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Slovakia’s president is ready to swear in a new Cabinet after partner replaces ministry nominee

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP) — Slovakia’s president is ready to swear in a new Cabinet led by a former populist prime minister after a coalition partner agreed to replace its nominee for environment minister known for not believing in the threat of climate change, the presidential office said on Tuesday.President Zuzana Caputova was set to appoint the new government on Wednesday.Caputova, a Liberal, last week said Rudolf Huliak, who was nominated by the ultranationalist and pro-Russian Slovak National Party, could not ensure the proper functioning of the environment ministry because he opposes the government’s long-term environmental policies and Slovakia’s international obligations.The Slovak National Party announced Tuesday the nomination of Tomas Tabara instead. Tabara is also known for controversial statements about the environment.Huliak was the most controversial of the Cabinet candidates presented to the president by former populist prime minister Robert Fico, whose leftist Smer...

The body of a man who was missing after fishing boat sank off Connecticut is recovered

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

WESTPORT, Conn. (AP) — The body of one of two boaters who went missing in the Long Island Sound off Connecticut has been recovered, authorities said.The remains of Juan Gabriel Valle Pineda were recovered at 4:30 p.m. Monday by Bridgeport Fire Department staffers, Westport Police Lt. Eric Woods said.Pineda, 38, of Spring Valley, New York, was one of five people in a small fishing boat that sank near Westport on Sunday. Three of them were rescued.The sunken boat was found earlier Tuesday, Woods said.“Westport Police extend our sympathies to the family of the deceased and are hopeful of recovering the second missing person,” he said.The Associated Press

Pakistani court extends protection from arrest in graft cases to former premier Nawaz Sharif

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

ISLAMABAD (AP) — A Pakistani court has extended protection from arrest to former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in graft cases while another withdrew its arrest warrant against him on Tuesday following his return home after four years of self-imposed exile in London. Sharif appeared at the Islamabad High Court and the anti-graft tribunal to appeal his 2018 conviction on corruption and clear his name prior to parliamentary elections due in January. The court extended Sharif’s bail until Thursday, his lawyer Azam Nazeer Tarar said. Hundreds of his supporters gathered outside the court complex building, throwing rose petals on his car as he arrived amid tight security. Sharif stepped down as prime minister in 2017 over corruption charges. In 2018, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison by the anti-graft tribunal in a corruption case involving purchases of luxury apartments in London. A year later, he complained of chest pains and was granted permission by his then-successor Imran Kh...

Tropical Storm Otis forecast to strengthen to hurricane before landfall near Mexico’s Acapulco

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Tropical Storm Otis strengthened early Tuesday as it approached Mexico’s southern Pacific coast and was forecast to become a hurricane before making landfall near the resort of Acapulco late Tuesday or early Wednesday.The U.S. National Hurricane Center said that Otis was about 175 miles (280 kilometers) south-southeast of Acapulco on Tuesday morning with winds of 65 mph (100 kph). It was moving north-northwest at 8 mph (13 kph).There was a hurricane warning in effect from Lagunas de Chachua to Zihuatenejo.Otis was expected to dump five to 10 inches of rain on the southern state of Guerrero with as much as 15 inches possible in some areas. That raised the possibility of mudslides in Guerrero’s steep mountainous terrain.In the Atlantic, Hurricane Tammy continued moving northeastward over open water with winds of 75 mph (120 kph) after sweeping through the Lesser Antilles over the weekend. Tammy was located about 605 miles (975 kilometers) south-southeast of Bermuda....

At least 50 people are kidnapped over two days in northern Cameroon by unknown gunmen

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

YAOUNDE, Cameroon (AP) — At least 50 people were kidnapped in two separate incidents over two days in northern Cameroon, local authorities said Tuesday.The kidnappings occurred Sunday and Monday afternoons by an unknown armed group near the border with Chad, the mayor of Touboro town, Celestin Yandal, told The Associated Press.Seven people have been released so far. Abductions in this area happen often, but locals say the scale of these attacks is rare.The first kidnapping took place between Touboro and Koutere towns, where mostly Chadians were taken as well as some people from Cameroon including students and shopkeepers, the mayor said.The second abduction occurred while people were traveling on a bus from Ngaoundere city to Touboro, he said.Cameroon has been plagued by fighting since English-speaking separatists launched a rebellion in the Central African nation in 2017 with the stated goal of breaking away from the area dominated by the French-speaking majority and setting up an ...

Funeral services planned for Philadelphia police officer killed in airport garage shooting

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Funeral services are planned Tuesday for a Philadelphia police officer killed in an airport parking garage shooting that also wounded another officer earlier this month.A funeral Mass for Officer Richard Mendez is scheduled to begin at noon Tuesday at the Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Philadelphia with family, friends, law enforcement personnel and dignitaries in attendance. Interment is to follow at Forrest Hills Cemetery in northeast Philadelphia.Mendez and Officer Raul Ortiz had just started their shift around 11 p.m. on Oct. 12 when they heard breaking glass and saw several people breaking into a car in the parking lot at Philadelphia International Airport, police said. A confrontation ensued and the two officers and one of the suspects were shot.Mendez, 50, who had been on the force for more than two decades, was shot four times and pronounced dead at a hospital, police said. Ortiz, also a 20-year veteran, was shot once in the arm and has si...

Wisconsin officers fatally shoot person on school roof in exchange of gunfire, state police say

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

GERMANTOWN, Wis. — Police officers in suburban Milwaukee have killed a person who fired at them from a middle school roof.Dozens of students were in the building during the exchange of gunfire but none were hurt, officials said.The incident began around 6:30 p.m. Monday when officers with the Germantown Police Department responded to a call of a person acting “erratically” in Kennedy Middle School’s parking lot, the Wisconsin Department of Justice said in a statement. When officers arrived the person climbed onto the school’s roof and fired at them. Three officers returned fire, killing the person, the statement said. As many as 70 students were in the school, which went into a lockdown. The students were later bused to an elementary school where they were reunited with family.“This is believed to be an isolated incident,” the Justice Department statement said, adding that there’s no danger to the public. “All interactions with the subject occurred outside of the b...

Georgia Supreme Court sends abortion law challenge back to lower court, leaving access unchanged

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

ATLANTA (AP) — The Georgia Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a lower court ruling that the state’s restrictive abortion law was invalid, leaving limited access to abortions unchanged for now.Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney said last November that the ban was “unequivocally unconstitutional” because it was enacted in 2019, when Roe v. Wade allowed abortions well past six weeks.Tuesday’s ruling does not change abortion access in Georgia and may not be the last word on the state’s ban. The state Supreme Court had previously allowed enforcement of the ban to resume while it considered an appeal of the lower court decision. The lower court judge has also not ruled on the merits of other arguments in a lawsuit challenging the ban.McBurney had said the law was void from the start, and therefore, the measure did not become law when it was enacted and could not become law even after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year.State officials challen...

Qatar becomes a key intermediary in Israel-Hamas war as fate of hostages hangs in the balance

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

JERUSALEM (AP) — The gas-rich nation of Qatar has become a key intermediary over the fate of some 200 hostages held by Hamas militants after their unprecedented attack on Israel, once again putting the small Arabian Peninsula country in the spotlight. The negotiations have also thrust Qatar into a delicate international balancing act as it maintains a relationship with those viewed as militant groups by the West while trying to preserve its close security ties with the United States. Under arrangements stemming from past Hamas cease-fire understandings with Israel, the gas-rich emirate of Qatar has paid the salaries of civil servants in the Gaza Strip, provided direct cash transfers to poor families and offered other kinds of humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza.Qatar has also hosted Hamas’ political office in its capital of Doha for over a decade. Among officials based there is Khaled Mashaal, an exiled Hamas member who survived a 1997 Israeli assassination attempt in Jor...

Pope accepts resignation of bishop of Polish diocese where gay orgy scandal under investigation

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 05:46:41 GMT

ROME (AP) — The pope on Tuesday accepted the resignation of a Polish bishop whose diocese has been rocked for weeks by reports of a gay orgy involving a male prostitute in a priest’s apartment.The Vatican didn’t give a reason for why Bishop Grzegorz Kaszak was resigning as head of the diocese of Sosnowiec, in southwestern Poland. At 59, he is several years shy of the normal retirement age of 75.But his diocese has been in the spotlight for over a month after one of his priests was placed under criminal investigation for having allegedly organized a gay orgy at his apartment in Dabrowa Gornicza. Polish media reported that a male prostitute collapsed after overdosing on erectile dysfunction pills.A prosecutor said the priest is suspected of “failing to provide assistance to a person whose life is at risk,” for having allegedly tried to bar police and paramedics from entering the apartment.Three weeks after the scandal erupted, Kaszak issued a statement calling for priests in the dioce...