It's not just the United States — other major polluters around the world have also been falling behind the climate goals they set for themselves under the Paris agreement.

As the Biden administration virtually hosts the leaders of more than three dozen countries Thursday and Friday to discuss the need for more action on climate change, here's...Read more

LOS ANGELES — U.S. District Judge David O. Carter's order to Los Angeles officials to sweep homeless people off skid row into shelters or housing is grounded in his conviction that a wrongheaded focus on creating permanent housing has perpetuated racism, spread encampments and caused the avoidable deaths of Black people.

But the complexities ...Read more

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Weeks after their arrest, more than a dozen alleged plotters were freed over their involvement in a royal feud between King Abdullah II and his half-brother and onetime crown prince, Prince Hamzah.

The rift, which government officials describe as a foreign-backed plot to destabilize the country, has for weeks ...Read more

MINNEAPOLIS — Two days after people poured into Minneapolis streets to rejoice for the state's first-ever murder conviction of a white police officer for the killing a Black man, community members began to gather at a north Minneapolis church to mourn the death of another Black man killed by police.

The funeral for Daunte Demetrius Wright on ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a life term in prison without parole for a 15-year-old who fatally stabbed his grandfather, ruling that a sentencing judge need not decide that the young person was “permanently incorrigible.”

The 6-3 decision retreats somewhat from a pair of earlier rulings, which said that such life ...Read more

A study of more than 2,000 pregnant women from dozens of hospitals around the world has found that those with COVID-19 saw a significantly higher risk of death and of complications for themselves or their newborns.

The study, published Thursday in JAMA Pediatrics, underscores that pregnancy is a major risk factor for complications involving ...Read more

WASHINGTON — The House passed a bill Thursday that would make Washington the 51st state, but the bill’s journey is far from over.

Democrats held together to vote in favor of D.C. statehood, and no Republicans crossed party lines to join them. It marked a day of celebration for some, but advocates know there’s work to do to convince a ...Read more

ELIZABETH CITY, N.C. — A neighbor and lifelong friend of Andrew Brown Jr. said he fled from Pasquotank County sheriff’s deputies in his car before more than a dozen shots were fired at the vehicle, killing him.

Demetria Williams, who lives a few houses down from the slain man, said Thursday that she heard shots Wednesday morning and came ...Read more

PHILADELPHIA — Tarik Khan rushed to his car, carrying 10 syringes full of the coronavirus vaccine. He had only six hours to get them into the arms of some of Philadelphia's most vulnerable residents.

The family nurse practitioner climbed behind the wheel and turned the ignition. The gas light flashed on — already, a delay getting shots to ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — More than a year after the COVID-19 pandemic began, a return to normalcy seems tantalizingly close. But even as restaurants reopen and shopping malls fill up, a glaring reminder of the virus’s presence remains: face masks.

Mask mandates remain in place in most regions across the globe, but the list of places where mask orders ...Read more

LOS ANGELES — Shelby Bernstein can’t wait for life to get back to normal.

In theory.

But as COVID-19 restrictions are lifted, Bernstein has found herself feeling increasingly anxious.

“Maybe it’s like Stockholm syndrome, except our captor is the coronavirus,” she said. “We’re all so used to the mental and physical havoc it ...Read more

COLUMBUS, Ohio — They gathered in a circle Wednesday night, the crowd probably 300 strong, standing on the broken and weedy patch of parking lot pavement and chanting the 16-year-old girl's name.

Say her name. Ma'Khia Bryant. Say her name.

Over and over again.

A day after Bryant, a 16-year-old Black girl, was killed by a Columbus police ...Read more

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The 22-year-old Arvada man accused of killing 10 people inside a Boulder King Soopers last month now faces more than 50 charges in connection with the shooting.

Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa was previously charged with 10 counts of first-degree murder and first-degree attempted murder of a police officer in the 20th Judicial...Read more

SEATTLE — Checkerboarded across the landscape of the American West are thousands of parcels of state-owned land that collectively cover an area larger than North Dakota. They include vast swaths of forest and prairie, fracking wells, coal mines, luxury housing developments, parking lots, cell towers and solar panels.

Known as state trust ...Read more

BROOKLYN CENTER, Minn. — Kelly Bryant arrived for nephew Daunte Wright's viewing this week to find the church guarded by a dozen members of the Minnesota Freedom Fighters, a Black militia armed with AR-15-style rifles.

It was just a day after a jury had convicted white former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin of murdering a Black man, ...Read more

WASHINGTON — Ahead of Saturday's annual commemoration of the killing of more than a million Armenians a century ago, Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill are pressing President Joe Biden to become the first U.S. president to acknowledge the events as genocide.

Armenian Americans, including the large diaspora in Southern California, have ...Read more

As more Americans start commuting to work and hitting the roads after a year indoors, they’ll be returning to streets that have gotten deadlier.

Last year, an estimated 42,000 people died in motor vehicle crashes and 4.8 million were injured. That represents an 8% increase over 2019, the largest year-over-year increase in nearly a century —...Read more

Western Europe is beginning to loosen restrictions to contain the coronavirus, offering relief for the pandemic-weary region as vaccination programs turn the corner.

Italy will ease many restrictions on Monday, Greece will follow suit in early May, and Germany is mulling privileges for people who have been immunized. Later on Thursday, French ...Read more