MIAMI (AP) — The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration quietly removed its top official in Mexico last year over improper contact with lawyers for narcotraffickers, an embarrassing end to a brief tenure marked by deteriorating cooperation between the countries and a record flow of cocaine, heroin and fentanyl across the border.
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Winning matches at the Australian Open does not give Novak Djokovic all that much trouble.
BALTIMORE (AP) — The federal perjury case against Baltimore’s former top prosecutor Marilyn Mosby, who was scheduled to stand trial in March, likely faces further delays after a judge allowed her entire defense team to quit on Friday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden announced Jeff Zients as his next White House chief of staff on Friday, tapping an experienced technocrat who headed his administration's response to the COVID-19 pandemic as Biden prepares for a reelection bid while facing an onslaught of investigations from a newly empowered House Republican majority.
Between financially helping his parents and losing income as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Jeremy Mazza landed into serious credit card debt. Relief came from a source he wasn’t expecting: his partner, Ginna Lambert, who had come into a small inheritance.
MOSCOW (AP) — A former Russian Orthodox monk, who denied that the coronavirus existed and defied the Kremlin, was handed a seven-year prison sentence Friday.
Nikolai Romanov, 67, who was known as Father Sergiy until his excommunication by the Russian Orthodox Church, urged his followers to disobey the Russian government's lockdown measures and spread conspiracy theories about a global plot to control the masses.
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s government said Friday it will promote civilian efforts to provide humanitarian assistance to North Korea in hopes of softening a diplomatic freeze deepened by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s growing nuclear ambitions.
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea says it will continue to restrict the entry of short-term travelers from China through the end of February over concerns that the spread of COVID-19 in that country may worsen following the Lunar New Year’s holidays.
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — They held their on-ice embrace a little longer this time, kneeling in an end pose moments after a near-flawless short program.
Overwhelming favorite and reigning world champions Alexa Knierim and Brandon Frazier scored a personal-best 81.96 on Thursday for a commanding lead in the first day of the U.S.
The U.S. is poised to make COVID-19 vaccinations more like a yearly flu shot, a major shift in strategy despite a long list of questions about how to best protect against a still rapidly mutating virus.
ATLANTA (AP) — Republicans in the Georgia Senate on Thursday announced goals to further lower state income tax rates and improve reading instruction for young public school students, although tax changes are unlikely to occur before the 2024 legislative session and leaders could be find themselves short of time to build the consensus for changes in literacy instruction this year.
NEW YORK (AP) — Payment processing giant Visa Inc. said Thursday that its profits rose 6% in its latest quarter from a year earlier, helped by the continued rise of digital payments across the globe.
SAQQARA, Egypt (AP) — Egypt on Thursday unveiled dozens of new archaeological discoveries, including two ancient tombs, at a Pharaonic necropolis just outside of the capital Cairo.
The artefacts, unearthed during a year-long excavation, were found beneath an ancient stone enclosure near the Saqqara pyramids and date back to the fifth and sixth dynasties of the Old Kingdom, spanning from roughly 2500 B.C to 2100 B.C., the excavation team said.
For the past couple of years, hotel and airline loyalty programs have extended elite status in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. But in 2023, that’s coming to an end. A tsunami of downgrades will wipe out some travelers’ elite status because pandemic-era offers are expiring and loyalty programs are upping the qualification requirements.
HONG KONG (AP) — About 20% of the Americans in Hong Kong have left for various reasons over the past two years, the U.S. consul general in the semi-autonomous Chinese city said, drawing harsh criticism from Beijing for allegedly interfering in its affairs.
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations forecast Wednesday that global economic growth will fall significantly to 1.9% this year as a result of the food and energy crisis sparked by the war in Ukraine, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, persistently high inflation and the climate emergency.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Jill Biden says her Inauguration Day outfits, now featured in a Smithsonian museum exhibit about first ladies, were a “voice for me on one of the most important days of my life.”
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A former Virginia Parole Board chair violated state policy and law in her handling of cases at the start of the coronavirus pandemic and could have faced criminal charges if not for the statute of limitations, the state's attorney general said Wednesday.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Los Angeles County's annual count of homeless residents began Tuesday night — a crucial part of the region's efforts to get tens of thousands of unhoused people off the streets.
Up to 6,000 clipboard-toting volunteers with the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority fanned out for the effort’s main component, the unsheltered street tally.
NEW YORK (AP) — One day in January, a once-regular customer at Fuel Training Studio in Newburyport, Massachusetts, stopped in to take a “shred” class. She hadn’t stepped foot in the gym since before the pandemic.
BANGKOK (AP) — Growing numbers of people in Asia lack enough to eat as food insecurity rises with higher prices and worsening poverty, according to a report released Tuesday by the Food and Agricultural Organization and other United Nations agencies.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. health officials want to make COVID-19 vaccinations more like the annual flu shot.
The Food and Drug Administration on Monday proposed a simplified approach for future vaccination efforts, allowing most adults and children to get a once-a-year shot to protect against the mutating virus.
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Lynette Hardaway, a zealous supporter of former President Donald Trump whose death had prompted widespread speculation over its cause, died earlier this month of a heart condition, according to a death certificate obtained Monday by The Associated Press.
LONDON (AP) — Music streaming service Spotify said Monday it's cutting 6% of its global workforce, or about 600 jobs, becoming yet another tech company forced to rethink its pandemic-era expansion as the economic outlook weakens.
BEIJING (AP) — From Jakarta to Seoul, Bangkok to Beijing, people in Asia have been celebrating the Lunar New Year marking the start of the Year of the Rabbit.
Lunar New Year is the most important holiday in the Chinese calendar, a time to gather with family, reconnect with friends and indulge in food and drink.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is expected to name Jeff Zients, who ran the administration's response to the COVID-19 pandemic at the start of Biden's term, as his next chief of staff, according to two people familiar with the matter.
HONG KONG (AP) — Rabbits scamper around a play area in a climate-controlled building in suburban Hong Kong, some climbing a castle made of wood while others explore a cotton tunnel.
In one of the world's most densely populated cities, where most apartments range from small to miniscule, rabbits are popular pets.
BEIJING (AP) — People across China rang in the Lunar New Year on Sunday with large family gatherings and crowds visiting temples after the government lifted its strict “zero-COVID” policy, marking the biggest festive celebration since the pandemic began three years ago.
REHOBOTH BEACH, Del. (AP) — White House chief of staff Ron Klain, who has spent more than two years as President Joe Biden's top aide, is preparing to leave his job in the coming weeks, according to a person familiar with Klain's plans.
The Navajo Nation has rescinded a mask mandate that's been in effect since the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, officials announced Friday, fulfilling a pledge that new tribal President Buu Nygren made while campaigning for the office.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Education Minister Chris Hipkins is set to become New Zealand's next prime minister after he was the only candidate to enter the contest Saturday to replace Jacinda Ardern.
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, the 2016 Democratic vice presidential nominee and a fixture in Virginia politics for decades, said Friday that he would seek reelection next year, easing his party’s worries about holding on to a seat in a state now led by a Republican governor.
CHICAGO (AP) —
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday that two years into President Joe Biden’s administration, the United States is “in a better place in the world” and better positioned to address global issues including climate change, COVID-19 and dangerous opioids.
NEW YORK (AP) — Administrators of a trust fund established to preserve historic Black churches in the United States on Friday revealed a list of houses of worship receiving $4 million in financial grants.
DAVOS, Switzerland (AP) — Inspections of ships carrying Ukrainian grain and other food exports have slowed to half their peak rate under a U.N.-brokered wartime agreement, creating backlogs in vessels meant to carry supplies to developing nations where people are going hungry, United Nations and Ukrainian officials say.
FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Still fuming over pandemic-era shutdowns, Kentucky Republicans are pushing to obtain behind-the-scenes correspondence that Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear and his inner circle had about school closures at the height of the COVID-19 outbreak.
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Friday announced plans to downgrade the legal status of COVID-19 to the equivalent of seasonal influenza in the spring, a move that would further relax mask wearing and other preventive measures as the country seeks to return to normalcy.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — When Jacinda Ardern announced this week she was stepping down as New Zealand's prime minister, speculation began almost immediately about what she might do for a second act.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A federal court jury convicted a Kansas man who insisted that a death threat he made against U.S. Rep. Jake LaTurner was a message from God, amid what authorities have said is a sharp rise in threats against members of Congress and their families.
BANGKOK (AP) — A hoped-for boom in Chinese tourism in Asia over next week’s Lunar New Year holidays looks set to be more of a blip as most travelers opt to stay inside China if they go anywhere.
From the beaches of Bali to Hokkaido’s powdery ski slopes, the hordes of Chinese often seen in pre-COVID days will still be missing, tour operators say.
EVANSTON, Ill. (AP) — Northwestern has postponed a second straight men's basketball game because of COVID-19 health and safety protocols.
The Wildcats were slated to host Wisconsin on Saturday, but they announced Thursday night that the game would not be played as scheduled.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — More than half a million New Mexicans will see the amount of money they have to spend on groceries each month shrink significantly when the U.S. government cuts off extra aid that had been doled out during the coronavirus pandemic.