News

By STEPHEN McGRATH Associated Press BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Romania’s president has nominated a former army general to be prime minister in the latest attempt to end a political crisis amid a coronavirus surge that is stretching the country’s health care system to capacity. After holding consultations with Romania’s parliamentary parties, President Klaus Iohannis nominated

NEW YORK (AP) — Rosamund Pike is already starring in the Amazon Prime Video based on Robert Jordan’s “The Wheel of Time” books. She’s also taken on the epic task of narrating the first of the “Wheel of Time” novels, “The Eye of the World.” Macmillan Audio announced Thursday that the audiobook comes out Nov.

By CHRISTOPHER RUGABER AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell last week to a new low point since the pandemic erupted, evidence that layoffs are declining as companies hold onto workers. Unemployment claims dropped 6,000 to 290,000 last week, the third straight drop, the Labor Department said

By MICHELLE L. PRICE Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — The two men running to become New York City’s next mayor offered starkly different visions at their first debate about how to lead the nation’s largest city out of the pandemic, improve public safety and gird the city of 8.8 million people for more powerful

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Syria’s Justice Ministry says authorities have executed 24 people after charging them with igniting deadly wildfires last year. The blazes left three people dead and burnt thousands of hectares (acres) of forests. Executions are common in war-torn Syria, where the decade-old conflict has left hundreds of thousands dead and displaced half

By LORNE COOK Associated Press BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO defense ministers are weighing what lessons to draw from the military mission in Afghanistan, including whether to even undertake major operations outside Europe and North America. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg says Afghanistan “highlights the challenges and the risks to engage in big missions and operations outside

By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV Associated Press MOSCOW (AP) — Authorities in Moscow have announced plans to shut restaurants and non-food stores and introduce other restrictions later this month as Russia registered the highest daily numbers of new coronavirus infections and deaths since the start of the pandemic. The government coronavirus task force reported 36,339 new confirmed

By CHINEDU ASADU Associated Press LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — A Nigerian separatist leader accused of instigating violence in country’s southeast has pleaded not guilty to terrorism and treason charges in a court in the capital, Abuja. Amid heavy security presence, Nnamdi Kanu, who also holds British citizenship, was brought into the court for his trial.

PARIS (AP) — Facebook says it’s struck a deal with a group of French publishers to pay for links to their news stories that are shared by people on the social network. The company said Thursday that it inked the licensing agreement with a group representing 300 French publishers to “improve the quality of online