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PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - New Jersey politicians are due to battle on Monday over whether to slap a tax on millionaires or cut services for low-income senior citizens and the disabled.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Sunday that targeted economic sanctions on Iran had "real potential" to pressure Tehran to halt its nuclear program.

The NOAA ship Pisces discovered a dead sperm whale on June 15--a possible victim of the ongoing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  

There are at least 1,600 such sperm whales in the Gulf, according to marine biologist Thomas Shirley of Texas A&M University. Minus one.  

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When Portugal meet North Korea in Cape Town on Monday, it will be a rematch of perhaps the most remarkable game of any played at the World Cup finals. Reuters sports editor Paul Radford was at that extraordinary 1966 encounter between the two teams when the unknown Koreans took a shock 3-0 lead and threatened to turn the sport's established order on its head.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Bill "The Comeback Kid" Clinton is trying to help fellow Democrats rebound from poor public opinion ratings and retain control of the U.S. Congress in November 2 elections.

WARSAW (Reuters) - Poland's acting head of state, Bronislaw Komorowski, won most votes in an election on Sunday that was forced by the death of President Lech Kaczynski in a plane crash, but faces a runoff vote against Kaczynski's twin.

OSH, Kyrgyzstan (Reuters) - Kyrgyz forces started removing barriers dividing the city of Osh on Sunday as the government extended a state of emergency in some regions where up to 2,000 people have been killed in ethnic clashes.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Two suicide bombers detonated cars laden with explosives outside the Trade Bank of Iraq on Sunday, killing 26 people in the latest attack to raise concerns about the nation's stability after an inconclusive election.

BEIJING/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Policymakers in the world's economies will closely monitor the Chinese yuan this week for signs that it is actually moving after Beijing announced it would make its exchange rate more flexible.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - BP Plc CEO Tony Hayward watched a yacht race off the English coast on Saturday, sparking new controversy in the United States as his company struggles to plug its huge Gulf of Mexico oil leak.

BURAS, Louisiana (Reuters) - BP Plc estimates that a worst-case scenario rate for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill could be about 100,000 barrels of oil per day, according to an internal company document released Sunday by a senior U.S. congressional Democrat.

KABUL (Reuters) - Already facing chronic staff shortages, the United Nations has said it plans to withdraw some of its foreign workers from Afghanistan following sustained reports of insurgent threats against its workforce.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House renewed its sharp criticism of BP Plc CEO Tony Hayward after he attended a yacht race off the English coast on Saturday as his company struggles to plug its huge Gulf of Mexico oil leak.

ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) - France is ready to start talks with Iran over its nuclear program at the International Atomic Energy Agency "without delay," French President Nicolas Sarkozy told Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Saturday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - China's unexpected pledge on Saturday to allow its currency to rise more rapidly will probably make for a less contentious meeting with Group of 20 world leaders in Toronto next week.

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's network had been "severely degraded" by joint U.S.-Pakistani efforts, the U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan said on Saturday.

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BEIJING/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - China said on Saturday it would gradually make the yuan more flexible, in a gesture that may deflect foreign criticism at next week's G20 summit but will not quickly yield a big move by its currency.

BISHKEK (Reuters) - The U.S. envoy for Central Asia urged Kyrgyzstan on Saturday to create conditions for a safe return of hundreds of thousands of refugees uprooted by last week's outburst of ethnic violence.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Debate over the U.S. war strategy in Afghanistan is exposing what some see as discord within the Pentagon about how to cast the fight for Kandahar and the extent and pace to which progress can be shown.