Sept 13 (Reuters) - The head of Russia's state nuclear energy corporation accused Ukraine on Sunday of attacking diesel fuel trucks, killing ‌two Russian servicemen and deliberately jeopardising safety at the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia ‌nuclear power plant in Ukraine.
Alexei Likhachev said the attack took place on Friday and also resulted in injuries to other Russian soldiers.
The Zaporizhzhia plant, Europe's largest with six reactors, was seized by Russian forces in the early weeks of the Ukraine war that broke out in February 2022. Each side has regularly ‌accused the other of actions ⁠that endanger safety at the plant and increase the risk of a nuclear accident.
Likhachev issued a statement saying Ukrainian ⁠forces had launched "a series of combined strikes" on Friday on fuel trucks which deliver diesel to the station.
"The strikes hit very close to the perimeter of the station's site," he said.

#russian #nuclear #Friday

KINSHASA, Congo (AP) — The Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo, the world's fastest-growing outbreak of the disease on record, has now spread to seven provinces in the African country, local authorities said. And it's showing no signs of slowing down.
According to the governor of the northwestern province of Sud-Ubangi, Jean-Rene Galekwa Vundawe, laboratory tests by Congo's national research institute found in a sample the Bundibugyo virus, the rare kind of Ebola that caused the current outbreak.
The statement, which was issued on Thursday and reported by local media outlets on Friday, said the sample was from the Bulu health district in Sud-Ubangi. It did not disclose other information about the source of the infection.
The development makes Sud-Ubangi the seventh province affected by the outbreak — and the first in western Congo — a worrisome spread west from what was previously concentrated in the country's east. A case was detected in Kinshasa in May in a person who had traveled from eastern Congo, but the Congolese capital was not classified as an affected province.
As of Wednesday, 6,942 cases and 3,349 deaths have been reported, according to the latest government figures.

#outbreak #local

(Refiles to remove extraneous reporting credit)
By Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen and Soren Jeppesen
COPENHAGEN, Sept 4 (Reuters) - Five European nations aim to sign deals this year to send migrants without legal residency ‌to countries outside the European Union, they said at a meeting hosted by Denmark on ‌Friday.
Germany, Austria, Greece, Denmark and the Netherlands said they had agreed on concrete steps towards a deal with a non-European Union country on return facilities, the latest effort by European nations to reduce immigration.
The countries, known as the Group of Five, did not name the nations they expect to host return centres.

#nations #jacob

By Jack Queen
NEW YORK, Sept 3 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump's administration on Thursday proposed new regulations that would strip schools of tax-exempt status if they offer students that consider ‌race in admissions or programs.
The rules proposed by the U.S. Treasury Department and Internal Revenue ‌Service are the latest salvo in the administration's campaign to eradicate diversity programs and end what officials say is discrimination against white students in favor of students of color.
Civil rights advocates say diversity practices help address historic inequities for marginalized ethnic minorities who were legally discriminated against for decades.
The proposal, which is subject to a public comment period and would likely draw legal challenges if implemented, draws on recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings that ‌limited how colleges and universities can ⁠consider race in admissions.

#consider #race #admissions #queen

People who consume greater amounts of a popular artificial sweetener could face a greater risk of heart attack and stroke, a new study suggests.
The research, which was presented at the ESC Cardiology Congress in Germany this week, showed that higher levels of xylitol in the blood were **** ociated with an increased risk of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE).
Xylitol is a sugar alcohol that is commonly used as a low-calorie sweetener and sugar substitute, according to the National Institutes of Health. It is often used in higher amounts to sweeten foods, drinks, chewing gum and dental care products.
Zero-calorie Sweeteners Could Alter The Genes Of Later Generations, New Study Warns
The researchers followed two large study cohorts of more than 17,700 Canadian and British participants.

#study #higher

The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo is the biggest in the country's history, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said.
As of 30 July, there were 3,605 confirmed cases including 1,587 deaths - a fatality rate of 44%.
The current outbreak is caused by the Bundibugyo strain of the virus. It was declared on 15 May 2026 and surpasses the previous biggest outbreak between 2018 and 2020, which had nearly 3,500 recorded cases of whom almost 2,300 died.
There is currently no approved vaccine or treatment for the Bundibugyo strain, but vaccines are being developed in the UK and Singapore.
Ebola, which spreads through contact with bodily fluids, has killed 15,000 people across Africa over the last 50 years.

#ebola #bundibugyo #cases #strain

NEW YORK (AP) — Ancient mummy DNA recovered in Chile has yielded the firmest evidence yet that European colonization brought smallpox to the Americas.
Smallpox was one of the deadliest diseases in human history before it was eradicated in 1980, largely thanks to vaccination. For centuries, the virus had killed about one-third of the people it infected and left most survivors with deep and sometimes disfiguring scars.
Outbreaks struck Asia and Europe and eventually spread to the Americas, where colonial writings, administrative records and missionary reports documented how it killed millions and devastated Indigenous populations who had never been exposed to the virus.
Now there's scientific evidence for the spread: An ******* ysis of Chilean mummies provides the strongest genetic link yet to the virus as it existed outside of the Americas, and provides a better picture of how it reached remote populations through colonization, said geneticist Shigeki Nakagome with Trinity College Dublin.
In the new study, Nakagome and colleagues examined 13 bone samples previously collected from an archaeological site at Camarones, in northern Chile.

#populations

Relentless flooding is claiming more lives in Texas. One of the hardest hit areas was Kerr County, the site of that deadly camp flooding just one year ago. NBC News' Ryan Chandler reports from the storm zone.

Sen. Bill Cassidy appeared to question President Donald Trump's view of Congress, saying in an interview that he is not sure Trump grasps that Congress "is a separate body, separate from the presidency."
"Sometimes he acts as if Congress is merely an appendage, and, frankly, sometimes Congress acts like it's an appendage," the Louisiana Republican said in a pre-taped interview with CBS' "Face the Nation" that aired Sunday.
The latest criticism in a public clash between the two leaders, Cassidy also told host Margaret Brennan that he would be focused on affordability, including the cost of health care and groceries, if he were president.
"If I were president, I would be focused on those people that they have, my people, our people, us at the kitchen table. How do you make their life better? And that's what I think the president should be focused on," Cassidy said.
The relationship between Cassidy and Trump has been rocky for some time. Cassidy was one of only a handful of Republican leaders who voted to convict Trump for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

WASHINGTON – The Great American State Fair is underway at the National Mall to mark the United States' 250th birthday. But not everything is off to such a great start.
The event has quickly faced problems including power outages, melting ice cream – and a lack of representation from states that declined to send delegations.
While organizers ****** ured visitors all parts of the nation would be represented, at least 10 states and territories refused to participate, with many citing the price tag to send staff to the 16-day event as their reason for opting out.
Booths for Connecticut, Oregon, Washington, Maine, Alaska, the U.S. Virgin Islands featured just backdrops and chairs or carpets.
But other states went all-out for the semiquincentennial. The Texas booth allowed visitors to take photos with the Alamo, play with an interactive display for long-running music series "Austin City Limits" and sit inside a ****** eship. Meanwhile, the Nevada booth was Las Vegas-themed. California's booth offered attendees the opportunity to enter a raffle for a free vacation.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is warning that Virginia risks becoming "the next California" in the Trump administration's fight against resistance to federal immigration enforcement after filing a new lawsuit last week.
"We are suing Virginia to prevent Virginia from becoming the next sanctuary jurisdiction, just like California," DOJ ****** istant Attorney General for the Civil Division Brett Shumate told Fox News Digital in a Zoom interview.
The lawsuit, first shared with Fox News Digital earlier in June, argues Virginia is violating the Constitution by trying to regulate federal law enforcement operations, including restrictions on agents' masks, identification requirements and conditions on local cooperation with ICE.
"Under our Constitution, the states do not get to regulate or dictate how the federal government performs its duties, and that is especially the case when it comes to law enforcement. Virginia passed two bills in this newest session, one that restricts the ability of law enforcement officers to wear facial coverings and requires officers, federal agents, to wear identification badges," said Shumate.
First On Fox: Doj Sues Spanberger's Virginia Over Laws Kneecapping Federal Agents As Mask War Escalates

By Steve Holland, Parisa Hafezi and Yomna Ehab
EVIAN-LES-BAINS, France/DUBAI, June 17 (Reuters) - The U.S. and Iran released the text of an interim agreement their presidents have signed to end their war on Wednesday, with U.S. President Donald Trump threatening to resume attacks and kill Iranian officials if they failed to honour their commitments.
Trump, attending the G7 with other leaders in France, also withdrew at least one of his stated rationales for attacking Iran in the first place, ‌saying it would be "unfair" for Tehran not to have ballistic missiles, having previously vowed to obliterate them.
"We're going to bomb the **** out of them if they violate the agreement," Trump said of Iran at a press conference. "I don't want ‌them to. I want them to honor the agreement." He also called Iranians "smart people" as U.S. and Iranian negotiators work on a permanent truce over the coming 60 days, which Trump said he hoped would usher in peace in the Middle East and lower oil prices.
Earlier, he had said: "If I don't like it, if they don't behave, we'll go right back to dropping bombs right smack in the middle of their head, OK?"

A man whose car was set on fire in the Rathcoole estate in County Antrim has said he fears the attackers will try to kill him next.
The victim, who is from Nigeria and wants to remain anonymous, said he regrets the day he moved to Northern Ireland to study as he has experienced years of direct and indirect racism.
His Mournebeg Drive home has been targeted three times in the last five months.
Police, who attended the scene along with Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service (NIFRS), are treating the latest incident as a racially-motivated hate crime. There were no reports of any injuries.
It is the latest in a string of racist attacks in Northern Ireland over the past week, including an attack on two homes in Belfast over the weekend.