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A brief encounter between two leaders has raised hope for better relations between India and Pakistan. India's prime minister hosted Pakistan's president and accepted a return invitation to travel to Pakistan. We talk here of two nuclear-armed rivals whose relations were even worse than usual, after Pakistani militants attacked Mumbai in 2008. And the meeting came as disaster struck Pakistani troops facing Indian soldiers in the Himalayas.

NPR's Julie McCarthy is going to talk us through all this. Hi, Julie.

Over the weekend, 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace died in Connecticut. Wallace, a star of that CBS news magazine for 40 years, stood out because of his seeming willingness to ask anybody anything. In 2005, he sat down for an interview with Steve Inskeep.

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At some point, you likely received a present from a prepaid gift card from the person who wasn't exactly sure what you'd want. Residents of New Jersey may not be able to buy them for much longer. American Express has pulled its gift cards from the state, and other big industry players are threatening to do the same. They oppose a new law that would allow New Jersey to claim unused gift card balances after two years. NPR's Joel Rose reports.

In 2012, the federal tax return deadline is Tuesday, April 17 — so if you haven't already filed your income tax return, you have about one week left to shop around for different options to finish your taxes, or request an extension.

Since the uprising began in Syria last year, there have been a lot of stories about soldiers who have defected from the army to join the rebels. This rebel group is loosely known as the Free Syrian Army, and it's starting to look more and more like an insurgency.

Not all soldiers who leave the army, however, decide to join these rebels. Those who simply escape the army altogether offer a rare glimpse into a military they say is committing unspeakable atrocities and a rebel force that's fighting back with its own brutality.

When Lisa Galloway was trying to decide what kind of radiation treatment to undergo after surgery for early breast cancer, she jumped at the chance to get a newer, quicker approach.

Instead of dragging on for weeks, the newer form of radiation, called brachytherapy, only takes five days.

"Five days compared to 33 days, I was like, 'Yay!' " says Galloway, 53, of Silver Spring, Md. "So I wanted it so badly. I got it — I got my wish."

Hundreds of thousands of veterans have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan in recent years, eager to get an education under the new post-Sept. 11 GI Bill.

Many vets looking for a school find they are inundated by sales pitches from institutions hungry for their government benefits. Now, lawmakers are looking for ways to protect vets without narrowing their education choices.

Blaise Pascal once wrote that writing succinctly can be hard. It's something many of us aim for, yet few of us master. But if you're writing on Twitter, you have to keep it short.

The Nigerian writer Teju Cole recently devoted himself to the goal of writing in brief. On his Twitter account, he crafts compact stories based on small news items, things you might overlook in the metro section of a newspaper. And with brevity, his stories gain deeper meaning.

Police in Tulsa, Okla., say it is much too early in their investigation to describe the murder of three black residents and the wounding of two others as a hate crime. Two men were arrested early Sunday morning and are expected to face charges of first-degree murder and shooting with intent to kill.

Soon after Friday's shooting, authorities reached out to the public for help. Police Maj. Walter Evans, the head of a task force looking into the murders, says information started pouring in shortly after that.

Scientists have found one more reason that pregnancy and obesity can be a bad combination.

A new study in the journal Pediatrics suggests that moms who are obese or have diabetes are more likely to have a child with autism or another developmental problem.

The finding is "worrisome in light of this rather striking epidemic of obesity" in the U.S., says Irva Hertz-Picciotto from the MIND Institute at the University of California, Davis, one of the study's authors.

There was a time when a child born deaf had few choices. For more than a century, the only option for parents was to send their son or daughter away to a boarding school for the deaf. There, the children and the schools thrived in the shadows, embracing a distinct culture of silent communication.

Recent advances in medicine and technology are now reshaping what it means to be deaf in America. Children who could never hear a sound are now adults who can hear everything. That's having a dramatic impact on the nation's historic deaf schools as well as the lives of people.

Lena Dunham's new series Girls debuts on HBO on April 15. Dunham, who got quite a bit of attention for being the star, director and writer of the 2010 indie film Tiny Furniture, fills the same three roles in this ensemble show about four young women in New York.

There are plenty of pop culture references to the dangers of a close mother-son relationship. From the myth of Oedipus to the movie Psycho, narrative after narrative harps on the idea that mothers can damage their sons, make them weak, awkward and dependent.

But for millions of men, the opposite has turned out to be true, author Kate Lombardi tells NPR's Laura Sullivan. Lombardi — a mother herself — is the author of the new book, The Mama's Boy Myth: Why Keeping Our Sons Close Makes Them Stronger.

More than 6,000 original stories were submitted to this round of Three-Minute Fiction. To see these stories and others, visit npr.org/threeminutefiction.

Two men were arrested in Tulsa, Okla., on Sunday in connection with the deaths of three people in a shooting spree that terrorized the city's black community and left two others critically wounded.

Jacob England, 19, and Alvin Watts, 32, were arrested following a tip from the public to help police solve the five shootings that happened Friday. Police spokesman Jason Willingham said the two face three counts of first-degree murder and two counts of shooting with intent to kill.

Malawi's first female president takes office with a personal history of women's rights advocacy and a long fight ahead. For Joyce Banda, economic empowerment is crucial for women's progress. It is also a nationwide struggle now resting on her shoulders.

Banda, who had been the country's vice president, was sworn in Saturday, following the death of President Bingu wa Mutharika on Thursday.

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There's a question whether Rick Santorum will prolong his presidential campaign to finish in Pennsylvania later this month. Mitt Romney, on the other hand, is moving in for the kill, buying $1.8 million of airtime in the state. NPR's Mara Liasson reports on the state of the GOP nominating campaign.

One choice that's not necessarily around the corner, but is certainly taking up a lot of time in Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney's camp is the shortlist for potential running mates. That is, of course, IF he wins the nomination. Host Rachel Martin talks with Republican strategist Mark McKinnon about the possible strategies Romney may use.

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This is WEEKEND EDITION from NPR News. I'm Rachel Martin. Police in Tulsa, Oklahoma this morning arrested two white males in shootings that left three people dead and two more critically wounded - all of them black. The shootings happened Friday in the same north Tulsa neighborhood all around the same time. It comes against a background of heightened tensions in the wake of the Trayvon Martin shooting death in Florida. Earlier this morning, we spoke with the mayor of Tulsa, Oklahoma, Dewey Bartlett. He gave us an update on the case.

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From Tulsa, we move our focus back to the city of Sanford, Florida, where Trayvon Martin, an unarmed African-American teen, was shot and killed six weeks ago by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman. The constant spotlight has brought the issue of race to the forefront, and with it some tense moments in that Florida community. NPR's Kathy Lohr spent the last week in Sanford and has this story.

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When a presidential campaign leaves a state, political activists and the local reporters who cover the candidates often take a vacation. Not so in Wisconsin this year, where Mitt Romney won the GOP primary this past Tuesday. As Chuck Quirmbach of Wisconsin Public Radio reports, recall elections scheduled during the next two months mean there is no spring break in Badger State politics.

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This is WEEKEND EDITION from NPR News. I'm Rachel Martin.

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The annual Oxford-Cambridge University boat race took place in London yesterday. And reporter Vicki Barker was one of those throwing a party along the race route. For boat race party-throwers and the oarsmen themselves, the day unfolds with military precision - or at least it's supposed to. Vicki Barker has more.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #1: The man duck saw that something needed to be done...

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There is one group in the military with a unique role in helping soldiers and their families through difficult times. So, on this Easter Sunday, an Army chaplain describes his work helping soldiers who have just returned from war.

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RICK EBB: My name is Chaplain Rick Ebb. I'm the post chaplain here at Camp Atterbury. I am one of the first people they see, and I think that's very important that the representative of faith is there. And we say a prayer, a quick prayer, for God's safety bringing them back.

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A new Smartphone goes on sale. The Nokia Lumina 900 represents the Finnish company's big and somewhat desperate effort to regain a toehold in the all-important U.S. market.

NPR's Wendy Kaufman offers this brief history of America's infatuation with the mobile phone.

WENDY KAUFMAN, BYLINE: In The iconic 1987 film "Wall Street," Michael Douglas strolls the beach with and uses his cell phone to congratulate an associate on making a ton of money.

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