NPR News

Today, workers at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan tested out a system that will start cleaning up an enormous volume of radioactive water there.

The water has flooded many buildings at the complex, and it has seriously complicated efforts to bring the crisis there to an end. But it's also essential to keep the reactor cores from overheating.

As Syrian troops continue their crackdown against demonstrators in the north of the country, more Syrians are massing on the border with Turkey. Nearly 8,500 Syrians are already seeking refuge there, and Turkish officials are scrambling to keep the situation from getting out of hand.

It's an eye-catching claim at a time when the unemployment rate is 9.1 percent, 13.9 million people are officially unemployed and another 8.5 million are working part-time but would like to have full-time jobs:

Three agents from the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms marched to Congress on Wednesday to blow the whistle on a risky operation targeting gun traffickers.

They told the House Government Reform Committee that more than 1,000 guns tied to the ATF's investigation of drug cartels are still missing somewhere in the U.S. and Mexico. Lawmakers want to know who approved the operation in the first place.

In the battle for nutrition bragging rights, Los Angeles has beat New York — at least when it comes to scratching chocolate milk and other less-healthful items from the school lunch menu.