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NPR's Michele Kelemen reports from Moscow that President Vladimir Putin said today he feels guilty and responsible for the sinking of submarine Kursk in the Barents Sea. He said Russia's defense minister, navy chief and commander of the Northern Fleet had all offered to resign, but he did not accept their resignations. Putin said there would be no rush to assign guilt until the facts of the accident are known. Yesterday, family members of the 118 sailors who died on the Kursk grilled Putin for hours about his handling of the crisis. Little of the meeting was shown on television. Lawyers for the Kursk families are threatening legal action against the government over the Kursk disaster.

Barbara Bradley reports on today's announcement that Attorney General Janet Reno will not appoint a special counsel to investigate Vice President Gore's 1996 campaign fundraising. Reno says further investigation would not result in a prosecutable case, so a special counsel is not warranted. Gore's campaign spokesman says the vice president is pleased with the announcement. His opponent, Texas Governor George W. Bush, says he understands the American people are tired of investigations, but also says Gore engaged in questionable fundraising activities.

President Clinton's legal defense fund released its semi-annual report today showing the same friends of the White House contributing as in past years. The fund was established when the president began accumulating big legal bills to deal with investigations by Congress and a series of independent counsels. NPR's Peter Overby reports.

NPR's Richard Knox reports the National Institutes of Health has announced new guidelines allowing federally funded researchers to perform experiments with cells taken from human embryos. Research with embryonic cells is controversial. Scientists say cells taken from human embryos may be helpful in treating many serious diseases, including Parkinson's and diabetes. But some people have moral objections to the research because it involves destroying a human embryo. The NIH guidelines attempt to strike a balance by insisting that federally funded scientists can only use cells taken from embryos that are left over from fertility treatments -- embryos that would otherwise be thrown away.

Commentator Louise Rafkin goes to the beach in Provincetown, Massachusetts every summer. This year, a couple with beachfront property decided they didn't want any swimmers in front of their house - so they set out some decoy beach chairs, hoping to keep people away. It didn't work.

An important amendment to yesterday's story on the CBS Survivor show.

Amy Tardif of member station WGCU in Fort Myers reports on changes in Florida's fire inspection laws. Schools are now required to be inspected by fire marshals, but there's not been enough time to get all schools up to code.

Commentator John Ridley may have missed the conventions in Philadelphia and Los Angeles, but he had a chance to attend a far more inclusive convention in the small town of Britt, Iowa.

Host Jacki Lyden speaks to reporter Sherry Devlin of the Missoulian newspaper in Missoula, Montana, about fires that are still burning out of control in western states. Almost six million acres have already been blackened this summer, with another one-and-a-half million still burning.

Host Renee Montagne talks with Allison Des Forges, a consultant to Human Rights Watch Africa, about the on-going Burundi peace talks. President Clinton, as a personal favor to Nelson Mandela, will address the peace talks later today as part of his trip to Africa. Mandela was hoping to have an agreement from both the Tutsi-controlled government and the Hutu rebels before Clinton's visit, but that agreement has proved elusive.