternoon by the Senate.

CQPolitics.com - The Senate Rules and Administration Committee by voice vote Thursday approved the nomination of labor lawyer John J. Sullivan to the Federal Election Commission.

Bloomberg - June 11 (Bloomberg) -- Most Senate Finance Committee members are “inclined” to support creation of member-run health cooperatives to bridge a partisan divide over revamping the nation’s health-care system, the panel’s chairman said.

AP - President Barack Obama challenged Republican critics Thursday to offer alternative plans for overhauling U.S. health care, declaring he's 'happy to steal people's ideas' but that doing nothing about out-of-reach costs and uninsured Americans is not an option.

AP - The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is convening business groups on Friday to plot strategy as alarm grows over the direction of Democratic health care overhaul proposals.

Politico - Group of senators calls on Obama to issue an executive order prohibiting torture photos from being made public.

AP - The House and Senate have worked out a compromise to give a $500 retroactive bonus to soldiers for every month they were forced to stay in the military beyond their enlistment term since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

AP - The U.S. government can keep pictures of detainee abuse secret while it asks the Supreme Court to permanently block release of the photographs on the grounds they could incite violence in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, a federal appeals court said Thursday.

AP - The Anne Frank House museum says it will put the teenage Holocaust victim's diaries and other writings on permanent display to commemorate what would have been her 80th birthday on Friday.

McClatchy Newspapers - WASHINGTON � Among the 17 senators who voted against allowing the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco are some of the top recipients of campaign contributions from the tobacco industry, which has donated millions of dollars to lawmakers in the past several campaign cycles.

AP - After a flare-up over controversial detainee abuse photos, House-Senate negotiators sealed agreement on a crucial war-funding bill Thursday night when President Barack Obama personally guaranteed the photos would never be released.

Politico - House-Senate negotiators reach agreement on a $105.9 billion wartime spending bill.

Politico - Sen. Barbara Boxer says that she expects to mark up the legislation before the August recess.

AP - President Barack Obama plans to fire the inspector general who investigates AmeriCorps and other national service programs amid a controversy between the IG and Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, who is an Obama supporter and former NBA basketball star.

AP - President Barack Obama's special envoy to North Korea said Thursday that the United States is determined to make sure the North faces serious consequences if it does not reverse its missile and nuclear work.

McClatchy Newspapers - WASHINGTON � Senate Democrats are offering to scrap a controversial government-sponsored health insurance provision in an effort to win more than a dozen moderate and conservative Republican votes to extend health care coverage to nearly 46 million uninsured Americans.

CQPolitics.com - The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee offered an uncharacteristic apology for not speaking with the panel's ranking Republican before announcing the start date for Sonia Sotomayor's Supreme Court confirmation hearing.

AFP - US Middle East envoy George Mitchell is due to arrive in Syria amid renewed efforts to revive stalled Middle East peace talks a week after President Barack Obama reached out to the Muslim world.

CQPolitics.com - Health care lobbyists met Thursday with Senate Republicans despite what some characterized as warnings from Democratic staffers against undermining overhaul legislation.