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EU shrugs as pro-Russia pals Orbán and Fico troll the West after Putin handshake

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has spent the past week brazenly trolling the West — shaking hands with Vladimir Putin, comparing the EU to an oppressive Soviet Union, and vowing to hold up a fresh tranche on aid for Ukraine.Now the swaggering Hungarian leader is set to team up with Slovakia’s newly elected pro-Putin leader, Robert Fico, to further affront the bloc during a gathering of EU leaders on Thursday in Brussels.The EU’s response so far? A collective shrug — and the whispered promise that Brussels will unfreeze €13 billion for Hungary in exchange for Budapest implementing reforms to bring it into line with EU rule-of-law standards.“Slovakia is such a piddly country that this will barely make a difference,” an EU official said. “Slovakia barely has any leverage. They need their cohesion funds and the EU’s goodwill, they can’t really afford to be a troublemaker in Brussels. What is much more relevant for Orbán is the loss of Poland as...

Mediator no more: Erdoğan takes aim at Israel, backing Hamas ‘freedom’ fighters

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

Israel is committing atrocities against civilians as it steps up its military operations in Gaza, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said in an explosive broadside that appeared to pull him away from earlier ambitions of acting as a mediator in the crisis. “We had plans to travel to Israel. It has been cancelled — we will not go,” he said in a speech to governing AK Party lawmakers on Wednesday. “I invite all other countries with reason and conscience to put pressure on the … government to return the state of Israel to sanity,” he added, claiming “crimes against humanity” are now being committed against ordinary Palestinians. At the same time, in a major break with NATO allies, Erdoğan insisted that Palestinian militant group Hamas “is not a terrorist organization, but a group of freedom and mujahideen [warriors] who are striving to protect their lands and their citizens.”More than 1,400 Israelis were ...

$150,000 reward offered as authorities search for suspect who robbed a mail carrier in Mattapan

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

A reward of up to $150,000 is being offered by federal authorities as police search for a man who robbed a mail carrier in Mattapan last week.The US Postal Inspection Service is offering the reward to anyone who provides information resulting in the arrest of the suspect, who was caught on camera robbing a US Postal Service carrier on Wednesday, Oct. 18.According to the USPIS, the robbery happened in the area of Stonecrest Road just before 2:30 p.m.The suspect was described as a Black male with a height of 6’1″-6’2″ and weight of approximately 220 pounds. He was also seen wearing a dark-colored hooded sweatshirt, dark-colored pants, and white sneakers.Images of the suspect also showed the individual pointing an object that resembled a firearm, though no details on a possible weapon have been released.The USPIS asks that the public not attempt to apprehend the suspect themselves, and that if anyone has any information about the incident, contact the Postal Ins...

MBTA boss cites new ‘spirit of partnership” with Chinese train maker

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

There’s still no final delivery date, but after a long stretch of upheaval afflicting promised MBTA Red and Orange Line vehicles, the agency’s top boss on Tuesday praised a “spirit of partnership” from the company building the trains.MBTA General Manager Phil Eng said the T has now received 94 out of 152 promised Orange Line cars and 14 out of 252 expected Red Line cars under its contract with Chinese firm CRRC. Dozens more Red and Orange Line cars are either currently under production in Springfield, where CRRC operates a manufacturing facility, or sitting on site waiting for final assembly.While officials work to “reset this contract” following a series of delays and malfunctions, Eng said recently completed vehicles “continue to exceed the contract requirements” for safety and quality.“They have committed to delivering this, and I believe that what we’re seeing is a spirit of partnership,” Eng told the MBTA’s...

Michael Cohen’s testimony will resume in the Donald Trump business fraud lawsuit in New York

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Michael Cohen will be back on the witness stand Wednesday, testifying against his ex-boss Donald Trump in a civil trial over allegations that the former president chronically exaggerated the value of his real estate holdings on financial documents.During his first day of testimony Tuesday, Cohen said he and key executives at Trump’s company worked to inflate the estimated values of his holdings so that documents given to banks and others would match a net worth that Trump had set “arbitrarily.”Trump watched as his lawyer Alina Habba then cross-examined Cohen, working to portray him as a convicted liar.Cohen worked as Trump’s lawyer and fixer for many years, but in 2018 he was prosecuted for tax evasion, making false statements to a bank and to Congress and making illegal contributions to Trump’s campaign in the form of payouts to women who said they had extramarital sexual encounters with the Republican. Trump said the women’s stories were fal...

In the Amazon, communities next to the world’s most voluminous river are queuing for water

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

CAREIRO DA VARZEA, Brazil (AP) — As the Amazon drought rages on, public authorities in Brazil are scrambling to deliver food and water to thousands of isolated communities throughout a vast and roadless territory, where boats are the only means of transportation.Across Amazonas state, which has a territory the size of three Californias, 59 out of its 62 municipalities are under state of emergency, impacting 633,000 people. In the capital Manaus, Negro River — a major tributary of the Amazon — has reached its lowest level since official measurements began 121 years ago.One of the most impacted cities is Careiro da Varzea, near Manaus by the Amazon River. On Tuesday, the municipality distributed emergency kits using an improvised barge originally designed to transport cattle.The Associated Press accompanied the delivery to two communities. It docked miles away from them, requiring residents, most of them small farmers and fishermen, to walk long distances through former riverbeds turn...

Slovakia swears in a new Cabinet led by a populist ex-premier who opposes support for Ukraine

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP) — Slovakia’s president swore in a new government Wednesday, led by a former populist prime minister poised to end the country’s military aid for Ukraine as it fights Russia’s invasion.Robert Fico returned to power and took over as prime minister for the fourth time after his leftist Smer, or Direction, party won Slovakia’s Sept 30 parliamentary election. The party won 42 seats in the 150-seat Parliament after campaigning on a pro-Russian and anti-American platform.Fico formed a parliamentary majority by signing a coalition government deal with the leftist Hlas, or Voice, party and the ultranationalist Slovak National Party.Hlas, led by Fico’s former deputy in Smer, Peter Pellegrini, gained 27 seats. Pellegrini parted ways with Fico after the scandal-tainted Smer lost the previous election in 2020.Pellegrini replaced Fico as prime minister after he was forced to resign following major anti-government street protests resulting from the 2018 killin...

Houston’s Hobby airport resumes flights after two planes clip wings on an airport runway

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

Flights have resumed at Houston’s William P. Hobby Airport after after two private jets clipped wings when they were moving on the airfield.Debris was cleared from the airfield and flight operations restored, the airport posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Tuesday evening. No injuries were reported and the city fire department said there was no risk of fire after the collision Tuesday afternoon at the airport southeast of downtown.The Federal Aviation Administration said on X that a twin-engine Hawker H25B turned off a runway without permission and collided with a twin-engine Cessna C510 that had landed on another runway. The FAA did not say how many people were on board each plane. The National Transportation Safety Board is sending a six-person team to investigate the collision, the NTSB said on X.There were 54 flights cancelled and 78 diverted while operations were suspended, according to ABC-13.There has been a string of recent close calls at airports around the nat...

A century after her birth, opera great Maria Callas is honored with a new museum in Greece

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Finishing her class at The Julliard School of the arts in New York, Greek opera great Maria Callas gave her students a final word of advice.“Keep on going the proper way: Not with fireworks, not with easy applause, but with the expression of the words, the diction, and to really feel what you feel. That’s what I want. I’m not good at words, so that’s that.”The March 1972 speech was a detail little known to her admiring public, along with letters, jewellery and countless honors that include a postage stamp series from Kyrgyzstan and Congo.Now they are on display. The City of Athens inaugurated the Maria Callas Museum in the center of the Greek capital Wednesday, marking a century since the birth to Greek parents of the legendary soprano in New York.The museum, next to the city’s cathedral and with a view of the Acropolis, opens to the public Thursday, with sections of the museum connected by a red carpet.The top floors offer a recreated room of her Paris apartme...

Pickering councillor has pay suspended for motions deemed homophobic and transphobic

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:44 GMT

A city councillor in Durham Region has seen her pay temporarily suspended over comments she made earlier this year regarding the 2SLGBTQIA+ community.Coun. Lisa Robinson, representing Pickering Ward 1, has had her pay docked for 60 days after that city’s integrity commissioner deemed three motions she promoted to be transphobic and homophobic. It’s the second time in a month that Robinson has seen her pay docked following an investigation into her conduct.Pickering Integrity Commissioner Janice Atwood’s recent report addressed complaints against Robinson over comments she made earlier this year on universal washrooms and changerooms for City of Pickering facilities, specifically at the Chestnut Hills Recreation Centre.Robinson discussed the motion at length outside the Durham District School Board (DDSB) back in May. She wanted to see the recreation centre alter its policy so members could only use the changeroom corresponding to their sex assigned at birth, or the...