UK Labour Party sweeps to power in historic election win. But impatient voters mean big challenges
LONDON (AP) — Britain’s Labour Party swept to power Friday after more than a decade in opposition, as a jaded electorate handed the party a landslide victory — but also a mammoth task of reinvigorating a stagnant economy and dispirited nation. Labour leader Keir Starmer will officially become prime minister later in the day, leading his party back to government less than five years after it suffered its worst defeat in almost a century. In the merciless choreography of British politics, he will take charge in 10 Downing St. hours after Thursday’s votes are counted — as Conservative leader Rishi Sunak is hustled out.
He’s derided as dull, but Keir Starmer becomes UK prime minister with a sensational victory
LONDON (AP) — For someone often derided as dull, Keir Starmer has delivered a sensational election result. Starmer has led Britain’s Labour Party to a landslide election victory, and on Friday will become prime minister — the first leader from the center-left party to win a U.K. national election since Tony Blair, who won three in a row starting in 1997. It’s the latest reinvention for a man who went from human rights attorney to hard-nosed prosecutor and from young radical to middle-aged pragmatist. Like Blair, who refashioned the party as “New Labour” in the 1990s, 61-year-old Starmer led Labour to victory over Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party in Thursday’s election after dragging the party towards the political middle ground.
Iran holds runoff presidential vote pitting hard-line former negotiator against reformist lawmaker
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iranians voted Friday in a runoff presidential election between a hard-line former nuclear negotiator and a reformist lawmaker, with both men trying to convince a skeptical public to cast ballots after years of economic woes and mass protests roiling the Islamic Republic. The race between hard-liner Saeed Jalili and Masoud Pezeshkian, a heart surgeon and longtime member of parliament, comes after a first round of voting saw the lowest turnout ever for an Iranian election, leaving turnout Friday a major question. Meanwhile, wider tensions have gripped the Middle East over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.
Israel conducts military operation in the area of the West Bank city of Jenin; 5 Palestinians killed
JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli military said Friday it was conducting counterterrorism activity that included an airstrike in the area of the West Bank city of Jenin. Palestinian authorities said five people were killed. The military said Israeli soldiers had “encircled a building where terrorists have barricaded themselves in” and the soldiers were exchanging fire, while an airstrike had “struck several armed terrorists” in the area. The Palestinian Health Ministry said five people died but did not provide any information on their identities. No further details were immediately available from either side. The clashes in Jenin, a known militant stronghold where the army frequently operates, came a day after an Israeli anti-settlement monitoring group said the government plans to build nearly 5,300 new homes in settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Brazil’s Bolsonaro indicted for alleged money laundering for undeclared diamonds from Saudi Arabia
SAO PAULO (AP) — The indictment of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro for money laundering and criminal association in connection with undeclared diamonds from Saudi Arabia marked the far-right leader’s second formal accusation with more potentially in store. Two sources with knowledge of the case confirmed Thursday’s indictment by Federal Police, which followed another formal accusation in May against Bolsonaro for allegedly falsifying his COVID-19 vaccination certificate. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. Brazil’s Supreme Court has yet to receive the police report with the latest indictment. Once it does, the country’s prosecutor-general, Paulo Gonet, will analyze the document and decide whether to file charges and force Bolsonaro to stand trial.
Biden heads into a make-or-break stretch for his imperiled presidential campaign
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden on Thursday opened a critical stretch in his effort to salvage his imperiled reelection campaign, facing a growing sense that he may have just days to make a persuasive case that he is fit for office before Democratic support for him completely evaporates. In the aftermath of Biden’s disastrous debate performance last week against Republican Donald Trump, some financial backers were holding off or canceling upcoming fundraisers, according to a person familiar with the plans who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to talk about private discussions. “I’m not going anywhere,” Biden told a crowd gathered for a July Fourth barbecue on the White House South Lawn.
FACT FOCUS: Trump’s misleading claims about the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former President Donald Trump said during his debate with President Joe Biden last week that the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol involved a “relatively small” group of people who were “in many cases ushered in by the police.” But that’s not what happened. Thousands of his supporters were outside the Capitol that day and hundreds broke in, many of them beating and injuring law enforcement officers in brutal hand-to-hand combat as the officers tried to stop them from storming through windows and doors. There is ample video evidence of the violence, and more than 1,400 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot.
Fireworks light up the skies across the US as Americans endure searing heat to celebrate July Fourth
Millions of people in the U.S. celebrated and suffered under heat warnings Thursday as they flocked to beaches and traveled in droves to toast their nation’s birth with July Fourth parades, cookouts and the always anticipated fiery splashes of color in the evening sky. In Washington, neon bursts of light illuminated the night above the National Mall. The Boston Pops performed a musical fireworks spectacular at that city’s Hatch Memorial Shell. And at parades all across the country, from Brattleboro, Vermont, to Waco, Texas, to Alameda, California, revelers dressed up in red, white and blue and waved the Stars and Stripes in commemoration of Independence Day.
Hurricane Beryl takes aim at the Mexican resort of Tulum as a Category 3 storm
TULUM, Mexico (AP) — Hurricane Beryl strengthened back into a Category 3 storm and headed for what could be a direct hit on Mexico’s Caribbean coast resort of Tulum early Friday, where authorities urged tourists to leave white sand beaches. Beryl was the earliest Category 5 hurricane in the Atlantic before weakening to a Category 2 storm. But it regained strength late Thursday with windspeeds of 115 mph (185 kph) as it neared landfall on Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador issued a statement late Thursday saying Beryl may make a direct hit on Tulum, which, while smaller than Cancun, still holds thousands of tourists and residents.
A bench and a grandmother’s ear: Zimbabwe’s novel mental health therapy spreads overseas
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — After her son, the family’s shining light and only breadwinner, was arrested last year, Tambudzai Tembo went into meltdown. In Zimbabwe, where clinical mental health services are scarce, her chances of getting professional help were next to zero. She contemplated suicide. “I didn’t want to live anymore. People who saw me would think everything was okay. But inside, my head was spinning,” the 57-year-old said. “I was on my own.” A wooden bench and an empathetic grandmother saved her. Older people are at the center of a homegrown form of mental health therapy in Zimbabwe that is now being adopted in places like the United States.
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