Month: August 2022

By YURI KAGEYAMA AP Business Writer TOKYO (AP) — Toyota’s profit fell nearly 18% from a year earlier in the April-June quarter as a semiconductor shortage that has slammed the industry dented production at Japan’s top automaker. Toyota officials apologized Thursday to customers who have been waiting for their cars after putting in orders. Some

By JOHNSON LAI and HUIZHONG WU Associated Press KEELUNG, Taiwan (AP) — China says it has conducted “precision missile strikes” in the Taiwan Strait as part of military exercises by its navy, air force and other departments in six zones surrounding the island. Japan says it protested to China after five of the missiles landed

By HAVEN DALEY and CHRISTOPHER WEBER Associated Press KLAMATH RIVER, Calif. (AP) — California firefighters made gains against the state’s deadliest and largest wildfire of the year just as an eastern Washington town was evacuated Thursday because of a blaze that was burning homes. At about 1:30 p.m. the Adams County Sheriff’s Office said on

By NICK PERRY Associated Press WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — The government of the Solomon Islands is tightening its control over the nation’s state-owned broadcaster. Opponents say the move is squarely aimed at controlling and censoring the news. The government this week accused the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation of a “lack of ethics and professionalism.”

By TERRY SPENCER Associated Press FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Roses brought to honor love on that Valentine’s Day in 2018 lay withered, their dried and cracked petals scattered across classroom floors still smeared with the blood of victims gunned down by a former student more than four years ago. Bullet holes pocked walls, and

By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations is heading to Africa, saying she is going to focus on how the United States can help Uganda, Ghana and Cape Verde deal with the food crisis that has hit the continent particularly hard — not to compete

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A suspect mistakenly released from a Los Angeles County jail where he was being held on suspicion of shooting Lady Gaga’s dog walker and stealing her French bulldogs has been recaptured, authorities said. James Howard Jackson, 19, was arrested Wednesday nearly five months after he was released from jail while awaiting

BEIJING (AP) — Police in southern China have arrested a 47-year-old man suspected of an attack that killed three people and injured six others at a kindergarten in Jiangxi province. A police statement said that Liu Xiaohui was arrested at 10:50 p.m. on Wednesday, about 12 hours after the morning attack. Police have not provided

By DARLENE SUPERVILLE Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — Jill Biden barnstormed the country during her debut year as first lady as if on a one-woman mission to help her husband’s administration tackle the problem of the moment: getting people vaccinated and boosted against the deadly COVID-19 pandemic. New headwinds blowing in year two — President

By JONATHAN MATTISE and KIMBERLEE KRUESI Associated Press NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Andy Ogles, a far-right county mayor, won Tennessee’s crowded Republican primary on Thursday in a reconfigured congressional district in left-leaning Nashville that the party is hoping to flip in November. In a warning ahead of the general election, he said, “Liberals, we’re coming

By LISA MASCARO AP Congressional Correspondent WASHINGTON (AP) — At a dinner with the president of Finland shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell assured his host that the U.S. Senate would swiftly ratify NATO membership if the north European country chose to apply to the military alliance. It was a bold

By BOBBY CAINA CALVAN Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — Even in hindsight, Nichole Schmidt can’t be sure if anything could have been done to save her daughter Gabby Petito from a messy and violent relationship that ended in murder nearly a year ago in the western wilderness. But there is work to do, she

By THALIA BEATY Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — The virtual cat hero from the new video game sensation “Stray” doesn’t just wind along rusted pipes, leap over unidentified sludge and decode clues in a seemingly abandoned city. The daring orange tabby is helping real world cats as well. Thanks to online fundraising platforms, gamers

By DAVID RISING Associated Press PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — The Association of Southeast Asian Nations is calling for calm in the Taiwan Strait, urging against any “provocative action” in the wake of a visit to Taipei by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that has infuriated Beijing. In a rare statement from the 10-nation group

By AAMER MADHANI and EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — Russia is dismissing a claim by U.S. officials that it’s working to fabricate evidence about last week’s deadly strike on a facility housing prisoners of war in eastern Ukraine. U.S. intelligence officials determined that Russia is looking to plant false evidence to make

WASHINGTON (AP) — The federal government is proposing tougher rules for when airlines must give passengers refunds for changing their travel plans. The Transportation Department issued a proposal Wednesday that would require refunds if the airline changes a passenger’s arrival or departure by several hours, or adds another stop on their itinerary. The proposal comes

By MARI YAMAGUCHI Associated Press TOKYO (AP) — The construction of facilities needed for a planned release of treated radioactive wastewater into the sea next year from the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant has begun despite opposition from the local fishing community. Plant workers started construction of a pipeline to transport the wastewater from hillside

By DANIEL POLITI Associated Press BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Argentina’s third economy minister in a month has been sworn in, and as his first order of business Sergio Massa is seeking to bring down sky-high expectations for his tackling of the country’s economic woes. At a news conference Wednesday evening, Massa warned that he

TOLAR, Texas (AP) — One firefighter has suffered burns and two others have been treated for heat exhaustion while fighting a new North Texas wildfire that is completely uncontained after burning almost half a square mile. Hood County officials say the injured firefighter was airlifted to a Dallas hospital with burns to 10% of his

By BOB CHRISTIE Associated Press PHOENIX (AP) — Officials in an Arizona county are vowing to overhaul their election procedures after a shortage of some ballots at about two dozen voting sites led to some voters leaving before being able to cast their primary ballots. Pinal County Attorney Kent Volkmer and Board of Supervisors Chair

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Chrissy Teigen and her husband John Legend are expecting another child nearly two years after the couple suffered a pregnancy loss. Teigen made the announcement Wednesday on Instagram where she posted two photos of her baby bump. She wrote that joy has “filled our home and hearts again” in a post

By KEN RITTER Associated Press LAS VEGAS (AP) — A Las Vegas-based corporate owner of thousands of residential rental properties in several U.S. states is facing investigations about whether it improperly evicted tenants during the coronavirus pandemic while receiving millions of federal dollars aimed at keeping people in their homes. Probes of The Siegel Group

MEXICO CITY (AP) — A journalist was among four people killed inside a beer shop in central Mexico, the 13th media worker killed in the country this year. San Luis de la Paz Mayor Luis Sánchez confirmed the Tuesday night killings of Ernesto Méndez and three others Wednesday. He says that armed attackers stormed a

CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y. (AP) — A former schoolteacher from suburban New York City has been sentenced to 30 months in prison for mailing dozens of violent threats to LGBTQ affiliated individuals, groups and businesses over several years. the 74-year-old Robert Fehring had pleaded guilty in February. Prosecutors say the Bayport, Long Island, resident threatened to

HAMPSHIRE, Ill. (AP) — Illinois State Police say an eighth person has died from a fiery crash involving a wrong-way car on an interstate in northern Illinois. Police announced Wednesday that 32-year-old Thomas Dobosz of Rolling Meadows, Illinois, has died. They say he was driving a van carrying his 31-year-old wife, Lauren, and five children

By MICHAEL LIEDTKE and OLGA R. RODRIGUEZ Associated Press BERKELEY, Calif. (AP) — A group of protesters broke through an 8-foot chain fence erected Wednesday around Berkeley’s historic People’s Park and faced off with police officers standing guard as a construction crew began work on a controversial student housing project. The park was cleared overnight

By LINDSAY WHITEHURST Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration has filed its first legal challenge to a state abortion ban since the end of Roe v. Wade, arguing Idaho’s restrictive abortion law leaves doctors facing criminal penalties for providing abortion-related medical care to women in life-threatening medical situations. The Justice Department may have

GONZALES, La. (AP) — A Louisiana judge has refused to set any bond for rapper Mystikal, who is accused of raping and choking a woman at his home outside Baton Rouge. The Advocate reports that state District Judge Steven Tureau ruled on Tuesday that evidence against 51-year-old Michael Tyler, his past history and the victim’s

By ALAN FRAM Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans see inflation, taxes and immigration as Democratic weak spots worth attacking in the upcoming battle over an economic package the Democrats want to push through the Senate. They’re also targeting two Democratic senators, Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona and Joe Manchin of West Virginia. The measure embodies

By BOB CHRISTIE Associated Press PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona voters relegated House Speaker Rusty Bowers to the history books after the conservative Republican crossed former President Donald Trump and refused to back his unsupported claims that he lost in 2020 because of fraud. Bowers was thoroughly trounced in Tuesday’s GOP primary, losing to a former