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July was the world's hottest month ever recorded, a US federal scientific and regulatory agency has reported. The data shows that the combined land and ocean-surface temperature was 0.93C above the 20th Century average of 15.8C. It is the highest temperature since record-keeping began 142 years ago. The previous record, set in July 2016, was equalled in 2019 and 2020.
Source: bbc.com
Rescuers sift through rubble for victims and survivors as country reels from floods and wildfires. An unknown number of people are missing. Opposition politician Hasan Baltacı told Halk TV that residents had contacted authorities seeking information about 329 people still feared missing.
Source: theguardian.com
Taliban insurgents have seized most of Herat, Afghanistan's third largest city,and also captured Ismail Khan, the veteran local commander leading militia resistance there, local officials said on Friday.
Source: reuters.com
A study found humans have wiped out 469 bird species from the Earth over the last 50,000 years. The extinctions were caused by humans overhunting the birds. Most of the extinct birds lived on islands, were very large and flightless.
Source: dailymail.co.uk
"Unprecedented" levels of torrential rain hit western Japan, raising the risk of floods and landslides, the weather agency said. The downpours are forecast to continue for several days over a large swathe of the country, from the northern Tohoku region to Kyushu in the south.
Source: france24.com
The British and Russian ambassadors to Iran have angered the country by recreating a World War Two image of Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin, when Iran was under Allied occupation. The Russian embassy posted a photo of the two diplomats recalling a famous picture of the wartime leaders in 1943. Iran's foreign minister described the image as "extremely inappropriate". The Russians say no harm was intended, and they only meant to pay tribute to the Allied fight against Nazi Germany.
Source: bbc.com
Fires burning for over a week that caused Greece's worst ecological disaster in decades were finally placed under control Friday, the fire department said. Rain and falling temperatures helped the fire-dousing effort, but crews remain on alert for possible flare-ups in hard-to-access ravines on the island of Evia and in the region of Arcadia in the Peloponnese, the spokesman said.
Source: france24.com
North Korean state television has aired its first coverage of the Tokyo Olympic Games - two days after the closing ceremony. According to local news reports, Korean Central Television aired 70 minutes of a women's football match between the UK and Chile this week. The match was actually played weeks earlier on 21 July. North Korea has previously aired the Olympic Games a few days after its opening ceremony, according to Yonhap. According to specialist site NK News, the women's match was aired without commentary and in low resolution - leaving it unclear how the footage was obtained.
Source: bbc.com
New Zealand has long been associated with “The Lord of the Rings” but with the filming of a major new television series suddenly snatched away, the nation has become more like Mordor than the Shire for hundreds of workers. In a major blow to the nation’s small but vibrant screen industry, Amazon Studios announced Friday it would film the second season of its original series, inspired by the books of J.R.R. Tolkien, to Britain.
Source: apnews.com
It was the first time that the non-Hispanic white population has fallen below 60% since the census began. Non-hispanic whites now account for around 58% of America’s population, a drop from 2010 when they made up 63.7% of the population. Meanwhile, there was significant growth among minority groups over the last decade. The Hispanic or Latino population grew by 23%, while the Asian alone population surged by over 35%. The Black population also increased by more than 5.6%.
Source: theguardian.com
The Taliban claimed Friday to have captured Kandahar, Afghanistan's second-largest city, which would leave just the capital and pockets of other territory in the government's hands.
Source: france24.com
Britney Spears' father has agreed to step down as the singer's conservator after 13 years, US media report. The singer's career has been in the hands of legal guardians since public concerns over her mental health in 2008. The court-ordered agreement gave her father, Jamie Spears, control over her estate and other aspects of her life. But she later sought to remove him from the role, calling for him to be charged with "conservatorship abuse". Jamie Spears has consistently denied any accusations of wrongdoing and has expressed concern for his daughter's wellbeing.
Source: bbc.com
The jailed de facto leader of the giant Samsung group walked free on parole Friday, the latest instance of South Korea's long tradition of freeing business leaders imprisoned for corruption or tax evasion on economic grounds. Lee Jae-yong -- the 202nd richest person in the world according to Forbes, with a net worth of $11.4 billion -- was serving a two-and-a-half year prison sentence for bribery, embezzlement and other offences in connection with the corruption scandal that brought down ex-South Korean president Park Geun-hye.
Source: france24.com
Italian firefighters said Thursday they had battled more than 500 blazes overnight as another death was reported, taking the total toll linked to wildfires to four over the past week. An anticyclone dubbed Lucifer is sweeping across Italy, sending temperatures soaring and causing what is believed to be a new European record of 48.8 degrees Celsius in Sicily on Wednesday.
Source: france24.com
The foreign ministers of Israel and Morocco are taking a new step towards strengthening ties between the two countries, signing three accords less than a year after agreeing to normalise relations. Visiting Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid and Nasser Bourita, his Moroccan counterpart, signed off on Wednesday on an air service agreement between the North African kingdom and the state of Israel and an agreement to cooperate in the fields of culture, sport and youth.
Source: aljazeera.com
The Australian capital Canberra is going into a snap one-week lockdown after recording its first case of Covid-19 in more than a year. It will come into effect at 17:00 local time on Thursday. The lockdown was called for the whole of the Australian Capital Territory - home to around 400,000 people - because authorities do not know how the infected person caught the virus. Residents will only be able to leave home for essential reasons.
Source: bbc.com
In an interview with Al Jazeera, Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, the Belarusian Olympian defector who missed her moment at the Tokyo Games, explained why she is auctioning one of her medals to support other Belarusian athletes and recounted her recent ordeal. “I made the decision to put my medal up for auction to help athletes that are in need of support or any kind of help and the money will go to the [Belarusian] Sports Solidarity Foundation. In turn, the foundation will help athletes organise gatherings and competitions,” the 24-year-old sprinter told Al Jazeera’s podcast show, The Take.
Source: aljazeera.com
Robert Plant and Alison Krauss have reunited for another album more than a dozen years after their collaboration “Raising Sand” became a critical and commercial hit, earning six Grammy Awards. The 12-track “Raise the Roof” will be out Nov. 19 from Rounder Records and is a collection of covers like its predecessor. It was completed in Nashville just weeks before the 2020 lockdown and is once again produced by T-Bone Burnett.
Source: apnews.com
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