Authorities looking for the cause of an explosion that killed five people at a power plant  launch a criminal investigation, saying they could not rule out criminal negligence.

Forecasters predict more snow for the Mid-Atlantic, starting Tuesday afternoon and continuing into Wednesday as airlines warn travelers more flights would be canceled.

North Dakota has escaped the worst effects of the national recession, but with its good fortune has come an unexpected problem: homelessness, as job seekers flow into the state looking for work.

The meeting would mark the first time in the long health care debate that leaders from both sides would be allowed to air their ideas publicly.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg says he is skeptical that the federal government would cover the cost of trying Sept. 11 suspects in Manhattan and he wants a guarantee from the Obama administration.

A Chinese-born engineer convicted of espionage and other federal charges in California is sentenced to more than 15 years in prison.

A 26-year-old Buffalo man remains in jail on charges of holding a 13-year-old runaway in his house for six months, having sex with her more than 100 times and making her baby-sit his 1-year-old son.

Unable to halt the "Choose Life" license plate variations in nearly two-dozen states, abortion-rights activists are pushing  "Trust Women/Protect Choice" license plates in Virginia.

President Barack Obama's administration is forming a new agency to study and report on the changing climate.

A portion of a terminal at Detroit Metropolitan Airport was evacuated Monday after a man without a boarding pass walked through a passenger screening checkpoint and refused to obey security officers, officials said.

The Obama administration will ask Congress to improve childhood nutrition by ridding school vending machines of sugary snacks and drinks and giving school lunch and breakfast to more kids.

Authorities in California say a woman fell about 60 feet to her death after she chased her dog off a cliff in the Mendocino headlands.

A 17-year-old  in Washington state crashed his parents' car through the doors of a school, then drove down the hall, sheriff's deputies say.

Prosecutors on Monday dropped state charges against a woman in the 2002 abduction of Elizabeth Smart in exchange for a guilty plea related to the attempted kidnapping of Smart's cousin.

Residents are being urged to stay away from their North Carolina mountainside homes after a 30-foot-high mudslide washed over their road.

A murder warrant is issued  against a former Philadelphia police officer accused of fatally shooting a neighbor during an off-duty altercation in November.

Navigational locks and gates in Chicago-area waterways crucial for shipping may be opened less frequently than usual under a $78.5 million campaign to prevent Asian carp from overrunning the Great Lakes, federal officials said Monday.

Iran moves closer to being able to produce nuclear warheads with formal notification that it will enrich uranium to higher levels.

Why did eight American soldiers die defending an remote outpost the U.S. military no longer wanted to hold? NBC News' Richard Engel reports from Kabul.

The drama on the sidelines of Haiti's earthquake, in which 10 American missionaries were arrested trying to take children out of the country, was a fiasco waiting to happen. By Kari Huus.

China's Xinhua News Agency says that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has reiterated his country's promise to achieve a denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

China is showing off the results of its massive drive to rebuild its own quake zone  22 months after a 7.9-magnitude temblor struck and devastated the region and left at least 90,000 dead.

Mexican authorities on Monday arrested two suspected leaders of a brutal drug trafficking gang that terrorized the border city of Tijuana for several years, a U.S. official said.

In Haiti's devastated capital city, early spring rains threaten to cause landslides and bring about health problems in the makeshift camps where more than 500,000 people are living.

Thousands of Afghan soldiers and police will join U.S. and NATO troops in an offensive in southern Afghanistan, playing their biggest role in any joint operation of the Afghan war.

A magnitude 5.7-earthquake shook southern Mexico near the Oaxaca coast Monday, setting off evacuation alarms and swaying buildings as far away as Mexico City.

Opposition leader Viktor Yanukovych emerges as the apparent winner in Ukraine's presidential contest, with a lead of almost three percentage points with about 99 percent of ballots counted.

Authorities arrest six suspected Taliban militants with a suicide vest and hand grenades allegedly on their way to attack a five-star hotel and kill Americans, police say.

Mexican soldiers seize more than 12 tons of marijuana found beneath a false floor of a tractor trailer.

An Israeli man has been jailed, suspected by police of enslaving a cult-like harem of at least 17 women and 37 children.

Police in central China have shut down a hacker training operation that openly recruited thousands of members online and provided them with cyberattack lessons and malicious software, state media said Monday.

Italy's agriculture minister defended his sponsorship of McDonald's new all-Italian burger Monday amid criticism that he is selling out to a multinational corporation.

The No. 2 leader of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood and two other top figures are arrested in a sweep targeting members of the nation's most powerful opposition group.

High rates of the most effective type of malaria-fighting drugs sold in three African countries are poor quality  raising fears of increased drug resistance to a killer disease.

A body was found inside a wheel well of a Delta Air Lines plane after it landed in Tokyo from New York, and Japanese authorities Monday were trying to identify the man.

Authorities say an alligator killed an 11-year-old girl as she swam with friends in a river in northeastern Brazil.

The lore of the Wild West and the hard reality of southern Afghanistan share a few things in common: danger, men with guns and desert wilderness

Taliban fighters plan to disguise themselves as civilians during a looming NATO offensive in southern Afghanistan, a militant commander told NBC News.

A political ally says Sri Lanka's former army chief and presidential candidate has been arrested on sedition charges.

Heavy snowfall has seriously disrupted transport in Bulgaria and neighboring Romania, blocking highways and leaving cars stranded in snow.

Tourists headed for the observation deck of the world's tallest tower were left disappointed and confused Monday after the owner of Dubai's Burj Khalifa unexpectedly cut off public access to the building because of electrical problems.

A massive avalanche plowed into an Indian army training center at a ski resort town in Indian-controlled Kashmir on Monday, killing 17 soldiers and critically injuring 17 others.

British broadcaster ITV pleaded guilty to animal cruelty and was fined by an Australian court Monday after a rat was killed and eaten on the reality TV show "I'm a Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here."

Chayne Hultgren, an Australian performance artist, set a new Guinness World Record Monday by simultaneously swallowing 18 swords, each nearly as long as two and a half rulers.