Month: August 2021

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The Netherlands appears to be heading toward talks to form a minority coalition after efforts to piece together a Cabinet made up of five parties from across the political spectrum broke down Tuesday. More than five months after a general election, the Dutch political landscape is still fragmented. Two key

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran’s judiciary says that prosecutors have opened criminal cases against six guards at the country’s notorious Evin prison, after footage showing the widespread abuse of detainees at the facility leaked out last week. The spokesman said on Tuesday that the judiciary’s three-day investigation into mistreatment at Tehran’s Evin prison

BERLIN (AP) — German Chancellor Angela Merkel says she would never govern with support from the Left party. That’s an option two of her would-be successors have refused to rule out ahead of the country’s national election in September. Speaking at a news conference in Berlin, Merkel welcomed her current vice chancellor Olaf Scholz’s positive

WAUKESHA, Wis. (AP) — A Wisconsin school district has reversed a decision to leave a federal free meals program following widespread criticism and loud protests from parents and others. Waukesha school board members said they received threats in the wake of national attention after voting to opt out of the program that was providing free

By MENELAOS HADJICOSTIS Associated Press NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) — A Cyprus official says Pope Francis will visit Cyprus in December, making him the second Roman Catholic pontiff to ever travel to the eastern Mediterranean island nation. The official said Tuesday the pontiff’s two-day visit will take place Dec. 2-3. The official spoke to The Associated

LONDON (AP) — British government veterinarians have killed an alpaca whose sentence of death made international headlines and pitted animal activists against the state. Veterinary staff in blue overalls, masks and goggles, backed by police officers, arrived at the western England farm where Geronimo lived and took the animal from his pen on Tuesday. The

By JOE McDONALD and ZEN SOO AP Business Writers BEIJING (AP) — Hugely popular online games and celebrity culture are the latest targets in the ruling Communist Party’s campaign to encourage China’s public to align with its political and economic vision. Rules that take effect Wednesday cut the amount of game time children are allowed

By YURAS KARMANAU Associated Press KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine’s president is visiting the United States in hopes of bolstering security ties with Washington and persuading the administration to ramp up sanctions against a new Russian gas pipeline bypassing his country. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called the U.S. failure to block the construction of the

By JARI TANNER Associated Press TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Estonia’s parliament has elected the chief of a major national museum as the Baltic country’s new president in a second round of voting. Estonian National Museum director Alar Karis secured support from 72 members of the 101-seat Riigikogu legislature, while eight lawmakers voted blank and the

By COURTNEY JESPERSEN of NerdWallet One of the biggest sale weekends of the year is fast approaching. Labor Day weekend is traditionally filled with retail discounts ahead of the federal holiday on the first Monday of September. But this year, Labor Day sales will be happening in the midst of an ongoing pandemic, inflation and

By SAMUEL PETREQUIN and MIKE CORDER Associated Press BRUSSELS (AP) — European Union justice and home affairs ministers have pledged to support Afghanistan’s neighbors to help them host people fleeing the new Taliban regime and prevent a new wave of migrants heading to Europe. In a closing statement after a meeting Tuesday in Brussels, the

CHICAGO (AP) — A white Chicago police officer has been placed on administrative duty as the city’s police oversight agency investigates his struggle with a Black woman who was walking her dog in a lakefront park. The department says Police Superintendent David Brown on Monday directed that the officer be placed on paid desk duty.

By VANESSA GERA Associated Press WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Poland’s government has asked the president to declare a state of emergency along the border with Belarus as it tries to stop migrants from entering from the neighboring country. The government citied the potential risk from foreign actors and the actions of protesters in Poland as

BERLIN (AP) — Google has announced that it is investing $1.2 billion by 2030 to expand its cloud computing infrastructure in Germany and to increase the use of renewable energy. The Internet giant said Tuesday that it plans to add new cloud computing centers in the Berlin region and in Hanau, a town near Frankfurt.

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Doctors at Poland’s main children’s hospital say they will carry out a liver transplant on a 6-year-old Afghan boy who ate poisonous mushrooms with his family. However, his 5-year-old brother is in a coma and they are testing to see if he is brain dead. The boys and their older sister,

By DAVID McHUGH AP Business Writer FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Consumers are seeing higher prices in Europe. Official figures released Tuesday show annual inflation hit 3% in August. Economists say it’s mostly temporary. But that hasn’t stopped people from debating how long higher prices will last. The price jump could influence upcoming wage negotiations in

LUCEDALE, Miss. (AP) — Two people were killed and at least 10 others were injured after a roadway collapsed in Mississippi on Monday night. Troopers say both the east and westbound lanes of Highway 26 in George County west of Lucedale collapsed. Cpl. Cal Robertson with the Mississippi Highway Patrol says the collapse is around

By ALEXIA FERNANDEZ CAMPBELL The Center for Public Integrity A Center for Public Integrity investigation finds that the U.S. Postal Service regularly cheats mail carriers out of their pay. Arbitrators and federal investigators have found managers at hundreds of post offices around the country have illegally underpaid hourly workers for years. Private arbitration records from

By ISABEL DEBRE Associated Press DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Saudi state TV says that a bomb-laden drone has targeted an airport in southwestern Saudi Arabia, wounding eight people and damaging a civilian plane. The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen blamed the assault on Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels. It’s the latest assault on the

By DEREK GATOPOULOS Associated Press ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece’s center-right government replaced top public security officials following the country’s multiple devastating wildfires this month. But it suffered an embarrassing political setback Tuesday when the retired admiral appointed to oversee firefighting withdrew hours before he was due to be sworn in. The government had named

By JULHAS ALAM Associated Press DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — A Bangladesh anti-terrorism tribunal has sentenced six Islamist militants to death in the brutal slayings of two men, including a prominent gay rights activist. Five years ago, assailants hacked to death Xulhaz Mannan, an editor of Bangladesh’s first gay rights magazine who had also worked for

BERLIN (AP) — Official statistics show that the number of unemployed people in Germany declined slightly in August, unusually for the summer month, while the country’s jobless rate remained steady at 5.6%. In its last jobs report before a national election on Sept. 26, the Federal Labor Agency said that 2.578 million were registered as

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — Pakistan’s counter-terrorism police say 11 militants of the Islamic State group were killed in a raid in restive southwestern Baluchistan province. The pre-dawn raid on Tuesday took place in the district of Mastung, where IS militants had recently killed two police officers. The police say suicide belts, hand grenades and assault

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Poland’s constitutional court has reopened but then recessed its proceedings in a case over whether Polish or European Union law has primacy in the country. The Constitutional Tribunal said it would take up the question again on Sept. 22. The court’s ruling, when it comes, is expected to define the future

ISTANBUL (AP) — The Turkish president the United Arab Emirates’ de-facto leader have spoken by telephone, in a sign of easing tensions between the countries. The two discussed their countries’ relations and regional issues, according to a statement from the Turkish presidency late Monday. The statement did not say when the conversation took place. The

By NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press VENICE (AP) — Venice’s central place in the history of battling pandemics provides the backdrop to this year’s Venice Film Festival.  In an early screening Tuesday, Italian director Andre Segre presents a documentary shot last year showing how Venice organizers managed to stage the first and only in-person international film

By JOE McDONALD AP Business Writer BEIJING (AP) — Asian stock markets have gained as investors weighed the economic impact of the spread of the coronavirus’s delta variant. Wall Street ended August with a gain for the seventh straight month. Shanghai and Hong Kong retreated while Tokyo and South Korea advanced. Wall Street’s benchmark S&P

By CHALIDA EKVITTHAYAVECHNUKUL Associated Press BANGKOK (AP) — Lawmakers in Thailand have begun a no-confidence debate targeting Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha and five members of his Cabinet. The opposition focused Tuesday on charges the government bungled its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. The debate is scheduled to last four days, with voting by the lower

By TOM VERDIN Associated Press SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — The Caldor Fire near Lake Tahoe can be measured in more than acres burned. While it has claimed homes, it’s also churning through or threatening places that have been cherished getaways for generations of Californians and others. An entire town, South Lake Tahoe, lies in its

By JAY REEVES and STACEY PLAISANCE Associated Press CROWN POINT, La. (AP) — New Orleans largely escaped catastrophic flooding during Hurricane Ida, but nearby communities were not so lucky. In LaPlace, Ida tore roofs off homes and flooded entire subdivisions. Residents retreated to their second floors or attics and took to social media to plead

By LEAH WILLINGHAM Associated Press/Report for America For Shelly Savoie, time is running out at the Motel 6 in Bossier City, Louisiana. So are diapers and dollars. Savoie and her family of six fled their home in a New Orleans suburb before powerful Hurricane Ida hit the region on Sunday. But the initial relief she

By KEVIN MCGILL, CHEVEL JOHNSON and MELINDA DESLATTE Associated Press NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Louisiana communities battered by Hurricane Ida are now dealing with the possibility of weeks without power in the stifling, late-summer heat. Ida ravaged the region’s power grid, leaving 1 million people and businesses in Louisiana without power. The entire city of

By MARINA VILLENEUVE Associated Press ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Resigning from office probably didn’t end former Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s legal problems, and no matter what happens next, taxpayers are likely to wind up with a hefty bill. The state has already agreed to pay up to $9.5 million to lawyers representing and investigating Cuomo and

By SAM METZ and JANIE HAR Associated Press/Report for America SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. (AP) — Firefighters are bracing for strong winds a day after an explosive wildfire emptied a resort city at the southern tip of Lake Tahoe. The flames forced the evacuation of California communities on the south end of the alpine resort

By LOLITA C. BALDOR and MATTHEW LEE Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — As the final five U.S. military transport aircraft lifted off out of Afghanistan on Monday, they left behind up to 200 Americans and thousands of desperate Afghans who couldn’t get out and now must rely on the Taliban to allow their departure. Secretary

By AAMER MADHANI and KEVIN FREKING Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is defending the way the U.S. ended its 20-year “forever war” in Afghanistan. He called the military airlift to extract some 120,000 Afghans, Americans and other allies an “extraordinary success.” More than 100 Americans and thousands of Afghans were left behind,

By BECKY BOHRER Associated Press JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — Alaska residents don’t know how much money they might get from the state’s oil wealth this year, or even when they might get the unique payout just for living in the oil-dependent state. It’s left many upset. Frustrated residents have told lawmakers that they’re tired of

By AAMER MADHANI and ZEKE MILLER Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden still faces daunting challenges born of the hasty end of the Afghanistan war. They include helping to extract as many as 200 Americans and thousands of vulnerable Afghans left behind, resettling tens of thousands of refugees who were able to flee

By KATHY GANNON, TAMEEM AKHGAR and JOSEPH KRAUSS Associated Press KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Taliban are reveling in their victory after the American withdrawal from Afghanistan, while reiterating their pledge to bring peace and security to the country after decades of war. An anxious population is waiting to see what the new order looks

By SOPHIA EPPOLITO Associated Press/Report for America SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Members of the faith widely known as the Mormon church remain deeply divided on vaccines and mask-wearing despite consistent guidance from church leaders. Members who support the stance say they fear that some Latter-day Saints who refuse to get vaccinated are allowing their