A 26-year old Redmond man was transported to the hospital by helicopter after he was rescued from the bottom of a steep 200-foot embankment leading down to the Clackamas River east of Estacada on Monday evening, deputies reported. Danny Russell Crane was negotiating the side of a steep bank near milepost 24 of Highway 224 with a friend in order to get down to the Clackamas River below when the earth collapsed beneath their feet ... [full story]

The Oregon Air National Guard announced that an F-15 jet fighter has crashed about 35 miles off the Oregon Coast this afternoon. The plane from the 142nd Fighter Wing Oregon Air National Guard was on a training mission out of Portland Air Base when it went down west of Cannon Beach about 1:35 p.m. Tuesday. Search and rescue operations are underway by United States Coast Guard personnel from North Bend and Astoria. The aircraft was ... [full story]

ST. CHARLES, Mo. - Accused killer Christopher Vaughn will remain in Missouri at least another month before he is extradited to Illinois to face charges he massacred his family. Christopher Vaughn Vaughn remained jailed in St. Charles County Tuesday as prosecutors and defense attorneys huddled to work out plans for a full extradition hearing. Vaughn, 32, is charged in Illinois with shooting his wife and three children earlier this month inside a van near ... [full story]

WASHINGTON - U.S. President George Bush Tuesday pushed for adoption of an immigration reform measure before Congress, saying the current system "isn't working." Bush, speaking at an immigration reform briefing at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, said most Americans understand the current system needs reform and efforts to fix it in 1986 failed. "The first thing that we've got to recognize in the country is that the system isn't working," Bush said, calling for something ... [full story]

A 21-year old Eugene man died in surgery after the rifle his friend was carrying accidentally went off, striking him in the back after an evening of shooting and fishing on an Oregon coastal lake, police reported. Oregon State Police (OSP) detectives, in conjunction with the Lane County District Attorney’s Office are continuing the investigating into the death of Weston Schoener.  Police said that a group of four friends returned to a private dock on ... [full story]

MOSCOW - Moscow plans to cooperate more with NATO, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday in Moscow. Lavrov said the cooperation will be aimed at monitoring reforms within NATO, RIA Novosti reported. "The parameters of the cooperation will depend on which way NATO's transformation goes," Lavrov said at the opening of a Russia-NATO Council session in Moscow, Novosti reported. Lavrov said he will emphasize Russia's concerns to NATO officials at the council session, including ... [full story]

MUNICH, Germany - Prosecutors in Germany want to try 13 U.S. intelligence agents who allegedly kidnapped a German citizen in 2003. The German case is the second in Europe to focus attention on the controversial U.S. "extraordinary rendition" practice under which terror suspects arrested in one country can be transported to one with fewer prisoner rights for questioning. A trial of 26 CIA agents in Italy is on hold. In Munich, prosecutors demanded the extradition ... [full story]

LONDON - Roman Catholic bishops have told Britain's parliament considering human-animal hybrid embryos that they have the same rights as human embryos. The statement was part of a submission to the joint committee scrutinizing draft overhaul legislation of the Human Tissue and Embryo Bill, which regulates abortion, test tube babies and embryo research, The Telegraph reported Tuesday. As the draft stands, the creation of animal-human embryos created by injecting animal cells or DNA into human ... [full story]

BAGHDAD - The Iraqi culture minister has been accused of assassinating two sons of a parliament member. Officials have issued a warrant for the arrest of Asaad Al-Hashimi, sources told the Kuwait News Agency, KUNA. Iraqi and U.S. forces arrested several of Hashimi's bodyguards Monday at the Culture Ministry buildings in Baghdad but Hashimi wasn't there, sources told KUNA. KUNA reported that government sources said the warrants for Hashimi and his bodyguards were based on ... [full story]

JERUSALEM - Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's decision to release Palestinian prisoners is a mistake. Netanyahu also told a Jewish assembly that he wasn't going to interfere in negotiations over the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, the Jerusalem Post reported. Olmert announced Monday that Israel would free 250 Fatah prisoners. "For us, releasing prisoners would be crossing a red line. We must remember there are prices ... [full story]