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Biden attends memorial Mass to mark 8 years since son Beau’s death from brain cancer

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — President Joe Biden marked Tuesday’s eighth anniversary of one of the saddest days of his life, the death of his son Beau, by attending a memorial Mass and visiting his gravesite.Biden, his wife, Jill, and other family members prayed for Beau Biden during the Mass at St. Joseph on the Brandywine, the Roman Catholic church where the president worships during weekends at his home near Wilmington, Delaware.Afterward, the family visited Beau Biden’s gravesite in the church cemetery. The first lady carried a bouquet of flowers. The president later traveled to Veterans Memorial Park in New Castle for his annual tradition of paying his respects and laying flowers. Beau Biden was 46 when he died of brain cancer in 2015. His father was vice president.The eldest of Biden’s three children, Beau Biden served two terms as Delaware attorney general before declaring a run for governor. Many saw in him the same aspirations that brought his father to the White House. In...

Trial opens for accused gunman in Pittsburgh synagogue massacre

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

PITTSBURGH (AP) — The federal jury trial of the suspect in the nation’s deadliest antisemitic attack got underway Tuesday morning, four and a half years after the shooting deaths of 11 worshipers at a Pittsburgh synagogue.Twelve jurors and six alternates — chosen Thursday after a month of questioning of more than 200 jury candidates — are hearing the case against Robert Bowers. The jurors include 11 women and seven men.Bowers, 50, could face the death penalty if convicted of some of the 63 counts he faces in the Oct. 27, 2018, attack at the Tree of Life synagogue building. The attack claimed the lives of 11 worshipers from three congregations sharing the building, Dor Hadash, New Light and Tree of Life. Charges include 11 counts each of obstruction of free exercise of religion resulting in death and hate crimes resulting in death. Members of the three synagogues arrived at the courthouse in a school bus and went in together.Prosecutors have said Bowers made antisemitic comment...

Stock market today: Wall Street rises as DC moves to avoid default

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street is ticking higher in its first trading after Washington struck a tentative deal to avoid a potentially disastrous default on its debt. The S&P 500 was 0.6% higher in early trading Tuesday and near its highest level in nine months. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose slightly, while excitement about artificial intelligence helped the Nasdaq composite to lead the market with a 1.2% gain. President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy are working to win votes for a deal reached over the weekend to allow the U.S. government to borrow more money.THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.Wall Street pointed mostly higher early Tuesday after President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy reached an agreement on a deal to raise the U.S. national debt ceiling. Futures for the Dow were flat the S&P 500 rose 0.7% before the bell. Biden and McCarthy are now working to gather votes needed to gain congressional approval in t...

South America’s leaders meet in Brazil to discuss greater regional cooperation

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

BRASILIA (AP) — South America’s leaders were gathering Tuesday in Brazil’s capital as part of an effort by the Brazilian president to revive regional cooperation in energy, crime-fighting and the economy. The regional bloc previously known as Union of South American Nations, or Unasur, first gathered 15 years ago to boost cooperation between the 12 South American nations. But the group eventually fractured amid the continent’s political swings and polarization, and this is their first meeting in nine years.Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva suggested at a news conference Monday that he might consider floating the idea of a regional currency to challenge the U.S dollar. But he said nothing would be decided during the meeting.“The main idea is that we need to form a bloc to work together,” Lula said.Seen by some as having a leftist bent, the regional bloc had fallen apart on disagreements over Unasur’s leadership. The participation of Venezuela’s authoritarian President Nic...

Halifax wildfire: Officials worry that high winds will cause ‘reburn’ in subdivisions

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

HALIFAX — Fire officials in Nova Scotia say the uncontained wildfire in suburban Halifax remained stable overnight, but they warned the return of dry, windy conditions today could lead to a “reburn” in evacuated subdivisions. Halifax deputy fire Chief David Meldrum told a news conference that firefighters spent the night extinguishing hot spots in neighbourhoods where 200 homes and structures have been damaged since the fire started Sunday.Since then, about 16,000 people have been ordered to leave their homes, most of them about a 30-minute drive northwest of the port city’s downtown.With today’s weather forecast calling for southwesterly winds gusting at 30 kilometres per hour, the concern is that the eight-square-kilometre fire will retrace its original route and set fire to what hasn’t already burned.David Steeves, a forest resources technician with Nova Scotia’s Department of Natural Resources, says trees and other flammable materials in the affecte...

Woman rescued from partially collapsed Iowa apartment building amid calls to delay demolition

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

A woman was rescued more than a day after a six-story apartment building partially collapsed in Davenport, Iowa, and after city officials pushed for it to be demolished, saying it was in “imminent danger” of coming down. Protesters urged for a delay, concerned that people could still be trapped inside.Protesters carried signs Tuesday morning near the building site, saying “Find Them First” and asking “Who is in the Rubble.” Some used a megaphone to shout out names of building residents. The city said in a statement that it has been “continually evaluating the timing of the demolition” and that “the building remains structurally insecure and in imminent danger of collapse.” The woman was rescued at about 8 p.m. Monday after calling her family and waving for help, according to multiple news reports. The building partially collapsed shortly before 5 p.m. Sunday. A city statement late Monday said an injured woman had been extricated, but it wasn’t immediately clear if this w...

Central figure in German tax evasion scandal convicted in 2nd case

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

BERLIN (AP) — A central figure in a German tax evasion scandal was convicted on Tuesday and sentenced to more than eight years in prison, the second verdict against him in the space of a few months.The Wiesbaden state court convicted German lawyer Hanno Berger of three counts of tax evasion and gave him a sentence of eight years and three months, German news agency dpa reported. In addition, it ordered the confiscation of nearly 1.1 million euros (nearly $1.2 million) of his assets.Prosecutors accused Berger of involvement in complex “cum-ex” deals between 2006 and 2008 that led to unwarranted tax rebates of 113 million euros.The cum-ex scheme has spawned a series of legal cases. Berger was accused of helping investment bankers who swapped shares to collect multiple reimbursement for taxes they had only paid once.In December, a court in Bonn convicted him on three counts of tax evasion and sentenced him to eight years in prison in connection with alleged crimes between 2007 and 2011...

Artificial intelligence threatens extinction, experts say in new warning

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

LONDON (AP) — Scientists and tech industry leaders issued a new warning Tuesday about the perils that artificial intelligence poses to humankind. “Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war,” said the statement posted online. Sam Altman, CEO of ChatGPT maker OpenAI, and Geoffrey Hinton, a computer scientist known as the godfather of artificial intelligence, were among the hundreds of leading figures who signed the statement, which was posted on the Center for AI Safety’s website.Worries about artificial intelligence systems outsmarting humans and running wild have intensified with the rise of a new generation of highly capable AI chatbots such as ChatGPT. More than 1,000 researchers and technologists, including Elon Musk, signed a letter earlier this year calling for a six-month pause on AI development because, they said, it poses “profound risks to society and humanity.”Countries...

Worst cyberattack in Greece disrupts high school exams, causes political spat

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece’s Education Ministry says it has been targeted in a cyberattack described as the most extensive in the country’s history, aimed at disabling a centralized high school examination platform.It said the distributed denial of service, or DDoS, attacks aimed at overwhelming the platform occurred for a second consecutive day Tuesday. The attack involved computers from 114 countries, causing outages and delays in high school exams but failing to cripple the system, the ministry said.The cyberattacks prompted a judicial investigation ordered by a Supreme Court prosecutor, to be assisted by the police’s cybercrime division.“It is the most significant attack ever carried out against a Greek public or government organization,” the Education Ministry said, describing the incidents on Monday and Tuesday as “large scale and of sustained duration.”End-of year high school exams in Greece are administered using an online platform known as the Subject Bank, designed to to...

Canopy Growth signs deal with Indiva for Wana brand of edibles

Published Sun, 29 Dec 2024 12:15:34 GMT

SMITHS FALLS, Ont. — Cannabis company Canopy Growth Corp. has signed a deal with Indiva Ltd. for the exclusive rights and interests to manufacture, distribute and sell Wana branded edible products in Canada.The companies also signed a contract manufacturing agreement that grants Indiva the exclusive right to manufacture and supply Wana branded products in Canada for five years, with the ability to renew for an additional five-year term upon mutual agreement.Under the deal, Canopy Growth will buy about 37.2 million Indiva shares for a purchase price of 5.79 cents per share for a total of nearly $2.2 million giving it a 19.99 per cent stake in Indiva.The company will also pay Indiva additional consideration representing a value of $844,383 and a cash payment of $1.25 million on May 30, 2024.Canopy Growth chief executive David Klein says the agreements provide the company more complete ownership over the value chain for the Wana brand in Canada, while ensuring the continuity of high-qu...