Six critically endangered North Atlantic right whales have been found dead in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence this month, Canadian officials said Thursday.
As a result, Transport Canada has expanded a shipping speed limit of 10 knots in the Gulf and closed 16,000 square kilometers (6,200 square miles) to commercial fishing.
The animal carcasses were spotted drifting in the channel and tagged with satellite tracking devices, and on Thursday afternoon Fisheries and Oceans Canada said a plane had spotted another carcass adrift off a peninsula not far from the gulf.
Two of the bodies were towed to nearby beaches where necropsies were performed. A 40-year-old female, which was known to marine biologists and had been named Punctuation, was found to have likely died in a collision with a ship.  Official ssaid they weren't able to establish a cause of death for the second whale, a nine-year-old male named Wolverine.
More autopsies are planned or being considered for the remaining whales.
This ...

Six dead endangered right whales found in Canadian waters

PTI Automatic

World leaders gather in Japan Friday for one of the most high-stakes and fractious G20 meetings in years, with a bruising US-China trade war, geopolitical tensions, and climate change on the agenda.
The two-day summit in the city of Osaka will be dominated by trade issues, with all eyes on whether US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping can reach a truce in a dispute that has been hugely damaging for the world economy.
But world leaders will also be seeking to tamp down tensions between Washington and Iran that have led to fears of a new conflict in the Middle East.
And they will look for common ground on climate change, with Japan hoping to unite European leaders who want strong action with an American leadership committed to withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement.
Trump set the tone for the meeting before even arriving in Japan, taking aim at allies and foes alike.
Tweeting from Air Force One, he slammed India, a longstanding partner, for "unacceptable" ...

High-stakes G20 opens with trade tensions looming

German Chancellor Angela Merkel arrived Friday at the G20 meeting in Osaka amid fears over her health after she suffered a second bout of uncontrollable shaking in just over a week.
Merkel's plane touched down in the western Japanese city with a German government spokesman stressing, "She is doing well. Nothing is wrong."
The 65-year-old German leader sparked renewed fears for her health on the eve of the summit, as she began to tremble at a speech given by the German president. The shaking lasted around two minutes, according to a DPA photographer present.
A previous bout of uncontrollable shaking last week was blamed on dehydration on a hot summer's day.
Officials sought to play down the fears over her health.
Government spokesman Steffen Seibert said she would not cancel any of her engagements in the coming days, which promise to be hectic.
Merkel is to participate in the two-day G20 gathering and numerous bilateral meetings. These include what is shaping up to be a fractious ...

Merkel arrives at G20 after shaking scare

US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday bowed to pressure from President Donald Trump's Republicans as Congress approved USD 4.6 billion in emergency aid to ease a swelling migrant crisis on the nation's southern border.
One day after the Senate passed the measure, the House of Representatives followed suit with a bipartisan vote of 305 to 102 that sends the bill to the president's desk.
Pelosi and Democrats had wanted additional language that would ensure better protections of migrant children but conceded to Republicans when they failed to move the needle.
"At the end of the day, we have to make sure that the resources needed to protect the children are available," Pelosi told Democrats before the vote.

US Congress approves USD 4.6 billion in emergency border funding

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday against adding a question about citizenship to the US census in a setback for President Donald Trump and victory for critics who say the item would lead to severe undercounts of immigrants.
Chief Justice John Roberts tipped the balance by siding with the court's liberal minority to block the Trump administration bid for the question to be added to its 2020 census.
The 5-4 ruling said the government's arguments were "contrived."
However, the decision left open the possibility that the Trump administration could still seek to make new justifications.
Trump, who is in Japan for the G20 summit, said on Twitter that not having the citizenship question was "totally ridiculous."
He said government lawyers would now try to have the 2020 census delayed -- "no matter how long" -- in order to give the Supreme Court "additional information" and get a new decision.
In a separate ruling, the top court's conservative majority refused to rule against electoral ...

Supreme Court blocks Trump on census citizenship question

Israeli police said they shot a Palestinian who attacked officers with fireworks Thursday in east Jerusalem, and the Palestinian health ministry said he died of his wounds.
Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said that during unspecified "police operations" in the Issawiya neighbourhood a suspect fired fireworks at officers.
"He was shot, injured critically as a result of firing fireworks directly at officers putting them in a life-threatening situation," he told AFP.
The Palestinian health ministry said the man, identified as Mohammed Obeid, 20, died of his injuries.
"A citizen was martyred after the occupation shot him in the Issawiya neighbourhood," it wrote in Arabic.
Rosenfeld said that fireworks, lashed together in bundles and fired from a tube, were often fired at Israeli security forces.
"Within a certain range, they're life-threatening," he said.
The official Palestinian news agency WAFA said that Palestinians had clashed with the police who had entered Issawiya.
Four other ...

Israel police say Palestinian firework assailant shot in Jerusalem

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for double suicide attacks that killed a police officer and wounded eight people in the Tunisian capital on Thursday, a US-based monitor said.
The "executors of the two attacks on Tunisian security elements" were IS "fighters", SITE Intelligence Group quoted a statement from the jihadists' propaganda wing, Amaq, as saying.

IS claims twin suicide attacks in Tunisia capital: US monitor

Scientists were celebrating a groundbreaking astronomical discovery Thursday that they say could pave the way for mapping the outer reaches of the universe.
An Australian-led team of international astronomers have determined for the first time the precise source of a powerful, one-off burst of cosmic radio waves.
They have pinpointed it to a massive galaxy billions of light years away, with properties that upend what scientists previously thought they knew about the formation of mysterious fast radio bursts (FRBs).
"This result is highly anticipated within the astronomy community," Casey Law, an astronomer at UC Berkeley who was not involved in the study told AFP.
The findings, published in the journal Science, are among the most significant since the discovery in 2007 of FRBs, which flash for only a micro-instant but can emit as much energy in a millisecond as the Sun does in 10,000 years.
Exactly what creates these high-energy surges of long waves at the far end of the ...

Cosmic waves discovery could unlock mysteries of intergalactic space

Iran's foreign minister on Thursday warned US President Donald Trump he was mistaken to think a war between their countries would be short, as Washington sought NATO's help to build an anti-Tehran coalition.
The latest developments in the Iran-US standoff came as a diplomatic source in Vienna said Tehran would not exceed a uranium stockpile limit agreed with world powers, contrary to what it had said earlier this month.
Iran had set Thursday as a deadline to surpass the agreed 300-kilogram reserve of enriched uranium because it no longer felt bound by certain limits contained in the 2015 deal, which the United States unilaterally pulled out of in May 2018.
"They won't exceed it today," the diplomatic source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told AFP in Vienna on the eve of a meeting by a commission that oversees the nuclear deal.
The source suggested there might be a "political reason" for this, given intensified efforts by European governments in recent days to de-escalate ...

Iran warns Trump against 'illusion' of short war

Facebook said Thursday it would soon open up nominations for a new 40-member oversight panel to make tough decisions on content moderation, saying it would be independent of governments and management of the social networking giant.
A report on the process was released following more than six months of consultations in 88 countries on how to deal with the delicate topics of allowing and removing controversial comments and images.
The initiative was based on chief executive Mark Zuckerberg's call for a "supreme court" that would make difficult calls on what is appropriate content for Facebook.
"First and foremost, people want a board that exercises independent judgment -- not judgment influenced by Facebook management, governments or third parties," said a blog post by Facebook governance and global affairs director Brent Harris.
"And people want a board that's as diverse as the many people on Facebook and Instagram... These members should be experts who come from different ...

Facebook starting nominations 'soon' for content oversight panel

Italian police have arrested 18 people including a mayor, doctors and social workers for allegedly brainwashing vulnerable children into thinking their parents had abused them so they could then be sold to foster parents.
Police in the northern city of Reggio Emilia made the arrests after an investigation started in 2018 revealed an alleged network of carers who used methods including electroshock to make the children believe they had been sexually abused.
The network then allegedly gave the children to foster families in exchange for cash, while keeping gifts and letters sent to the children by their real parents hidden in a warehouse that was discovered by police.
The alleged abuse was reported by Italian media and confirmed to AFP by police in Bibbiano, near Reggio Emilia, on Thursday.
"These accusations, if confirmed, are frightening and shocking," Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said at the G20 meeting in Japan.
The accused include psychotherapists working for a social work 

Italy arrests 18 for allegedly brainwashing and selling children

At least 19 illegal miners were killed on Thursday after part of a copper mine collapsed in southeastern DR Congo, Swiss-based mining giant Glencore said.
The incident happened when two galleries caved in at a mine in the Kolwezi area operated by Kamoto Copper Company (KCC), a subsidiary of Glencore.
"Tragically there were 19 fatalities today, with possible further unconfirmed fatalities," Glencore said in a statement, which said there had been recurrent problems with illicit mining on its concessions.
Other reports suggest the death toll could be higher.
The Congolese site Actualite.CD reported at least 36 deaths.
"The illegal artisanal miners were working two galleries in benches overlooking the extraction area. Two of these galleries caved in," the company said.
Glencore said KCC had observed a "growing presence" of illegal miners, with on average 2,000 people a day intruding on its operating sites.
"KCC urges all illegal miners to cease from putting their lives at risk by ...

At least 19 illegal miners killed in DR Congo mine collapse: Glencore

The US on Thursday warned European countries they were making a "bad decision" by leaving their nationals who fought with the Islamic State group in Syria instead of repatriating them to face justice.
The collapse of the IS "caliphate" has left US-backed Syrian rebel forces holding thousands of foreign fighters and many Western countries are reluctant to take them back due to public opposition and fears they could pose a threat.
But James Jeffrey, the US special representative on Syria and Washington's ambassador to the global coalition to defeat ISIS, said that by dodging their responsibility for their citizens, rich countries were risking fresh violence.
"We're talking about countries with per capita incomes about the same as the United States... putting the burden on informal local authorities who are detached from a state structure in the middle of a war zone," Jeffrey told reporters at a meeting of the coalition in Brussels.
"That's a bad decision. Period. If those people break ..

US warns Europe over IS fighters

Twitter said Thursday it would label and deprioritize tweets from politicians that break its rules -- in a move that could affect the prodigious output of US President Donald Trump.
"In the past, we've allowed certain tweets that violated our rules to remain on Twitter because they were in the public's interest, but it wasn't clear when and how we made those determinations," the company said in a blog post.
"To fix that, we're introducing a new notice that will provide additional clarity in these situations, and sharing more on when and why we'll use it."
Under the measure, verified political candidates and government officials with more than 100,000 followers will have the offending posts obscured by a notification that the tweet violates standards.
Twitter will also tweak its algorithms to deprioritise the tweets so they are seen by fewer people.
The announcement follows criticism of the platform on Wednesday by Trump, whose vitriolic posts attacking opponents are often followed by .

Twitter announces action against politicians' rule-breaking tweets

President Donald Trump's top economic advisor said Thursday there are no preconditions from the US or Chinese sides ahead of make-or-break trade talks between Trump and President Xi Jinping.
"There are no preconditions to these talks," Larry Kudlow told reporters at the White House. "That's very important."
Kudlow dismissed a report in The Wall Street Journal saying that Xi will present Trump with a list of demands to be met if the two sides are to resume negotiations on ending their huge trade dispute.
The Journal reported that these preconditions include an end of attempts to block US companies from doing business with Chinese tech giant Huawei, which Washington describes as a national security threat.
Trump and Xi meet Saturday in Osaka, Japan, on the sidelines of a G20 summit.
Trump says the talks will be crucial in deciding whether he will expand his trade war with China, effectively raising barriers on all Chinese goods sent to the United States.
Kudlow said that Trump will ...

'No preconditions' for Trump-Xi talks: White House advisor

At least sixteen people were facing the death penalty in a trial that started Thursday over the gruesome death of a young Bangladeshi woman that sparked protests and government promises of tough action.
Nusrat Jahan Rafi, 19, was set on fire in April after allegedly refusing to withdraw claims of sexual harassment against the head teacher of the Islamic seminary she attended.
She was lured onto the seminary rooftop in the southeastern town of Sonagazi, doused in kerosene and set alight, prosecutors say. She died five days later, triggering countrywide outrage.
The 16 people indicted -- including the teacher -- could face the death penalty if convicted. All defendants pleaded not guilty, while eight of the accused told the court that police forced them to sign written statements confessing involvement in the murder.
A special tribunal opened the trial Thursday at a crowded courtroom in the southeastern Feni district, with the first testimony by Rafi's elder brother Mahmudul Hasan Noman 

Trial opens over Bangladesh teen's grisly murder

Shares of Boeing fell Thursday after US regulators identified a new issue in the Boeing 737 MAX that will likely slow the plane's return to service following two deadly crashes.
Near 1500 GMT, Boeing was down 2.6 per cent at USD365.18, the biggest loser in the Dow.
Late Wednesday, the Federal Aviation Administration said it would require Boeing to mitigate a new "potential risk" in the 737 MAX. The planes have been grounded since mid-March following two crashes that claimed 346 lives.
The issue, identified during simulator testing, concerns a problem with a microprocessor that impedes the ability of pilots to quickly reassert control of the plane after having activated the  Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), according to two people familiar with the issue.
Even before this latest issue surfaced, the outlook for getting the planes back in the air was uncertain, in part because the FAA would like other regulators to approve the plane's reentry soon after the US ...

Boeing shares hit as FAA finds new 737 MAX issue

Former ring-master Bernie Ecclestone would bring back refuelling, give all teams the same engine and introduce a new third world championship category to revive Formula One's flagging appeal.
Ecclestone, who was the sport's commercial boss and greatest influence for more than four decades, responded to claims that the sport has been reducted to a Mercedes procession, with Ferrari challenging, has become a 'turn-off' for fans.
The sense that Formula One's image was becoming tarnished by the predictability of Mercedes domination and Lewis Hamilton's supremacy in the drivers' championship came to a head at last weekend's French Grand Prix where Hamilton won with ease ahead of Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas.
On top of that, Mercedes have won the drivers' and constructors' double every season since the start of the current V6 hybrid turbo era.
That translates as five double titles in a row, an achievement that has been followed this season by the decline of their rivals -- Ferrari ...

Ecclestone proposes blueprint for F1 revival

JP Duminy has apologised to South Africa fans after the country's "dismal" showing at the World Cup.
Faf du Plessis's men have beaten only win-less Afghanistan in their opening seven games, meaning they cannot mathematically reach the last four.
"It's been pretty dismal from our part," said Duminy, who will retire from the 50-over game after the tournament in England and Wales.
"We obviously want to apologise to the public and the South African fans for letting them down.
"You know when you represent your country it is always a proud moment and you understand that you represent 50, 60 million people, that is a proud moment in itself.
"And when you put in performances like that, you know, you in a way almost feel ashamed of that." Reports have emerged that coach Ottis Gibson will be in the firing line after the tournament, with Cricket South Africa (CSA) president Chris Nenzani promising that "heads will roll".
All-rounder Duminy, who has not featured in the past four matches, said the 

Duminy 'ashamed' of South Africa World Cup flop

Sri Lanka coach Chandika Hathurusingha has warned that misfiring South Africa could still be dangerous after his side revived their World Cup hopes with a shock victory against England.
The Sri Lankans, the 1996 champions, had a miserable start to the tournament in England and Wales, with just one win from their first five games, during which they suffered two washouts.
But last week's win against the hosts and England's subsequent defeat at the hands of Australia has thrown the World Cup wide open.
Hathurusingha said South Africa still posed a threat in Friday's match, even though they will be heading home after the group phase.
"When you have no pressure of qualifying, they can come and play without any pressure, fearless cricket and that can get them going, so at the same time they can turn up and just want to go home, so you never know," he said.
Sri Lanka lost their one-day international series earlier this year in South Africa 5-0 but Hathurusingha said the team were confident ..

Sri Lanka coach warns of South Africa World Cup threat

Massive German chemical company BASF said Thursday it would slash 6,000 jobs worldwide by 2021, as the company slims down its organisation in pursuit of fatter margins.
"BASF expects a reduction of a total of around 6,000 positions worldwide until the end of 2021" out of 122,000 employees, the company said in a statement, saying the layoffs would save around 300 million euros (USD 341 million) annually.
The move is part of a broader "excellence programme" aimed at boosting profits by two billion euros per year.
Executives aim to "develop our organisation to work more effectively and efficiently," chief executive Martin Brudermueller said.
BASF said it would centralise many services common to its different divisions, like engineering, procurement, human resources, finance and logistics, as well as create a 1,000-strong "corporate centre" to support executives.
As part of the restructuring, bosses and worker representatives at BASF's headquarters in Ludwigshafen agreed to bring forward .

AFP

AFP

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