Breaking News

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama's budget will propose an ambitious six-year, $478 billion public works program of highway, bridge and transit upgrades, half of it financed with a one-time mandatory tax on profits that U.S. companies have amassed overseas, White House officials said.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Flash floods caused by heavy rains have hit northwestern Greece and southern Albania, forcing the evacuation of hundreds of villagers Sunday and destroying a famous 18th-century stone bridge.

By Natalia Zinets and Aleksandar Vasovic KIEV/DONETSK, Ukraine (Reuters) - Thirteen Ukrainian soldiers and 10 civilians have been killed in the past 24 hours in the country's separatist-minded east, Kiev authorities said, after the collapse of peace talks dimmed hopes of a near-term ceasefire. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which took part in the talks in Minsk, Belarus, along with envoys from Ukraine and Russia, said rebel delegates had not been ready to discuss key points of a peace plan, including enforcement of a ceasefire, and sought to redraw a blueprint agreed last September. The terms of that 12-point protocol have been repeatedly violated, but Kiev and the international community see it as the only viable roadmap to end the nine-month-long conflict in which over 5,000 people have been killed. In eastern Ukraine, the Kiev military reported no let-up in rebel attacks on government positions.