in VOA Special English.At the end of each year,the Associated Press releasesa list of the top tennews stories of the year.American editors and news directorsare asked to vote for what theyconsider the top stories.This year, the story withthe most votes was the hugeoil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.An oil rig operatedby BP exploded in April.The explosion killed eleven workers.Close to five million barrelsof oil were released into the Gulfuntil the leak was containedin the middle of July.BP agreed to set aside twenty billiondollars to pay claims and damagesto people working in the area'sfishing and tourism industries.The AP says the secondmost important story washealth care reform in the United States.President Obama won a major politicalvictory with congressional passageof his health care reform plan.Among other things, it will extendhealth care insurance to thirty-twomillion Americans now without it.But many Republicans in Congressoppose the law and wantto cancel parts of it.The congressional electionsin November were another big story.The Republican Party gained a majorityin the House of Representatives.But Democrats kept their majorityin the Senate.The American economywas another major story.Economists reported in twenty-tenthat the worst recessionsince the nineteen-thirties had ended.Americans began to spend moreas the year ended.But the unemployment ratestayed above nine percent.In January, a powerful earthquakestruck Haiti.It killed at least two hundredthirty thousand people and leftmillions of others homeless.Disease and other problems haveslowed efforts to rebuild the country.Another important storywas the Tea Party movementin the United States.The Tea Party supports limited government,less federal spending and lower taxes.The movement had a big influenceon the Congressional elections.Another major story was the rescueof thirty-three mine workers in Chile.A partial mine collapse on August fifthtrapped them more thanhalf a kilometer underground.They remained trapped for sixty-nine days.Millions of people around the worldwatched on television as each minerwas safely brought to the surface.In twenty-ten, United States forcesofficially ended combat operations in Iraq.The Iraq war began more than seven years ago.Another major story wasthe activities of the WikiLeaks website.First the website released thousandsof United States military documentsabout the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.Then it published thousandsof State Department diplomatic cables.They included comments by American diplomatsabout the lives of world leadersand criticisms of foreign governments.The tenth story on the AP's listwas the war in Afghanistan.President Obama ordered an increasein troops fighting the nearly ten-year-old war.American troops are to begin leavingthe country in July.Afghans are to control their own securityby the end of twenty fourteen.And that's IN THE NEWSin VOA Special English.