AP National

Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate has passed a defense bill that authorizes significant pay raises for junior enlisted service members and boosts overall military spending to $895 billion. It also strips coverage of transgender medical treatments for children of military members. The annual defense authorization bill usually gains strong bipartisan support and hasn’t

Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — A Pentagon report says China is expanding its nuclear force, has increased military pressure against Taiwan and has strengthened its ties with Russia over the past year. Those actions are accelerating key areas of conflict with the United States. The report also notes that the recent rash of corruption allegations

Associated Press LONDON (AP) — A teen charged with killing three girls and wounding 10 other people in a stabbing rampage at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in England this summer has had not guilty pleas entered for him in court. Axel Rudakubana, 18, who has refused to speak in court was read the charges Wednesday

The killing of a senior Russian general in a bombing outside his apartment building in Moscow was the boldest assassination yet of a top military officer and it again brought the war in Ukraine to the streets of the capital. Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov was killed Tuesday by a bomb hidden on an electric scooter

NEW DELHI (AP) — An Indian navy speedboat has crashed into a ferry carrying over 100 people to a popular tourist destination off Mumbai, killing at least 13 people. A navy statement says 99 ferry passengers were rescued. They were on their way to Elephanta Island when the speedboat circled and collided with the ferry

Associated Press MAMOUDZOU, Mayotte (AP) — They clustered around water taps, rare sources of electricity and each other. Four days after the strongest cyclone in nearly a century ripped through the French island territory of Mayotte off the coast of Africa, survivors recalled the horror of the storm that caught many by surprise. Associated Press

Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon has transferred two Malaysian detainees at the Guantanamo Bay U.S. military prison to their home country. That’s after they pleaded guilty to charges stemming from deadly 2002 bombings in Bali and agreed to testify against the alleged ringleader of that and other attacks. The move leaves just 27

Associated Press PARIS (AP) — France’s highest court has upheld an appeal court decision which had found former President Nicolas Sarkozy guilty of corruption and influence peddling while he was the country’s head of state. Sarkozy, 69, faces a year in prison, but is expected to ask to be detained at home with an electronic

Associated Press The past year has been both a glass half empty and half full for the world’s democracies. From Asia to Africa to the Americas, it produced examples of democracy working and citizens standing up against attempted coups or authoritarians. At the same time, some of the new regimes ushered in by all those

AP National Writer NEW YORK (AP) — A new novel from Kiran Desai, her first fiction since the Booker Prize-winning “The Inheritance of Loss” came out nearly 20 years ago, will be published next fall. Desai’s “The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny” is scheduled for release in September by Hogarth, an imprint of the Random

Associated Press MONROVIA, Liberia (AP) — The parliament building in Liberia caught fire Wednesday and the country’s president condemned the “wanton destruction,” even as no link was immediately confirmed to anti-government protests in the capital. The protests in the West African nation began with anger Tuesday over the decision to remove the parliament speaker, an

Associated Press MILAN (AP) — Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni is defending her friendship with U.S. tech billionaire and Trump advisor Elon Musk. She told Italian lawmakers Wednesday that she would not be influenced in areas where he has economic interests. Meloni added that she has good relationships “with many people” but doesn’t “take orders from