News And Current Events

A pregnant woman in Ansan, Gyeonggi Province, who went into labor and needed immediate medical attention was turned away by more than 40 hospitals before giving birth inside an ambulance.

A report was made to 119 at 12:42 a.m. on March 10 that a woman in her 20s, who was 34 weeks pregnant, had gone into labor in Danwon District, Ansan, the Korean Emergency Firefighters Union said Tuesday.

Emergency responders quickly assessed her condition as critical and immediately contacted obstetrics and gynecology departments at hospitals in Seoul, Gyeonggi and South Chungcheong provinces. However, they were repeatedly told that treatment was unavailable. Hospitals reportedly cited reasons such as "obstetric care is unavailable at night" and "no staff is available to handle the case."

Emergency responders desperately called more than 40 hospitals for over an hour. At 1:48 a.m., the 119 control center secured a bed at Seoul Medical Center in Jungnang District, Seoul. The ambulance immediately headed there, but the woman's condition deteriorated as she suffered intense labor pains. As a result, emergency responders were forced to perform an emergency delivery. The woman gave birth to a baby boy at 2:11 a.m., approximately an hour and 30 minutes after the initial call.

Both the mother and newborn were admitted to Seoul Medical Center at 2:36 a.m. for follow-up care. Reports indicate that both are in stable condition.

Elon Musk’s X has reportedly regained a $44 billion valuation – the same price the world’s richest person paid to buy the social media site in 2022.

The company formerly known as Twitter was valued at $44 billion in a recent secondary financing round in which investors exchanged existing shares in X, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday, citing sources with knowledge of the matter.

A separate report by Bloomberg said X raised nearly $1 billion in new equity from investors – with Musk himself participating in the financing round.

The deal reportedly valued X at approximately $32 billion, alongside roughly $12.5 billion in debt.

The valuation points to a major turnaround for Musk and his handpicked CEO Linda Yaccarino, who have set about remaking X as an “everything app” with loosened content moderation standards and plans for an onsite payment platform.

President Trump promised to address the issue of Ukraine’s missing and abducted children by Russia during a call with President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday, despite the halting of U.S. funding for an investigation into identifying them.

The issue is at the center of an international war crimes arrest warrant against Russian President Vladimir Putin and one of his top officials.

“President Trump promised to work closely with both parties to help make sure those children were returned home,” national security adviser Mike Waltz and Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a joint statement.

Zelensky, in a statement following the call, said he raised with Trump “the return of Ukrainian children who were taken by Russian forces.”

While Rubio had earlier said the Ukrainians “need to get the children back,” as part of any peace settlement, the Trump administration halted funding for a key U.S. program investigating and identifying children who disappeared from Ukraine into Russia.

“The funding has been cut based on the assessments we have been making regarding a whole host of funding, if it worked within our framework of America’s interest,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a response to a question Wednesday.

Bruce indicated that Trump personally addressing the issue of Ukraine’s children with Zelensky overrides any funding cuts to specific programs.

“I think that’s a pretty good, clear indication that we can still work on issues that matter and make them happen without it being in a certain structure that has existed,” she said.

The investigations were carried out by the Yale School of Public Health’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL). In a report presented to the United Nations Security Council in December, the HRL said it identified 314 Ukrainian children placed in a “systematic, Kremlin-directed program of coerced adoption and fostering.”

The New Republic reported that the Trump administration also blocked sharing the HRL’s sensitive data with European law enforcement as part of investigations into Russia’s alleged systematic kidnappings.

A group of bipartisan lawmakers wrote to Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Wednesday raising alarm over the Trump administration’s “reduction in American leadership in countering these crimes.”

President Trump proposed a takeover of Ukrainian power plants as a form of protection, suggesting the U.S. could deter Russian attacks, amid a push for a partial ceasefire between Kyiv and Moscow covering energy facilities and infrastructure.

Trump made the offer during a call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday.

“American ownership of those plants would be the best protection for that infrastructure and support for Ukrainian energy infrastructure,” national security adviser Mike Waltz and Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a joint statement following the call.

“He said that the United States could be very helpful in running those plants with its electricity and utility expertise,” they added.

Trump’s push for control of Ukraine’s nuclear power plants is reportedly linked to his support for a minerals deal with Ukraine as repayment for American military assistance. The president shelved the deal with Ukraine following an explosive Oval Office meeting late last month. And while Zelensky’s overtures have helped repair U.S. relations that ruptured in the fallout, the minerals deal is currently stalled.

The New York Times reported Tuesday that Trump views control of Ukraine’s nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhia as important in building out extraction of the war-torn nation’s critical minerals. The power plant is occupied by Russian forces and is on the front line of fighting in the southeastern region of Ukraine.

Harvard University on Monday announced that tuition will be free for students from families with annual incomes of $200,000 or less starting in the 2025-26 academic year.

"Putting Harvard within financial reach for more individuals widens the array of backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives that all of our students encounter, fostering their intellectual and personal growth," Harvard University President Alan M. Garber said in a statement. "By bringing people of outstanding promise together to learn with and from one another, we truly realize the tremendous potential of the University."

The new plan will enable about 86% of U.S. families to qualify for Harvard financial aid and expand the Ivy League college's commitment to providing all undergrads the resources they need to enroll and graduate, according to Garber.

A Brown University assistant professor and doctor was deported over the weekend from Boston to Lebanon after federal agents found photos of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Iran’s supreme leader on her cell phone, a source familiar with the case told CNN.

Following Dr. Rasha Alawieh’s return Thursday from a visit to Lebanon, federal agents at Boston Logan International Airport found the photos, the source familiar said. It was not immediately clear why officers were examining her phone.

The existence of the photos was outlined in a court filing Monday obtained by CNN affiliate WCVB. “In explaining why these multiple photos were deleted by her one to two days before she arrived at Logan Airport, Dr. Alawieh stated that she did not want to give authorities the perception that she supports Hezbollah and the Ayatollah politically or militarily,” the filing reads, per WCVB.

“I think if you listen to one of his sermons, you would know what I mean,” Alawieh allegedly told the agents, according to WCVB’s copy of the filing. “He is a religious, spiritual person. As I said, he has very high value. His teachings are about spirituality and morality.”

Alawieh, 34, acknowledged to federal agents she attended Nasrallah’s February 23 funeral – a public event attended by thousands – during her visit, said the source.

Hong Kong CNN — One nationalist influencer called it “truly gratifying.” Another said he was laughing his head off. And a state-media editorial hailed the demise of what it called the “lie factory.”

For years, the Chinese government and its propaganda apparatus have relentlessly attacked VOA and RFA for their critical coverage of China, particularly on human rights and religious freedom.

Chinese nationalists and state media could hardly contain their schadenfreude after President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday to dismantle Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Asia (RFA) and other US government-funded media organizations that broadcast to authoritarian regimes.

And now, the Trump administration is silencing the very institutions that Beijing has long sought to undermine – at a time when China is spending lavishly to expand the global footprint of its own state media.

There is “no military solution” to the conflict in Ukraine, US secretary of state Marco Rubio has said ahead of high-stakes meetings on Tuesday in Saudi Arabia aimed at repairing a severely damaged relationship that has left embattled Kyiv without Washington’s support.

Ukraine’s delegation, led by Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, will meet Rubio, and other senior White House officials on what is seen as neutral ground in the Saudi city of Jeddah.

Ukraine’s position in the talks would be “fully constructive”, said Zelenskyy, its president, on Monday, adding that he hoped for practical outcomes from the negotiations on ending the Russian war in his country.

On his way to Jeddah, Rubio stressed the need to gauge Kyiv’s readiness to make concessions to reach peace.

He told reporters on the plane: “The most important thing that we have to leave here with is a strong sense that Ukraine is prepared to do difficult things, like the Russians are going to have to do difficult things, to end this conflict or at least pause it in some way, shape or form.

“I think both sides need to come to an understanding that there’s no military solution to this situation.

“The Russians can’t conquer all of Ukraine, and obviously it’ll be very difficult for Ukraine in any reasonable time period to sort of force the Russians back all the way to where they were in 2014.”

Billionaire entrepreneur and DOGE chief Elon Musk claimed Monday that X went dark as the result of a “massive cyberattack” that originated in the “Ukraine area.”

“We’re not sure exactly what happened,” Musk told Fox Business Network host Larry Kudlow about the apparent operation targeting his social media platform.

“But there was a massive cyberattack to try to bring down the X system, with IP addresses originating in the Ukraine area,” the world’s richest man added.

Musk, 53, did not immediately provide additional evidence of who may have been responsible. Cybercriminals have been know to create false IP addresses to impersonate computer systems from different parts of the world, a practice known as “spoofing.”

Experts told The Post it was highly improbably that Ukrainian government actors were the perpetrator of such an audacious and far-reaching attack one day before diplomats from Washington and Kyiv meet in Saudi Arabia.

“It makes absolutely no sense for Ukrainian hackers to attack Elon Musk the day before a meeting between the United States and Ukraine in which they are attempting to get the United States to start sharing intelligence again, and provide aid and assistance, working towards a peace agreement that has been in question since the Oval Office visit,” the Atlantic Council’s Alex Plitsas told The Post on Monday.

NEW YORK, March 9 (Reuters) - U.S. immigration agents arrested a Palestinian graduate student who has played a prominent role in pro-Palestinian protests at New York's Columbia University, the student workers' labor union said on Sunday.

The student, Mahmoud Khalil at the university's School of International and Public Affairs, was arrested by U.S. Department of Homeland Security agents at his university residence on Saturday, the Student Workers of Columbia union said in a statement. His wife is an American citizen, eight months pregnant, according to news reports, and he holds a U.S. permanent residency green card, the union said.

Khalil's detention appears to be one of the first efforts by U.S. President Donald Trump, a Republican who returned to the White House in January, to fulfill his promise to seek the deportation of some foreign students involved in the pro-Palestinian protest movement, which he has called antisemitic. The Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023 and subsequent U.S.-supported Israeli assault on Gaza have led to months of pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel protests that have roiled U.S. college campuses.

Khalil calls it an anti-war movement that includes Jewish students and groups, and he was one of the lead negotiators with school administrators on behalf of pro-Palestinian student protesters, some of whom set up tent encampments on Columbia lawns last year and seized control of an academic building for several hours before Columbia called in police to arrest them. Khalil was not in the group that occupied the building, but was a mediator between Columbia vice provosts and the protesters.

In an interview with Reuters a few hours before his arrest on Saturday about Trump's criticism of student protesters, Khalil said he was concerned that he was being targeted by the government for speaking to the media.

WASHINGTON, March 7 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said he wants to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran and sent a letter to its leadership this week suggesting talks with the Islamic Republic, which the West fears is rapidly nearing the capability to make atomic weapons. "I said I hope you're going to negotiate, because it's going to be a lot better for Iran," Trump said in an interview with Fox Business Network broadcast on Friday.

Iran has not yet received the letter, Iran's mission to the United Nations in New York said on Friday. There was no immediate response from the foreign ministry in Iran, where it is the weekend, to a request for comment on Trump's remarks. Trump told reporters at the White House on Friday that he anticipated movement on the issue very soon.

"We're down to final strokes with Iran. That's going to be an interesting time. And we'll see what happens. But we're down to the final moments. Final moments. Can't let them have a nuclear weapon," he said in the Oval Office.

"We have a situation with Iran that something's going to happen very soon... Hopefully we can have a peace deal. You know, I'm not speaking out of strength or weakness. I'm just saying I'd rather see a peace deal than the other, but the other will solve the problem."

Iran's Nour News, affiliated with the country's top security body, dismissed Trump's letter as a "repetitive show" by Washington.

The Argentinean president branded himself as an edgy economic genius to ride a wave of financial discontent to power. Now he’s implicated in one of the biggest scams in history, wiping out over $4 billion in market cap in a few hours, leaving Argentineans wondering if they’ve also been rugged. Argentina’s President Javier Milei has been accused of fraud, and is likely to face impeachment charges, after he promoted a sham cryptocurrency token which allowed a handful of con artists to dupe crypto owners out of hundreds of millions of dollars in a single day. The scam is believed to be the first cryptocurrency “rug-pull” to have been orchestrated with the help of a sitting president. While the exact number of victims is unknown, around 75,000 people are suspected to have been swindled, and a judge has been appointed to investigate after at least 100 criminal complaints were filed against Milei in Argentina in the days since.

Crypto token $LIBRA jumped massively in value after Milei endorsed it on social media on Feb. 14, posting a link to purchase the coin and lauding the “private project” for “encouraging the growth of the Argentine economy, funding small business and Argentine ventures.” Milei went as far as framing the coin as a legitimate investment, writing, “the world wants to invest in Argentina.”

The URL for the $LIBRA token’s official website, vivalalibertadproject.com, was a clear nod to Milei’s campaign slogan, “¡Viva la libertad, carajo!” The page, which remains online, says the coin was being launched “in honor of Javier Milei’s libertarian ideas” and was “designed to strengthen the Argentine economy from the ground up by supporting entrepreneurship and innovation.”

The token immediately shot up from $0.27 to well over $4, then dropped to less than $0.20 in a matter of hours as a tiny handful of insiders who owned over 80% of the supply dumped their holdings, draining an estimated $280 million from the unsuspecting buyers. While horrified owners discovered they’d been victimized by a classic “pump-and-dump” scheme, Milei promptly deleted his post publicizing the coin.

In their place, Milei published a new message attempting to wash his hands of the matter, insisting he’d merely been “supporting a supposed private enterprise with which I obviously have no connection whatsoever.”

“I was not aware of the details of the project and after having become aware of it I decided not to continue spreading the word (that is why I deleted the tweet),” he wrote.

But a number of social media posts make clear that Milei had previously interacted with at least three of the scheme’s operators, and met with two of them on multiple occasions. Further, the claim that Milei was “not aware of the details of the project” is contradicted by a prior statement he gave to Bloomberg in which he insisted that the project was “real” and involved “pure private financing.”

Just two weeks before the scam’s culmination, Milei uploaded a photo to Instagram showing him posing beside Hayden Mark Davis, one of the creators of the $LIBRA coin. As of publication, the post remains online.

Russian forces executed a missile strike on a Ukrainian military training base – reportedly killing 150 Ukrainian soldiers and 30 Foreign instructors, prompting a full-scale investigation by counterintelligence officials.

Commander of the Ukrainian Ground Forces, Mykhailo Drapaty, described the incident as a “terrible consequence of an enemy strike” in a statement on Telegram.

The EU is spending more money on Russian fossil fuels than on financial aid to Ukraine, a report marking the third anniversary of the invasion has found.

EU member states bought €21.9bn (£18.1bn) of Russian oil and gas in the third year of the war, according to estimates from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (Crea), despite the efforts under way to kick the continent’s addiction to the fuels that fund Vladimir Putin’s war chest.

The amount is one-sixth greater than the €18.7bn the EU allocated to Ukraine in financial aid in 2024, according to a tracker from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).

Vaibhav Raghunandan, an analyst at Crea and coauthor of the report, said: “Purchasing Russian fossil fuels is, quite plainly, akin to sending financial aid to the Kremlin and enabling its invasion. [It’s] a practice that must stop immediately to secure not just Ukraine’s future, but also Europe’s energy security.”

The researchers compiled trade data to estimate the value of Russian fuels that were sold around the world in the third year of the invasion. They forecast data for February 2025, which is not yet available, based on imports in January.

In the calendar year 2024, the EU spent 39% more on Russian fossil fuel imports than it set aside for Ukraine. The aid figure does not include military or humanitarian contributions.

Christoph Trebesch, an economist at IfW Kiel, which was not involved in the analysis, said there was a striking gap between how much aid donors had mobilised for Ukraine compared with past wars, with European donors spending on average less than 0.1% of GDP a year.

Sir Keir Starmer has suggested MPs would get a vote on potential deployment of British troops in Ukraine, saying Parliament will be able to “express its view”, but the situation is currently “nowhere near that stage”.

The Prime Minister responded to concerns of MPs on the UK “coming to a direct military conflict with a nuclear armed Russia” and personnel being sent “into harm’s way” without a US security agreement.

Sir Keir convened an emergency summit of European leaders over the weekend as allies scrambled to find a way forward following the Oval Office row between US President Donald Trump, vice president JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Key to the European discussions has been an insistence on the inclusion of an American backstop as part of any peacekeeping deal in order to deter future Russian aggression.

The US has not yet committed to providing any such security guarantee, which the UK sees as essential to ensuring a “durable and lasting” ceasefire.

In his statement to the Commons on Monday, Sir Keir said the “coalition of the willing” European leaders agreed to “intensify planning now”.

He said: “As this House would expect, Britain will play a leading role. With, if necessary and together with others, boots on the ground and planes in the air.

“It is right that Europe do the heavy lifting to support peace on our continent, but to succeed, this effort must also have strong US backing.

“I want to assure the House I take none of this lightly. I visited British troops in Estonia and no aspect of my role weighs more heavily than the deployment of British troops in the service of the defence and security in Europe, and yet I do feel very strongly that the future of Ukraine is vital for our national security.”

Labour MP for Leeds East, Richard Burgon, welcomed the “growing push” for a peace deal in Ukraine but raised concern on the UK coming into direct conflict with Russia.

He said: “I am alarmed by the issue of deploying British troops on the ground in Ukraine and British military planes in the skies over Ukraine, because there’s no getting away from the fact that would risk our country coming to a direct military conflict with a nuclear-armed Russia, and the consequences of millions of people in our country and across Europe of such war and nuclear conflict really don’t bear thinking about.

“So, given the enormity of such a decision, will the Prime Minister commit to ensuring a vote in the House of Commons before any such deployment in keeping with the important principles of our parliamentary democracy?”

The Pacific Island nation of Tuvalu faces the likely prospect of becoming the first country in the world to be uninhabitable due to climate change, as rising sea levels threaten to submerge the archipelago in a matter of decades.

Given this stark reality, Tuvaluans are being forced to consider relocation as the sea continues to encroach upon the islands, making the future of the isolated nation that lies some 1,000 kilometers north of Fiji increasingly uncertain.

Perched at an average height of just 2 meters above sea level, the archipelago of nine low-lying coral atolls has seen a 15-centimeter rise in sea levels over the last 30 years, a rate 1.5 times the global average, according to the Sea Level Change Team at the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

By 2050, NASA scientists project that much of the nation's 26 square km of land and the critical infrastructure on it will be below the average high tide level.

Evidence of the rising sea is clear on the main atoll of Funafuti, home to more than half the nation's population of 9,600 people. Sections of the island's main road flood at high tide, leaving locals to dodge large puddles of seawater as they zip past on motorbikes.

For Lilian Vi, a 31-year-old mother of two young boys, the sea level rise is something she notices every day.

"It's been 31 years I've been seeing the sea level rise, and it's not okay. It's really scary," Vi told Kyodo News outside her home in the center of Funafuti, which she shares with her father, cousin and her two sons, Moses, 7, and Carl, 3.

Their home sits behind a section of raised reclaimed land fortified by sandbags positioned to protect against the lapping waves of the lagoon. While the built-up area gives her some peace of mind, Vi questions how long it will last.

"Some of the islets -- the sea has been taking up. It's been eating the islands. It's going to disappear sometime," she said.

While Tuvalu's government is working to secure a future for the archipelago by strengthening its coastline, it has also struck a deal with its Pacific neighbor Australia to provide a migration pathway for up to 280 Tuvaluans a year under an agreement dubbed the "Falepili Union."

With its small population, Tuvalu could be depopulated in 35 years at that rate. But locals and experts alike suggest a mass migration out of the country is unlikely, due to the strong links between the Tuvaluan people and their homeland.

In Japan, there is a little-known network of "white post" pornography drop boxes that were installed on streets decades ago to protect young people from exposure to explicit material not intended for their unsuspecting eyes.

Primarily located outside train stations across the country, users deposited "obscene books," DVDs, and other items considered harmful to youth. But as people turn to the internet rather than physical media for their carnal needs, the white boxes are quickly becoming obsolete.

Although some municipalities still have them in use, one expert points out that "even if society is ostensibly 'clean' on the surface, people are still being exposed to obscene content via their smartphones."

Last October, a city-commissioned worker unlocked a white box in Nakagawa, Fukuoka Prefecture, in southwestern Japan, and removed one book and a DVD. In all on the day, he collected 16 books and 81 DVDs from eight white post boxes in the area.

The man, Kazuhide Inoue, 73, who has performed this task for the past 12 years, still feels the need to keep the boxes in his community.

"Before the white boxes were installed, this stuff was littered on the streets," Inoue said. "Although the number of boxes has fallen, they still play a significant role."

A 71-year-old cab driver, who often picks up customers in and around the city, said, "At night, when the streets are less crowded, men of all ages, from young to old, come to get rid of their stuff."

In the city of Fukui, central Japan, two more of the collection boxes were installed in 2018, indicating they are still considered necessary in some places.

Yuko Obi, an associate professor of sociology at Tokyo Keizai University who is familiar with the history of the white boxes, said the first units were installed in Amagasaki, Hyogo Prefecture, western Japan, in 1963 to collect "obscene books" that were harmful to the sound development of young people. Since then, they have spread nationwide.

As physical media progressed to video in the 1980s and then onto DVDs, those items began being deposited. Tokyo, however, began removing the boxes around this period. With the spread of the internet, the number of magazines sold has declined.

US stocks slid Monday as investors braced for President Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs on Canada and Mexico to go into effect by the midnight deadline.

The Dow tumbled 650 points, or 1.48%, to close at 43,191. The Dow fell almost 900 points in afternoon trading before pulling back slightly. The broader S&P 500 fell 1.76% and the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.64%.

The S&P 500 posted its biggest one-day decline of the year. The Nasdaq is down about 6.5% since since Trump took office on January 20.

“Tomorrow, tariffs — 25% on Canada and 25% on Mexico,” Trump said during a press conference at the White House. “And that’ll start. … What they have to do is build their car plants, frankly, and other things in the United States, in which case they have no tariffs.”

Trump said the two trading partners had “no room” left to negotiate to avoid the levies and that he was using tariffs to “punish” countries that, as he put it, were taking from the US economy without giving enough in return.

“They’re all set. They go into effect tomorrow,” he said.

(Reuters) - One year after California introduced a first-of-its-kind $20 minimum wage for fast-food workers, an increase of up to 70 cents is slated for a vote.

California's Fast Food Council, comprised of fast-food workers, restaurant owners and state officials, approved a motion Wednesday to consider a cost-of-living-adjustment at an upcoming meeting.

The Council's next meeting, expected to take place in April or May, will be for further discussion and not see a vote taken on a decision about it.

Before the vote, the Council heard scores of public comments.

Business owners said not enough time has passed since the $20 minimum wage went into effect to study the effects, which they say has already led to higher consumer prices and less jobs for workers.

Workers and labor advocates said the increase was needed to address rising costs of living in one of the country's most expensive states to live.

Veronica Gonzales, a fast-food worker, spoke remotely from a room full of workers organized under the California Fast Food Workers Union’s San Jose chapter. Through a translator, she said in Spanish that the cost of her rent and her medicine has gone up.

“I cannot live with this wage,” she said.

The possibility of a wage increase, which would be the first for the Council since the state created it last year alongside the $20 fast-food minimum wage, has become a flashpoint in a growing debate about California’s unique effort to regulate the fast-food industry.