Juan Martin Del Potro edged top seed Andy Roddick to successfully defend his Legg Mason Classic title in Washington with a 3-6 7-5 7-6 victory in Sunday's final. The Argentine produced five aces in the deciding tiebreaker which he took on his fourth match-point when the Hawk-Eye review system upheld a forehand winner. "I did my best services ever in my life," Del Potro told the official ATP Tour Web site www.atpworldtour.com after making 19 aces in the grueling two ...

There is growing concern that local militias now allied with the U.S. are turning their guns on each other as the U.S. prepares to pull back its presence. These groups have been tasked with pacifying some of the most restive corners of Iraq — contributing to the measure of stability enjoyed by the country in the last few months. "We're paying them and training them so they're effective," says Lawrence Korb, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, ...

Top seed Andy Roddick continued his fine form on return from injury as he moved into the semifinals of the Legg Mason Classic by beating fellow big-server Ivo Karlovic in Washington on Friday night. The American, who notched his 500th career win in the previous round, triumphed 7-6 (7-4) 7-6 (7-5) against the 11th-seeded Croatian to set up a last-four clash with compatriot John Isner. The 26-year-old, playing in his first tournament since suffering a hip injury during his heartbreaking ...

It's been a successful few days in the war on terror. On Aug. 5 Baitullah Mehsud, leader of Pakistan's Taliban, was apparently killed in a strike by a U.S. drone. And on Saturday Aug. 8, Indonesian authorities reported that Noordin M. Top, the country's most wanted terrorist, was probably killed during a police raid, ending a years-long manhunt for the Malaysian believed responsible for a string of bomb attacks in Jakarta and Bali in recent years. In a dramatic ...

Baitullah Mehsud is a natural leader: cagey, dogged and charismatic, with an apparent knack for uniting disparate factions around a common cause. But instead of channeling those talents toward building an empire, Mehsud is trying to bring one to its knees. The shadowy Pakistani Taliban commander, whose vertiginous rise to infamy landed him on 2008's TIME 100 List, has transformed the badlands of South Waziristan into al-Qaeda's most important redoubt. Among the atrocities attributed to Mehsud is the brazen ...

Andy Roddick joined a select group with his 500th career win on the ATP Tour as he dispatched fellow American Sam Querrey in their third round match at the Legg Mason Classic in Washington. Roddick, returning to the circuit after losing an epic five-setter to Roger Federer in the Wimbledon final, is the 36th player in the Open era to reach the mark. He joins Federer (657), Carlos Moya (573) and Lleyton Hewitt (511) as active players who have reached ...

American and Pakistani officials say it looked more and more likely that the man was Baitullah Mehsud, who had a $5-million bounty on his head. Pakistan's Foreign Minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, told reporters in Islamabad on Friday Aug. 7 that, "According to my intelligence information, the news is correct. We are trying to get on the ground verification to be 100% sure. But according to my information, he has been taken out." Local Pakistani media, citing "tribal sources" in ...

A friend of three American hikers arrested in Iran said he believes they had no knowledge they were nearing the Iranian border while hiking in Iraq, and made "a simple and regrettable mistake." Shon Meckfessel was with the three on a hiking trip to Iraqi Kurdistan, but had stayed behind at their hotel on July 31, the day the three went missing, because he had a cold. He issued a statement to media outlets on Thursday and confirmed its authenticity ...

A month ago, Barack Obama made his first trip to Africa as President and, while in Ghana, delivered a message of support tinged with impatience with leaders who have not been held accountable for their misdeeds. His Kenyan ancestry and the continent's nearly universal adoration for a man it sees as an African son put him in the rare position of being able to say such things without being viewed as a neocolonial scold. Now U.S. Secretary of State ...

The dead always tell a story. And in Mexico that story is the fight for the right to meet U.S. demand for illegal drugs -- a war becoming more violent and ruthless, mostly because of one group. Its name is Los Zetas. Imagine a band of U.S. Green Berets going rogue and offering their services and firepower to drug cartels. That's what happened in Mexico in the 1990s. Commandos from the Mexican army deserted and set up a cartel, known ...