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UN nuclear agency chief to visit Fukushima plant to see final preparations for release of wastewater

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

TOKYO (AP) — The chief of the U.N. nuclear agency will visit Japan next week to meet with Japanese leaders and see final preparations for the release of treated radioactive wastewater from the damaged Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean, officials said Friday.Japan’s government hopes the visit by International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Mariano Grossi will add credibility to the discharge plan. It has been strongly opposed by local fishing groups and by neighboring South Korea, China and some Pacific Island nations over safety concerns.Grossi will visit Japan July 4-7, Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi said. He is expected to meet with Hayashi, Industry Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura and Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and visit the Fukushima plant, which was damaged by a massive earthquake and tsunami in 2011.“Japan attaches great importance to the efforts of the IAEA, which serves an important role in promoting nuclear nonproliferation and peaceful uses of nucle...

Transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney says Bud Light didn’t support her during backlash

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

Transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney says she felt abandoned by Bud Light after facing “more bullying and transphobia than I could have ever imagined” over her partnership with the beer giant.In a video posted Thursday to Instagram and TikTok, she said she “was waiting for the brand to reach out to me. But they never did.” She said she should have spoken out sooner but was afraid and hoped things would get better — but they didn’t.“For months now, I’ve been scared to leave my house,” Mulvaney said. “I have been ridiculed in public. I’ve been followed, and I have felt a loneliness that I wouldn’t wish on anyone.”A deluge of criticism and hate erupted soon after Mulvaney cracked open a Bud Light in an Instagram video on April 1 as part of a promotional contest for the beer brand. She showed off a can emblazoned with her face that Bud Light sent to her — one of many corporate freebies she gets and shares with her millions of followers.Conservative figures and others called...

The US flies nuclear-capable bombers in a fresh show of force against North Korea

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The United States flew nuclear-capable bombers to the Korean Peninsula on Friday in its latest show of force against North Korea, days after the North staged massive anti-U.S. rallies in its capital.The long-range B-52 bombers took part in joint aerial drills with other U.S. and South Korean fighter jets over the peninsula, South Korea’s Defense Ministry said in a statement. The bombers’ flyover is the latest in a series of temporary U.S. deployments of strategic assets in South Korea in response to North Korea’s push to expand its nuclear arsenal.Two weeks ago, the U.S. deployed a nuclear-powered submarine capable of carrying about 150 Tomahawk missiles to South Korean waters for the first time in six years. The USS Michigan’s arrival came a day after North Korea resumed missile tests to protest previous U.S.-South Korean drills that it views as an invasion rehearsal. The South Korean Defense Ministry said the B-52 bombers’ deployment boosted the vis...

Denver weather: More storm chances and cooler

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

DENVER (KDVR) - With extra clouds, highs in Denver weather only reach 70 degrees with early afternoon storms that will push out into the plains this evening.Weather Friday: Early afternoon stormsHighs in Denver will struggle to reach the low 70s Friday afternoon, keeping storm severity lower. Storms will fire up just after noon and push out into the plains in the early evening hours.On June 30, storms will begin just after noon in Denver.The Southeastern corner of the state has a slight risk for severe weather, including hail and isolated tornadoes.On June 30 the Southeastern corner of Colorado could see severe weather with hail and potential for tornadoes.Weather Friday night: Slow-clearing skiesCloudy skies will gradually clear overnight with comfortable lows in the middle 50s. Winds will be lighter overnight as the storms exit the state.Looking ahead: Warming over the weekendSaturday will see mostly sunny skies and below-average highs in the upper 70s. Sunday is warmer with highs...

Macron calls crisis talks after another night of violence across France, with more than 800 arrested

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

PARIS — The French government is scrambling to find a way to curb the violence that has taken place across the country for three nights in a row following the death of a teenager who was shot dead by police.President Emmanuel Macron is chairing a government crisis meeting Friday, the second one this week. He was in Brussels Thursday and Friday morning for a European Council summit but left to attend the ministerial meeting at 1 p.m.The president was “kept fully informed of events” while in Brussels, one of his advisers told Playbook Paris. There has been unrest across France after a 17-year-old was killed by police in a Paris suburb, with protesters targeting public buildings, transport systems, and shops with projectiles and Molotov cocktails. Riots have erupted in large cities such as Paris, Lyon, Lille, Marseille and Bordeaux, as well as smaller towns such as Roubaix. For local authorities, law enforcement, and young people in the impoverished banlieues, the shadow of the 20...

Boris Johnson ally quits ‘apathetic’ UK government, sparks row with Sunak

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

LONDON — Minister Zac Goldsmith quit the British government Friday with a stinging attack on Rishi Sunak’s environmental record.But his exit comes a day after MPs took him to task for sticking up for Boris Johnson — and it’s already kicked off a bitter row with No.10 Downing Street.In a highly-critical letter to the U.K. leader, the environment minister — who once ran for London mayor and was placed in the House of Lords by Johnson — said “this government’s apathy in the face of the greatest challenge we have faced makes continuing in my current role untenable.”The dramatic exit comes after Goldsmith, a longstanding environmentalist, was criticized by a cross-party committee for his recent role in backing Johnson.The privileges committee argued Thursday that allies of the former prime minister, including Goldsmith, had been part of a “coordinated campaign to interfere with” its work investigating Johnson’s conduct.Goldsmith was critici...

Prosecutor says Oscar-winning actor Kevin Spacey is ‘a sexual bully’ who preys on men

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

LONDON (AP) — Oscar-winning actor Kevin Spacey gets a thrill by preying on other men, a prosecutor told jurors during his sexual assault trial Friday in a London courtroom.Spacey is “a man who does not respect personal boundaries or space, a man who it would seem delights in making others feel powerless and uncomfortable — a sexual bully,” Prosecutor Christine Agnew said in her opening statement. “His preferred method of assault is, it appears, to grab aggressively other men in the crotch.”The four men who have accused Spacey of sexual assault did not know each other, but all “had the misfortune to attract” his attention, she said.Spacey, 63, has pleaded not guilty to a dozen charges including sexual assault, indecent assault and causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without consent.Defense lawyer Patrick Gibbs said Spacey denied all allegations of nonconsensual activity and told jurors to ask themselves as they listened to the evidence what — if ...

Jury deliberations set to continue in trial of man accused of killing Weymouth police officer, bystander

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

Jury deliberations are set to continue Friday in the trial of a man accused of killing a Weymouth police officer and an innocent bystander in 2018.During final arguments Wednesday, prosecutors, gripping the gun they say accused killer Emanuel Lopes used to murder Weymouth police Sgt. Michael Chesna and Vera Adams, describe how Lopes first struck Chesna in the head.“He takes this rock and he throws it, and where does it land? It lands on Sgt. Chesna’s head,” prosecutor Greg Connor told the jury in closing arguments. With Chesna’s heartbroken family listening to the impassioned closing arguments, prosecutors told jurors how Lopes grabbed the officer’s gun and opened fire. “He stood over Sgt. Chesna in a defensive posture and with two hands … he shot Sgt. Chesna eight times,” Connor said.Lopes’s attorney painted a very different story of a man wrestling with mental illness for years.“This case is not about sympathy for Mr. Lopes, it’s just about understanding what happened th...

Could DeMar DeRozan or Zach LaVine be traded? 4 questions for the Chicago Bulls before NBA free agency begins.

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

The Chicago Bulls enter the most crucial step of their offseason Friday as free agency opens across the NBA, placing the front office in a position to finally address issues plaguing the last two seasons.This should be a clear-cut offseason for the Bulls. This team’s needs are obvious: a point guard and a bolstered 3-point offense. But the same was true last summer, when the Bulls attempted to address identical problems by signing Andre Drummond and Goran Dragic, moving zero players in the process.Executive vice president of basketball operations Artūras Karnišovas echoed the same promises from last summer after the team traded in to make a second-round pick in the NBA draft.“We’re going to address the shooting, address the lead position,” Karnišovas said last week. “We’re gonna address it. Once free agency starts, I’m sure (more) information will come out and we’ll see what we have but there’s a lot of work to do....

This year’s Hajj was held in sweltering heat, and for those serving pilgrims there was little relief

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:50:09 GMT

MINA, Saudi Arabia (AP) — As hundreds of thousands of Muslim pilgrims walked in the footsteps of the prophets beneath a sweltering sun, contracted cleaners in lime-green jumpsuits held out matching plastic bags to collect their empty water bottles.It takes tens of thousands of cleaners, security personnel, medics and others to make the annual Hajj pilgrimage possible for 1.8 million faithful from around the world. As the Hajj concludes on Friday, the workers will begin a massive, weeklong cleanup effort.For the cleaners, who are migrant workers, it’s a much-needed source of income. But this year it was particularly trying, as temperatures regularly hovered around 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Farhrenheit) during the five-day pilgrimage, most of which is held outdoors with little if any shade.“This job is not easy,” said a 26-year-old trash collector as he took a quick break to splash water on his face before rushing back to his position as another wave of pilgrims approached...