AP - Roland Burris tried to take President-elect Barack Obama's Illinois Senate seat Tuesday but failed in a scripted piece of political theater staged just before the opening of the 111th Congress. "Mr. Burris is not in possession of the necessary credentials from the state of Illinois," declared Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.

AP - The new Congress opened for business at the stroke of noon on Tuesday, eager to join President-elect Barack Obama in tackling the worst economic crisis in generations. Democrats celebrated last fall's election gains in the House and Senate.

AP - Israeli mortar shells struck outside a U.N. school where hundreds of Palestinians had sought refuge on Tuesday, killing at least 30 people — many of them children whose parents wailed in grief at a hospital filled with dead and wounded.

AP - President-elect Barack Obama apparently plans a more aggressive approach than the Bush administration to helping friendly nations get better at fighting terrorism within their own borders, the State Department's top counterterrorism official said Tuesday.

AP - Republican Norm Coleman is suing to challenge Democrat Al Franken's apparent recount victory in Minnesota's U.S. Senate race. At a news conference Tuesday, Coleman says he won't accept a board's determination that Franken won 225 more votes in the November election.

AP - A cross-dressing, millionaire Harvard dermatologist serving life in prison for shooting his estranged wife to death has been found hanged in his cell, a prison spokeswoman said Tuesday. Richard Sharpe was found by his cellmate at MCI-Norfolk on Monday evening and was declared dead at a hospital, said Department of Correction spokeswoman Diane Wiffin.

AP - Parkinson's sufferers who had electrodes implanted in their brains improved substantially more than those who took only medicine, according to the biggest test yet of deep brain stimulation.

AP - Phillies reliever J.C. Romero and Yankees minor league pitcher Sergio Mitre were suspended for the first 50 games of next season after testing positive for a banned substance. The suspensions were announced Tuesday by Major League Baseball.

AP - Israeli mortar shells struck outside a U.N. school where hundreds of Palestinians had sought refuge on Tuesday, killing at least 30 people — many of them children whose parents wailed in grief at a hospital filled with dead and wounded.

AP - France's president sought Syrian help Tuesday to bring a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip, while Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice headed to the United Nations for meetings with Arab and European leaders.

AP - Gunmen have killed a member of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani's political party in a drive-by shooting in the northern city of Kirkuk, Iraqi police officials said Tuesday.

AP - The Russia-Ukraine natural gas dispute hit Europe with the force of a winter storm Tuesday, cutting or limiting supplies to at least a dozen nations. Tens of thousands of people were left without heat and governments scrambled to find alternate energy sources.

Reuters - The son of the late German zookeeper who nurtured celebrity polar bear cub Knut at Berlin zoo has raised nearly 7,000 euros ($9,748) by selling off his father's belongings on internet auction site eBay.

AP - Arab nations have drawn up a proposed United Nations resolution calling for an immediate end to all military action in the Gaza Strip. It also calls for deployment of an international force to monitor a cease-fire and protect Palestinian civilians.

AP - Rescuers ended their search Tuesday for victims of a massive landslide that tore down a mountain and buried a northern Guatemalan highway, killing at least 35 people.

Reuters - A Zimbabwean court Tuesday ruled that a leading human rights advocate and eight other activists should remain in custody, in a case that has raised further doubts over a power-sharing deal.

AP - Pakistan's president called Tuesday for foreign allies to provide more support — not more troops — to help win the battle against extremist militias along its volatile border with Afghanistan.