Scott Neuman

Kurdish forces have retaken the key border town of Kobani from militants with the self-declared Islamic State, the second time the Islamist extremists have been ousted from the region this year, according to a British-based monitoring group.

Farther east, ISIS fighters had also attacked the government-held Syrian city of Hasaka.

Updated at 3:05 p.m. ET

Across Greece, people lined up outside banks and at ATMs to withdraw euros today after their prime minister called for a surprise referendum on a proposed international bailout for the troubled country — a move that has pushed Athens to the brink of default and ...

A day after Richard Matt, one of two escaped inmates from a prison in upstate New York was shot and killed by police, a weeks-long manhunt, which has yet to track down accomplice David Sweat, has gone into overdrive. Helicopters, search dogs and hundreds of officers are scouring an ...

Updated at 1:05 p.m. ET

The man who opened fire on tourists at a Tunisian beach resort, killing 39 and wounding 36 others, has been identified by the country's prime minister as a 23-year-old aviation student studying at the nearby University of Kairouan.

Premier Habib Essid also said that ...

Updated at 4:35 p.m. ET

An African-American activist scaled the 30-foot flag pole in front of the South Carolina Statehouse early this morning and removed the Confederate battle flag that flies there.

Despite a call from Gov. Nikki Haley to take down the flag in the wake of the ...

President Obama called the Supreme Court's decision affirming the constitutional right of same-sex couples to marry a "victory for America" that had "made our union a little more perfect."

In the 5-4 decision, Justice Kennedy wrote the opinion of the court, saying the equal protection clause of the 14th ...

Updated at 3:35 p.m. ET

President Obama, delivering the eulogy at the funeral of the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, said the alleged killer of the pastor and eight other congregants at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church hoped to "terrorize and oppress" but that "God has different ideas."

Noting the public ...

At least 10 people are dead at a mosque in the Kuwaiti capital after an attack carried out by a suicide bomber wearing an explosive belt. The self-declared Islamic State has claimed responsibility.

The explosion at the Imam Sadiq Mosque in a residential and shopping district of Kuwait City occurred ...

Updated at 4:50 p.m. ET

A gunman at tourist hotel on Tunisia's Mediterranean coastal resort of Sousse removed a Kalashnikov from a beach umbrella and opened fire, killing at least 37 people, including British, German and Belgian tourists, according to government officials in the North African country.

Tunisia's health ministry ...

Fighters of the self-declared Islamic State have killed some 146 people in a house-to-house massacre of civilians in the Syrian border town of Kobani, a conflict monitoring group says, calling it the second-worse such mass killing by the Islamist extremists since last year.

NPR's Deborah Amos, reporting from southern Turkey, ...

A proposed resolution to remove state flags containing any portion of the Confederate "stars and bars" from the U.S. Capitol has been put on hold by House Republicans.

The measure, sponsored by Rep. Bennie Thompson, the only black member of Mississippi's congressional delegation, would authorize the Speaker of the House ...

The California Assembly has joined the state Senate in voting to approve a controversial bill requiring all children attending school to be vaccinated against measles and other common, preventable illnesses — effectively eliminating so-called "personal belief exemptions" that allowed parents to opt out.

The bill is aimed at increasing immunization ...

Pope Francis, speaking on family issues, says that sometimes marriages are so damaged that it is "morally necessary" for a husband and wife to separate.

"There are cases in which separation is inevitable," the pontiff said at his weekly general audience. "Sometimes it can become even morally necessary, precisely when ...

Updated at 1:25 p.m. ET

President Obama, commenting on the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling today to uphold a key provision of his signature health care law, said after numerous challenges, the Affordable Care Act has been "woven into the fabric of America" and "is here to stay."

In the ...

The giant ostrich-like rhea, despite its largely useless vestigial wings, seems to be something of a flight risk.

Last year, we brought you the story of one of the birds — native to South America — that escaped from a farm in the U.K., startling cyclists and otherwise wreaking ...

Islamic State fighters, who were ousted from the Kurdish border town of Kobani in January, have launched an offensive to recapture the Syrian city — setting off car bombs as a prelude to an attack, NPR's Deborah Amos reports.

Deborah, reporting from southern Turkey near the Syrian border, says thousands ...

Islamic State militants have sown landmines around ancient ruins in the Syrian city of Palmyra, captured by the Islamist group in May, according to a British-based monitoring group.

It wasn't clear, however, whether the move is a prelude to destroying the Roman-era sites or securing them from Syrian government ...

A rare Galápagos tortoise, known affectionately as "Speed," has died at the San Diego Zoo — his home of more than eight decades. He was (approximately) 150.

After suffering for years from arthritis and other problems, which the zoo staff sought "to treat with medication, hydrotherapy, physical therapy, even acupuncture," ...

Updated at 3:40 p.m. ET

Authorities on a massive manhunt for a pair of convicted murderers, who made an extraordinary escape from a prison in upstate New York two weeks ago, have shifted the focus of their search to Allegany County near the Pennsylvania border after reports of a ...

Updated at 11:10 a.m. EST

The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., today is holding its first Sunday service following a horrific shooting that killed nine members of a Bible study group there.

Dylann Roof, 21 — who has apparently expressed strong racist and white supremacist views ...