Month: July 2022

By ROB GILLIES and NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press ST-ANNE-DE-BEAUPRÉ, Quebec (AP) — Pope Francis celebrated Mass on Thursday at Canada’s national shrine and came face-to-face with a long-standing demand from Indigenous peoples: to rescind the papal decrees underpinning the so-called “Doctrine of Discovery” and repudiate the theories that legitimized the colonial-era seizure of Native lands

By JOE McDONALD AP Business Writer BEIJING (AP) — China’s leaders effectively acknowledged the struggling economy won’t hit its official 5.5% growth target this year and said Thursday they will try to prop up sagging consumer demand but will stick to strict anti-COVID-19 tactics that disrupted manufacturing and trade. The announcement after a Communist Party

CAIRO (AP) — A leading human rights watchdog is urging Egyptian authorities to allow the family of a prominent activist serving a five-year sentence access to him. Amnesty International also reiterated calls on Thursday for the immediate release of Alaa Abdel-Fattah. It says his family members had not received any word from him and were

SPARTA, Ga. (AP) — State investigators looking into the death of a Georgia woman who fell out of a patrol car after being arrested have concluded that deputies never closed the car’s rear passenger-side door. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation said in a news release that 28-year-old Brianna Grier suffered significant injuries as she was

By DÁNICA COTO Associated Press SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Authorities say at least five Haitian migrants have drowned and 68 others have been rescued after a suspected human smuggling boat dropped the group off in waters near an uninhabited island west of Puerto Rico. The incident is the latest in a string of

By KEN SWEET AP Business Writer NEW YORK (AP) — For more than a decade, US Bank pressured its employees to open fake accounts in their customers’ names in order to meet unrealistic sales goals, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said Thursday, in a case that is deeply similar to the sales practices scandal uncovered

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The International Criminal Court has unsealed an arrest warrant for a former government minister in Central African Republic for crimes against humanity and war crimes allegedly committed in 2013. Prosecutors at the global court accuse Mahamat Nouradine Adam of crimes including torture, persecution, enforced disappearances and cruel treatment at two

CHICAGO (AP) — U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois says he has tested positive for COVID-19 and was in quarantine with what he described as minor symptoms. The No. 2 Senate Democrat, who said in a statement Thursday he was vaccinated and had received two coronavirus booster shots, planned to continue to work remotely. The

By BARBARA ORTUTAY AP Technology Writer Facebook is letting violent hate speech slip through its controls in Kenya, according to a new report from the nonprofit groups Global Witness and Foxglove. This is the third such test that Facebook has failed. Each time, Global Witness submitted ads with blatant, violent hate speech to see if

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — The U.N. expert on migrants’ rights says that, while Poland has welcomed millions of Ukrainian refugees fleeing the war, third-country nationals fleeing the same conflict are not getting the same assistance. Felipe González Morales presented his findings to journalists following his mission to Poland and Belarus earlier this month. Thousands of

BY JULIE WATSON Associated Press TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) — With its cheery unicorn printed case, Ana Morazan’s iPhone contains all that’s left of what she calls her “other world,” referring to her middle-class life before back-to-back hurricanes destroyed her home in Honduras. There are glam shots of the 42-year-old with blond, salon-styled hair, impeccable makeup

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — A crowd of staunch fans have braved wet winter weather in downtown Melbourne to watch an outdoor showing of an Australian soap opera’s finale. The star-studded television show “Neighbors” ran for 37 years. Margot Robbie, Guy Pearce and Holly Valance are among the celebrities who returned to fictional Ramsay Street to

By JULIE WATSON Associated Press TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) — Tens of millions of people are being uprooted by natural disasters due to the impact of climate change, though the world has yet to fully recognize climate migrants or come up with a formalized mechanism to assess their needs and help them. Scientists predict migration will

By MATT OTT AP Business Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — Fewer Americans applied for jobless benefits last week, but the previous week’s number was revised upward significantly, with claims breaching the 250,000 level in back-to-back weeks for the first time in more than eight months. Applications for jobless aid for the week ending July 23 declined

By KEN SWEET AP Business Writer NEW YORK (AP) — The head of the nation’s financial watchdog is having second thoughts about using fines to deter illegal behavior in the financial industry, saying some companies have gotten so big that the money makes little difference. In an interview with The Associated Press, Rohit Chopra signaled

By ROB GILLIES and DAVID CRARY Associated Press In his extensive papal travels, Pope Francis has never journeyed farther north than Iqaluit, capital city of the Inuit-governed territory of Nunavut. On Friday, it will be the final stop of his somber six-day visit to Canada. It is a distinctive destination – home to about 7,500

VEVEY, Switzerland (AP) — Global food giant Nestle has reported higher sales in the first half of the year, even as it increased prices by 6.5% as inflation soared around the world. The Swiss company that makes Purina pet food, KitKat candy bars and Gerber baby food said Thursday that total reported sales grew by

VIENNA (AP) — Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer has welcomed Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Vienna for bilateral talks that focused on migration as well as on the war in Ukraine. The meeting of the two central European leaders on Thursday came only days after one of Orban’s closest associates resigned in protest over what

MADRID (AP) — Spain’s Socialist-led coalition government wants large energy companies and banks to pay a windfall tax, which officials hope will yield around 7 billion euros (dollars) over two years. The government delivered its proposal to parliament Thursday, with a debate and vote scheduled for after the summer recess. Officials say the tax would

By CHRIS MEGERIAN, ZEKE MILLER and ELLEN KNICKMEYER Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden and China’s Xi Jinping are exploring meeting in person, a senior administration official said after the leaders spent more than two hours Thursday talking through the future of their complicated relationship, with tension over Taiwan once again emerging as

By JONATHAN LANDRUM Jr. AP Entertainment Writer LOS ANGELES (AP) — Tyler Perry will receive an honorary AARP award for uplifting communities and helping people “overcome various obstacles” through his foundation. The organization announced Thursday that Perry will receive the honorary AARP Purpose Prize award during a virtual ceremony on Oct. 25. The famed filmmaker-actor-

By STEPHEN WHYNO AP Sports Writer Washington Commanders owner Dan Snyder testified for more than 10 hours Thursday before a congressional committee investigating the NFL team’s history of workplace misconduct. Snyder gave a deposition to the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform conducted virtually and in private. Snyder is in Israel and agreed to

By MATTHEW PERRONE AP Health Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — Altria reports its nearly $13 billion investment in troubled vaping company Juul is worth 95% less than it originally paid. The tobacco giant on Thursday took a $1.2 billion financial hit on its investment in the e-cigarette maker, writing down its value to less than $500

By BRUCE SCHREINER, REBECCA REYNOLDS and TIMOTHY D. EASLEY Associated Press JACKSON, Ky. (AP) — Torrential rains unleashed devastating floods in Appalachia on Thursday, as fast-rising water killed at least eight people in Kentucky and sent people scurrying to rooftops to be rescued. Water gushed from hillsides and flooded out of streambeds, inundating homes, businesses