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China promises to help with gas pipeline probe, Finnish PM says

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo has said he could ask for EU funding to repair the undersea Balticconnector pipeline, as a probe continues into the potential role of a Chinese ship in the damage.“We have a clear picture of what has happened. Now we are cooperating with China to find the role of the Chinese ship which was in this area at the time the damage happened,” Orpo said on arrival at the European Council summit in Brussels. “They have promised to do good collaboration.”Earlier this month, the 77-kilometer Balticconnector gas pipeline  — located in the Baltic Sea and linking NATO members Finland and Estonia — suffered from an unusual drop in pressure due to a leak. The Finnish National Bureau of Investigation found a large anchor close to the damaged pipeline, with the Chinese ship now under the investigation spotlight.To help repair the damaged pipeline, Orpo plans to ask for EU funding for countering hybrid threats. “The EU has been closely...

Australia pushes for EU deal at upcoming trade meeting

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

Canberra is playing the now-or-never card with Brussels ahead of a meeting between Australian Trade Minister Don Farrell and the EU’s trade chief Valdis Dombrovskis in Japan. Hopes are rising that the two can bridge the remaining gaps when they meet in Osaka on Monday, at the tail end of a weekend meeting of G7 trade ministers. Australia is ready to politically seal the deal if Brussels budges a bit on agricultural concessions. Failure to sign now could mean having to wait until the next European Commission is appointed after European elections next June.“If we haven’t got a deal, the Europeans move into their electoral cycle for elections next year,” Farrell said in a podcast on Wednesday. “I think we will have lost the opportunity for two, perhaps three years to come back and resolve this.”Australia performed a theatrical walk-out in July, as Canberra felt that the offer on the table wouldn’t open the EU market sufficiently to Australian farm produce.“If the offer is th...

Rep. Jamaal Bowman pleads guilty to misdemeanor for falsely pulling fire alarm in House office building

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

(CNN) — Rep. Jamaal Bowman, a New York Democrat, pleaded guilty Thursday to a misdemeanor charge for falsely triggering a fire alarm in a House office building.Bowman struck a deal with the Washington, DC, Attorney General’s office, in which he pleaded guilty to the single misdemeanor offense.According to the terms of the deal read aloud in court, Bowman’s sentencing will be deferred for three months. During that time, Bowman will be on probation, will pay a $1,000 fine and will write an apology letter to the US Capitol Police.If he fulfills these terms, prosecutors will drop the charge at his sentencing hearing on January 29.Bowman was caught on tape pulling the fire alarm in the Cannon House Office Building in late September, shortly before the House was scheduled to vote on a government funding bill. The building was subsequently evacuated.It’s still possible for Bowman to face federal prosecution over the incident, though it is unclear clear whether Justice D...

Israeli troops briefly raid northern Gaza to ‘prepare’ for an expected full-scale incursion

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

By NAJIB JOBAIN, KAREEM CHEHAYEB and AMY TEIBEL (Associated Press)RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli troops and tanks briefly raided northern Gaza overnight, the military said Thursday, engaging with Hamas terrorists and targeting anti-tank weapons in order to “prepare the battlefield” before an expected ground invasion.The raid came after after more than two weeks of devastating airstrikes in the small, densely-populated territory — with more than 250 in the past 24 hours — and as the U.N. and other world leaders warn of a dire humanitarian crisis getting worse.Israel has imposed a suffocating siege on Gaza since Hamas’ bloody rampage and hostage-taking across southern Israel ignited the war. Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union. Residents are running out of food, water and medicine, and U.N. workers have barely any fuel left to support their relief missions across Gaza, where more than 1 million Palestinians have b...

Massachusetts State Police detail efforts working with Maine on manhunt for mass shooting suspect Robert Card

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

Massachusetts State Police are in regular contact with authorities in Maine as the manhunt for Robert Card, wanted in connection with a massacre in Lewiston, Maine, continues.At least 18 people were killed in locations that include a bowling alley and local pub.“Massachusetts State Police Colonel John Mawn has been in contact with his counterparts from Maine and the other New England states to assess and coordinate capabilities for providing mutual aid to the Maine State Police,” according to an MSP statement released Thursday morning. “The full complement of Massachusetts State Police assets stand ready for deployment if requested, as necessitated by the evolving investigation and fugitive apprehension mission.”The trooper deployed, a member of the MSP bomb squad, was sent in along with his K9 partner as a member of a federal ATF task force, according to the MSP.State police are also continuing to probe whether or not Card, 40, has any connections to to Mass...

Hurricane Otis caused 27 confirmed deaths and left 4 missing, Mexican authorities report

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

By MARK STEVENSON (Associated Press)ACAPULCO, Mexico (AP) — Mexican authorities on Thursday gave the first human toll for Hurricane Otis’ destruction along the country’s Pacific coast: at least 27 dead and four missing.Tens of thousands of residents in damaged homes without electricity awaited help more than a day after Otis roared ashore in Acapulco. The municipal water system wasn’t functioning, because there was no electricity to run the pumps.President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said at his morning news briefing that the deaths occurred around Acapulco, but provided few details. He acknowledged that the government was late in arriving because of the havoc Otis left behind.López Obrador, who made it into Acapulco late Wednesday, said the destruction was so complete in the impact zone that not a single power line pole remained standing. Outside the city, small farmers had their corn crops devastated by Otis’ wind and pounding rain, he said. Restoring power...

Canada Border Services Agency issues alert about man wanted for Maine mass shooting

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

The Canada Border Services Agency has issued an “armed and dangerous” alert to its officers stationed along the Canada-U.S. border, warning them to be on the lookout for the man suspected of fatally shooting at least 18 people in southern Maine.The shootings were reported Wednesday night in Lewiston, about 260 kilometres southwest of the New Brunswick border.A police bulletin identified the suspect as 40-year-old Robert Card, a firearms instructor believed to be in the U.S. Army Reserve and assigned to a training facility in Saco, Maine.As a massive search continued today for Card, residents of southern Maine were told to lock their doors and remain inside.The CBSA says it is working with Canadian and U.S. law enforcement partners, including U.S. Customs and Border Protection and RCMP to “protect Canada’s borders against any threat or attempt at illegal entry.”The Canadian border agency said its “Armed and Dangerous – Firearms lookout”...

Teenager charged in deadly 2022 school shooting in Iowa seeks to withdraw guilty plea

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — One of the 10 teenagers charged in a deadly 2022 shooting at an Iowa high school now wants to withdraw his guilty plea.Octavio Lopez Sanchez Jr. was originally charged with first-degree murder, two counts of attempted murder, and two counts of willful injury-causing serious injury. In August, Lopez Sanchez agreed to plead guilty to second-degree murder and two counts of willful injury, WHO-TV reported. He was scheduled to face sentencing Nov. 7.Fifteen-year-old Jose David Lopez was killed in the shooting on March 7, 2022, on the grounds of East High School in Des Moines. Two other teenagers were seriously injured. Lopez was not a student at the school.Lopez Sanchez filed a motion last week to withdraw his guilty plea. In the motion, Lopez Sanchez said his legal counsel was ineffective and incorrectly told him that if found guilty he would face life in prison without parole. But the motion noted that as a minor, a life sentence is not mandatory.The motion said...

Want people to tune in to an opioid film? Make it funny, says director David Yates

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

TORONTO — How do you get people to pay attention to the opioid epidemic? For English director David Yates and Canadian producer Lawrence Grey, the answer was simple: make it funny.  In an effort to draw “as broad an audience as possible,” per Yates, they created “Pain Hustlers,” a highly stylized Netflix film in the vein of “The Big Short” that takes aim at big pharma instead of big banks. “When you see opioid on the tin, you might go: ‘Oh, it’s a drama about the opioid crisis,'” Yates said last month at the Toronto International Film Festival, where the movie premiered.“But if you cast two big movie stars, or three or four movie stars, and then you watch a trailer that looks kind of fun, then there’s a good chance that you will tune in and give it some time.” Those Hollywood celebrities — a bottle blond Emily Blunt and a goateed Chris Evans — portray pharmaceutical sales executives who conspire to bribe d...

Many Israelis are furious at their government’s chaotic recovery efforts after Hamas attack

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:04 GMT

JERUSALEM (AP) — More than two weeks after Hamas militants rampaged through a string of sleepy farming towns, many Israelis are furious at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, not just for failing to prevent the attack, but for failing to come to their aid afterward.While the military is launching unrelenting airstrikes in Gaza that have killed thousands of Palestinians, and hundreds of thousands of Israeli troops are massing for a possible ground offensive, government infighting and lack of help for those in need have left traumatized survivors to mourn on their own and volunteers — many of whom spent the past year protesting the government — to take on recovery efforts.“It has to be clear. The government is completely incompetent,” said Ruvi Dar, a clinical psychologist and Tel Aviv University professor who has been counseling survivors evacuated from their homes. “Any support that the refugees are getting right now is completely grassroots. Absolutely nothing by the st...