February, 2017

• 22 February

  do circuses need animals?

  

    BOSTON / AP A circus is under fire for bringing back animal acts a year after earning praise from animal rights groups for dropping them to keep up with changing public attitudes. The Melha Shrine Circus, which has seven performances over four days scheduled for May in western Massachusetts, brought back performing elephants, tigers and dogs because that’s what ...

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• 22 February

  New plague of caterpillars deals blow to farmers

  

    JOHANNESBURG / DPA One of the most damaging pests in North and South America has reached Africa and is threatening the maize crop in many countries there. Experts are also warning that the fall armyworm (Spodoptera frugiperda), the larva of the fall armyworm moth, could soon spread from Africa across the Mediterranean to southern Europe. “Whether this year, next ...

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• 22 February

  Trump’s immigration crackdown likely to bring lawsuit flood

  

    Bloomberg President Donald Trump’s plan to round up and deport millions of undocumented immigrants is likely to trigger waves of lawsuits that may soon dwarf the legal fight over the administration’s temporary ban on travelers from seven Muslim majority countries. The Department of Homeland Security is pushing ahead with what the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) calls a “hyper-aggressive ...

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• 22 February

  Planes, tanks, ships: Russian military gets massive upgrade

    MOSCOW / AP The Russian military received a sweeping array of new weapons last year, including 41 intercontinental ballistic missiles, and the wide-ranging military modernization will continue this year, the defense minister said on Wednesday. Minister Sergei Shoigu told lawmakers the air force will receive 170 new aircraft, the army will receive 905 tanks and other armored vehicles while ...

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• 22 February

  Rebel missile kills senior Yemeni general in Red Sea port

    Sanaa / AP A ballistic missile fired by Yemen’s Shiite rebels on Wednesday killed the deputy chief of staff of the country’s military in a major blow to the US-backed Saudi-led coalition, which heavily supports the government, officials said. The SABA news agency, which is controlled by the Houthi rebels, said their forces struck the vehicle of Brig. Gen. ...

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• 22 February

  Iraqi suicide bomber ‘was ex-Gitmo detainee’

  

    LONDON / AP A suicide bomber who attacked a military base in Iraq this week was a former Guantanamo Bay detainee freed in 2004 after Britain lobbied for his release, raising questions about the ability of security services to track the whereabouts of potential terrorists. The IS group identified the bomber as Abu Zakariya al-Britani, and two British security ...

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• 22 February

  Cyprus peace process falters after latest talks called off

    BEIRUT / AP Talks to reunify ethnically-split Cyprus suffered another blow after the leader of breakaway Turkish Cypriots backed out of a scheduled meeting aiming to push negotiations forward, officials said on Wednesday. Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades expressed regret that Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci told United Nations officials that he won’t attend Thursday’s meeting. “I’m ready to continue ...

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• 22 February

  Police: Suspects in North Korean death coated hands with poison

    KUALA LUMPUR / AP The two women suspected of fatally poisoning a scion of North Korea’s ruling family were trained to coat their hands with toxic chemicals then wipe them on his face, police in Malaysia said Wednesday, announcing they were seeking a North Korean diplomat in connection with the attack. But the North Korean embassy ridiculed the police ...

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• 22 February

  Le Pen wins over ‘Left behind’ women voters

  

    Bloomberg French women are starting to picture their next president as a divorced mother of three. The anti-euro, anti-immigrant candidate Marine Le Pen has been playing up her gender as she seeks to convert a likely first-round victory into an overall majority in the run-off on May 7 — and it’s paying off. The 48-year-old National Front leader has ...

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• 22 February

  Saudi Aramco weighs offering discounted shares for locals

  

    Bloomberg Saudi Arabian Oil Co., gearing up for what may be the world’s biggest initial public offering, is considering discounted shares for local investors, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The oil company has discussed ways to structure the offering in different tiers, allowing Saudi buyers to receive the stock at a lower price than international investors, ...

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