Month: July 2023

ROME (AP) — Italians are using social media to denounce a court verdict clearing a school janitor of a sexual assault charge for groping a 17-year-old student because it only lasted “around five/10 seconds.” The teenager said the man came up from behind her as she was pulling up her trousers while walking up the

TOKYO (AP) — A rocket being developed by the Japanese space agency has exploded during testing but there were no reports of injuries. That’s according to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA. The cause of the accident at the facility in Akita Prefecture in northeastern Japan is still being investigated. It’s unclear when tests

By MIKE SCHNEIDER Associated Press ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Disney is asking a Florida judge to toss out a lawsuit filed by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ appointees to Disney World’s governing district. The appointees are trying to void agreements that the company made in an attempt to neutralize the takeover of the district by the Florida

By MUNIR AHMED Associated Press ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has launched the construction of a 1,200-megawatt Chinese-designed nuclear energy project. It’s being built at a cost of $3.5 billion as part of the government efforts to generate more clean energy. Friday’s ceremony to mark the start of the project comes less

By OLGA R. RODRIGUEZ Associated Press SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Wildlife officials were trying to capture a wayward sea otter Thursday that has been wresting surfboards away from surfers and aggressively approaching kayakers off the coast of Santa Cruz, California. The 5-year-old female otter has shown aggression toward people for several weeks and poses a

By NOAH BERGER and DOUG GLASS Associated Press FORT ST. JOHN, British Columbia (AP) — As more than 900 fires burn in a Canadian fire season that has periodically pushed dangerous smoke south into the U.S. and even far east to Europe, one province — British Columbia — relies on smokejumpers to help fight the

By DAVID BRUNAT Associated Press BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Spanish police have arrested six young Germans for allegedly raping an 18-year-old German woman on Spain’s Mallorca island in the Mediterranean. Police said Friday that the alleged gang rape occurred in a hotel room in the popular tourist spot of Playa de Palma on Thursday. The

By AIJAZ RAHI and ASHOK SHARMA Associated Press SRIHARIKOTA, India (AP) — An Indian spacecraft blazed its way toward the far side of the moon Friday in a follow-up mission to its failed effort nearly four years ago to land a rover on the lunar surface, the country’s space agency said. Chandrayaan-3, the word for

LONDON (AP) — Britain’s Health Security Agency said that measles vaccination rates in parts of London have dropped so low that the capital could see tens of thousands of cases of the rash-causing disease. The agency said on Friday that although the risk of an outbreak across the U.K. was low, the current levels of

By EDNA TARIGAN, DAVID RISING and JIM GOMEZ Associated Press JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has met China’s top diplomat to discuss thorny issues as part of efforts to nurture talks on the sidelines of regional diplomatic meetings in Indonesia. United States officials said Blinken stressed the importance of maintaining

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A Dutch court has convicted a man of killing two people at an activity farm for people with mental disabilities and limitations and earlier fatally shooting a man to test his weapon. He was sentenced Friday to life imprisonment for the murders and two attempted murders. The defendant fatally shot

By YURI KAGEYAMA AP Business Writer TOKYO (AP) — Global shares are mostly higher, buoyed by another rally on Wall Street fueled by hopes that cooling inflation will help stave off more interest rate hikes. France’s CAC 40 gained 0.3% in early trading to 7,394.68. Germany’s DAX fell 0.1% to 16,121.61. Britain’s FTSE 100 edged