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San Francisco based Wells Fargo won its three-month effort to takeover another California based bank today. First Interstate agreed to be acquired in a stock transaction valued at $11.6 billion. If the deal is approved by regulators it will be the largest merger in U.S. banking history. The deal is expected to eliminate as many as 7,000 jobs, half of them in the Los Angeles area, as hundreds of First Intersate branches are closed.

Robert talks with author Salman Rushdie, who's latest novel is "The Moor's Last Sigh." It is set in Bombay, with characters drawn from different religious groups, and a narrator who is living his life at double speed. (Publisher: Pantheon)

Former Democratic Congresswoman Barbara Jordan of Texas died today after a long illness. Ms. Jordan was one of the most influential blacks on Capitol Hill and reached national stature as an outspoken member of the House Judiciary Committee that recommended the impeachment of President Richard Nixon in 1974. We hear an excerpt from a speech she gave at the 1992 Democratic Convention.

in northern German earlier this morning which injured 5 people.

Tami Graham spoke with actor Sky Lakota-Lynch, who will be closing the PlayFest with a cold reading of a new play by Lee Blessing.

Commentator DAGOBERTO GILB tells us about his trip to NYC.

limit and budget.

including efforts at privatization and difficulties in securing an International Monetary Fund loan.

NPR's Anne Garrels reports from Moscow on the continuing battle between Russians and Chechen rebels. In a southern Russian village, it is the third day of artillery and rocket attacks on Chechens holding hostages. In the Chechen capital of Grozny, 30 workers at a power plant have been kidnapped. And, in the Black Sea, another group of rebels holds 200 people hostage aboard a ferry which they have threatened to blow up.

NPR's Wade Goodwyn reports that, more than nine months after explosion destroying the federal office the mystery of John Doe #2 remains. Immediately after the explosion, the FBI release two sketches, one was ID'd as John McVeigh and, despite a massive manhunt the other was never found. Some federal prosecutors hint that there was no John Doe II, but NPR interviews five people who believe they saw him with McVeigh, and the other defendant, Terry Nichols. (12:30) CUTAWAY 1C 0:59 1D 7. AFRICA POLICY - Linda talks with Thomas L. Friedman, foreign affairs columnist for the New York Times, about his recent trip accompanying Madeleine Albright to African nations on a mission of "preventive diplomacy." Albright is the U-S Ambassador to the United Nations. One country they visited of particular concern is Burundi, where Tutsis have been persecuting Hutus. The Hutu tribe makes up 85 percent of Burundi's population and the Tutsi, 15 percent. The Tutsi control the army and the government. Many observers fear an explosion of violence similar to the genocide in Rwanda in 1994.