KATMANDU, Nepal – Nepal‘s capital faced shortages of fresh food, cooking gas and gasoline as a strike and demonstrations to demand the king restore democracy shut down the city and dragged into its 12th day Sunday. Hundreds of protesters marched on the outskirts of Katmandu, waving banners and chanting, “We …

CHARLESTON, W.Va. – Excerpts of a letter sent to victims’ families this week by Randal McCloy Jr., the sole survivor of the Sago Mine disaster. The letter mentions several mining terms: a “man-trip” is a vehicle that transports miners, a “rescuer” is an emergency air pack, and a “coal rib” …

SAN FRANCISCO – When documentary crews began trailing Barry Bonds for his ESPN reality TV show, the idea was to capture intimate behind-the-scenes moments of the slugger as he chased Hank Aaron’s homer record. But production took a hard turn last month, after two San Francisco Chronicle reporters detailed Bonds’ …

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – The judge in Zacarias Moussaoui‘s death penalty trial admonished the jury Friday to avoid dictionaries after learning a juror looked up the meaning of “aggravating.” How aggravating and mitigating factors balance out in the jurors’ minds is key to their deliberations, which resumed after a daylong break …

JERUSALEM – Prime Minister Ariel Sharon underwent a successful operation Wednesday to reattach a piece of his skull, a day after the procedure was delayed because of a respiratory infection, hospital officials said. Sharon, who has been comatose since suffering a stroke on Jan. 4, was in stable condition after …

WASHINGTON – Lawyers for a former top White House aide charged in the CIA leak investigation said Thursday the prosecutor should surrender a wide range of information about news organizations and their reporters, including The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward. Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald has failed to disclose information that would …

SAN JOSE, Calif. – Seagate Technology LLC has started shipping a notebook PC hard drive that overcomes an obstacle many feared would be a major roadblock to the further expansion of disk capacity — and the overall growth of the storage industry. The new approach that aligns bits of data …

LOS ANGELES – The revisionist fairy tale “Hoodwinked” and the inspirational sports flick “Glory Road” topped a family oriented box office for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, according to estimates Monday. “Hoodwinked,” an animated update of the Little Red Riding Hood story, debuted with $16.6 million in ticket …

NEW YORK – Texas Instruments Inc. (TXN) on Monday said it will sell its sensors and controls business to private-equity firm Bain Capital LLC for $3 billion in cash as it focuses on chips for mobile phones and other consumer electronics. The deal allows Texas Instruments to part company with …

WASHINGTON – President Bush said Friday that Sen. Hillary Clinton, a potential candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, is “formidable,” but he declined to speculate on which Republicans might run for the White House in 2008. “This is an unusual year because this is the first time there hasn’t been …