AP World News

By JIM GOMEZ, JOEAL CALUPITAN and AARON FAVILA Associated Press MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A massive crowd of mostly barefoot Filipino Catholics joined an annual procession of a centuries-old statue of Jesus Christ in the Philippine capital Friday, with some using the gathering to express outrage over a corruption scandal involving influential legislators. After a

By ISABEL DEBRE Associated Press BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Venezuela’s sudden release of detainees Thursday brought relief and guarded optimism to a country consumed by uncertainty. But it was another, less covered news event farther away that some Venezuelan rights advocates said offered their only real hope for justice as long as the government

By FARNOUSH AMIRI Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) — The top United Nations official on Thursday said the United States has a “legal obligation” to keep paying its dues that fund U.N. agencies after the White House announced that it is withdrawing support from more than 30 initiatives operated by the world body. Secretary-General Antonio

By LISA MASCARO and KEVIN FREKING Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — In a remarkable rebuke of Republican leadership, the House passed legislation Thursday that would extend expired health care subsidies for those who get coverage through the Affordable Care Act as 17 renegade GOP lawmakers joined every Democrat in support. The tally, 230-196, signified growing

By OMAR FARUK and DENG MACHOL Associated Press MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Somalia’s government on Thursday denied an allegation by the U.S. government that authorities in Mogadishu destroyed an American-funded warehouse belonging to the World Food Program and seized food aid earmarked for impoverished civilians. The U.S. State Department said Wednesday that it has suspended

By MARÍA VERZA Associated Press MEXICO CITY (AP) — The Mexican government boasted Thursday a sharp decline in homicide rates, presenting the figures as evidence that its security strategy is working, while analysts cautioned that the numbers may not fully reflect the country’s violence. During President Claudia Sheinbaum’s daily news conference, officials said Mexico recorded

By REGINA GARCIA CANO, MEGAN JANETSKY and MATIAS DELACROIX Associated Press GUATIRE, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela released a number of imprisoned high-profile opposition figures, activists and journalists — both citizens and foreigners — Thursday in what the government described as a gesture to “seek peace” less than a week after former President Nicolás Maduro was

By JOSEF FEDERMAN and WAFAA SHURAFA Associated Press JERUSALEM (AP) — A former U.N. Mideast envoy has been chosen to direct U.S. President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace to oversee the ceasefire in Gaza, Israel’s prime minister said Thursday, as at least eight more deaths from Israeli strikes were reported there. The appointment of Bulgarian

By ILLIA NOVIKOV Associated Press KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian drone strikes temporarily knocked out power to the entire southern Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine and left more than 600,000 households in the central Dnipropetrovsk region without electricity, officials said Thursday. The bombardment occurred against the backdrop of U.S.-led diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting, nearly

By JILL LAWLESS Associated Press LONDON (AP) — The U.S. seizure of a Venezuela-linked oil tanker in the North Atlantic was seen by some as the unilateral action of an America-first government with scant regard for other countries’ views. Britain calls it an example of trans-Atlantic cooperation in support of international rules. The U.K. government

By HUIZHONG WU Associated Press BANGKOK (AP) — Chen Zhi boasted of pulling in $30 million a day, prosecutors in the United States said — a suspected criminal mastermind and onetime internet cafe manager who authorities say presented himself as a legitimate businessman. But in reality, they say, he ran online gambling sites, scams and

By SYLVIE CORBET and DEREK GATOPOULOS Associated Press PARIS (AP) — Dozens of angry farmers demonstrated in France and Greece Thursday, halting traffic and blocking key roads with tractors to protest European Union plans to move forward with a free trade deal with five South American nations. Farmers drove about a hundred tractors into Paris

By KAREEM CHEHAYEB Associated Press BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s military said Thursday it had concluded the first phase of a plan to fully deploy across southern Lebanon and disarm non-state groups, notably Hezbollah. Israel said the development was encouraging but “far from sufficient,” and its Foreign Ministry said the group still has dozens of compounds

By TED ANTHONY AP National Writer BEIJING (AP) — They’re at it again. China and Japan — frenemies, trading partners and uneasy neighbors with a tortured, bloody history they still struggle to navigate — are freshly at each other’s rhetorical throats as 2026 begins. And it’s over the same sticking points that have kept them

By GHAITH ALSAYED, OMAR ALBAM and ABBY SEWELL Associated Press ALEPPO, Syria (AP) — Clashes between government and Kurdish forces in a contested area in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo intensified Thursday after Syrian authorities ordered civilians to evacuate. The authorities opened a corridor for civilian evacuations for a second day and tens of thousands

By JON GAMBRELL Associated Press DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran’s government cut off the country from the internet and international telephone calls Thursday night as a nighttime demonstration called by the country’s exiled crown prince drew a mass of protesters to shout from their windows and storm the streets. The protest that went

By CHARLOTTE GRAHAM-McLAY Associated Press WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced a wide-ranging royal commission into antisemitism, weeks after two gunmen opened fire on a Jewish holiday event at Bondi Beach, killing 15 people. The commission will investigate the nature, prevalence and drivers of antisemitism generally as well as the

By JON GAMBRELL Associated Press DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Saudi Arabia said Thursday that the United Arab Emirates smuggled a separatist leader in Yemen wanted for treason out of the country and flew him to Abu Dhabi. The UAE had no immediate reaction to the accusation, which further escalates tensions between the neighboring

By ISABEL DEBRE and MANUEL RUEDA Associated Press BOGOTÁ, Colombia (AP) — An “abhorrent” violation of Latin American sovereignty. An attack committed by “enslavers.” A “spectacle of death” comparable to Nazi Germany’s 1937 carpet bombing of Guernica, Spain. There is perhaps no world leader criticizing the Trump administration’s attack on Venezuela as strongly as left-wing

By WILL WEISSERT Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump abruptly changed his tone Wednesday about his Colombian counterpart, Gustavo Petro, saying they had exchanged a friendly phone call and he’d even invited the leader of the South American country to the White House. “It was a Great Honor to speak with the President

By JIM GOMEZ Associated Press MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A series of mild eruptions at the most active volcano in the Philippines has prompted the evacuation of nearly 3,000 villagers from a danger zone on its foothills, officials said Wednesday. Authorities raised the 5-step alert around Mayon Volcano in the northeastern province of Albay to

By MATTHEW LEE and FARNOUSH AMIRI Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration will withdraw from dozens of international organizations, including the U.N.’s population agency and the U.N. treaty that establishes international climate negotiations, as the U.S. further retreats from global cooperation. President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order suspending U.S. support

By MARÍA VERZA Associated Press MEXICO CITY (AP) — As the United States prepares to seize control of Venezuelan oil and the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump hardens its stance toward Cuba, Mexico has emerged as a key fuel supplier to Havana. It’s a role that could further complicate already strained relations with the