BP says it has begun drawing crude from a damaged well in the Gulf of Mexico in the first sign that the massive leak could be contained more than three weeks after it began.

Officials for the UK-based oil giant said on Sunday that efforts to stop the flow of oil using a tube attached to a tanker on the water's surface appeared to be working.
Millions of liters of oil have polluted the Gulf of Mexico since an explosion on April 20 aboard the Deepwater Horizon rig, which killed 11 oil workers.
BP officials said the latest underwater operation to contain the leak involved guiding robots to insert a small tube into a 53-cm pipe to funnel the oil to the waiting ship.
""It's working as planned and we are very slowly increasing the rate that is coming from the riser tool up to the surface,"" Kent Wells, BP's senior executive vice-president, said.
""So we do have oil and gas coming to the ship now.""