Philippines mulls pullout of Syria peacekeepers The Philippine foreign secretary says he is recommending to President Benigno Aquino III to pull out all Filipino U.N. peacekeepers from the Golan Heights following the abduction of four by Syrian rebels. More
8 die in clothing factory fire in Bangladesh as Rana Plaza toll passes 900 Eight people were killed when a fire swept through a clothing factory in Bangladesh, police and an industry association official said on Thursday, as the death toll from the collapse of another factory building two weeks ago climbed above 900. More
Most people aren't meeting exercise guidelines Most adults in the USA aren't meeting the federal physical activity recommendations for both aerobic exercise and muscle-strengthening activity, according to government statistics out today. About 79% of adults don't meet the physical activity guidelines that advise getting at least 2½ hours a week of moderate-intensity aerobic activity such as brisk walking, or one hour and 15 minutes a week of vigorous-intensity aerobic activity, such as jogging. More
Pandemic 2025: Deadly Bird Flu Mutating Rapidly, Scientists Sound Alarm After First US H5N1 Death Five years after COVID-19, experts warn of a new pandemic threat as a rapidly mutating H5N1 bird flu strain emerges. Urgent precautions are essential to prevent a crisis. 01/20/2025 - 1:30 pm | View Link
CLIMATE MATTERS: Bird Flu Impacts Temperatures have been warming across planet Earth for at least the last 130 years. Birds tend to migrate in fall and winter to warmer weather. Still, these changes in temperatures and other variables ... 01/20/2025 - 8:00 am | View Link
Bird flu mutating very fast: Health experts warn after first human death in US Scientists have said that the strain developed changes that make it better at spreading, triggering inflammation, and causing severe disease. 01/19/2025 - 9:41 pm | View Link
First U.S. H5N1 Death Sparks Urgency: Scientists Warn That Bird Flu Is Mutating Faster Than Expected Researchers at Texas Biomed have identified nine mutations in a strain of bird flu found in a person in Texas. Bad news: This strain shows an increased ability to cause disease and is more effective ... 01/19/2025 - 3:09 pm | View Link
How deadly is bird flu in humans? What we know as US confirms 1st death How deadly is the bird flu? The US has reported its first death from avian influenza, H5N1. Here's what to know about bird flu mortality rate and who is at risk. 01/15/2025 - 8:14 pm | View Link
JERUSALEM — Israel’s top general resigned on Tuesday, citing the security and intelligence failures related to Hamas’ surprise attack that triggered the war in the Gaza Strip.
Israel meanwhile launched a large military operation in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday that the Palestinian Health Ministry said had killed at least six people and wounded 35.
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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily suspending all U. S. foreign assistance programs for 90 days pending reviews to determine whether they are aligned with his policy goals.
It was not immediately clear how much assistance would initially be affected by the Monday order as funding for many programs has already been appropriated by Congress and is obligated to be spent, if not already spent.
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The order, among many Trump signed on his first day back in office, said the “foreign aid industry and bureaucracy are not aligned with American interests and in many cases antithetical to American values” and “serve to destabilize world peace by promoting ideas in foreign countries that are directly inverse to harmonious and stable relations internal to and among countries.”
Read More: Breaking Down All of Trump’s Day 1 Presidential Actions
Consequently, Trump declared that “no further United States foreign assistance shall be disbursed in a manner that is not fully aligned with the foreign policy of the President of the United States.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during his confirmation hearing last week that “every dollar we spend, every program we fund, and every policy we pursue must be justified with the answer to three simple questions:
“Does it make America safer?
LONDON — The sequel to Prince Harry vs. the British tabloids begins Tuesday in a high-stakes trial pitting him against Rupert Murdoch’s newspapers that could cost him millions even if he wins.
Harry, 40, the younger son of King Charles III, and one other claimant remain alone among hundreds who have settled lawsuits against News Group Newspapers, the publisher of The Sun and the now-defunct News of the World, over allegations their phones were hacked and investigators unlawfully snooped on their lives.
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It will be the first case of its kind to go to trial against the publisher since a widespread phone hacking scandal forced Murdoch to close News of the World in 2011.
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.
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“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.
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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.
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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.