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Stock market today: Asia shares gain, tracking Wall St rally

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

NEW YORK — Shares advanced in Asia on Friday after Wall Street rallied to its best day since January. Gains in Asian markets were more modest as traders waited to see what the Bank of Japan would do in its first policy meeting since Kazuo Ueda took the helm. The central bank kept its ultra-lax policy unchanged, and the Japanese yen weakened sharply against the U.S. dollar. The dollar rose to 134.92 yen from 133.96 yen earlier in the day. “With extremely high uncertainties surrounding economies and financial markets at home and abroad, the bank will patiently continue with monetary easing while nimbly responding to developments,” the BOJ said in a statement. Rising prices are putting pressure on the central bank to tighten its ultra-lax monetary policy: Japan reported inflation excluding volatile fresh food costs was at 3.5% in March. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index added 1.1% to 28,764.98 and the Hang Seng in Hong Kong gained 0.6% to 19,951.51. The Shanghai Composite index surged 0.7...

British military says ship comes under attack off Yemen

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A ship came under attack Friday off the coast of Yemen in unclear circumstances, a British military organization said. The British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations, which provides support to ships across the Mideast, said the attack happened off Nishtun, Yemen, in the country’s far east near the border with Oman. It said shots had been fired at the unidentified vessel, with three boats chasing after it.There was no additional information immediately available. There have been incidents in the past off Yemen, though Nishtun is held by forces allied to Yemen’s internationally recognized government, which is backed by a Saudi-led coalition. The Associated Press

In Arizona, fresh scrutiny of Saudi-owned farm’s water use

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — In rural Arizona’s La Paz County, on the state’s rugged border with California, the decision by a Saudi-owned dairy company to grow alfalfa in the American Southwest for livestock in the Gulf kingdom first raised eyebrows nearly a decade ago. Now, worsening drought has focused new attention on the company and whether Arizona should be doing more to protect its groundwater resources.Amid a broader investigation by the state attorney general, Arizona last week rescinded a pair of permits that would have allowed Fondomonte Arizona, a subsidiary of Almarai Co., to drill more than 1,000 feet (305 meters) into the water table to pump up to 3,000 gallons (11 kiloliters) of water per minute to irrigate its forage crops. In an interview with The Associated Press, Attorney General Kris Mayes said she thought most Arizonans see it as “outrageous” that the state is allowing foreign-owned companies “to stick a straw in our ground and use our water for free to grow alfalfa and s...

GOP uses state capitol protests to redefine ‘insurrection’

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

Silenced by her Republican colleagues, Montana state Rep. Zooey Zephyr looked up from the House floor to supporters in the gallery shouting “Let her speak!” and thrust her microphone into the air — amplifying the sentiment the Democratic transgender lawmaker was forbidden from expressing.It was a brief moment of defiance and chaos. While seven people were arrested for trespassing, the boisterous demonstration was free of violence or damage. Yet later that day, a group of Republican lawmakers described it in darker tones, saying Zephyr’s actions were responsible for “encouraging an insurrection.”It’s the third time in the last five weeks — and one of at least four times this year — that Republicans have attempted to compare disruptive but nonviolent protests at state capitols to insurrections.The tactic follows a pattern set over the past two years when the term has been misused to describe public demonstrations and even the 2020 election that put Democrat Joe Biden in th...

What to know about tick, Lyme season following a mild winter

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — After a mild winter in the U.S., will there be an uptick in ticks this year?Researchers say it is hard to predict how the tick season will play out. This year’s mild winter and early snow melt, though, could mean more ticks earlier than usual and a wider spread of Lyme disease and other tick-borne diseases, scientists said.In Connecticut, ticks are showing up in greater numbers this year, according to Goudarz Molaei, a tick expert for the state. So far, more than 700 ticks have been sent in for a testing program that normally would have gotten 200 to 300 by now. The state typically sees a lot of Lyme disease, which got its name from a Connecticut town.“It’s going to be an above average year for tick activity and abundance,” Molaei said.WHAT DISEASES DO TICKS SPREAD?Infected ticks spread bacteria, viruses and parasites that make people sick. Lyme disease is the most common tick-borne infection in the U.S., mostly in the Northeast and Midwest. An estimated 476,0...

Coalition challenges Paraguay’s long-ruling Colorado Party

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

ASUNCIÓN, Paraguay (AP) — Voters will decide Sunday whether to stay with the party that has governed Paraguay for seven decades or back a broad opposition coalition that has mounted a strong challenge amid discontent over health, schools and corruption.The elections for president and Congress could also have geopolitical implications as Paraguay is the only country in South America with political ties to Taiwan and the opposition coalition has vowed to review that relationship.The landlocked country, which enjoys a relatively stable economy even as it suffers high levels of poverty and corruption, has been practically immune to political change and the social movements that have swept the region, including the feminist wave.But analysts say the political landscape may be due for alteration given that popular anger is at high levels over corruption and the deficiencies in the health and education systems that worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Efraín Alegre, the leader of the Lib...

Gunmen kill 15 people, abduct 5 aid workers in north Nigeria

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

ABUJA, Nigeria (AP) — Gunmen killed 15 villagers and abducted five aid workers in separate attacks in Nigeria’s troubled northern region, authorities said Thursday.The assailants arrived in Benue state’s Apa area and opened fire on villagers in their homes, according to David Olofu, a senior state government official. He said military personnel were among those shot in the attack and many houses were razed as villagers fled to safety.The incident in Benue is the latest in a spiral of violent attacks in which armed groups are targeting remote communities across Nigeria’s northwest and central regions, often defying government and security measures.More than 80 people have been killed in Benue in the past month in such attacks. No group has claimed responsibility for the killings, though authorities have blamed Fulani herdsmen, a group of mostly young pastoralists from the Fulani tribe caught up in Nigeria’s conflict between host communities and herdsmen over limited acces...

Congress’ anger at FBI shapes surveillance program’s future

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Growing anger at the FBI from both parties in Congress has become a major hurdle for U.S. intelligence agencies fighting to keep their vast powers to collect foreign communications that often sweep up the phone calls and emails of Americans. Key lawmakers say they won’t vote to renew the programs under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that expire at the end of this year without major changes targeting the FBI. Many blame problems with how the FBI’s special agents search for U.S. citizens using Section 702 — along with publicly revealed mistakes in other intelligence investigations by the bureau. Among the revelations since the law was last renewed in 2018: The bureau misled surveillance court judges in seeking to wiretap a 2016 campaign aide for former President Donald Trump, and agents didn’t follow guidelines in searching Section 702 databases for the names of a congressman on the House Intelligence Committee, a local pol...

Fed’s review of role in Silicon Valley Bank collapse due out

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve is scheduled Friday to release a highly-anticipated review of its supervision of Silicon Valley Bank, the go-to bank for venture capital firms and technology start-ups that failed spectacularly in March, setting off a crisis of confidence for the banking industry. The review, due to be released at 11 a.m. eastern, is expected to examine how regulators may have missed warning signs in Silicon Valley Bank’s business and whether they could have been addressed before the bank failed. Further, the report is expected to look at what regulators could do better to prevent a similar bank failure in the future.Federal regulators seized Silicon Valley Bank on March 10 after customers withdrew tens of billions of dollars in deposits in a matter of hours. Two days later, they seized Signature Bank of New York. Although regulators guaranteed all the banks’ deposits, customers at other midsize regional banks rushed to pull out their money — often with a few ta...

Trouble along the Mississippi River as the spring snowmelt drives near-record flooding

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 18:54:44 GMT

Chalk up what's going on along stretches of the Mississippi River to another of the myriad impacts of this past winter and early spring's parade of ATMOSPHERIC RIVER STORMS off the Pacific--storms which then swept across the country unleashing mega snowfalls and, in their warm sectors, severe weather.Per cent of average snow over the 2022-23 season to date courtesy of the NOAA Midwestern Regional Climate Center at Purdue UniversityNOAA MIDWEST REGIONAL CLIMATE CENTER 2022-23 SEASONAL SNOWFALL analysis to dateDeparture from mean snowfall over the 2022-23 season courtesy of the NOAA Midwest Regional Climate Center at Purdue UniversityMelting Snow Straining River Systems that Drain the AreaThe past snow season's bountiful snows across the northern Plains and Upper Midwest is now melting and the meltwaters are straining the river systems that drain the area. Mississippi River levels are predicted to reach the 3rd-highest level on the books at Davenport.As of Wednesday morning, the Missi...