NAVALNY WINS EU HUMAN RIGHTS PRIZE
BRUSSELS» Imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who narrowly survived a poisoning that he blames on the Kremlin, was awarded the European Union’s top human rights prize Wednesday in a clear slap at President Vladimir Putin.
In awarding the Sakharov Prize to Navalny, the European Parliament praised his “immense personal bravery.” The 45-year-old activist fell ill from a nerve agent poisoning last year and recuperated in Germany. He promptly was arrested upon his return to Moscow and later imprisoned.
Cruz pleads guilty to 2018 Parkland school massacre.
FORT LAUDERDALE, FLA.» Nikolas Cruz pleaded guilty Wednesday to murdering 17 people during a rampage at his former high school in Parkland, Fla., leaving a jury to decide whether he will be executed for one of the nation’s deadliest school shootings.
The guilty pleas will set the stage for a penalty trial in which 12 jurors will determine whether Cruz, 23, should be sentenced to death or life in prison without parole. Cruz was charged with 17 counts of murder and 17 counts of attempted firstdegree murder for those wounded in the Feb. 14, 2018, attack at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland.
Reports say health problems tied to global warming are on the rise.
NEW YORK» Health problems tied to climate change are all getting worse, according to two reports published Wednesday.
The annual reports commissioned by the medical journal Lancet tracked 44 global health indicators connected to climate change, including heat deaths, infectious diseases and hunger. All of them are getting grimmer, said Lancet Countdown project research director Marina Romanello, a biochemist.
“Rising temperatures are having consequences,” said University of Washington environmental health professor Kristie Ebi, a report co-author.
One report is global, and the other is aimed just at the United States.
Bus bombs kill 14 in Syrian capital.
DAMASCUS, SYRIA» Two bombs attached to a bus carrying Syrian troops exploded in Damascus during the morning rush hour Wednesday, a military official said. Fourteen people were killed in the attack, one of the deadliest in the capital in years.
While the Syrian government’s decade-long conflict with insurgents continues in parts of the country, bombings in Damascus have become exceedingly rare since President Bashar Assad’s troops pushed opposition fighters from the capital’s suburbs in 2018.
Shortly after the Damascus bombings, government shells landed in a rebel-held town in northern Syria, killing at least 10 people.
Report: Trump golf club under new criminal probe.
NEW YORK» Donald Trump’s company is under criminal investigation by a district attorney in a New York suburb into whether it misled officials to cut taxes for a golf course there.
The district attorney’s office subpoenaed records from the Trump National Golf Club in Westchester and the town of Ossining that handles the club’s taxes, said the Times.
The probe appears to focus in part on whether the former president’s company submitted misleading valuations on the golf course.