Month: July 2023

By CHRIS MEGERIAN, LORNE COOK and SEUNG MIN KIM Associated Press VILNIUS, Lithuania (AP) — NATO leaders gathered Wednesday to launch a highly symbolic new forum for ties with Ukraine, after committing to provide the country with more military assistance for fighting Russia but only vague assurances of future membership. U.S. President Joe Biden and

VILNIUS, Lithuania (AP) — China has renewed its concern about NATO’s eastward “expansion” as the alliance wraps up its summit in Lithuania. A joint communique from the Atlantic alliance a day earlier said China’s “stated ambitions and coercive policies challenge our interests, security and values,” while indicating that NATO members “remain open to constructive engagement”

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union has slapped a $475 million fine on U.S. biotech giant Illumina for buying out cancer-screening company Grail without the approval of the 27-nation bloc’s antitrust watchdog. Illumina had announced an $7.1 billion acquisition of Grail in 2020 but the EU’s executive commission said it broke the bloc’s merger rules

By JILL COLVIN Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — Former Vice President Mike Pence is leaning in on his anti-abortion stance as he campaigns for the Republican presidential nomination. Pence says he does not support exceptions in the case of nonviable pregnancies, when doctors have determined there’s no chance a baby will survive outside the

By HANNAH FINGERHUT Associated Press DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Iowa’s Republican-led Legislature passed a bill banning most abortions after roughly six weeks of pregnancy during a marathon special session Tuesday that continued late into the night. Gov. Kim Reynolds immediately said in a statement she would sign the bill on Friday. The bill passed

By LORI HINNANT Associated Press PARIS (AP) — Milan Kundera, whose dissident writings in communist Czechoslovakia transformed him into an exiled satirist of totalitarianism, has died in Paris at the age of 94, Czech media said Wednesday. Kundera’s renowned novel, “The Unbearable Lightness of Being,’’ opens wrenchingly with Soviet tanks rolling through Prague, the Czech

By ABDUL SATTAR Associated Press QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — Pakistani officials say five heavily-armed militants have attacked a security post in southwest Pakistan, triggering an intense shootout that left four soldiers, three attackers and a female passerby dead, officials said. The newly-formed militant group Tehreek-e-Jihad Pakistan has claimed responsibility for the attack. In a statement,

By KANIS LEUNG Associated Press HONG KONG (AP) — A top official in Hong Kong says the city would immediately ban the import of aquatic products from 10 prefectures in Japan if it discharges treated radioactive wastewater into the sea. Secretary for Environment and Ecology Tse Chin-wan said Wednesday that errors in the wastewater treating

By ASHOK SHARMA Associated Press NEW DELHI (AP) — Apple iPhone manufacturer Foxconn has announced it is backing out of a $19.5 billion semiconductor joint venture with Indian mining conglomerate Vedanta Ltd. but was still looking for other partners. Indian officials downplayed the potential impact of its withdrawal. Taiwan-based Hon Hai Technology, also known as

LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — Police and rescue officials say a  fire swept through a house in Pakistan’s eastern city of Lahore before dawn Wednesday, killing six children and four adults mostly of the same family. Two women, two men and six children between 6 and 16 years old lost their lives, a deputy inspector-general of

By HUIZHONG WU Associated Press TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — China has sent navy ships and a large group of warplanes, including fighter jets and bombers, toward Taiwan over the past two days. It comes ahead of the island’s annual military and exercises aimed at defending itself from an invasion. China sent some 68 warplanes flying

By HYUNG-JIN KIM and MARI YAMAGUCHI Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea fired its first intercontinental ballistic missile in three months on Wednesday, two days after it threatened “shocking” consequences to protest what it called provocative U.S. reconnaissance activity near its territory. Some experts say North Korea likely launched its developmental, road-mobile

By CARA ANNA Associated Press NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Iran’s president has begun a rare visit to Africa as the country under heavy U.S. economic sanctions seeks to deepen partnerships around the world. President Ebrahim Raisi’s visit to Kenya on Wednesday is the first to the African continent by an Iranian leader in more than