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BTS members RM and V start compulsory military service in South Korea. Band seeks to reunite in 2025

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

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Singers RM and V of the K-pop band BTS began their mandatory military duties under South Korean law, their management agency announced Monday. This came a day before two of their bandmates, Jimin and Jung Kook, were also expected to report for duty.Three other BTS members — Jin, J-Hope and Suga — are already months into their conscription. The seven singers of the popular K-pop band plan to reunite as a group sometime in 2025 after they finish their service.Jin and J-Hope are serving in the army while Suga is fulfilling his duty as a social service agent, an alternative form of military service.According to HYBE, the band’s management company, RM and V arrived at an army boot camp in the central city of Nonsan to start their 18-month compulsory service.The company said Jimin and Jung Kook would report to the army together. It didn’t immediately confirm South Korean media reports that they would be at the boot camp on Tuesday.“I’ve been so happy to have been...

Some nations want to remove more pollution than they produce. That will take giving nature a boost

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

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Why promise net zero emissions when you can go even lower, such as negative emissions?As countries at the COP28 climate talks are wrangling over ways to lower their greenhouse gas emissions, a Danish-led group of countries has decided to set the ultimate goal: to remove more carbon dioxide, the main source of global warming, from the atmosphere than they emit.The Group of Negative Emitters was launched Sunday in Dubai by Denmark, Finland and Panama, and aims to reach that goal by slashing emissions, protecting and expanding forests, and investing in new technologies. Panama has already reached the goal with its vast forests that act as a huge carbon sink. Finland and Denmark hope to achieve this by 2035 and 2045, respectively.“It’s a huge challenge to become carbon neutral and then carbon negative and we are not yet there,” cautioned Kai Mykkänen, Finland’s environment minister, “but we are really targeting this.”For the rich Nordic country, the st...

Live updates | Israel says it’s prepared to fight for months to defeat Hamas

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

Israel said it is prepared to fight for months or longer to defeat Gaza’s Hamas rulers, as its ground offense intensifies with more airstrikes and artillery fire.Qatar, which has played a key mediating role, says efforts to stop the war and have all hostages released will continue, but a willingness to discuss a cease-fire is fading. Israel faces international outrage after its military offensive has killed more than 17,700 Palestinians in Gaza, around two-thirds of them women and children, according to the Hamas-controlled Health Ministry. About 90% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been displaced within the besieged territory, where U.N. agencies say there is no safe place to flee.The United States has provided vital support to Israel in recent days by vetoing a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for a cease-fire and pushing through an emergency sale of over $100 million worth of tank ammunition to Israel. The U.N. General Assembly plans to vote Tuesday on a ...

Artificial intelligence act: Council and Parliament strike a deal on the first rules for AI in the world

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

Following three-day ‘marathon’ talks, the Council presidency and the European Parliament’s negotiators have reached a provisional agreement on the proposal on harmonised rules on artificial intelligence (AI), the so-called artificial intelligence act. The draft regulation aims to ensure that AI systems placed on the European market and used in the EU are safe and respect fundamental rights and EU values. This landmark proposal also aims to stimulate investment and innovation on AI in Europe.This is a historical achievement, and a huge milestone towards the future! Today’s agreement effectively addresses a global challenge in a fast-evolving technological environment on a key area for the future of our societies and economies. And in this endeavour, we managed to keep an extremely delicate balance: boosting innovation and uptake of artificial intelligence across Europe whilst fully respecting the fundamental rights of our citizens.Carme Artigas, Spanish secretary of state for digital...

Racist remarks against Mexicans caught on camera in Disneyland bathroom

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

A woman caught on camera saying “I hate Mexicans” in a Disneyland bathroom led to the arrest of a well-known street-vendor activist in San Bernardino County Sunday.  The Disneyland bathroom exchange unfolded late last week when Eva Ramirez filmed another woman tossing out racist comments after reportedly hearing Ramirez and her son speaking Spanish in the bathroom.  Ramirez said that they were at the theme park enjoying her son’s birthday and that the altercation started with a disagreement over a bathroom stall.  “I’m at Disneyland and this person just heard me speaking Spanish and she said, ‘Great, you’re a f-----g Mexican, right?’ Repeat what you just said,” Ramirez is heard telling the woman in the video. “You have a problem with people that speak Spanish in your country, right?” “Yeah, but it’s America. It’s America,” the unidentified woman responds. “You don’t speak Spanish in America. It’s an English-speaking country.”  “Your comment is racist, and it has ...

Polling centers open in Egypt’s presidential elections

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

CAIRO (AP) — Polling centers in Egypt opened Monday, the second voting day in a presidential election that is certain to see President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi secure another term.The vote, which began across the Middle Eastern nation on Sunday, has been overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, on Egypt’s eastern borders.The vote is also taking place amid a staggering economic crisis in Egypt, a country of 105 million people in which nearly a third live in poverty, according to official figures.The crisis stems from mismanagement of the economy but also from the repercussions of the coronavirus pandemic and the ongoing Russian war in Ukraine, which rattled the global economy.El-Sissi faces no serious challenger, although there are three other candidates: Farid Zahran, head of the opposition Social Democratic Party; Abdel-Sanad Yamama, chairman of the Wafd Party; and Hazem Omar, head of the Republican People’s Party.El-Sissi came to power in 2014, a year after he, as defense minist...

Kishida promises he’ll take appropriate steps ahead of a Cabinet shuffle to tackle a party scandal

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

TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Monday he planned to take “appropriate steps” over his governing party’s widening slush funds scandal as speculation is rife that he may purge implicated Cabinet members in a major shuffle this week. The scandal mostly involves the Liberal Democratic Party’s largest and most powerful faction formerly led by assassinated ex-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Its key members, including those in top Cabinet and party posts, were suspected of systematically failing to report several hundred million yen (several million dollars) in funds in a possible violation of campaign and election laws, according to media reports. The money is alleged to have gone into unmonitored slush funds.Kishida told reporters Monday that he is aware of the growing public distrust over the fundraising scandal and takes it seriously. He has acknowledged that authorities are investigating the scandal following a criminal complaint.“I’ll take appropriate action at the...

India’s Supreme Court upholds government’s decision to remove disputed Kashmir’s special status

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

SRINAGAR, India (AP) — India’s top court on Monday upheld a 2019 decision by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government to strip disputed Jammu and Kashmir’s special status as a semi-autonomous region with a separate constitution and inherited protections on land and jobs.The five-judge constitutional bench of the Supreme Court ruled that the region’s special status had been a “temporary provision” and that removing it in 2019 was constitutionally valid.The unprecedented move also divided the region into two federal territories, Ladakh and Jammu-Kashmir, both ruled directly by the central government without a legislature of their own. As a result, the Muslim-majority region is now run by unelected government officials and has lost its flag, criminal code and constitution.But Chief Justice Dhananjaya Yeshwant Chandrachud said the government has promised to restore Jammu-Kashmir’s statehood and should do so as soon as possible. Ladakh, however, will remain a federal territo...

Google antitrust trial focused on Android app store payments to be handed off to jury to decide

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

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A federal court jury is poised begin its deliberations in an antitrust trial focused on whether Google’s efforts to profit from its app store for Android smartphones have been illegally gouging consumers and stifling innovation.Before the nine-person jury in San Francisco starts weighing the evidence Monday, the lawyers on the opposing sides of the trial will present their closing arguments in a three-year-old case filed by Epic Games, the maker of the popular Fortnite video game.The four-week trial included testimony from both Google CEO Sundar Pichai, who sometimes seemed like a professor explaining complex topics while standing behind a lectern because of a health issue, and Epic CEO Tim Sweeney, who painted himself as a video game lover on a mission to take down a greedy tech titan.Epic alleged that Google has been exploiting its wealth and control of the Android software that powers most of the world’s smartphones to protect a lucrative payment ...

Israel battles militants in Gaza’s main cities, with civilians still stranded near front lines

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

RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli forces battled Palestinian militants in Gaza’s two largest cities on Monday, with civilians still sheltering along the front lines even after massive waves of displacement across the besieged territory.Israel has pledged to keep fighting until it removes Hamas from power, dismantles its military capabilities and returns all of the scores of hostages still held by Palestinian militants after being captured during the Oct. 7 surprise attack into Israel that ignited the war.The U.S. has provided unwavering diplomatic and military support for the campaign, even as it has urged Israel to minimize civilian casualties and further mass displacement. The war has killed thousands of Palestinian civilians and driven nearly 85% of the territory’s 2.3 million people from their homes.Residents said there was heavy fighting in and around the southern city of Khan Younis, where Israeli ground forces opened a new line of attack last week, and battles were...