Toomaj Salehi, the Iranian dissident rapper who escaped the death penalty earlier this summer has been cleared entirely of the original charges by a lower court in Isfahan, central Iran. Salehi became a key voice of anti-government dissent in Iran during the 2022 ‘Woman, Life Freedom’ protests, with lyrics that galvanized protesters and urged them to unite. He was sentenced to death after ...
People in Kiribati went to the polls on Wednesday for the first round of voting in a national election expected to serve as a referendum on rising living costs and the government’s stronger ties with China. A second round of voting is scheduled on Aug. 19 for all parliamentary seats that are not won by a majority vote on Wednesday. ...
As Kyiv’s forces advance farther into Russia following their surprise incursion last week, Ukrainians living near the border are watching with mixed feelings: a sense of justice combined with fear of what could come next. “We entered their territory not because we wanted to, but because they came to our home and took away our peaceful life. Now they have to ...
Conflict between elephants and humans is a growing, and potentially deadly, problem in some parts of India. Now, the state of Assam, a northeastern region famous for its rolling tea plantations, has launched a mobile app that alerts villagers of approaching herds in an effort to reduce the risk of catastrophic encounters. While estimates vary, such conflicts in the state ...
Japanese railways and airlines are canceling services as Typhoon Ampil gathers strength in the western Pacific, with the storm expected to hit on Friday during the peak summer travel season. As of early Thursday local time, Typhoon Ampil was recording sustained winds of 140 kph (85 mph), according to the latest advisory from the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC). That ...
A US citizen has been sentenced to 15 days in a Russian prison on charges of “petty hooliganism” for attacking a police officer, according to Moscow court officials. The American man, identified as Joseph Tater, was on Wednesday given an “administrative penalty in the form of administrative arrest for a period of 15 days” by the Meshchansky Court of Moscow, ...
More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since Israel launched its war against Hamas, the health ministry in the enclave said Thursday, yet another dark milestone in the 10-month-old conflict. The ministry said 40 people had died in Gaza during the past 24 hours, taking the total number of deaths since October 7 to 40,005 – about one in every 55 people in the enclave. More than 92,401 have been injured. The soaring figures give a window ...
New Zealand is set to extradite internet mogul Kim Dotcom to the United States after the country’s justice minister gave his approval on Thursday. Dotcom, who was born in Germany but has New Zealand residency, had been fighting his extradition to the US since 2012. He is facing charges relating to his file-sharing site Megaupload, which was shut down by ...
A Russian court has sentenced a Russian-American woman to 12 years in prison for treason after she made a donation of just over $50 to a US-based charity supporting Ukraine. Ksenia Karelina, 33, had pleaded guilty to the charges. She was detained in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg earlier this year while visiting her grandparents. The verdict was announced Thursday ...
The world’s only self-driving taxi company has been forced to fix a fleet of cars after residents complained about their constant honking. Waymo’s autonomous cars arrived in a car park in San Francisco, California, a few weeks ago, where they wait between jobs. However, the cars were installed with an update that made them beep their horns whenever another car ...