Boeing launches NASA astronauts for the first time after years of delays
By: Marcia Dun
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Boeing launched astronauts for the first time Wednesday, belatedly joining SpaceX as a second taxi service for NASA.
A pair of NASA test pilots blasted off aboard Boeing’s Starliner capsule for the International Space Station, the first to fly the new spacecraft.
The trip by Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams was expected to take 25 hours, with an arrival Thursday. They will spend just over a week at the orbiting lab before climbing back into Starliner for a remote desert touchdown in the western U.S. on June 14.
“Let’s get going!” Wilmore called out a few minutes before liftoff.
Half an hour later, he and Williams were safely in orbit and giving chase to the space station. Back at Cape Canaveral, the relieved launch controllers stood and applauded. After all the trouble leading up to Wednesday’s launch, including two scrapped countdowns, everything seemed to go smoothly before and during liftoff.
Years late because of spacecraft flaws, Starliner’s crew debut comes as the company struggles with unrelated safety issues on its airplane side.
Ukraine uses U.S. weapons to strike inside Russia – Western official
By: Aamer Madhani
WASHINGTON (AP) — Ukraine has used U.S weapons to strike inside Russia in recent days, according to a Western official familiar with the matter.
The weapons were used under recently approved guidance from President Joe Biden allowing American arms to be used to strike inside Russia for the limited purpose of defending Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city.
The official was not authorized to comment publicly on the sensitive matter and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Biden’s directive allows for U.S.-supplied weapons to be used to strike Russian forces that are attacking or preparing to attack. It does not change U.S. policy that directs Ukraine not to use American-provided ATACMS or long-range missiles and other munitions to strike offensively inside Russia, U.S. officials have said.
Ukrainian officials had stepped up calls on the U.S. to allow Kyiv’s forces to defend themselves against attacks originating from Russian territory. Kharkiv sits just 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the Russian border and has come under intensified Russian attack.
In advancing in the northeast Kharkiv region, Russian forces have exploited a lengthy delay in the replenishment of U.S. military aid. In addition, Western Europe’s inadequate military production has slowed crucial deliveries to the battlefield for Ukraine.
The Taliban publicly flogs 63 people including women accused of crimes
ISLAMABAD (AP) — The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan on Wednesday condemned the public flogging of more than 60 people, including more than a dozen women, by the Taliban in northern Sari Pul province.
At least 63 people were lashed on Tuesday by Afghanistan’s de facto authorities, UNAMA said in a statement on social platform X. The UN office condemned corporal punishment and called for respect for international human rights obligations.
Taliban’s supreme court in a statement confirmed the public flogging of 63 people including 14 women who had been accused of crimes including sodomy, theft and immoral relations. They were flogged at a sports stadium.
The Taliban, despite initial promises of a more moderate rule, began carrying out severe punishments in public — executions, floggings and stonings — shortly after coming to power again in 2021. The punishments are similar to those during the Taliban’s previous rule in the late 1990s.
Separate statements by the supreme court said a man and a woman convicted of adultery and trying to run away from home were flogged in northern Panjsher province on Wednesday.
Hunter Biden’s exes are called as witnesses in his federal gun trial to detail his drug use
WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Hunter Biden’s ex-wife and a former girlfriend testified Wednesday in his gun trial about finding his crack pipes and other drug paraphernalia as prosecutors sought to show he still had a substance abuse problem when he filled out a form to buy a firearm.
The courtroom grew quiet when Kathleen Buhle, who was married to Hunter for 20 years, walked in. She testified that she discovered her husband was using drugs when she found a crack pipe in an ashtray on their porch on July, 3, 2015, a day after their anniversary. When she confronted him, “he acknowledged smoking crack,” she said.
The trial has quickly become a highly personal and detailed tour of Hunter Biden’s mistakes and drug use. The proceedings are unfolding as the 2024 presidential election looms, and allies worry about the toll it will take on the president, who is deeply concerned about the health and sustained sobriety of his only living son. Prosecutors argue that the testimony is necessary to show Hunter Biden’s state of mind when he bought the gun.
Hunter Biden has been charged with three felonies stemming from the purchase of a gun in October 2018. He’s accused of lying to a federally licensed gun dealer, making a false claim on the application by saying he was not a drug user and illegally having the gun for 11 days.
Amanda Knox reconvicted of slander in Italy for accusing innocent man in roommate’s 2007 murder
By: Colleen Barry
FLORENCE, Italy (AP) — An Italian court reconvicted Amanda Knox of slander Wednesday, quashing her hope of removing a legal stain against her that has persisted after her exoneration in the brutal 2007 murder of her British roommate while the two were exchange students in Italy.
The decision by a Florence appeals court panel marked the sixth time that an Italian court found Knox had wrongly blamed the killing on an innocent man, the Congolese owner of the bar where she worked part time.
Knox has argued that her statements to police were forced during an intense night of questioning that included bullying as she relied on her then-remedial Italian when she was a 20-year-old university student.
The panel of two judges and six jurors, however, confirmed the three-year sentence, which she already served during four years in Italian custody while the investigation and multiple trials ensued. The court’s reasoning will be released in 60 days.
Knox’s appearance Wednesday in Florence, in a bid to clear her name “once and for all,” was the first time she had returned to an Italian court since she was freed in 2011. Accompanied by her husband, Christopher Robinson, she showed no visible emotion as the verdict was read aloud.
Gunman shot, captured after shootout outside U.S. Embassy in Lebanon
By: Kareem Chehayeb And Lujain Jo
AUKAR, Lebanon (AP) — A gunman who attacked the U.S. embassy near Beirut was shot and captured by Lebanese soldiers after a Wednesday morning shootout that injured an embassy security guard, the military and embassy officials said.
The attack took place as tensions simmered in the tiny Mediterranean country, where months of fighting between Hezbollah militants and Israeli troops has displaced thousands along the border, following years of political deadlock and economic hardship.
Local media reported that there was a gunfight involving at least one attacker and lasting almost half an hour.
No motive was immediately clear, but Lebanese media have published photos that appear to show a bloodied attacker wearing a black vest with the words “Islamic State” written in Arabic and the English initials “I” and “S.”
The Islamic State has not claimed the attack, nor has any other group.
A Lebanese security official and two judicial officials familiar with the case said the gunman appeared to be a lone attacker. They identified him as a resident of the eastern Lebanese border town of Majdal Anjar near Syria. Earlier, the Lebanese military identified the suspect as a Syrian national.
Death toll rises to 6 from floods across southern Germany
BERLIN (AP) — The death toll from floods across a large part of southern Germany rose to six on Wednesday as police recovered the body of a woman missing since the weekend from a canal in Bavaria.
The 79-year-old failed to return home after being seen on a bicycle in Jettingen-Scheppach, near the city of Augsburg, on Sunday. A local resident spotted her body in a canal on Wednesday, police said.
Persistent heavy rain led to widespread flooding over the weekend. While the situation has now eased in southwestern Germany, water levels are only gradually beginning to recede along the Danube in eastern Bavaria.
The bodies of four people who died in the floods were found Sunday and Monday, three of them in inundated basements. Police reported a fifth victim, a driver whose body was recovered from a submerged car, on Tuesday.
Silence and heavy security in China and Hong Kong mark 35th anniversary of the Tiananmen crackdown
By: Ken Moritsugu And Kanis Leung
BEIJING (AP) — Beijing’s Tiananmen Square had checkpoints and police vehicles Tuesday as China tried to silence the 35th anniversary of a bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protests. Hong Kong police arrested four people and swarmed a handful of others who tried to protest or commemorate as the effort extended beyond the mainland.
China has long quashed any public memory of the military crackdown on months-long protests at the heart of its capital. An estimated 180,000 troops and police rolled in with tanks and armoured vehicles and fired into crowds trying to block them from advancing on the student-led demonstration in the square.
Hundreds, if not thousands, are believed to have been killed in an overnight operation that ended on the morning of June 4, 1989.
It was a turning point in modern Chinese history as Communist Party hard-liners embraced control instead of political reforms.
Life appeared as normal in Beijing on Tuesday, with tourists lining the streets leading to gates to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City, the former imperial palace across from it. The closest subway exit was closed, as was a viewing point atop Tiananmen Gate, according to a visitor registration website.
U.S. flies B-1B bomber for first precision bomb drill in 7 years as tensions simmer with North Korea
By: Hyung-jin Kim And Kim Tong-hyung
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — The United States flew a long-range B-1B bomber over the Korean Peninsula on Wednesday for its first precision-guided bombing drill with South Korea in seven years, the South’s military said.
The drill — seen as a show of force against North Korea — comes as tensions are rising over the North’s recent launches of rubbish-carrying balloons toward South Korea and other provocations.
Wednesday’s training involved other advanced U.S. and South Korean fighter jets as well as the B-1B aircraft, the second U.S. bomber temporarily deployed over the Korean Peninsula this year. The exercise was meant to demonstrate the U.S. security commitment to South Korea and strengthen the allies’ joint defence posture, according to the South Korean Defence Ministry.
During the training, the B-1B dropped Joint Direct Attack Munitions while being escorted by South Korean jets, the first such bombing drill for a U.S. bomber since 2017, a ministry statement said.
It said South Korean fighter jets also conducted live-firing exercises to demonstrate the country’s readiness to punish North Korea if provoked, it said.
