DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Less than 10 months after three tickets split a world-record lottery prize, the jackpot for Saturday's Powerball drawing was nearing historic territory once again.

ADEN (Reuters) - Gunmen shot dead a senior Yemeni military intelligence officer who had been targeted for assassination by al Qaeda-linked militants, a local security official said. Colonel Abdullah al-Rabaki was walking home in the city of Mukalla in Hadramawt Province late on Friday when the gunmen shot him six times with a revolver fitted with a silencer, the official said. They escaped on a motorbike. Leaflets from Islamist militants allied to al Qaeda had previously been circulated in the city on Yemen's south coast, calling for Rabaki's assassination, the official said. ...

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea fired three short-range guided missiles into its eastern waters on Saturday, a South Korean official said. It routinely tests such missiles, but the latest launches came during a period of tentative diplomacy aimed at easing tensions.

By Xiaoyi Shao and Michael Martina BEIJING (Reuters) - China's housing inflation accelerated to its fastest pace in April in two years, driven by a jump in prices in Beijing and Shanghai, complicating the task of policymakers trying to cool the property sector while supporting economic expansion. Average new home prices rose 4.9 percent last month from a year ago, after a year-on-year increase of 3.6 percent in March, according to Reuters calculations from data released by the National Bureau of Statistics(NBS) on Saturday. The rise was the sharpest since April 2011. ...

PARIS (Reuters) - French President Francois Hollande has signed into law a bill allowing same-sex marriage, making France the 14th country to legalize gay weddings. France's official journal announced on Saturday that the bill had become law after the Constitutional Council gave the go-ahead on Friday. The bill, a campaign pledge by the Socialist president, has been hotly contested in France where allowing gay marriage is one of the biggest social reforms since abolition of the death penalty in 1981. ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Political scandals have strange ways of causing collateral damage, and Republicans are hoping the furor over federal tax enforcers singling out conservative groups will ensnare their biggest target: President Barack Obama's health care law.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Political scandals have strange ways of causing collateral damage, and Republicans are hoping the furor over federal tax enforcers singling out conservative groups will ensnare their biggest target: President Barack Obama's health care law.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Seeking maximum political gain from the string of controversies swirling around the White House, Republicans are on the attack against Democratic lawmakers who accepted donations from the union that represents Internal Revenue Service employees.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Seeking maximum political gain from the string of controversies swirling around the White House, Republicans are on the attack against Democratic lawmakers who accepted donations from the union that represents Internal Revenue Service employees.

PARIS (AP) — French President Francois Hollande has signed a law authorizing gay marriage and adoption by same-sex couples, after months of nationwide protests and wrenching debate.

NEWARK, N.J (AP) — An airline official says a US Airways flight with 34 people aboard was forced to make a belly landing at Newark International Airport after experiencing landing gear trouble. No injuries were reported.

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea fired three short-range missiles from its east coast on Saturday, South Korea's Defense Ministry said, but the purpose of the launches was unknown. Launches by the North of short-term missiles are not uncommon, but the ministry would not speculate whether these latest launches were part of a test or training exercise. "North Korea fired short-range guided missiles twice in the morning and once in the afternoon off its east coast," an official at the South Korean Defense Ministry spokesman's office said by telephone. ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Internal Revenue Service is feeling the sort of heat that targeted taxpayers feel from the tax agency. It's the sense that a powerful someone is breathing down your neck.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Internal Revenue Service is feeling the sort of heat that targeted taxpayers feel from the tax agency. It's the sense that a powerful someone is breathing down your neck.

ATLANTA (AP) — Republicans aren't the only ones roiled by internal jostling and recruiting hiccups ahead of next year's midterm elections.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Motorcycle-riding gunmen assassinated a police chief in front of his house after he led an anti-Taliban campaign in western Afghanistan, an official said Saturday.

FAIRFIELD, Conn. (AP) — Two commuter trains packed with rush-hour commuters collided in an accident that sent more than 60 people to the hospital, severely damaged the tracks and threatened to snarl travel in the congested Northeast Corridor.

MALMO, Sweden (AP) — Flashy skirts, fake tans, fur and feathers: It's the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest.

SANTA CLARITA, Calif. (AP) — A pair of tamed but persistent wildfires still burned in the hills and mountains around Interstate 5 after a wild week of burning brush in the area north of Los Angeles.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Despite Democratic fears, predictions of the demise of President Barack Obama's agenda appear exaggerated after a week of cascading controversies, political triage by the administration and party leaders in Congress and lack of evidence to date of wrongdoing close to the Oval Office.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Despite Democratic fears, predictions of the demise of President Barack Obama's agenda appear exaggerated after a week of cascading controversies, political triage by the administration and party leaders in Congress and lack of evidence to date of wrongdoing close to the Oval Office.

LAS VEGAS (AP) — O.J. Simpson's former lawyer defended himself point-by-point Friday against allegations he botched the former football star's armed-robbery trial, after giving damaging testimony that Simpson actually knew his buddies had guns when they went to a hotel room together to reclaim some sports memorabilia.

By Daniel Bases NEW YORK (Reuters) - Europe's top trade official for the first time late on Friday officially cited Chinese mobile telecommunications equipment makers Huawei and ZTE Corp for violating anti-dumping and anti-subsidy guidelines. European Union Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht said he was prepared to launch a formal investigation into anti-competitive behavior by these Chinese companies in order to protect a "strategic" sector of Europe's economy. ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Guest lineups for the Sunday TV news shows:

UNIONDALE, N.Y. (AP) — Last Sunday Andrea Rebello, a 21-year-old Hofstra University junior studying public relations, posted a recipe for how to prepare July 4-themed strawberries covered in sparkling sugars on her blog.

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc said on Saturday that rockfalls were hampering rescue efforts after a tunnel collapse four days ago at its giant Indonesian copper mine, with hopes fading of finding alive any of the 23 still missing. Freeport closed the world's second largest copper mine on Wednesday, a day after a tunnel fell in on 38 workers undergoing training. Five are known to have died. Several of the 10 rescued are still in hospital. The Grasberg mine in West Papua is in one of the most remote regions of the Indonesian archipelago. ...

Following the chaotic bailout of Cyprus, top European Union officials are saying it's time to rethink how the region manages its crisis — and who should be involved.

Following the chaotic bailout of Cyprus, top European Union officials are saying it's time to rethink how the region manages its crisis — and who should be involved.

BERLIN (AP) — Engineering a financial bailout for Cyprus in March was such a chaotic process that top European officials say it is time to rethink how the region manages its crisis — and who should be involved.

BERLIN (AP) — Engineering a financial bailout for Cyprus in March was such a chaotic process that top European officials say it is time to rethink how the region manages its crisis — and who should be involved.

"Listening to the nightly news, this appears to be just the latest example of a culture of cover-ups and political intimidation in this administration. It seems like the truth is hidden from the American people just long enough to make it through an election." — Republican Dave Camp, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, speaking about the IRS scandal and two other issues plaguing the White House.

CAIRO (AP) — The pale, young Christian woman sat handcuffed in the courtroom, accused of insulting Islam while teaching history of religions to fourth-graders. A team of Islamist lawyers with long beards sang in unison, "All except the Prophet Muhammad."

By Caren Bohan WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The technology industry and organized labor are locked in a fight that threatens to complicate the U.S. Senate's immigration bill. At the heart of the debate is whether there is a shortage of Americans with the math and science skills needed for work at technology firms like Facebook Inc, Google Inc and Microsoft Corp. Labor is brandishing research that says the scarcity of workers is a myth while the tech industry is pointing to other studies that say the shortage is very real and is a threat to U.S. competitiveness. ...

SANTA CLARITA, Calif. (AP) — As firefighters took on a stubborn 3-day-old wildfire Friday in rough terrain north of Los Angeles, a second and more serious blaze broke out 30 miles away near Interstate 5, quickly surging to more than 500 acres, briefly threatening an elementary school and leading to the precautionary evacuation of nearly 20 homes.

ELIZABETH, N.J. (AP) — Two cups of coffee ended life on the run for an Internet sensation known as Kai the hatchet-wielding hitchhiker.

Today is Saturday, May 18, the 138th day of 2013. There are 227 days left in the year.

DOVER, Del. (AP) — A woman who lived with a Delaware pediatrician accused of waterboarding her 11-year-old daughter has agreed to plead guilty to child endangerment charges and testify against him.

FAIRFIELD, Conn. (AP) — Two commuter trains serving New York City collided in Connecticut during Friday's evening rush hour, sending 60 people to the hospital, including five with critical injuries, Gov. Dannel Malloy said.

By Keith Coffman DENVER (Reuters) - A group of Colorado county sheriffs, angry about two new state gun control laws passed in the wake of last year's mass shootings in Connecticut and Colorado, filed a federal lawsuit on Friday seeking to block the laws from going into effect. The two laws, passed by the state's Democratic-controlled legislature with scant Republican support, ban ammunition magazines that hold more than 15 rounds and require background checks for all private gun sales and transfers. All but 10 of the state's 64 county sheriffs signed on to the suit, filed in U.S. ...

"Special unit"assigned to groups "groups supportive of Israel."