Bill Chappell

Updated at 2 p.m. ET

The Environmental Protection Agency says Volkswagen intentionally violated the Clean Air Act by using sophisticated software in its diesel-powered cars that detects emissions testing — and "turns full emissions controls on only during the test."

Installed in four-cylinder cars, the software, which the EPA calls ...

Next week, it will be easier for people, money, and goods to flow between Cuba and the U.S., which announced a new round of relaxed sanctions Friday. The changes also allow U.S. companies to provide Internet and communications services in Cuba.

The new rules by the Department of the Treasury ...

"The only way to see a scale model of the solar system," Wylie Overstreet says, "is to build one." So he and a group of friends did just that, tracing out the planets' orbits and then filming a time-lapse video from a nearby mountaintop in Nevada's Black Rock Desert.

"Every ...

After nearly 10,000 refugees and migrants entered Croatia in the past two days, the country has placed its army on alert to deploy on the country's border with Serbia. People who were turned away by Hungary now see Croatia as an alternate route into European Union countries.

Reporting from the ...

The Syrian man who became part of an international story after he was tripped by a camerawoman in Hungary is now in Spain, where a sports organization plans to offer him work. Osama Abdul Mohsen was tripped by a camerawoman as he ran from police, holding his young son.

Arriving ...

European telecom giant Altice is buying the largest cable provider in New York City's metropolitan area, agreeing to pay $17.7 billion to acquire Cablevision, the company that was founded in 1973 by the Dolan family.

The total value of the transaction reflects $10 billion in equity (valuing Cablevision at $34.90 ...

After an absence of 17 years, Karin Kanzuki, the Goldilocks lookalike who became an unlikely hit in the long-running Street Fighter video game series in the late '90s, is returning to the game.

The news is being welcomed by fans, many of whom had been asking for Karin to come ...

In a Democratic mayoral primary race in Bridgeport, Conn., that pitted a former mayor who served a seven-year prison sentence for corruption against a two-term incumbent, Joe Ganim pulled off a surprising comeback Wednesday night.

"Ganim's message that everybody deserves a second chance earned the former felon the endorsement of ...

Updated at 4:20 p.m. ET

Weeks before a scheduled national election to choose a new government, soldiers of Burkina Faso's presidential guard say they've taken over the country. The announcement comes after members of the military arrested the interim president Wednesday.

The coup in the West African nation comes just ...

Expressing his admiration for a high school student's curiosity about science, President Obama has invited Ahmed Mohamed to the White House.

A tweet from the president reads: "Cool clock, Ahmed. Want to bring it to the White House? We should inspire more kids like you to like science. It's ...

Rock fans who are going to Metallica's concert in Quebec City Wednesday will see an unusual sight: a 48-foot tanker truck filled with Metallica-branded beer. Made at the Labatt facility, the beer is to commemorate the band as it opens a large new venue, the Centre Vidéotron.

The Centre Vidéotron ...

A 14-year-old boy says he was just trying to show off his engineering skill when he brought a digital clock he had made to his new high school in Irving, Texas. But Ahmed Mohamed was detained and reportedly suspended from school, after a teacher thought that his clock looked like ...

With Hungary's southern border now sealed, many refugees and other migrants are looking for other ways to reach refuge in northern Europe — and they hope to find an answer in a tricky route through Croatia.

Update at 1 p.m. ET: Tear Gas And Water Cannons At Hungary's Border

With ...

After last week's crane collapse that killed at least 107 people at the Grand Mosque in Mecca, the main developer in the city, the Saudi Binladin Group, is barred from any future projects, according to a statement from Saudi Arabia's Royal Court.

King Salman ordered compensation for the crash's ...

Updated 11:10 p.m. ET

Leaders of Seattle's public school teachers voted Tuesday evening to suspend their week-old strike and return to work on Wednesday. The district's 53,000 students begin classes on Thursday.

The decision follows a tentative contract agreement which will go before the full membership for a vote on ...

In a new expansion of commercial efforts to launch earthlings into space, Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos plans to build rockets on Florida's Space Coast — in an area he calls "a gateway to humankind's greatest adventures."

Speaking at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Bezos outlined a ...

Defeating Democrats' attempt to filibuster a large budget shift, Republicans in Alabama's state Senate approved transferring $100 million from the education budget to the general fund to help cover a large deficit.

A critic of the move said his colleagues decided to "rob children" instead of finding the money elsewhere.

Saying it has restarted a nuclear facility shut down since 2007, North Korea announced Tuesday that it has also upgraded its nuclear weapons program. The country has been working to restart the Yongbyon reactor since 2013.

The news about the reactor that produces weapons-grade plutonium was announced by the Korean ...

With new border control laws taking effect, Hungary has sealed its border with Serbia. Processing areas that were packed with more than 9,300 refugees and other migrants on Monday now stand empty.

Hungary declared a crisis in two southern counties today, as crowds of migrants were halted in Serbia, having ...

After Prime Minister Tony Abbott's ouster at the hands of his own party, Australians are marking the controversial leader's sudden exit by posting photos of onions. It's an homage to one of the more puzzling moments of Abbott's reign, when he zestfully ate a raw onion.

To mark the ...