AP National News

MOSCOW (AP) — A Japanese billionaire and his producer have rocketed to space for a 12-day mission at the International Space Station. Fashion tycoon Yusaku Maezawa and producer Yozo Hirano, who plans to film his mission, blasted off Wednesday for the International Space Station in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft along with Russian cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin.

By ELAINE KURTENBACH AP Business Writer BANGKOK (AP) — Stocks are mostly higher in Asia after another broad rally on Wall Street as investors wager that the new variant of the COVID-19 virus won’t pose a big threat to the economy. Oil prices fell back. Shares rose in Tokyo, Shanghai and Seoul, while Hong Kong

By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV and YURAS KARMANAU Associated Press MOSCOW (AP) — When the leaders of the Soviet Union’s three Slavic republics met at a secluded hunting lodge near the Polish border on Dec. 8, 1991, they delivered a death blow to the USSR. Their agreement that day triggered shockwaves that are still reverberating three decades

By GEIR MOULSON Associated Press BERLIN (AP) — Olaf Scholz has taken over as Germany’s new chancellor at the head of a three-party coalition government, ending the 16-year era of outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel. Scholz will lead a 17-member Cabinet with one more minister than Merkel’s team. Green co-leader Robert Habeck will become vice chancellor.

By GEIR MOULSON Associated Press BERLIN (AP) — Olaf Scholz is set to take office as Germany’s ninth post-World War II chancellor, succeeding Angela Merkel after her heralded 16-year tenure. Scholz’s government takes office with high hopes of modernizing the European Union’s most populous nation and combating climate change, but faces the immediate challenge of

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police say an Israeli woman has been stabbed and lightly wounded in a tense Jerusalem neighborhood. The suspect, a Palestinian female minor, was later arrested inside a school. The stabbing took place in Sheikh Jarrah, where several Palestinian extended families are at risk of being evicted by Jewish settlers amid a

BOSTON (AP) — A Massachusetts man who spent over two decades in prison for what a court is calling a wrongful murder and armed robbery conviction has been released from prison. WCVB-TV reports that James Lucien, 48, was serving a life sentence in connection to the 1994 fatal shooting of Ryan Edwards, 23. Lucien said

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police say an Israeli woman was stabbed and seriously wounded in a tense neighborhood in east Jerusalem. They say the suspect fled. The stabbing took place in Sheikh Jarrah, where several Palestinian extended families are at risk of being evicted by Jewish settlers amid a decades-long legal battle. Protests and clashes

By FARES AKRAM Associated Press GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) — The players race across the pitch on crutches, jostling for the soccer ball, passing it back and forth. Their prosthetic legs are lined up along the sidelines at a stadium in the Gaza Strip. They are the first Palestinian national soccer team made up

By AAMER MADHANI and VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin were still far apart after two hours of talks on the escalating crisis caused by Russia’s massing of tens of thousands of troops near its border with Ukraine. Biden delivered a simple message during Tuesday’s video call with

By AMY FORLITI and STEVE KARNOWSKI Associated Press MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Two views of the Minnesota police officer who killed Daunte Wright will collide in opening statements at her manslaughter trial. The defense claims that Kim Potter made an innocent mistake by pulling her handgun instead of her Taser when she shot Wright in April

By MARK SHERMAN Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a challenge from parents in Maine who want to use a state tuition program to send their children to religious schools. The parents argue that their exclusion from the state program violates their religious rights under the Constitution. Teacher unions

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A company once owned by “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli will pay up to $40 million to settle allegations that it jacked up the price of a life-saving medication by roughly 4 ,000% after obtaining exclusive rights to the drug. The Federal Trade Commission announced the settlement Tuesday. The FTC and seven

By BEN FOX Associated Press JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHURST, N.J. (AP) — More than three months after the fall of Kabul to the Taliban, about 35,000 Afghans are still housed at six U.S. military installations. The U.S. welcomed journalists to the largest of the bases, in central New Jersey, where many Afghans are relieved to be

By DON BABWIN and SARA BURNETT Associated Press CHICAGO (AP) — Closing arguments are set in the case against former “Empire” actor Jussie Smollett, who is accused of staging a racist, anti-gay attack against himself in downtown Chicago. After closings Wednesday morning, the jury is expected to deliberate whether Smollett is guilty on six counts

By DON THOMPSON Associated Press SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Scott Peterson is set to be resentenced to life in prison in the 2002 slayings of his pregnant wife and unborn son. The California Supreme Court ruled a year ago that his jury was improperly screened for bias against the death penalty in a case that

By FRANK BAJAK and BARBARA ORTUTAY Associated Press Amazon’s cloud-service network suffered a major outage Tuesday, disrupting access to many popular sites. The service provides remote computing services to many companies, governments and universities and companies, including The Associated Press. For roughly five hours, companies dependent on Amazon’s web services network to run their operations

By GENE JOHNSON Associated Press SEATTLE (AP) — Preliminary results show voters in Seattle narrowly in favor of recalling socialist City Councilmember Kshama Sawant. She’s the firebrand who pushed the city to adopt a $15 minimum wage, raged against hometown tech giant Amazon for its business practices and angered many with her aggressive political tactics.

By ELAINE KURTENBACH AP Business Writer BANGKOK (AP) — Stocks have advanced in Asia after another broad rally on Wall Street as investors wagered that the new variant of the COVID-19 virus won’t pose a big threat to the economy. Oil prices fell back. Shares rose in Tokyo, Shanghai and Seoul, while Hong Kong was

By NICK PERRY Associated Press WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — A New Zealand man who couldn’t afford to buy beer at a supermarket has pleaded guilty to stabbing and injuring four people at the store during a frenzied attack. Luke James Lambert, 42, will face up to 14 years in prison when he is sentenced