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New Hampshire sheriff pleads not guilty to theft, perjury and falsifying evidence

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

BRENTWOOD, N.H. (AP) — A New Hampshire sheriff accused of stealing $19,000 in county funds pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges of theft, perjury and falsifying evidence.Strafford County Sheriff Mark Brave is accused of using his county credit card to pay for travel to fictitious business meetings with multiple paramours and then lying about it to a grand jury. He was arrested last month and made an initial court appearance Thursday, where he spoke only to request that his bail conditions be modified to allow him to bring his daughter to and from school in Massachusetts. Prosecutors agreed to the request.Brave, a Democrat elected in 2020 as New Hampshire’s first Black sheriff, said after his arrest that he was innocent and that none of his spending was “due to deceive the county or the people of Strafford County.” He has called the allegations politically and racially motivated. County commissioners, all of whom also are Democrats, have denied his claims.Brave, who was p...

Catholic Memorial football star Guerby Lambert makes the grade

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

WEST ROXBURY — Catholic Memorial coach John DiBiaso has an elite offensive lineman who is also an elite student.When he came to CM, 6-foot-7, 300-pound Guerby Lambert had no designs on playing football at all.“I came here for the academics and the brotherhood,” Lambert said at practice Wednesday. “I planned to play soccer and basketball. I didn’t come for football.”Now, however, Lambert had scholarship offers from the likes of Ohio State and Alabama, and also Harvard and Yale.It was on that soccer pitch that DiBiaso discovered Lambert, who was not the size he is now, but still on the bigger side.“My first impression was, we were going to get him to play football,” DiBiaso said. “And after we got him out here, we noticed he had great feet from soccer, naturally, you know, running around. He was very light on his feet. I remembered something they said about Patrick Ewing when he played basketball. They said he had great feet for a big ma...

Dozens dead after blast in southwestern Pakistan at a rally celebrating birthday of Islam’s prophet

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — A powerful bomb exploded near a mosque at a rally celebrating the birthday of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad in southwestern Pakistan on Friday, killing at least 52 people and injuring nearly 70 others, police and a government official said.The bombing occurred in Mastung, a district in Baluchistan province, where around 500 people had gathered for a procession to celebrate the birth anniversary of the prophet. Muslims hold rallies and distribute free meals to people on the occasion, which is known as Mawlid an-Nabi.TV footage and videos on the social media showed an open area near a mosque strewn with the shoes of the dead and wounded after the bombing. Some of the bodies had been covered with bedsheets, and residents and rescuers were seen rushing the wounded to hospitals, where a state of emergency had been declared and appeals were being issued for blood donations.Baluchistan has witnessed scores of attacks by insurgents and militants, but they usually ta...

A new Spanish law strengthens animal rights but exempts bullfights and hunting with dogs

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

MADRID (AP) — A new animal welfare law that took effect Friday in Spain outlaws the use of animals for recreational activities that cause them pain and suffering but allows bullfights and hunting with dogs.Spain’s first specific animal rights legislation is intended to crack down on abuses. The law particularly targets the mistreatment of domestic animals, introducing fines of up to 200,000 euros ($212,000).It bans the buying of pets in stores or online, but gives stores a grace period to find homes for their animals. In the future, it only will be legal to purchase pets from registered breeders. The new rules allow pets into most establishments, including restaurants and bars.The law bans the use of wild animals at circuses and gives owners six months to comply. It allows zoos to keep using the marine mammals in their dolphin shows until the animals die. Bullfights are regarded as part of Spain’s cultural heritage. A proposal to include hunting dogs in the law prompted an out...

Novelist Murakami hosts Japanese ghost story reading ahead of Nobel Prize announcements

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

TOKYO (AP) — Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami hosted a ghost story reading event in Tokyo amid growing attention before the announcement of this year’s Nobel Prize in literature, an award he is a perennial favorite to win. Murakami said at Thursday’s reading that he enjoys scary stories and wanted to write more of them. The event featured one from the 18-century collection “Tales of Moonlight and Rain,” which intrigued Murakami since his childhood and is known to have inspired his work.The classic collection written by Akinari Ueda and called “Ugetsu Monogatari” in Japanese explores a blurry borderline between the real and surreal, which Murakami said in a guide he contributed to a 2021 magazine made him wonder which side he was on. Borders and walls are important motifs in Murakami’s writing. Protagonists in his stories often travel through walls or between two worlds and encounter mysterious, exotic characters. While Murakami has said he grew up mostly reading W...

Inflation drops sharply in Europe. It offers a glimmer of hope, but higher oil prices loom

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Inflation that has been plaguing Europeans declined sharply in September, strengthening hopes that consumers will eventually get relief from costlier groceries, vacations and haircuts — and that the European Central Bank won’t have to further restrict the economy by raising interest rates from already-record highs.The annual rate was 4.3% this month, a drop from 5.2% in August. But recently higher oil prices are casting a shadow over prospects for beating inflation back down to the central bank’s target of 2%. Core inflation, which excludes volatile fuel and food prices, fell more than analysts expected — to 4.5% from 5.3%, according to data released Friday by the European Union’s statistics agency, Eurostat. The ECB closely watches this figure to assess how inflation is coming down.The fall in core inflation “reinforces our view that the ECB has finished raising interest rates,” said Jack Allen-Reynolds, deputy chief eurozone economist at Capital Eco...

Leaders of European Union’s Mediterranean nations huddle in Malta to discuss migration

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

VALLETTA, Malta (AP) — The leaders of nine southern European Union countries met in Malta on Friday to discuss common challenges such as migration, the EU’s management of which has vexed national governments in Europe for years.The nations represented at the one-day huddle included host Malta, France, Greece, Italy, Croatia, Cyprus, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain. With the exceptions of Slovenia and Croatia, which were added to the so-called “Med Group” in 2021, the countries all rim the Mediterranean Sea. Two top EU officials — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Miche — were invited to the closed-door meeting. The leaders of the EU’s 27 nations have an informal European Council meeting scheduled for next week in Spain. The huddle’s main aim is to help develop consensus among the members on major issues concerning all EU countries.However, unity among EU members on migration has been elusive, as witnessed in Brussels d...

Swiss indict daughter of former Uzbek president in bribery, money laundering case involving millions

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

GENEVA (AP) — Swiss federal prosecutors have indicted the daughter of a former president of Uzbekistan on charges including money laundering, bribery and participation in a criminal network that used “violence and intimidation.” Authorities have already frozen or confiscated hundreds of millions of Swiss francs (dollars) in the case.The attorney general’s office said Gulnara Karimova, the daughter of former President Islam Karimov, was indicted along with the former director-general of the Uzbek subsidiary of a Russian telecommunications company for crimes allegedly committed between 2005 and 2013. That was during Karimov’s tenure: He led the central Asian country for more than a quarter-century until his death in September 2016. His daughter once served at the U.N. office in Geneva, and benefited from diplomatic immunity.Culminating a criminal probe that was opened more than a decade ago, the prosecutors announced the indictment on Thursday and said Karimova allegedly d...

Stock market today: European shares gain and Asian shares are mixed, with Chinese markets on holiday

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

BANGKOK (AP) — Shares advanced in Europe on Friday after a day of mixed and sparse trading in Asia, where many markets were closed for public holidays. Oil prices edged higher and U.S. futures advanced. Crude oil prices are hovering near their highest levels this year, adding to the inflationary pressures that are a factor behind the Federal Reserve’s intention to keep interest rates high. The likelihood of a U.S. federal government shutdown is also clouding the outlook for the U.S. economy.Germany’s DAX rose 0.8% to 15,438.45 and the CAC 40 in Paris also added 0.8% to 7,176.34. London’s FTSE 100 was up 0.7% at 7,655.90.The futures for the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average were both less than 0.5% higher. On Thursday, Wall Street’s benchmarks ticked higher, trimming its sharp loss for September. The S&P 500 rose 0.6% and the Dow gained 0.3%. The Nasdaq composite climbed 0.8%. In Asian trading Friday, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index lost 0.1% to 31,857.6...

As employers face labor shortages, Biden administration rolls out playbook for training workers

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:38:53 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration on Friday is expected to release a playbook on best practices for training workers as the low 3.8% unemployment rate and years of underinvestment have left manufacturers, construction firms and other employers with unfilled jobs.Worker shortages have been a frustration for some employers, who upped their investments in new factories and construction projects after President Joe Biden signed into law funding for infrastructure, computer chips and a shift toward renewable energy sources. Finding employees to replace retirees also has become a challenge.As part of the 2021 pandemic rescue package, state and local governments have committed $11 billion to worker training. The money must be spent by the end of 2026 and the administration is trying to ensure the investments pay off as promised.“This is a chance to make a once-in-a-generation investment in the skills and well-being of workers in your communities — an investment that will reap bene...