Your trusted source

TikTok was the world's most downloaded app in 2020 as it took the top spot from Facebook Messenger, according to digital analytics company App Annie. The Chinese video-sharing platform is the only app not owned by Facebook to make the global top five of downloads. In its home country, TikTok's owner ByteDance also holds the top spot with the Chinese language video app Douyin. TikTok's continued popularity emerged even after former US President Donald Trump tried to ban it in America.

Source: bbc.com

Japan had its best Olympic production in every category: the most gold medals (27), the most overall (58), and a third-place finish in gold medals behind two much larger countries — the United States and China.

Source: apnews.com

Jennifer Hudson says she is nervous and excited for people to see "Respect," her personal tribute to the late Aretha Franklin in which she was cast for the role by the Queen of Soul herself. Franklin, who died in 2018 at age 76, handpicked Hudson, an Oscar winner for "Dreamgirls," to play her in the biographical movie that arrives in theaters on Friday. The new film, the second screen project this year to tell Franklin's remarkable story, focuses on the challenges of her life from a child in her father's gospel church choir through domestic violence and alcohol addiction as she finds worldwide fame.

Source: reuters.com

China demanded Lithuania on Tuesday withdraw its ambassador in Beijing and said it would recall China's envoy to Vilnius in a row over the Baltic state allowing Chinese-claimed Taiwan to open a de facto embassy there using its own name.

Source: reuters.com

report Monday, warning the world is already certain to face further climate disruptions for decades, if not centuries, to come. Humans are "unequivocally" to blame, the report from the scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said. Rapid action to cut greenhouse gas emissions could limit some impacts, but others are now locked in. The deadly heat waves, gargantuan hurricanes and other weather extremes that are already happening will only become more severe.

Source: reuters.com

Mayor Anne Hidalgo returned to the French capital on Monday with the Olympic flag from Tokyo ahead of Paris's turn to host the Games in 2024.

Source: france24.com

London's Tower Bridge has become stuck open causing major traffic issues in the capital. The famous landmark was scheduled to open last afternoon to allow a large wooden tall ship through, but it appears to have become jammed in place. City of London Police said the 127-year-old crossing had been closed to both traffic and pedestrians "due to technical failure". Drivers have been warned to avoid the area.

Source: bbc.com

"CODA," a coming-of-age story about the only hearing member of a deaf family, will change that when it is screened with open captions that need no special equipment in all U.S. and U.K. movie theaters and showtimes, starting Friday. "It couldn't be more groundbreaking, (just) as the film is groundbreaking in support of the deaf community and the hard-of-hearing community," said Marlee Matlin, who plays a deaf mother in the film. Matlin is the only deaf performer to ever win an Oscar, for best actress in "Children of a Lesser God" in 1987.

Source: reuters.com

At least 51 people were killed when Islamist militants raided three villages in central Mali near the border with Niger, a district administrator said on Monday. The towns of Ouatagouna, Karou and Deouteguef were simultaneously attacked around 6 p.m. on Sunday, according to a note from the Asongo district administrator to the governor of Gao region. Houses were ransacked and burned to the ground and herds of livestock carried away.

Source: reuters.com

A pair of Ice Age lion cubs discovered in Siberia dating back tens of thousands of years to the Upper Paleolithic, are thought to be some of the best-preserved specimens ever found, researchers say. The cubs, the size of house cats and dubbed Boris and Sparta, were unearthed in 2017 and 2018 by mammoth tusk hunters in the Semyuelyakh River, Yakutia, in what is now eastern Russia. Both are believed to have been about a month or two old when they died, according to a study by an international team of scientists, published in the journal Quaternary.

Source: independent.co.uk

Indonesia’s most volatile volcano erupted Sunday on the densely populated island of Java, spewing smoke and ash high into the air and sending streams of lava and gasses down its slopes. No casualties were reported. Mount Merapi unleashed clouds of hot ash at least seven times since Sunday morning, as well as a series of fast-moving pyroclastic flows, a mixture of rock, debris, lava and gasses, said Hanik Humaida, who heads the city of Yogyakarta’s Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation Center. The rumbling sound could be heard several kilometers (miles) away.

Source: apnews.com

Suspected Taliban fighters killed an Afghan radio station manager in Kabul and kidnapped a journalist in southern Helmand province, local government officials said on Monday, reporting the latest in a long line of attacks targeting media workers. Gunmen shot Toofan Omar, the station manager of Paktia Ghag radio and an officer for NAI, a rights group supporting independent media in Afghanistan, in a targeted killing in the capital on Sunday.

Source: reuters.com

More than 30 Chinese officials have been fired or received other punishments over accusations they failed to respond properly to the latest surge of the coronavirus in the country. Among those fired were a vice mayor, heads of city districts and health commissions, and staff in hospital management, airport and tourism departments. China’s National Health Commission on Monday announced 94 new cases of domestic transmission had been recorded over the previous 24 hours.

Source: apnews.com

An eight-year-old Hindu boy is being held in protective police custody in east Pakistan after becoming the youngest person ever to be charged with blasphemy in the country. The boy’s family is in hiding and many of the Hindu community in the conservative district of Rahim Yar Khan, in Punjab, have fled their homes after a Muslim crowd attacked a Hindu temple after the boy’s release on bail last week. The boy is accused of intentionally urinating on a carpet in the library of a madrassa, where religious books were kept, last month. Blasphemy charges can carry the death penalty.

Source: theguardian.com

A baby thought to be the world's smallest at birth has been discharged from a Singapore hospital after 13 months of intensive treatment. Kwek Yu Xuan was just 212g - the weight of an apple - when she was born and measured 24cm long. She was delivered at just under 25 weeks - far short of the average 40. The previous record holder was a girl in the US who weighed 245g at birth in 2018 according to the University of Iowa's Tiniest Babies Registry. Yu Xuan now weighs a much healthier 6.3kg.

Source: bbc.com

Khartoum’s decision comes days after Addis Ababa rejected Sudan’s offer to mediate in the ongoing conflict in Tigray.

Source: aljazeera.com

The still-raging Dixie Fire in northern California is now the second-largest in the state’s history, officials said on Sunday, days after the blaze destroyed an historic town and forced the evacuation of thousands of people from the area. The wildfire now spanned 187,562 hectares and remained only 21 percent contained, but that favourable conditions would allow crews to battle the flames. Investigation continues into what sparked the blaze, which has now spread to an area larger than the city of Houston, Texas.

Source: aljazeera.com

The Coen Brothers may never work together again after one of the Oscar-winning duo decided he “didn’t want to make movies anymore”, their long-time composer has claimed. Eyebrows were raised last year after it was confirmed that Joel Coen would be single-handedly directing the forthcoming The Tragedy of Macbeth, which stars Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand. The film marks the first time Joel and his brother Ethan have not worked on a movie together.

Source: independent.co.uk