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In Niger, US seeks to hang on to its last, best counterterrorist outpost in West Africa

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Ten days into a coup in Niger, life has become more challenging for U.S. forces at a counterterrorism base in a region of West Africa known as the world’s epicenter of terrorism.Flights in and out of the country have been curtailed as coup leaders require Americans to seek permission for each flight. Fuel shortages mean the U.S. commander must sign off whenever an aircraft is refueled.And yet, as several European countries evacuate Niger, the Biden administration is showing itself intent on staying. It sees Niger as the United States’ last, best counterterrorism outpost — and until the coup, a promising democracy — in an unstable region south of the Sahara Desert.Abandoning it risks not only a surge in jihadist groups, but even greater influence by Russia’s Wagner mercenary group. While some European governments shut embassies and evacuated their citizens on military flights this week, as scattered anti-Western protests broke out following the coup, U.S. diplomats ...

Congressional delegation to tour blood-stained halls where Parkland school massacre happened

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

PARKLAND, Fla. (AP) — Nine members of Congress are expected to tour the blood-stained and bullet-pocked halls at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Friday, shortly before ballistics technicians reenact the massacre that left 14 students and three staff members dead. Few have been inside the three-story building since the Valentine’s Day 2018 shooting. The structure looms over the campus, locked behind a chain-link fence for use as evidence in last year’s penalty trial for the shooter.There is broken glass on the floor, along with wilted roses, deflated balloons and discarded gifts. Opened textbooks and laptop computers remain on students’ desks — at least those that weren’t toppled during the chaos. In one classroom, there is an unfinished chess game one of the slain students had been playing, the pieces unmoved. The Associated Press was one of five media outlets allowed to tour the building after shooter Nikolas Cruz’s jury went through. The shooting, which s...

Diana Taurasi becomes first WNBA player to reach 10,000 points, scoring season-high 42 for Mercury

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

PHOENIX (AP) — Diana Taurasi received a pass and in an instant, the shot was off her fingertips. It was a 3-pointer that splashed through the net, just like so many others.Taurasi became the first WNBA player to reach 10,000 points, hitting the mark with 8:23 remaining in the third quarter against the Atlanta Dream on Thursday night. After the shot, the crowd in Phoenix erupted in cheers and Taurasi’s teammates surrounded her in a circle, jumping up and down and celebrating.It was part of a vintage night for Taurasi, who reminded everyone just how incredible she’s been in her career with a season-high 42 points on 12 of 21 shooting, including 6 of 13 from 3-point range. She also hit all 12 of her free throws and the Mercury won 91-71.The 41-year-old guard started the night needing 18 points to make it to 10,000 — and finished at 10,024.“On behalf of the WNBA and basketball fans worldwide, I want to extend my heartfelt congratulations to Diana on reaching the incredible m...

Trump was told not to talk to witnesses in 2020 election conspiracy case. That could be a challenge.

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — It was a routine part of a federal court hearing: The defendant was told not to discuss the case with any witnesses without lawyers present.But there’s nothing routine about this case. The defendant is Donald Trump, accused of orchestrating a conspiracy to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The potential witness pool is vast and includes members of the former president’s inner circle deeply involved in his reelection campaign, including some currently on his payroll. His lies about the election — which form the basis of the charges — are repeated in nearly every speech he gives.“The standard language may not work here, when you have thousands of Americans who could be witnesses and he continues to have daily contact with people who may be involved,” said Laurie Levenson, a law professor at Loyola Law School of Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. “Everything is more complicated in this case because of who the defendant is, what he has don...

A baby was found in the rubble of a US raid in Afghanistan. But who exactly was killed and why?

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

The Afghan villager was afraid the American soldiers might come. And one cool night in fall, as his children lay asleep, helicopters roared overhead.At the first sound of gunshots, he yelled for his wife and 10 children to take cover. His young daughter grabbed her sleeping infant sister off the bed. Their mud compound exploded, and a blast sent a huge shock through the home.“My small sister fell away from my arms,” the girl, now a teenager, whispered, so quietly she could barely be heard above the breeze. “The wind blew her out of my hands.”Today, what exactly happened that night is at the center of a bitter international custody dispute over an orphaned baby found amid the rubble. The high-profile legal battle pits an Afghan family against an American one, and has drawn responses from the White House and the Taliban.The Afghan government and the International Committee of the Red Cross determined that the baby belonged to this Afghan villager. Friends and family say he was a farme...

After helping prevent extinctions for 50 years, the Endangered Species Act itself may be in peril

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

SHARON TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — Biologist Ashley Wilson carefully disentangled a bat from netting above a tree-lined river and examined the wriggling, furry mammal in her headlamp’s glow. “Another big brown,” she said with a sigh.It was a common type, one of many Wilson and colleagues had snagged on summer nights in the southern Michigan countryside. They were looking for increasingly scarce Indiana and northern long-eared bats, which historically migrated there for birthing season, sheltering behind peeling bark of dead trees.The scientists had yet to spot either species this year as they embarked on a netting mission.“It’s a bad suggestion if we do not catch one. It doesn’t look good,” said Allen Kurta, an Eastern Michigan University professor who has studied bats for more than 40 years.The two bat varieties are designated as imperiled under the Endangered Species Act, the bedrock U.S. law intended to keep animal and plant types from dying out. Enacted in 197...

Play It Again, Joe. Biden bets that repeating himself is smart politics

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden has his zingers (“This is not your father’s Republican Party”). He’s got patriotism (“This is the United States of America, dammit”). He’s got a geometry-based explanation on how grow to the economy (“from the middle out and the bottom up”). Move over, Beyonce and Taylor Swift. Biden has his own greatest hits and he’s keeping them on repeat.If you’ve heard one of the president’s recent speeches, you’ve basically heard them all — and you’re sure to keep hearing the same refrains in the year-plus leading up to Election Day 2024. People in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah will get to sample the playlist starting Tuesday, when Biden makes a three-day swing through the Southwest.Biden knows where the country is in the arc of history (“at an inflection point”). He knows what the middle class needs (“a little bit of breathing room”). Did you know his wife, Jill, is from Philadelphia? Yep, he “married a Philly girl” and will be “sleeping alone” ...

Haitians express skepticism over Kenya’s offer to UN to send police to confront gangs

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI (AP) — Haitians are expressing skepticism over an offer by Kenya to lead an international police force aimed at combatting the gang violence that has wracked the Caribbean nation.They say the sexual abuse and a devastating cholera outbreak that have accompanied foreign forces in past decades don’t inspire much trust. But Haitians also say uncontrolled bloodshed in their country leaves them with few other options.Florence Casimir, an elementary school teacher, said that while past international interventions have damaged Haiti, their abuses don’t compare to the brutality of gangs, which kidnap her students and force parents to pay hefty ransoms.“It will never be better (than past interventions), but the Haitian people don’t have a choice at this point,” Casimir said. “The Haitian people can’t fight it on their own.”After Primer Minister Ariel Henry urged the world in October to deploy an armed force to fight the gangs, the United Nations has struggled to c...

US economy likely generated 200,000 new jobs in July, showing more resilience in face of rate hikes

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The American economy has generated at least 200,000 new jobs for a record 30 straight months. And the streak likely continued into July. But just barely.The Labor Department’s latest jobs report, out Friday, is expected to show that employers tacked on exactly 200,000 jobs last month, according to a survey of forecasters by the data firm FactSet. That would be fewest since December 2020 – but still a healthy number and a sign that the U.S. labor market remains sturdy despite markedly higher interest rates.In another sign of strength, the unemployment rate is expected to stay at 3.6%, not far off a half-century low.The U.S. economy and job market have repeatedly defied predictions of an impending recession. Increasingly, economists are expressing confidence that inflation fighters at the Federal Reserve can pull off a rare “soft landing’’ – raising interest rates just enough to rein in rising prices without tipping the world’s largest economy into recession. Consume...

SKY5 LIVE: Authorities pursue motorcyclist in Los Angeles County

Published Wed, 25 Dec 2024 07:17:19 GMT

Authorities are pursuing a motorcyclist in Los Angeles County on Thursday night.The suspect was initially wanted for speeding, according to the California Highway Patrol. The biker was seen hitting speeds up to 120 miles per hour while dangerously weaving through highway traffic and surface streets.Sky5 is overhead.