HALLE, Belgium (AP) — The congregation at the Don Bosco church solemnly took the holy host after it was blessed during a Sunday service by Nancy Speeckaert — a woman. Only a week earlier, to equal excitement, she had also blessed a wedding. On both occasions, the humble neighborhood church was filled to near capacity
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — World leaders will open their annual meeting at the U.N. General Assembly Tuesday under the shadow of increasing global divisions, major wars in Gaza , Ukraine and, Sudan and the threat of an even larger conflict in the wider Middle East. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres previewed his opening “State of the World”
TINMEL, Morocco (AP) — The hand-carved domes and brick-laid arches had almost all been put back together when an earthquake shook Morocco so violently that they caved in on themselves and crashed to the earth. After nearly 900 years, the Great Mosque of Tinmel lay in pieces — its minaret toppled, its prayer hall full
TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s top diplomat asked China to ensure the safety of Japanese citizens there after the fatal stabbing of a Japanese schoolboy , and demanded a crackdown on what she called “groundless, malicious and anti-Japanese” social media posts that threaten children’s safety. Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa requested her Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, conduct
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — When Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva opens the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, he is expected to call on the world to do more to combat climate change. It remains to be seen whether he will address fires ravaging the rainforest back home and criticism of his administration’s
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Death row inmates in five states are scheduled to be put to death in the span of one week, an unusually high number of executions that defies a yearslong trend of decline in both the use and support of the death penalty in the U.S. If carried out as planned, the
NEW YORK (AP) — Nearly a year after FBI agents seized his phones, New York City Mayor Eric Adams faces an expanding constellation of federal inquiries involving his administration. In recent weeks the investigations have produced a drumbeat of subpoenas, raids and whiplash-inducing developments for the first-term Democrat. Federal investigators have visited more than a
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.N. General Assembly’s yearly meeting of world leaders is here — and with it, an array of acronyms, abbreviations, titles and terms that can be confounding to observers. Here is some key vocabulary, decoded. For starters … UNGA: Acronym (yes, people do pronounce it “UN’-gah”) for the U.N. General Assembly’s
MUWASI, Gaza Strip (AP) — As the escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah grabs global attention, Palestinians in Gaza wonder: What will become of their plight after nearly a year of devastating war? They are petrified that international concern has been diverted, and that a dark possibility looms: abandonment. The families of Israeli hostages held
NEW YORK (AP) — President Joe Biden is set to deliver his final address to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday as Israel and Hezbollah militants in Lebanon are edging toward all-out war and Israel’s bloody operation against Hamas in Gaza nears the one-year mark. Biden is expected to use his wide-ranging address to speak
