AP National News

HONG KONG (AP) — The new head of Hong Kong’s Catholic diocese has expressed hope that he could foster healing in a congregation and a city divided by the continuing fallout from massive anti-government protests in 2019. Bishop Stephen Chow spoke to the gathered after his ordination in the 19th-century Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.

BERLIN (AP) — Outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel has made what is likely her final appeal before leaving office next week for Germans to get vaccinated against COVID-19. Merkel gave what is expected to be her last weekly video message two days after federal and state leaders decided on a series of measures meant to break

By ABDOULIE JOHN and CARLEY PETESCH Associated Press BANJUL, Gambia (AP) — Gambians have shown up to vote in high numbers for the first presidential election in decades that does not include former dictator Yahya Jammeh as a candidate. Nearly 1 million voters were expected to drop marbles into one of six ballot bins on

By ELENA BECATOROS Associated Press KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Through clouds of billowing dust, two men circle each other warily before one plunges forward, grabbing his rival’s clothing. After a brief struggle, he deftly tackles his opponent to the ground. The scene is one played out each week after Friday prayers in the sprawling Chaman-e-Huzori

By BABAR DOGAR Associated Press LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — Officials say police have arrested 13 suspects and detained dozens of others in the lynching of a Sri Lankan employee at a sports equipment factory in eastern Pakistan. A mob of hundreds of enraged Muslims descended on the factory in Punjab province Friday after the Sri

The center-left party of German Chancellor-designate Olaf Scholz is meeting to decide whether to approve a deal to form a new government with environmentalist and pro-business parties. A membership vote at a Social Democratic Party convention on Saturday is the first of three such decisions needed for Scholz to take office next week. Scholz’s Social

By VANESSA GERA Associated Press WARSAW, Poland (AP) — The leaders of right-wing populist parties are meeting in Warsaw to discuss working together to bring change to the European Union. The head of Poland’s Law and Justice party, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, is hosting Saturday’s gathering. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, French far-right leader Marine Le Pen

By COREY WILLIAMS and ED WHITE Associated Press PONTIAC, Mich. (AP) — A sheriff’s office in Michigan says the parents of a teen accused of killing four students in a shooting at a high school have been caught early Saturday. Detroit police say James and Jennifer Crumbley were taken into custody at a commercial building

By OMER FAROOQ Associated Press HYDERABAD, India (AP) — A tropical storm has weakened after dumping heavy rains overnight in parts of southern India off the Bay of Bengal as more than 50,000 people evacuated to government-run camps. Kanna Babu, a state commissioner for disaster management, says no loss of life or major damage has

By KEN MORITSUGU Associated Press BEIJING (AP) — China’s Communist Party has taken American democracy to task, sharply criticizing a global democracy summit being hosted by President Joe Biden next week and extolling the virtues of its governing system. Party officials questioned how a divided country that botched its response to COVID-19 could lecture others

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexican immigration authorities say they have discovered 210 migrants packed into a truck trailer in the central part of the country. The National Migration Institute says the truck failed to stop as directed at a checkpoint in Puebla state on Friday and it was pulled over after a pursuit near the

By KIM TONG-HYUNG Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea has reported daily records in coronavirus infections and deaths and confirmed three more cases of the new omicron variant as officials scramble to tighten social distancing and border controls. The 5,352 new cases reported by the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency marked

By AAMER MADHANI, ELLEN KNICKMEYER, NOMAAN MERCHANT and ALEXANDRA JAFFE Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden has pledged to make it “very, very difficult” for Russia’s Vladimir Putin to take military action in Ukraine as U.S. intelligence officials have determined that Russian planning is underway for a possible military offensive that could begin

By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV and YURAS KARMANAU Associated Press MOSCOW (AP) — The Kremlin says President Vladimir Putin will seek binding guarantees precluding NATO’s expansion to Ukraine during a planned call with U.S. President Joe Biden. A U.S. intelligence report and the Ukrainian defense minister have warned of a possible Russian invasion as soon as next

By COREY WILLIAMS Associated Press PONTIAC, Mich. (AP) — The warning signs were there: A search for gun ammunition on a cellphone, drawings of blood on a school desk and a written plea for help. But on Tuesday, roughly 30 miles north of Detroit at Oxford High School, the student in question was sent back

By AAMER MADHANI, NOMAAN MERCHANT and VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. intelligence officials have determined that Russian planning is underway for a possible military offensive against Ukraine that could begin as soon as early 2022 and would include an estimated 175,000 personnel. That’s according to an administration official who spoke on condition

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Charlotte Mailliard Shultz, the long-reigning chief of San Francisco protocol and unofficial aide to 10 mayors, died Friday of complications from cancer. She was 88. Friends and family called Shultz a true San Franciscan, even though she was from Texas, who helped the city look its best. As the city’s chief

By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.N. Security Council  has voted unanimously to allow international naval forces to continue using all necessary means to fight piracy off the coast of Somalia, but only for the next three months. The Somali government says there has been no piracy incident for over

By NICOLE WINFIELD and DEREK GATOPOULOS Associated Press ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Pope Francis has arrived in Athens for the second leg of a five-day visit to Cyprus and Greece aimed at bolstering recently mended ties between the Vatican and Greek Orthodox churches. Francis is set to hold meetings on Saturday about an emerging alliance