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Stark, Meechai take 1st-round lead at LPGA Shanghai in tour’s return to China after pandemic

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

SHANGHAI (AP) — Maja Stark and Wichanee Meechai each shot 6-under 66 on Thursday to take a two-stroke first-round lead at the LPGA Shanghai event in the tour’s return to China after the COVID-19 pandemic.Stark, one of three rookies on the European team which tied the Americans to retain the Solheim Cup last month in Spain, birdied four of her first six holes on the Qizhong Garden Golf Club course. Meechai overcame a first-hole bogey and finished strongly with a pair of birdies.“Playing the Solheim Cup gave me so much confidence,” Stark said. “A whole continent is looking for you to play well.”Americans Danielle Kang, Lauren Coughlin and Alison Lee and Chinese players Cai Danlin and Li Shuying were in a group at 68 and in a 10-way tied for third.Kang is going for her third straight victory in Shanghai after winning in 2018 and 2019.The field, representing 21 countries, features the top two players in the women’s world rankings, Lilia Vu (72 Thursday) and Women’s PGA champion Ru...

M-DCPS board approves 20 social studies textbooks amid controversy

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

In a unanimous decision, the Miami-Dade County Public School (M-DCPS) board has given the green light to 20 social studies textbooks for kindergarten through 12th grade schools, aligning them with the state’s new academic standards. The move, however, has sparked opposition and concerns from some quarters.The approval comes as a significant milestone in the ongoing debate surrounding Florida’s academic standards. The new standards had initially faced pushback, with one notable concern being that students might learn that slaves somehow benefited from their experiences.The M-DCPS board was swift to address this concern, clarifying that such material is not included in the approved textbooks. Nevertheless, doubts linger among some skeptics.“The standards are full of government-approved indoctrination, the government in K-12 defining what patriotism is, defining moral values, defining virtues, starting in kindergarten,” expressed one critic.The public now has a ...

Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf’s family stuck in Gaza and ‘terrified’

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

LONDON — Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf’s parents-in-law are trapped in Gaza and fearing for their lives amid renewed conflict with Israel, his wife has said.The Scottish National Party leader’s mother-in-law and father-in-law have been trapped in Gaza since Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel on Saturday. The couple, who are from Dundee, travelled to Gaza last week to see a sick relative and other family, including multiple young grandchildren.In an interview with the BBC, Yousaf’s wife Nadia El-Nakla said her parents were “caught up in a war situation.”“My mother says that there is continual bombardment from land, sea and air,” she said, adding that her family had hoped to escape on Tuesday but found that the Rafah border between Gaza and Egypt was bombed and inaccessible. All Israeli border crossings have been closed.“They are just terrified, absolutely terrified, about what is to come and what is happening right now as we ...

Russia attacks Ukraine’s Danube ports with drones

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

KYIV — Russia once again launched a large-scale attack on Ukraine’s Danube ports infrastructure overnight.“Our air defense forces shot down 10 Shahed drones over Odesa region, but, unfortunately, there are also hits,” Oleg Kiper, head of the Odesa regional military administration, said in a statement Thursday morning.Ukrainian officials recorded damage to port infrastructure and residential buildings in the Ismail district of the Odesa region on the Danube River. “Fires broke out on the spot; they have already been extinguished. An elderly woman received thermal burns,” Kiper said.The latest attack on ports near the Romanian border happened two days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Bucharest, where he and Romanian President Klaus Iohannis agreed to deepen cooperation on Ukrainian grain transit through Romanian territory. Zelenskyy sees cooperation with Romania both on the Black Sea and on land as the way to find other export corridors for Ukraine’s grain.“The pr...

Palestinians rush to buy food and struggle under strikes as Israel readies possible ground operation

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

JERUSALEM (AP) — Palestinians lined up outside bakeries and grocery stores in Gaza on Thursday after spending the night surrounded by the ruins of pulverized neighborhoods darkened by a near-total power outage. Israel launched new airstrikes and said it was preparing for a possible ground invasion.International aid groups warned that the death toll in Gaza could mount after Israel stopped all deliveries of food, water, fuel and electricity and the tiny enclave’s crossing with Egypt closed. The war — which was ignited by a bloody and wide-ranging assault on Israel by Hamas militants — has already claimed at least 2,500 lives on both sides.Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli military spokesman, told reporters Thursday that forces “are preparing for a ground maneuver if decided,” but that political leaders have not yet ordered one. A ground offensive in Gaza, whose 2.3 million residents are densely packed into a sliver of land only 40 kilometers (25 ...

Former agent of East Germany’s Stasi agency is charged over the 1974 border killing of a Polish man

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

BERLIN (AP) — A former member of communist East Germany’s secret police has been charged with murder over the killing of a Polish national at a border crossing in divided Berlin in 1974, prosecutors said Thursday.The indictment against the 79-year-old man, whose name wasn’t released, was filed at the state court in the German capital.It relates to an incident on March 29, 1974, in which a 38-year-old Polish man took a fake bomb to the Polish Embassy to try to force an unhindered exit to West Berlin, prosecutors said in a statement.East Germany’s secret police, the Stasi, allegedly decided to feign authorizing the man’s exit. Its employees provided him with exit documents and accompanied him to a border crossing at the Friedrichstrasse railway station in East Berlin, prosecutors said.They said that the suspect, age 31 at the time, was tasked with rendering the Polish man “harmless.” After the Pole had passed the final checkpoint, the suspect allegedly shot him...

Grand National to reduce number of horses to 34 and soften fences in bid to make famous race safer

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

LONDON (AP) — The Grand National is implementing a series of significant changes, taking effect from next year, in an effort to make the world’s most famous steeplechase safer for horses and jockeys.They include reducing the field from 40 horses — the size since 1984 — to 34, softening the fences by using foam and rubber toe boards, and moving the first fence closer to the start to stop horses building up too much speed.The race will also start earlier in the day, so the course stays as soft as possible, and the horses will set off from a standing start.Sixteen horses have died in the Grand National since the turn of the century. The race, which takes place over 30 fences and typically in front of 70,000 spectators at Aintree and a global TV audience, is among the biggest occasions on the British sporting calendar and is also regarded as one of the most dangerous horse races in the world because of the size of the fences.“I believe that a competitive, fair and safe Randox Grand Nati...

Armenia wants a UN court to impose measures aimed at protecting rights of Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Armenia urged the United Nations top court on Thursday to impose new interim orders on Azerbaijan to prevent what the leader of Armenia’s legal team called “ethnic cleansing” of the Nagorno-Karabakh region by Azerbaijan from becoming irreversible.Armenia is asking judges at the International Court of Justice for 10 “provisional measures” aimed at protecting the rights of ethnic Armenians from the Nagorno-Karabakh region that Azerbaijan reclaimed last month following a swift military operation.In a 24-hour campaign that began on Sept. 19, the Azerbaijani army routed the region’s undermanned and outgunned Armenian forces, forcing them to capitulate. The separatist government then agreed to disband itself by the end of the year. More than 100,000 ethnic Armenians fled Nagorno-Karabakh.“Nothing other than targeted and unequivocal provisional measures protecting the rights of ethnic Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh will suffice to prevent the ethnic clean...

Former Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone pleads guilty to fraud

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

LONDON (AP) — Former Formula One boss Bernie Ecclestone admitted fraud at a court hearing Thursday after prosecutors charged him with failing to declare millions of dollars held in a trust in Singapore to Britain’s government.The 92-year-old billionaire, who wore a dark suit, said “I plead guilty” at Southwark Crown Court in central London. Ecclestone headed Formula One racing and controlled the sport for for four decades from the 1970s to 2017, when he stepped down as chief executive and Liberty Media took over the series.Prosecutors allege he failed to declare a trust in Singapore with a bank account containing around $650 million when he was asked about any trusts abroad that he was involved in.They say that Ecclestone claimed he had set up “only a single trust” in favor of his three daughters, and that he was “not the settler nor beneficiary of any trust in or outside the U.K.” Prosecutors say he acted “dishonestly” and intended to make a gain from the claims.“He now accepts tha...

Finnish intelligence says Russia views Finland as a hostile nation due to its NATO membership

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:24:25 GMT

HELSINKI (AP) — Finland’s relationship with Russia has significantly deteriorated due to the Nordic country’s membership in NATO and over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and related sanctions, and Moscow now views its western neighbor as a hostile country, the Finnish Security and Intelligence Service said Thursday.The agency, known by the abbreviation SUPO, said in a national security review that Russia was “prepared to take measures against Finland” and was likely to continue influencing operations and undermining bilateral links.After decades of military non-alignment, Finland — a European Union nation of 5.5 million people that shares a long border with Russia — became NATO’s 31st member on April 4. Moscow’s hostility toward Helsinki is evident in Russian media’s negative coverage of Finland and in Russia’s decision to close Finland’s consulate general in St. Petersburg this month, among other ways, SUPO said.“Russia currently remains focused on the war in Ukraine...