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White House says Russia is executing its own soldiers for not following orders

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House on Thursday said Russia is executing soldiers who have failed to follow orders and threatening entire units with death if they retreat from Ukrainian artillery fire. It’s a development that U.S. national security officials believe reflects Russia’s morale problems 20 months into its grinding invasion of Ukraine, said White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby.“It’s reprehensible to think about that you would execute your own soldiers because they didn’t want to follow orders and now threatening to execute entire units, it’s barbaric,” Kirby told reporters. “But I think it’s a symptom of how poorly Russia’s military leaders know they’re doing and how bad they have handled this from a military perspective.”The White House has downgraded and released intelligence findings about Russian action over the course of the war. In the past, the administration has said it has acted to disclose the intelligence to highlight plan...

Movie Review: ‘Pain Hustlers’ tells a sadly familiar story with a kitchen-sink style

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

The wife of a man who nearly died of an opioid overdose comes bursting into the office of the sleazy doctor who prescribed it, wrongly, in exchange for personal gain. She slugs the doctor, in her agony.The scene comes deep into the new Netflix film “Pain Hustlers,” and it feels bracingly real and tragic.If only the rest of the movie, the latest in a string of opioid-themed films, felt the same. Instead, despite a high-powered cast featuring a reliably solid Emily Blunt, an expertly low-life Chris Evans and the gifted Catherine O’Hara, the film tries too hard to be something it isn’t, or shouldn’t be: slick and breezy and too clever for its own good, filled with mockumentary interviews, wild montages, and other tricks used to more disciplined effect in more accomplished films.Not that Blunt isn’t an effective presence here as Liza Drake, a struggling, single Florida mom who works at a strip club but wants to move up in life — to be treated with respect, and to support her ailing teen...

Parts of Gaza look like a wasteland from space. Look for the misshapen buildings and swaths of gray

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

BEIT HANOUN, Gaza Strip (AP) — Apartment buildings are crumpled. Neighborhoods lie in ruins. Terrain is transformed into moonscape.The destruction of areas of northern Gaza is visible from space in satellite images taken before and after Israeli’s airstrikes, which followed the raids carried out by Hamas militants on Oct. 7.In images shot Saturday by Maxar Technologies, four- and five-story buildings in the Izbat Beit Hanoun neighborhood are in various states of collapse. Huge chunks are missing from some, others are broken in half and two large complexes lie in piles of rubble.The pattern of destruction in the Al Karameh neighborhood can be traced by a widespread pattern the color of ash.Tightly packed streets in Beit Hanoun look obliterated, with a rare white structure standing out in the gray wasteland.Israel has carried out thousands of airstrikes since the war erupted on Oct. 7 following a cross-border raid that killed 1,400 people in Israel and took over 200 others hostage. Pa...

Brittney Griner, 5-time Olympian Diana Taurasi head up US national women’s roster for November

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) — Five-time Olympic gold medalist Diana Taurasi and Brittney Griner head up the USA Basketball Women’s National Team roster announced Thursday for a pair of November exhibition games and training camp in Atlanta. The national team will play the Tennessee Lady Vols on Nov. 5 in Knoxville and Duke on Nov. 12. The team will hold a training camp Nov. 7-9 in Atlanta as the U.S. women chase an eighth straight Olympic gold medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics. USA Basketball will keep evaluating the player pool before naming the final roster for the Paris Games. A’ja Wilson, who just led the Las Vegas Aces to the WNBA title, currently has her left wrist in a cast. Breanna Stewart is awaiting the birth of her second child with her wife. Chelsea Gray is recovering from an injured foot, keeping her from a return to her college home at Duke.Taurasi is one of seven players who will play in both exhibitions along with Griner, Kahleah Copper, Allisha Gray, Rhyne How...

Erin O’Toole says CSIS told him he would remain target of China ‘into the future’

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

OTTAWA — Former Conservative leader Erin O’Toole says Canada’s spy agency told him he would be a target of the Chinese government “into the future” for “an undetermined time.” O’Toole shared that detail today with MPs on a parliamentary committee probing the issue of foreign interference and the privilege of fellow parliamentarians. The study was launched amid media reports late last year and early this year that Beijing had allegedly meddled in Canada’s affairs during the 2019 and 2021 federal elections. In May, the federal government confirmed a media report that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service had information in 2021 that China’s government was looking to intimidate longtime Conservative MP Michael Chong, as well as his relatives in Hong Kong. That prompted Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to say the spy agency needed to share such information with parliamentarians. O’Toole says he learned of Beijing’s like...

Africa’s fashion industry is booming, UNESCO says in new report but funding remains a key challenge

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) — Africa’s fashion industry is rapidly growing to meet local and international demands but a lack of adequate investment still limits its full potential, UNESCO said Thursday in its new report released at this year’s Lagos Fashion Week show.Currently valued at $15.5 billion worth of exports annually, the earnings from the continent’s fashion industry could triple over a decade with the right investment and infrastructure, according to UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay, who launched the organization’s first report on fashion in Africa in Nigeria’s economic hub of Lagos.With a young population of 1.3 billion people set to double by 2050, the continent’s fashion industry has also proven to be both “a powerful lever for the promotion of cultural diversity (and) also a way to empower young people and women,” said Azoulay.Across the continent, fashion continues to grow on various fronts – including in movies and films – in the form of textiles, garments as w...

Grand jury indicts Illinois man on hate crime, murder charges in attack on Muslim mom, son

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

JOLIET, Ill. (AP) — A man accused of murder, attempted murder and a hate crime in an attack on a Palestinian-American woman and her son was indicted Thursday by an Illinois grand jury.The eight-count indictment against Joseph Czuba, 71, tracks the charges that were filed soon after the fatal stabbing of Wadea Al-Fayoume, 6, and the wounding of Hanaan Shahin on Oct. 14. Authorities said the victims were targeted because of their Muslim faith.Shahin told police that Czuba, her landlord in Plainfield in Will County, was upset over the Israel-Hamas war and attacked them after she had urged him to “pray for peace.”Shahin, 32, is recovering from multiple stab wounds. Hundreds of people attended her son’s funeral on Oct. 16.The murder charge in the indictment against Czuba describes the boy’s death as the result of “exceptionally brutal or heinous behavior.”Defense attorney George Lenard has said he won’t comment on the case outside court. Czuba, who is in jail, is expect...

Sikh activists in B.C. emboldened by Trudeau’s comments on India ahead of referendum

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

SURREY, B.C. — Organizers of an upcoming vote on an independent Sikh state say Canada’s allegations of India’s links to the killing of activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar have significantly bolstered vocal support for their cause.Sikhs For Justice’s U.S.-based lawyer, Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, says many supporters for Khalistan, a term referring to an independent Sikh state in India, had been reluctant to voice their opinions over fear of being labelled a terrorist.Pannun says Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s statement last month that India may be involved in Nijjar’s killing has generated discussions in countries such as the United States and Great Britain on India’s handling of the incident, allowing supporters to vocalize their positions without fear.Sikhs For Justice will hold a second round of voting for its unofficial referendum on Khalistani independence on Sunday at the gurdwara in Surrey, B.C., where Nijjar was shot on June 18.The first vote in S...

How Tyson Bagent made history for his home state Sunday

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

LAKE FOREST, Ill. — He'd already become the first rookie quarterback to win a game in his debut for the Bears in 19 years on Sunday.But thanks to a friend, Tyson Bagent found out that he'd made some history for his home state, too."Last night I was on the phone with a dude from Huntington. He said he had done a bunch of research and that I was the first West Virginia-born and raised quarterback to ever start in the NFL," "I was sitting back on my couch like 'Wow, that's pretty cool. That's pretty amazing."Per Pro Football Reference, that's indeed the case.The statistics site lists just four quarterbacks who were born in West Virginia playing in the NFL, but none who grew up in the state ended up getting a start.Joe Gilliam was born in Charleston, West Virginia and started seven games with the Steelers from 1972-1975, but he was raised in Nashville, Tennessee. Paul Rickards of Wheeling, West Virginia played in just three games for the Rams in 1948 without a start. Fred Wyant of Westo...

Escaped murder suspect in custody after 6 weeks on the run: police

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:11:08 GMT

WASHINGTON (WDVM) -- Police said Thursday that Christopher Haynes, a man accused of murder who escaped custody at George Washington University Hospital in September, was in custody.In a news conference Thursday afternoon, the U.S. Marshals said that Haynes was taken into custody around 10:30 a.m. in Oxon Hill, Maryland, more than six weeks after he first escaped. PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Two weeks on the run, police still searching for escaped DC homicide suspect Christopher Haynes Haynes escaped custody on Sept. 6 while he was being treated for an ankle injury. Police said that an officer was changing Haynes' handcuffs when he assaulted the officer and ran away.Haynes had previously been taken into custody by the Metropolitan Police Department in Manassas, Virginia, on a warrant out of the District of Columbia for the killing of Brent Hayward, 33, on Aug. 12. PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Mother ‘fearful’ after son’s accused murderer escapes DC police custody During Thursday's news conference, ...