By Charlotte Reck, Billy Stockwell, CNN (CNN) — Spain, Ireland, Slovenia and the Netherlands announced their withdrawals Thursday from next year’s Eurovision Song Contest after organizers decided that Israel will be allowed to compete. Organizers of the pop music spectacle, which draws millions of viewers globally, met earlier Thursday to discuss Israel’s participation, amid calls
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By Alexandra Banner, CNN A pilot with the US Air Force’s elite Thunderbirds team ejected safely from a jet before it crashed in California on Wednesday. Video of the incident captured the fiery explosion as the plane plummeted into a dry lakebed. Here’s what else you need to know to get up to speed and
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By Jessie Yeung, Svitlana Vlasova (CNN) — Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow would seize Ukraine’s Donbas region “by military or other means,” digging in on one of his key demands as Ukrainian officials prepare for more peace talks that have yet to yield a deal. Putin arrived in New Delhi on Thursday where he
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WCCO By Rob Kuznia, CNN Minneapolis (CNN) — Everything seemed normal at Minneapolis’s Somali markets: Men sat in barber chairs, women browsed colorful garments at the boutiques and patrons sampled fried sambusas and rice dishes at the eateries, sometimes as the Muslim call to prayer was sung at low volume over the loudspeakers. But beneath
Continue Reading By Jessie Yeung, CNN (CNN) — China’s ruling Communist Party is using artificial intelligence to turbocharge the surveillance and control of its 1.4 billion citizens, with the technology reaching further into daily life, predicting public demonstrations and monitoring the moods of prison inmates, according to a new report. Many of these systems are already well-documented
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By Christian Edwards, CNN London (CNN) — Andrew Field recalls how his school in south London used to hand out a little blue book listing all the students enrolled that year. He says one boy used to go through the book to count how many children had the common English surname Smith, and how many
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By Lauren Kent, CNN (CNN) — The number of children who die before age 5 is expected to rise for the first time this century, amid sweeping cuts to global health funding by high-income countries, according to a new report from the Gates Foundation. Child mortality around the world is projected to reach an estimated
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By Rob Kuznia, CNN Minneapolis (CNN) — Everything seemed normal at Minneapolis’s Somali markets: Men sat in barber chairs, women browsed colorful garments at the boutiques and patrons sampled fried sambusas and rice dishes at the eateries, sometimes as the Muslim call to prayer was sung at low volume over the loudspeakers. But beneath the
Continue Reading By Sashikala VP, CNN (CNN) — Thirty-eight-year-old Rosy Devi’s body aches most of the time, short walks have become difficult, she loses her breath easily, has chest pain and feels her health is generally getting worse. It has been a gradual decline, she says, since her hysterectomy in 2019 which led to her prematurely going
Continue Reading By Michael Rios, Lex Harvey, CNN (CNN) — Honduras’ former President Juan Orlando Hernández thanked US President Donald Trump for pardoning his US drug trafficking conviction amid criticism from lawmakers that the pardon undermines the White House’s efforts to stop drug trafficking. “My profound gratitude goes to President (Trump) for having the courage to defend
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By Lauren del Valle, CNN (CNN) — The Massachusetts jury weighing the case of Brian Walshe saw a collection of evidence on Wednesday, including photos of items covered in what looked like blood, as prosecutors work to prove he murdered his wife around New Year’s 2023. The evidence capped the third day of witness testimony
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By Gloria Pazmino, CNN (CNN) — A group of New York state lawmakers introduced a bill Wednesday to ban demonstrations outside of houses of worship and reproductive health care clinics, days after a pro-Palestinian demonstration outside a prominent Manhattan synagogue led to criticism of Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s response. The bill would amend New York’s existing
Continue Reading By Daniel Wine, CNN 👋 Welcome to 5 Things PM! Throw another shrimp on the barbie. President Donald Trump said he’s looking Down Under for inspiration on how to improve the retirement savings system in the US. Here’s what else you might have missed during your busy day. 5 things 1️⃣ Sticker shock The average
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By Harmeet Kaur, CNN New York (CNN) — The news that Olivia Nuzzi had a book coming out was, in political and journalistic circles, the sensation of the fall season. In October of 2024, Nuzzi had lost her post at New York Magazine, where she’d been a star profiler of politicians, when it turned out
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By Tal Shalev, CNN (CNN) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his coalition on Wednesday boycotted a Knesset vote endorsing US President Donald Trump’s plan for Gaza. The vote, initiated by opposition leader Yair Lapid, passed with 39 votes in favor and none against. As the period to debate the proposal began, members of
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By Faith Karimi (CNN) — Gracie Muehlberger wrote letters to her future self and stored them in a multicolored trinket box on her dresser. Her notes, penned when she was 13 and signed “Gracie from the past,” bubbled with anticipation about her eighth-grade graduation, her first day of high school and life in college. She
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By Caitlin Danaher and Issy Ronald, CNN London (CNN) — A British nursery worker from London has pleaded guilty to 26 offenses against children, including nine counts of sexual assault, in what the Metropolitan Police has described as “one of the most harrowing and complex child sexual abuse investigations” undertaken by the force. Vincent Chan,
Continue Reading By Jack Guy and Hilary Whiteman, CNN (CNN) — Police in New Zealand have charged a man with theft after he allegedly stole a jewel-encrusted gold Fabergé egg locket from a jewelers by picking it up and swallowing it. The unusual incident occurred on Friday afternoon at a store in central Auckland, according to a
Continue Reading By Alexandra Banner, CNN The latest winter storm is heading out, but a sweeping chill is moving in — and parts of the US could soon face their coldest temperatures of the season. See which cities are bracing for record lows. Here’s what else you need to know to get up to speed and on
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By Hanna Park, CNN (CNN) — For nearly 40 years, the identity of the person who sexually assaulted and killed a 30-year-old woman found along a quiet stretch of rural highway south of Denver eluded investigators. Now, small pieces of preserved evidence – a pair of paper bags placed over the victim’s hands – have
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