Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai jailed after bail revoked
December 31, 2020
Hong Kong’s highest court has revoked media tycoon Jimmy Lai’s bail after prosecutors succeeded in asking the judges to send him back to detention…
Report: Harsh winter can bring illness, death to Afghan kids
December 31, 2020
A humanitarian aid organization says more than 300,000 children in war-ravaged Afghanistan face freezing winter conditions that can lead to illness and death without proper winter clothing and heating…
Ontario minister called back from St Barts pandemic vacation
December 31, 2020
The premier of Canada’s most populous province says he’ll be having a “tough conversation” with his finance minister on Thursday after he ordered him back to Canada after it became public that he was on a Caribbean vacation in the French Island of St. Barts during the pandemic…
South Africans swap firecrackers for candles amid pandemic
December 31, 2020
Many South Africans have swapped firecrackers for candles to mark New Year’s Eve amid COVID-19 restrictions including a nighttime curfew…
Around the world, many are having ‘the quietest’ New Year’s Eve in memory
December 31, 2020
“Hopefully, 2021 will be easier on all of us,” one Australian official said as Sydney and Melbourne scaled back celebrations.…
Global pandemic meets 500th anniversary of 1st global voyage
December 31, 2020
Disease, mutinies and uncharted waters nearly sabotaged the global circumnavigation launched by Portuguese mariner Ferdinand Magellan…
Yemeni PM accuses rebels, Iran of deadly Aden airport blast
December 31, 2020
Yemen’s prime minister has renewed accusations that the country’s Shiite rebels and Iran were responsible for the deadly explosion at the airport in the southern city of Aden the previous day…
2020 was a remarkably difficult year — not only because of the pandemic
December 31, 2020
Here are just a handful of significant events that occurred across the globe — some in the shadow of the coronavirus.…
Putin wishes Russians brighter New Year, ‘return to normal’
December 31, 2020
President Vladimir Putin is wishing Russians a brighter new year as he praises the nation for its courage and resilience amid the coronavirus outbreak…
North Korea’s Kim thanks people in rare New Year’s cards
December 31, 2020
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has thanked his people for their trust and support in difficult times and wished them good health in New Year’s Day cards…
A year after coronavirus emerged in Wuhan, China’s Xi declares 2020 a triumph
December 31, 2020
In a speech that resembled a victory lap, the president brimmed with positivity and nationalist sentiment.…
Japan’s emperor acknowledges virus hardship in video message
December 31, 2020
Japan’s Emperor Naruhito has expressed gratitude to medical professionals and acknowledged the hardship caused by the coronavirus in a New Year’s Day message…
Fewer people than usual will pop bottles of bubbly at midnight. Pour one out for France’s Champagne region.
December 31, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic has triggered “a crisis unlike anything the Champagne region has ever seen.”…
EU reviews BioNTech request for ‘extra dose’ of virus shot
December 31, 2020
The EU medicines watchdog says German company BioNTech has applied for clearance to administer up to six doses of its COVID-19 vaccine from each vial…
Search continues for survivors after major Norway landslide
December 31, 2020
Rescue workers in Norway continue searching for 10 people, including children, who are missing a day after a massive landslide struck a residential area near the capital…
Claude Bolling, French pianist who melded jazz and classical music, dies at 90
December 31, 2020
He became one of the most successful jazz musicians in Europe and gained a devoted following across the Atlantic with his pleasing crossover compositions.…
Guinea uses Russian COVID-19 vaccine on some officials
December 31, 2020
Guinea officials said Thursday the government has begun inoculating against the coronavirus with the Russian Sputnik V vaccine on an experimental basis, starting with government officials…
2020: The year of the virus
December 31, 2020
From early outbreak to global catastrophe: A coronavirus timeline.…
Auld lang syne: New Year brings final UK-EU Brexit split
December 31, 2020
Like a separated couple still living together, Britain and the European Union spent 2020 wrangling and wondering whether they could be friends…
As Brexit finally happens, Britons mark their moment of freedom while obeying stay-at-home orders
December 31, 2020
The U.K. leaves not with a bang but with a recorded New Year’s Eve light show.…
Canada’s largest pension fund bought SolarWinds stake days before hacking disclosure, stock plunge
December 31, 2020
Legal experts say the Canada pension board’s transaction is likely to be scrutinized by U.S. securities regulators, who will try to determine whether the investors withheld information about the possibility of a hack before unloading their stakes in SolarWinds.…
An island nation’s audacious effort to save its unique wildlife
December 31, 2020
New Zealand is seeking to go “predator-free” by 2050. Few countries have waged a battle like this on such a major scale, and what is learned here could offer lessons for others.…
She’s young, has no serious health conditions — and hasn’t left isolation since March
December 31, 2020
In Brazil, some have remained locked inside for months — and months.…
Coronavirus puts Honduras’ coffee harvest in jeopardy
December 31, 2020
Coffee producers say the coronavirus pandemic is threatening Honduras’ coffee harvest by keeping Hondurans who would normally travel for the work at home and preventing foreign harvesters from entering the country…
Increased testing needed as Africa sees rise in virus cases
December 31, 2020
As a result of holiday gatherings, African officials warn of a resurgence of COVID-19 on the continent and urge increased testing to combat it…
China approves Sinopharm coronavirus vaccine, the country’s first for general use
December 31, 2020
The move paves the way for a global rollout, but the drugmaker did not provide key details in interim analysis of late-stage trials.…
In new playground Dubai, Israelis find parties, Jewish rites
December 31, 2020
After a U.S.-brokered deal to normalize ties between Israel and the UAE, Israeli revelers seeking relief from monthslong virus restrictions came to Dubai in droves…
US to move aircraft carrier out of Mideast amid Iran tension
December 31, 2020
The Pentagon says it is sending home the only Navy aircraft carrier operating in the Middle East, amid heightened tensions with Iran…
Pakistan arrests 24 people over demolishing of Hindu temple
December 31, 2020
Pakistani police say they have arrested 24 people in overnight raids after a Hindu temple was set on fire and demolished by a mob led by supporters of a radical Islamist party…
Eastern Caribbean issues rare alerts for rumbling volcanoes
December 30, 2020
Volcanoes that have been quiet for decades are rumbling to life in the eastern Caribbean…
Aid group says colleague ‘murdered’ in Ethiopia’s conflict
December 30, 2020
A Dutch aid group says one of its staff members was “murdered” at a refugee camp during the conflict in Ethiopia’s Tigray region…
A year after first coronavirus reports in Wuhan, WHO says vaccines offer ‘great hope’ for 2021
December 30, 2020
WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus cheered an “unparalleled mobilization of science” to combat the pandemic.…
Protesting Indian farmers, government reach partial accord
December 30, 2020
Representatives of the Indian government and tens of thousands of protesting farmers have met after a hiatus of three weeks and reached agreement on two of the four issues that caused the farmers to blockade highways near the capital…
Kenya: Al-Shabab kills man taking pregnant wife to hospital
December 30, 2020
A police report says extremist gunmen ambushed an ambulance carrying a pregnant woman and killed her husband before setting the vehicle ablaze in northern Kenya, as such attacks are again on the rise…
Explosions rock Aden airport, killing at least 22, as new Yemen government arrives
December 30, 2020
The attack was launched just as members of a unity government reached the port city, creating more turmoil in a nation already besieged by war and hunger.…
US bomber mission over Persian Gulf aimed at cautioning Iran
December 30, 2020
Two strategic U.S. bombers have flown over the Persian Gulf in response to what U.S. officials say are worrying signs that Iran may be planning attacks against American or allied targets in the Middle East in the coming days…
Iran allocates payment to families of Ukraine crash victims
December 30, 2020
Iran says its cabinet has created a compensation fund to pay the families of the 176 victims of a Ukrainian passenger plane that was shot down by Iranian forces outside Tehran last January…
Brexit poised to become reality — after Britain’s final, mad dash to the finish line
December 30, 2020
The legislation galloped through Parliament and received royal assent from Queen Elizabeth II.…
US says it won’t allow Pearl murder suspect to evade justice
December 30, 2020
The U.S. is warning that it won’t allow a Pakistani man who was convicted and later acquitted in the 2002 murder of American journalist Daniel Pearl to evade justice after a provincial court in Pakistan ordered his release…
Russia slaps more UK nationals with entry bans over Navalny
December 30, 2020
Russia has decided to expand the number of British nationals barred from entering Russia in response to the “unacceptable and unfounded” U.K. sanctions over the poisoning of opposition leader Alexei Navalny…
Germany set for longer lockdown as death figures spike
December 30, 2020
German officials are making clear they won’t be able to relax lockdown restrictions in early January as the country recorded more than 1,000 deaths in a day for the first time…
‘Almost like a ghost’: Six portraits from a year defined by loss
December 30, 2020
Empty beds in an Italian monastery. A community wrenched apart in Wyoming. The year has left countless points of pain, but also perseverance.…
Yemeni official: Blast at Aden airport kills 16, wounds 60
December 30, 2020
A Yemeni health official says the explosion that hit the airport in the southern city of Aden as a government plane landed there has killed at least 16 people…
Hong Kong protesters captured at sea are sentenced to prison in China
December 30, 2020
The democracy activists were caught in August while trying to flee to Taiwan by speedboat.…
Uganda rights lawyer freed on bail after week in detention
December 30, 2020
A prominent rights attorney jailed in Uganda over criminal charges has been freed on bail amid intense pressure from the international community and watchdog groups ahead of elections in January…
Abortion rights advocates throughout Latin America draw inspiration from Argentina vote
December 30, 2020
The predominantly Roman Catholic homeland of Pope Francis will be the largest country in the region to legalize the procedure.…
U.K. authorizes Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine
December 30, 2020
The development should help the country to fight a surging outbreak, driven by a highly infectious new variant of the virus.…
Schools in India have been closed since March. The costs to children are mounting.
December 30, 2020
The hiatus is without precedent in the country’s history.…
Quake aftershocks keep people out of homes in Croatia
December 30, 2020
A series of tremors have jolted central Croatia after a 6.3-magnitude earthquake killed at least seven people, injured dozens and left several towns and villages in ruins a day earlier…