Islamic State Takes Damascus Area After Rebels Pull Out: Monitor

Pale, gaunt, and with a freshly shaved head, Chinese actor Wang Xing sat flanked by Thai police in the border town of Mae Sot on Jan. 7 to discuss his terrifying ordeal. The 31-year-old had flown to Bangkok for what he thought was a meeting with Thai movie executives. Instead, he was trafficked across the border to wartorn Myanmar’s lawless Myawaddy region, where he was forcibly put to work conducting online scams. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] “The environment was very dangerous,” Wang said on a video filmed on his flight home published by Chinese media.

ISLAMABAD — A prisoner swap between the United States and Afghanistan’s Taliban freed two Americans in exchange for a Taliban figure imprisoned for life in California on drug trafficking and terrorism charges, officials said Tuesday. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The deal came as Joe Biden, who oversaw the chaotic U. S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, handed power over to returning President Donald Trump.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — Among other false and misleading claims in U. S. President Donald Trump’s inauguration addresses on Tuesday, his declaration that Americans “split the atom” prompted vexed social media posts by New Zealanders, who said the achievement belonged to a pioneering scientist revered in his homeland. Ernest Rutherford, a Nobel Prize winner known as the father of nuclear physics, is regarded by many as the first to knowingly split the atom by artificially inducing a nuclear reaction in 1917 while he worked at a university in Manchester in the United Kingdom. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The achievement is also credited to English scientist John Douglas Cockroft and Ireland’s Ernest Walton, researchers in 1932 at a British laboratory developed by Rutherford.

BEIJING — China’s vice president held meetings with the U. S. vice president-elect and U. S. business leaders, including Elon Musk, in Washington on the eve of Donald Trump’s inauguration, as the two major powers tackle ongoing tensions over trade and technology. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Han Zheng, who serves as an envoy for Chinese President Xi Jinping at the inauguration, “discussed a range of topics including fentanyl, balancing trade and regional stability” with J.

BOGOTÁ, Colombia — More than 80 people were killed in the country’s northeast over the weekend following the government’s failed attempts to hold peace talks with the National Liberation Army, a Colombian official said. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Twenty others were injured in the violence that has forced thousands to flee as Colombia’s army scrambled to evacuate people on Sunday, according to William Villamizar, governor of North Santander, where many of the killings took place. Among the victims are community leader Carmelo Guerrero and seven people who sought to sign a peace deal, according to a report that a government ombudsman agency released late Saturday. Officials said the attacks happened in several towns located in the Catatumbo region near the border with Venezuela, with at least three people who were part of the peace talks being kidnapped. Thousands of people are fleeing the area, with some hiding in the nearby lush mountains or seeking help at government shelters. “We were caught in the crossfire,” said Juan Gutiérrez, who fled with his family to a temporary shelter in Tibú after they were forced to leave behind their animals and belongings.

Leaders from across the world of business, technology, policy, and entertainment gathered at the TIME100 Davos Dinner as the World Economic Forum’s 55th annual meeting kicked off on Jan. 20. In keeping with this year’s annual meeting theme “Collaboration for the Intelligent Age,” Dario Amodei, CEO and co-founder of AI company Anthropic, joined TIME editor-in-chief Sam Jacobs on stage to talk about the future of AI.