AP National News

HOUSTON (AP) — A woman accused by authorities of killing her 5-year-old daughter near a suburban Houston park because she thought the girl was an “evil child” has a history of mental illness, her attorney said Tuesday. Melissa Towne, 37, has been charged with capital murder in the death of her daughter Nichole and was

By HOLLY RAMER Associated Press CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — The first debate between U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan and Don Bolduc pitted the Democratic incumbent’s record against her Republican rival’s campaign trail rhetoric. Bolduc, a retired Army general, on Tuesday accused Hassan of failing constituents by supporting the Biden administration’s economic and energy policies. Hassan, a

By ERIC TUCKER and BOBBY CAINA CALVAN Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — French cement company Lafarge has pleaded guilty to paying millions of dollars to the Islamic State group so a plant in Syria could remain open, a case the Justice Department describes as the first of its kind. Lafarge has agreed to pay

By RUSS BYNUM Associated Press SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — Authorities say they plan to search a Georgia landfill for the remains of a toddler reported missing nearly two weeks ago. Chatham County Police Chief Jeff Hadley said Tuesday that investigators have evidence that leads them to believe 20-month-old Quinton Simon’s body was dumped in a

By HYUNG-JIN KIM Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea fired artillery shells near its sea boundaries with South Korea late Tuesday, a day after the South began annual military drills to better deal with North Korean provocations. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement early Wednesday that North Korea

By HALELUYA HADERO and ALEXANDRA OLSON AP Business Writers NEW YORK (AP) — Amazon workers in upstate New York overwhelmingly rejected a union bid on Tuesday, handing a second defeat to the labor group that’s been attempting to drag the company to the negotiating table since its historic win earlier this year. Warehouse workers near

By MADDIE BURAKOFF AP Science Writer NEW YORK (AP) — A new study finds that some people really are “mosquito magnets” and it probably has to do with the way they smell. The researchers found that people who are most attractive to mosquitoes produce a lot of certain chemicals on their skin that are tied

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The vice chairman of the University of Minnesota Board of Regents has publicly asked whether the increased diversity on the Morris campus is holding down enrollment, a question that’s drawn criticism and a call for his resignation. At a meeting of the board that oversees the university system last week, Vice Chairman

MOSCOW (AP) — After three missions in space, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev ran into difficulty on Earth when he drove over a colleague on a dark road outside Moscow less than three weeks after returning from his latest orbiting mission. Russia’s state space corporation Roscosmos said Artemyev didn’t see an employee of the Star City

By SIBI ARASU Associated Press BENGALURU, India (AP) — For countries to transition away from fossil fuels and toward cleaner energies like solar power, supply chains for components need to be more geographically diverse, officials said during a conference on solar energy in New Delhi said on Tuesday. Currently, 75% of components needed for solar

SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — A pipeline operator has agreed to pay $50 million to Southern California fishermen, tourism companies and property owners who sued over an offshore oil spill last year. A proposed settlement between Houston-based Amplify Energy Corp. and the businesses was filed Monday in federal court. A judge still needs to approve

By DÁNICA COTO Associated Press HAVANA (AP) — Soccer coaches across Cuba are training hundreds of players as part of a new program to elevate the sport’s profile and status in a country that last qualified for the World Cup in 1938. An initial group of 16 coaches were recently trained by international officials with

By MEG KINNARD Associated Press Control of the U.S. Senate could again come down to Georgia — and that means it could further come down to the state’s runoff election rules. Polls suggest that incumbent Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and Republican nominee Herschel Walker are headed to a tight contest Nov. 8. There’s also a

By JOSHUA GOODMAN Associated Press MIAMI (AP) — A small Texas seafood importer has sued the federal government for blocking a shipment of fish from protected waters near Antarctica. It’s an ocean at the center of a diplomatic feud dividing the normally allied U.S. and U.K. governments. Southern Cross Seafoods says in a complaint filed

By VANESSA GERA Associated Press WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Poland’s top opposition leader has called on the country’s ruling party to fully clarify the facts surrounding an eight-year-old affair involving the illegal recordings of top politicians and coal imports from Russia. Tusk said Tuesday that it has long been clear that Russia was involved in

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A winning lottery ticket worth a share of a $494 million Mega Millions jackpot was purchased in a southwest Florida city hammered by Hurricane Ian late last month. Florida lottery officials on Monday said one of the two winning tickets was purchased at a 7-Eleven in Fort Myers. The other winning

By RONALD BLUM Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — Igor Levit arrives at Carnegie Hall changed by the pandemic. Emotional insecurity caused by the pandemic plus the war, energy crisis and climate change are making him cherish moments before an audience. His stop in New York on Tuesday is part of a quick U.S. tour

By HANNA ARHIROVA Associated Press KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Airstrikes cut power and water supplies to hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians on Tuesday, part of what the country’s president called an expanding Russian campaign to drive the nation into the cold and dark and make peace talks impossible. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said nearly one-third of

By TRACEE M. HERBAUGH At a nondescript, basketball court in Waltham, Massachusetts, the leaves take on an autumnal glow and the air is crisp. But there are no pickup basketball players. This is now a spot for people who roller skate. “I had my eye on skates for a while — I saw they were

By HYUNG-JIN KIM and JON GAMBRELL Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — An Iranian competitive climber left South Korea on Tuesday after competing at an event in which she climbed without her nation’s mandatory headscarf covering, authorities said. Farsi-language media outside of Iran warned she may have been forced to leave early by Iranian