The oil tanker fleeing American forces in the Atlantic Ocean has been formally renamed and added to an official Russian database of vessels registered in that country, potentially complicating U.S. efforts to board the runaway ship.According to the Russian Maritime Register of Shipping, the vessel, previously known as the Bella 1,...

A Georgia judge dismissed racketeering charges on Tuesday against dozens of activists who had fought the construction of a police and fire training center outside of Atlanta that became known as “Cop City,” dealing a major setback to state officials who had pursued an unusually aggressive case against the protesters.The plan to tra...

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — The Trump administration can continue to withhold Medicaid funding from Planned Parenthood and other health centers that provide abortions as a coalition of mostly Democratic states challenges the cuts, a federal appeals court ruled. The decision on Tuesday is one of mul...

DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — One Syrian police officer was killed and others wounded in a suicide bombing late Wednesday in the northern city of Aleppo, Syrian state media reported.A patrol of the Internal Security Forces was attempting to detain the bomber in the neighborhood near the Bab al-Fara...

Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani on Wednesday announced several key picks to preside over central aspects of his agenda. He tapped Julia Kerson, an infrastructure adviser to Gov. Kathy Hochul, as his deputy mayor for operations, and Emmy Liss, a veteran education leader, as director of the city’s child care office.The two high-profile ap...

The Trump administration is closing NASA’s largest research library on Friday, a facility that houses tens of thousands of books, documents and journals — many of them not digitized or available anywhere else.Jacob Richmond, a NASA spokesman, said the agency would review the library holdings over the next 60 days and some material...

Big crowds braved the cold on Wednesday for one of New York City’s most popular annual events: the New Year’s Eve ball drop in Times Square.The celebration draws spectators from around the world to don novelty glasses, toss confetti and sing along to “Auld Lang Syne” and “New York, New York” at the stroke of midnight. The cold and...

The day after the second-snowiest day in Syracuse, N.Y., history, people came and went from New Year’s Eve celebrations at bars and restaurants, some appearing underdressed for the weather in their party clothes. One woman grumbled as she walked across a slushy crosswalk in high heels. In some places, the drifts along the sidewalks...

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — Just imagine the buffet.Forty thousand oysters, $400,000 worth of lobsters and a stash of crab meat were stolen in separate incidents in recent weeks in New England.The first shellfish disappeared Nov. 22 in Falmouth, Maine, where authorities suspect someone stole 14 cag...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Betty Boop and “Blondie” are joining Mickey Mouse and Winnie the Pooh in the public domain.The first appearances of the classic cartoon and comic characters are among the pieces of intellectual property whose 95-year U.S. copyright maximum has been reached, putting them in...

MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. (AP) — Because he is a billionaire, the chairman of the Texas Tech board of regents and the school’s No. 1 superfan, the easiest route for Cody Campbell would be to keep pumping money into his school’s sports programs and let the chips fall where they may.“For Texas Tech,...

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Iowa scored a touchdown late in first half of the ReliaQuest Bowl on Wednesday as the result of a quirky play involving an illegal kick by the Vanderbilt punter.On fourth down at the Vandy 15, punter Nick Haberer took the snap and began moving toward the line of scrimmage...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has ended the lease agreement for three public golf courses in Washington, a move that offers President Donald Trump an additional opportunity to put his stamp on another piece of the nation’s capital.The National Links Trust, the nonprofit that has...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reached the end of his latest trip to the United States and appears to have gained what he wants from President Donald Trump.Trump hailed Netanyahu after their meeting on Monday, calling him a “hero” and saying Israel – and by extension its prime minister – had “lived up to the plan 100...

United States President Donald Trump has unleashed another attack on Somali Americans, with the White House saying the administration is reviewing plans to strip citizenship from those convicted of fraud.The statements on Wednesday came a day after the Trump administration froze $185m in federal subsidies for low-income childcare a...

The United States Department of the Treasury has issued a new round of sanctions aimed at isolating Venezuela’s oil industry, as part of President Donald Trump’s pressure campaign against the South American country.The sanctions announced on Wednesday target four companies and their associated oil tankers, which are allegedly invol...

United States President Donald Trump announced he is ceasing his efforts to deploy federal troops to several Democratic-led cities in a major policy pivot.The announcement on Wednesday comes amid a series of legal setbacks to Trump’s efforts to deploy National Guard members to Chicago, Illinois; Los Angeles, California; and Portlan...

Wearing colorful hats and costumes for a road race in São Paulo, dancing in a field in Bali, dipping into a frigid lake in Croatia and — of course — setting off lots and lots of fireworks, people around the world came together on Wednesday to celebrate the end of 2025 and bring in a new year.New Year’s Eve offered a moment to refle...

A cargo ship severed an undersea telecommunications cable in the Gulf of Finland on Wednesday in what the Finnish police said they suspected was an act of sabotage that led them to seize the vessel.The ship, the Fitburg, was en route from St. Petersburg in Russia to the port of Haifa in Israel when it damaged a cable connecting the...

New Year’s Eve celebrations in Aleppo in northwestern Syria were violently disrupted late on Wednesday after security forces tried to arrest a man at a checkpoint spotted wearing an explosive belt who then detonated it, killing one officer and injuring two others, according to the Syrian Interior Ministry.The bomber, who has not ye...

Crowds who gathered to watch New Year celebrations at Sydney Harbour Bridge held a one-minute vigil on Wednesday to honor victims of the attack on a Hanukkah celebration on Bondi Beach weeks earlier that killed 15 people.Thousands of people stood in silence for a minute, an hour before the stroke of midnight, holding candles or shi...

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia devoted little more than half a minute of his annual New Year’s Eve address on Wednesday to the fighting in Ukraine, as war-fatigued Russians increasingly hope for a resolution to the conflict.Mr. Putin, delivering a brief speech with the Kremlin’s outer walls as his background, told Russia’s s...

Mali and Burkina Faso will impose a travel ban on Americans in response to President Trump’s announcement this month that citizens of the two West African countries would be barred from entering the United States from Jan. 1.Both governments said in separate statements on Tuesday that they were acting “in accordance with the princi...

When a group of masked thieves drove into a garage in an industrial city in western Germany last weekend, they were not simply searching for a parking spot.The thieves broke through a door to a local bank, forcing their way into its archive room, the police said. Then they started drilling through a thick wall, making a hole wide e...

Venezuelan security forces have detained several Americans in the months since the Trump administration began a military and economic pressure campaign against the government of the South American nation, according to a U.S. official familiar with the matter.Some of the detainees face legitimate criminal charges, while the U.S. gov...

President Emmanuel Macron of France threw his support on Wednesday behind the idea of restricting children’s access to social media, joining a list of world leaders who have made similar pledges to counter the scourge of online abuse in recent months.“We will protect our children and teenagers from social media and screens,” he sai...

Businesses, universities and government offices stayed closed on Wednesday across most of Iran under a government-ordered shutdown, as the president struggled to address public frustration that has fueled mounting protests over the faltering economy and the government.The one-day shutdown in 21 of Iran’s 31 provinces, including Teh...

(All times Central)Schedule subject to change and/or blackoutsThursday, January 1COLLEGE BASKETBALL (WOMEN’S)12 p.m.Creighton at Villanova — ESPN app, ESPN Select, Fubo Sports6 p.m.Wake Forest at Pittsburgh — ACCNXNBA BASKETBALL8:30 p.m.Philadelphia at Dallas — KFAA 29, NBA TV, NBCS Philadel...

ImageBeasts of the Seaby Iida TurpeinenThe action in Turpeinen’s BEASTS OF THE SEA (Little, Brown, 277 pp., $28) spans roughly 200 years, but its implications are timeless. Translated from the Finnish by David Hackston, this eloquent, impassioned novel uses the demise of a gentle mammal to chart mankind’s evolution from arrogant ex...

When a book editor invited the renowned French novelist Lola Lafon to contribute a volume to Edition Stock’s popular “Night at the Museum” series — in which authors camp out in a museum overnight and write about the experience — Lafon was hesitant.“I couldn’t see myself being in an art museum and able to legitimately write about it...

In the past year, drone warfare in Ukraine has undergone a chilling transformation.Most drones require a human pilot. But some new Ukrainian drones, once locked on a target, can use A.I. to chase and strike it — with no further human involvement.This i...

Hosted by Natalie KitroeffFeaturing Kashmir HillProduced by Nina FeldmanSydney HarperShannon M. LinMary Wilson and Olivia NattEdited by Brendan KlinkenbergMichael Benoist and Jody BeckerOriginal music by Diane WongMarion LozanoRowan NiemistoElisheba Ittoop and Pat McCuskerEngineered by Chris Wood and Rowan NiemistoThis week, The Da...

New England Patriots defensive lineman Christian J. Barmore is facing a domestic assault and battery charge after his girlfriend told police he threw her to the ground in August at his home outside Boston.A criminal complaint issued Dec. 18 claims Barmore, 26, briefly took the woman’s phone,...

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. (AP) — New England Patriots coach Mike Vrabel said Wednesday that he hasn’t heard anything from the NFL that would prevent Stefon Diggs from playing in Sunday’s regular-season finale as the receiver faces strangulation and other criminal charges in connection with a dispute...

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — A man handed an illegal prison sentence years longer than the maximum penalty for his crime has been granted clemency by Mississippi’s governor, weeks after the man’s brother received clemency in a similar case. Gov. Tate Reeves announced Wednesday that he was granting...

While schools, government and banks are closed on New Year’s Day, most major retailers across the U.S. will be open, with many offering discounts on older inventory to clear the way for newer products.But before you run out the door on New Year’s Day to peruse deals, it’s wise to double-chec...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The average rate on a 30-year U.S. mortgage fell to its lowest level of 2025 this week, an encouraging sign for prospective home buyers.The average long-term mortgage rate dipped to 6.15% from 6.18% last week, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Wednesday. That’s the lowest ave...

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The advice that legendary investor Warren Buffett offered on investing and life over the years helped earn him legions of followers who eagerly read his annual letters and filled an arena in Omaha every year to listen to him at Berkshire Hathaway’s annual meetings. Buffett...

NEW YORK (AP) — Incoming Mayor Zohran Mamdani will take his oath of office on a centuries-old Quran, marking the first time a mayor of New York City has used Islam’s holy text to be sworn in and underscoring a series of historic firsts for the city.When the 34-year-old Democrat becomes mayor...

Richard Smallwood, a classically trained composer and singer who grafted Baroque influences onto traditional gospel sounds to create a steady stream of hits, many of which were later recorded by a long list of stars, including Stevie Wonder, Destiny’s Child and Whitney Houston, died on Tuesday in Sandy Spring, Md. He was 77.His pub...

Good morning! Today we have for you:A garden’s worth of greens for a fresh start to the yearOne of our many popular recipes for pillowy store-bought gnocchiAnd, a versatile vegan soup that you can master in one go and repeat all winterImageToni Tipton-Martin’s Hoppin’ John, adapted by Kayla Stewart.Credit...Kate Sears for The New Y...

Shopping List for ChampagneImageCredit...Tony Cenicola/The New York TimesBy Eric AsimovThe bigger producers of Champagne are producing excellent, distinctive celebratory wines, even at the entry level. Here are 10 big brands well worth seeking out, and a glossary to help you navigate the selections.Billecart-SalmonRefined Champagne...

It’s a relationship, in my case a long-term one, that has weathered many actual storms. And yet the garden and I find ourselves lately at that stickiest of places that two partners can confront: the moment when one utters to the other, “I thought I knew you.”Taking stock of the fading year, that’s what’s in my head: I thought I kne...

Snap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2CloseSnap2ClosePhoenix | $850,000A midcentury modern house built in 1957, on 0.3 acresThis three-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bathroom house was built by a contractor who used it as his personal family residence, and recent updates have focused on retai...

The quiet, laid-back atmosphere of Shelter Island, nestled between the North and South Forks of Long Island, has long made it a special place for John and Christine Gachot. “I basically grew up here,” said Mr. Gachot, 55. “My family came every summer.”When he married Ms. Gachot, 56, she became part of the tradition. And even after...

Plopping a new, modern building atop a cherished, historic one is not a novel concept. In New York, the Hearst Tower rises out of a six-story Art Deco building from 1928. The Antwerp Port House, designed by the architect Zaha Hadid, delicately balances a glass structure above a fire station.And using air rights to develop skyscrape...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump issued the first vetoes of his second term on Tuesday, rejecting two low-profile bipartisan bills, a move that had the effect of punishing backers who had opposed the president’s positions on other issues.Trump vetoed drinking water pipeline legislati...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Department of Justice has expanded its review of documents related to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein to 5.2 million as it also increases the number of attorneys trying to comply with a law mandating release of the files, according to a person briefed on a le...

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan’s Prime Minister spoke by telephone with the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Wednesday to express his “complete solidarity” with the Kingdom following this week’s Saudi bombing of Yemen’s port city of Mukalla, the prime minister’s office said.According to...

NUR SHAMS REFUGEE CAMP, West Bank (AP) — Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank watched as Israeli military bulldozers pulled down their homes Wednesday as part of a nearly year-long incursion into the territory’s northern refugee camps.The scene in Nur Shams has been repeated often...

CAIRO (AP) — A U.N. humanitarian team visited el-Fasher in Sudan’s Darfur region for the first time since a paramilitary force overran the city in October, carrying out a rampage that is believed to have killed hundreds of people and sent most of the population fleeing.The hours-long visit g...

NEW YORK (AP) — The NBA saw its best Christmas Day viewership numbers in 15 years, the league announced Wednesday.More than 47 million people in the U.S. watched at least some of the five-game slate on ABC and ESPN, which represents a 45% increase over last year. And there was an average of...

Two iconic celebrations to ring in the New Year — the Rose Parade in Southern California and the midnight ball drop in New York City — are in for some rough weather.Marching bands, floats and throngs of spectators are bracing for a rare dose of New Year’s Day rain and even thunder at the pre...

Richard Smallwood, a gospel singer and recording artist nominated eight times for Grammy Awards, has died. He was 77.Smallwood died Tuesday of complications of kidney failure at a rehabilitation and nursing center in Sandy Spring, Maryland, his representative Bill Carpenter announced.Smallwo...

A week after migrant groups filed a lawsuit, California announced Tuesday that it will delay revoking 17,000 commercial driver's licenses until March to allow more time to ensure that truckers and bus drivers who meet legal requirements can keep their permits. But U.S. Transportation Secreta...

ROME (AP) — Pope Leo XIV closed out 2025 on Wednesday with a prayer that the city of Rome might be a welcoming place for foreigners and fragile people, young and old.Leo presided over a New Year’s Eve vespers service in St. Peter’s Basilica, giving thanks for the 2025 Holy Year that brought...

NEW YORK (AP) — English actors Tom Hiddleston and Zawe Ashton have welcomed their second child.Hiddleston confirmed the news to GQ in a feature published Monday. He described birth as the “most beautiful, profound, earth-shattering, life-altering” experience. He did not share his child’s bir...

MIAMI (AP) — Nikola Jokic is only going to miss a few weeks, which is surely cause for the Denver Nuggets to take a giant sigh of relief.The Nuggets’ superstar center has been diagnosed with a hyperextended left knee, the team said Tuesday, adding that the three-time MVP will be re-evaluated...

There were three times in the first 59 years of the Super Bowl era that a team went back-to-back regular-season games without punting once.That total has been matched during the 2025 season as part of a growing trend that has led to punts becoming more and more rare. The new kickoff rule, th...

A blast of Arctic air is pouring into the eastern two-thirds of the United States, driving temperatures as much as 20 degrees below normal, with frigid conditions expected to linger as far south as Florida as people ring in the New Year.The cold follows a recent powerful storm that brought blizzard conditions to parts of the Upper...

The origin of China’s dominance of rare earths can be traced to an iron ore mine near Baotou in the country’s north, 50 miles from the Mongolian border.It was April 1964 and Chinese geologists had discovered that the mine also held the world’s largest deposit of rare earths, a set of 17 metals that have become essential ingredients...

At a glance, stocks are set to end 2025 pretty much where analysts expected they would. But it’s been a bumpy ride getting there.A year ago, analysts predicted that the market would rise steadily, economists forecast cuts to interest rates and, in the wake of President Trump’s re-election, market watchers broadly expected a busines...

A 43-minute video posted online in the past week, purporting to expose extensive fraud at Somali-run child care centers in Minnesota, has been viewed by millions of people. It has also set off a series of events that show the symbiotic relationship between the Trump administration and self-described citizen journalists.It was poste...

Getting stronger is one of the best resolutions you can make for your health. Regular strength training can help you live longer, lift your mood, enhance cognitive function and improve your bone density. Picking up a new skill can also boost feelings of self-efficacy, or your belief that you can accomplish a goal, which can help yo...

Amy Schumer Bids AdieuImageCredit...Raymond Hall/GC ImagesThe comedian Amy Schumer took a loss on the sale of her Brooklyn townhouse, selling the refurbished brick home for $11 million, $1.25 million below what she had paid for it more than three years ago.The closed sale came just as Ms. Schumer announced the end of her seven-year...

In a world that is often full of surprises, did you expect President Trump to market a perfume as a sitting president? What about the breakup of the DOGE bromance between Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy? Or a step away from minimalism and an embrace of tchotchkes (see: Labubus)?We did.So what does 2026 have in store for us? We asked...

It was a day that should live in infamy. Instead, it was the day President Trump’s second term began to take shape.Five years ago, on Jan. 6, 2021, a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol, hoping to overturn the result of the 2020 presidential election. After the sun set that day, Congress reconvened to certify Joe Biden’s victory. The...

One afternoon some weeks ago, a little after 1 p.m., groups of office workers — a mass of navy quarter-zips and smart-casual suits — huddled together in the dim mahogany-paneled main room of the Devonshire, a pub tucked behind the Piccadilly Circus tube station in central London.Almost all of them had backpacks at their feet and pi...

In the last decades of the 1800s, horses left millions of pounds of manure on Manhattan’s streets every day. Life expectancy sank to its lowest levels in U.S. history, and politics reached new heights of violence.By the early 1900s, Americans were living longer than ever. Elections grew so peaceful that some worried about “apathy i...

This year, long before the potential acquisition of HBO by Netflix, each of these two entities launched a hospital drama produced by respected TV veterans. HBO Max debuted “The Pitt”in January, created by members of the team that produced “E.R.,” and Netflix premiered “Pulse”in April, executive produced by Carlton Cuse, a longtime...

“We took the freedom of speech away.”That was part of President Trump’s explanation in October of his executive order that purports to criminalize burning the American flag. Though his words fail as a constitutional rationale, they inadvertently distill many of his efforts at smothering dissent during the past 11 months.Since retur...

Best. Political year. Ever. Amirite? For all of us who rolled into the year wondering “How much more chaotic could a second Trump term be?” 2025 did not disappoint.As with President Trump’s first spin in the White House, I felt it necessary to limit the president’s eligibility for these awards, lest he overwhelm the field. It would...

President Donald Trump made a lot of tariff threats and trade promises this year. Many materialized into a barrage of new import taxes that overturned decades of U.S. economic policy — but others have yet to be fulfilled as 2025 comes to a close.Some of Trump’s unrealized threats reflect a b...

Thailand has released 18 ‍Cambodian prisoners of war, three days after the two countries agreed to a renewed ceasefire to end weeks of deadly border clashes.Cambodia’s Ministry of National Defence said the soldiers arrived on Cambodian soil at 10am local time (03:00 GMT) on Wednesday after 155 days in ‌Thai custody.Thailand’s Minis...

Myanmar’s military has claimed a voter turnout of more than 50 percent in the first stage of its national elections, framing the vote as “successful” despite widespread condemnation as a “sham” poll from rights groups.Military spokesman Zaw Min Tun said 52 percent of enrolled voters – more than six million people – cast their ballo...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Rashid Khan was named Afghanistan captain of a 15-man squad announced on Wednesday for the T20 World Cup in India and Sri Lanka.Left-arm fast bowler Fazalhaq Farooqi and all-rounder Gulbadin Naib were included after both were left out of the white-ball tour of Bangl...

The New York Times is joining an expedition by sea to Antarctica’s fastest-thinning glaciers.

More than a decade ago, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished without a trace, sparking one of aviation’s most baffling mysteries.Despite years of multinational searches, investigators still do not know exactly what happened to the plane or its 239 passengers and crew. On Wednesday, the Mala...

TOKYO (AP) — Japan is barreling forward with efforts to significantly boost its military capabilities to stand up to China’s growing threats by doubling annual arms spending. The goal comes as Tokyo’s main ally, the United States, pushes for more military assistance in Asia and a military ha...

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran on Wednesday appointed a new governor to the central bank after the former one resigned following a record currency fall against the U.S. dollar that sparked large protests.The plummeting of the rial, Iran’s currency, sparked the largest protests in the country in th...

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — A deep-sea search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 began in the Indian Ocean on Wednesday, reviving efforts to solve one of aviation’s greatest mysteries more than a decade after the jet vanished with 239 people on board.Malaysia’s Transport Ministry said Wednesday that...

BEIJING (AP) — China’s People’s Liberation Army said Wednesday that it “successfully completed” two days of military exercises in the waters off Taiwan, concluding a set of high-powered maneuvers aimed at asserting its sovereignty over the island — actions that ratcheted up tension in East A...

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Auckland was the first major city to ring in 2026 with a fireworks display launched from New Zealand’s tallest structure, Sky Tower, followed by a defiant celebration in Australia in the aftermath of its worst mass shooting. South Pacific countries were the first...

If an electric car stirs your interest but the lifestyle changes sound daunting, consider a plug-in hybrid. A plug-in hybrid is simply a rechargeable hybrid, with a larger battery than a standard hybrid that enables a short range of fully electric driving. A regular hybrid recharges by captu...

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission wants to turn America’s 250th birthday celebration into the country’s single biggest year for volunteering.But America Gives, the program unveiled Wednesday just before the U.S. begins commemorating the 1776 signing of the Declaration of...

Tatiana Schlossberg was John F. Kennedy’s granddaughter, and the child of one America’s most famous families. But in 2012, she was a rookie reporter at The Record in New Jersey. And I was her editor.The Record had put her to work on an unglamorous beat covering a few towns in North Jersey. She caught a murder story, did an election...

The Health and Human Services Department said on Tuesday that it had paused its child care payments to Minnesota, days after the posting of a widely circulated video that added new accusations to a fraud scandal in the state’s social services programs and led conservatives to call for a government crackdown. The decision blocks a f...

Ben Nighthorse Campbell, a Cheyenne Indian who walked into a political caucus in Colorado to kill time one day in 1982 and wound up serving two terms as a state legislator, three more in Congress and 12 years as a United States senator, died on Tuesday at his ranch in southwestern Colorado. He was 92. His daughter, Shanan Campbell,...

The Justice Department is seeking to enlist about 400 lawyers to review roughly 5.2 million pages of Epstein files documents, an effort that is drawing in prosecutors who work on national security and criminal cases, and in U.S. attorneys’ offices in New York and Florida, according to people familiar with the matter.The number of d...

Jon Kyl, a Republican from Arizona who served in both chambers of Congress for nearly 30 years, said on Tuesday that he was diagnosed with dementia.Mr. Kyl, 83, was one of the Republican Party’s most consequential Senate leaders of his era. He began his Congressional career in the House of Representatives in 1987, won a Senate seat...

The police found him in his bedroom in Edmond, Okla., facedown, dead from a gunshot wound and still gripping the bloody kitchen knife he had used to try to defend himself.His name was Wyan Wang, his job was in cannabis and he was a victim, investigators would say, of a robbery, one of many targeting the cash-heavy marijuana industr...

Husna Hashemi keeps photos on her phone from the day more than three years ago when she handed her infant son, asleep and swaddled in blankets, to her husband’s parents and brother in a city park in Kabul.She didn’t want to leave — even now, speaking in Dari through an interpreter, she wept as she talked about returning to Afghanis...

Long before the U.S. military began blowing up boats it suspected of smuggling drugs in strikes from the sky, the Coast Guard has pursued a very different campaign against drug smuggling on the water.Cutters guided by an intelligence center in Key West, Fla., have intercepted go-fast boats in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean and sei...

A Democratic candidate won a special election for the Iowa State Senate on Tuesday, The Associated Press said, a result that prevents Republicans from reclaiming a supermajority in that chamber.The Democrat, Renee Hardman, a member of the West Des Moines City Council, held a left-leaning suburban seat for her party, continuing a st...

Vast crowds have gathered in the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka for the state funeral of former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, with mourners travelling from across the country to bid farewell to a towering political leader.Footage showed huge crowds streaming in towards the national parliament building on Manik Mia Avenue, where her coffin...

HELSINKI (AP) — Authorities are investigating damage to an undersea telecommunications cable in the Gulf of Finland early Wednesday that occurred between the capitals of Finland and Estonia.Finnish authorities seized and inspected the vessel suspected to have caused the damage, the border gu...

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkish authorities on Wednesday pressed ahead with nationwide operations against suspected Islamic State members, detaining 125 people in simultaneous raids across 25 provinces.In the past week, police have taken hundreds of IS suspects into custody in nationwide raids...

SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP) — On New Year’s Day, Bulgaria becomes the 21st country to join the euro currency union, furthering its integration into the European Union. But the historic milestone arrives amid political instability and skepticism among ordinary people fueled by fears of price rises.S...

LONDON (AP) — Britain ’s Queen Camilla on Wednesday spoke publicly for the first time about her personal experience of indecent assault, saying that speaking out was one way she could use her royal platform to shine a light on the epidemic of violence against women.Camilla, who has made figh...

PARIS (AP) — Trains were running again Wednesday in both directions through the Channel Tunnel between continental Europe and the United Kingdom but problems remained after a day of travel chaos caused by power malfunctions.The tunnel operator, Eurotunnel, said the 50-kilometer (32-mile) und...

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian drones blasted apartment buildings and the power grid in the southern Ukraine city of Odesa in an overnight attack that injured six people, including a toddler and two other children, officials said Wednesday.The attack came as Russian President Vladimir Putin ex...

BEIJING (AP) — Chinese President Xi Jinping on Wednesday hailed his country’s technological progress in areas such as artificial intelligence and semiconductors while once again insisting his country would annex self-ruled Taiwan. During his New Year’s Eve address broadcast Wednesday evening...

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud says Israel’s “unexpected and strange” recognition of Somaliland may have dire implications for Palestinians in Gaza.“Somaliland has been claiming the secession issue for a long time, over the past three decades, and no one country in the world has recognised it,” Mohamud told Al Jazeera in an...

Dozens of humanitarian organisations, including Doctors Without Borders, are banned by Israel.

Dozens of humanitarian organisations, including Doctors Without Borders, are banned by Israel.

Dozens of humanitarian organisations, including Doctors Without Borders, are banned by Israel.

Dozens of humanitarian organisations, including Doctors Without Borders, are banned by Israel.

Dozens of humanitarian organisations, including Doctors Without Borders, are banned by Israel.

Several displacement camps have emerged and are quickly filling with people who fled Sudan’s devastated and largely emptied city of el-Fasher, which the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) seized in an atrocity-ridden campaign in October.One camp has been established in the small town of Qarni, northwest of el-Fasher, according...

Iran’s prosecutor general has pledged a “decisive response” if protests prompted by the plummeting currency and dire economic conditions destabilise the country, after demonstrations spread from Tehran to several other cities, hardening the government’s pledge to listen to legitimate concerns.In comments reported by Iranian state m...

The brutal war in Sudan, now deep into its third year, has shifted its centre of gravity to the strategic central region of Kordofan from Darfur, threatening to split the country in two.December saw the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) expand its offensive, seizing vital oil infrastructure and laying siege to key cities, whi...

An Al Jazeera investigative programme has obtained hours of leaked audio recordings of prominent military officers in the regime of the ousted leader, Bashar al-Assad, discussing plans and efforts to destabilise Syria, and suggesting coordination with Israel.The revelations, set to be broadcast on the programme Al-Mutahari, or The...

Turkiye’s government says it has detained more than 100 ISIL (ISIS) suspects in nationwide raids, as the group shows signs of intensified regional activity after a period of relative dormancy.Turkiye’s Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya announced the Wednesday morning arrests in a social media post, saying Turkish authorities rounded...

Israel said it will suspend permits for more than three dozen aid organisations for allegedly failing to meet new requirements for operating in war-devastated Gaza, a move likely to worsen already dire conditions for Palestinians in the enclave.Organisations facing bans as of January 1, 2026 have failed to meet new requirements for...

Isiah Whitlock Jr., a character actor best known for his scene-stealing role as a smooth-talking, corrupt politician in the widely acclaimed HBO show “The Wire,” died on Tuesday in New York City. He was 71.His manager, Brian Liebman, announced his death, in a hospital, in a post on Instagram. He did not specify a cause, saying only...

The most discussed video game of the year included plenty of sequels — among them Hollow Knight: Silksong, Hades II and Assassin’s Creed Shadows — and the debut R.P.G. that could, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.But lots of smaller games captured our attention as well. The New York Times has already reviewed dozens of them, and here ar...

What are the best movies of 2025? After publishing our critics’ Top 10 lists, followed by New York Times experts’ 25 notable titles, we heard an earful from readers. So we asked you to vote and tell us which films, in your opinion, were the best of the year.Thousands of you took us up on the challenge, and the results were fascinat...

Islamabad, Pakistan – The setting was Mar-a-Lago, the personal residence of United States President Donald Trump, and the question concerned the fate of Russia’s war on Ukraine, which has been raging since February 2022.“We have stopped eight wars,” Trump said during a news conference on December 22, where he also announced a new c...

United States President Donald Trump’s government has frozen childcare payments to the state of Minnesota and launched audits of immigration cases involving Somali Americans, intensifying a campaign that critics say uses fraud investigations to target immigrant communities.The Department of Health and Human Services announced the f...

Mali and Burkina Faso have announced their plan to apply reciprocal visa bans to citizens of the United States, weeks after President Donald Trump included the West African countries in an expanded travel ban list.In separate letters shared late on Tuesday, both countries emphasised that the new measures were aimed at applying the...

This week, United States President Donald Trump confirmed that the US had struck a docking facility in Venezuela, marking the first military action on the South American country’s land since it began targeting Venezuelan shipping in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific in September 2025.Speaking to reporters as he met in Florida with...

On the very first day of his second term, United States President Donald Trump signed an executive order creating the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a government panel tasked with rooting out waste, fraud and abuse.But as part of that effort, Trump made an announcement that alarmed privacy advocates.His administration...

Here is where things stand on Wednesday, December 31:Fighting Russian forces shelled the town of Kostiantynivka in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, killing one person, an official said. The deadly attack came a day after an attack in Druzhkivka killed another person and wounded four, according to the Ukrinform news agency. Russian forces...

Robbers broke into a vault at a savings bank in western Germany during the Christmas holidays, stealing cash, gold and jewellery estimated to be worth up to $105m, the police and the bank said.According to police on Tuesday, the perpetrators used a large drill to bore through a thick concrete wall of a branch of Sparkasse bank in t...

Russia has released footage showing the deployment of its Oreshnik hypersonic missile system in Belarus, a move that could strengthen Moscow’s ability to target Europe in a potential future conflict.The Russian state news agency TASS reported on Tuesday that this marks the first public display of the mobile Oreshnik systems. Presid...

Robbers stole items worth up to $105bn from safe-deposit boxes held at a German retail bank in Gelsenkirchen, North Rhine-Westphalia state, during the Christmas holiday, German police said on Tuesday.The German news agency dpa reported that it may rank among the biggest thefts in the country’s history.What happened and what was sto...

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece and Cyprus are starting 2026 by turning down the volume.The countries’ capital cities, Athens and Nicosia, have traded the familiar whizz, crackle and boom of window‑rattling fireworks for spectacle without the shock wave, opting for low‑noise pyrotechnics, light...

When U.S. border agents turned away a French scientist in March after searching his phone, the French authorities cried foul, blaming messages commenting on President Trump’s policies for the decision. U.S. officials denied that politics had played a role, but the incident left some travelers with an urgent question: Are such searc...

In his first New Year’s Eve address since taking office in May, Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany warned Germans on Wednesday that their country’s eight-decade partnership with the United States — the bedrock of Germany’s post-World War II security — is “changing.”That shift, Mr. Merz said, would require European nations, includ...

Vast crowds braved an unexpected cold spell in Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, on Wednesday to say goodbye to Khaleda Zia, the country’s first female prime minister, who died a day earlier and whose policies helped shape the country and its economy.As the vehicle carrying Ms. Zia’s body wove its way from her private residence tow...

Thailand has repatriated 18 Cambodian soldiers it had held captive since July, officials from both governments said, marking a hopeful turn in weeks of fighting that has killed dozens of people and displaced hundreds of thousands of others.Lt. Gen. Maly Socheata, a spokeswoman for the Cambodian Defense Ministry, confirmed that the...

For a certain France, Brigitte Bardot incarnated the lost idyll of the country’s supposed golden years after World War II when its president supped as an equal at the table of world leaders, French-made Citroëns rolled down its new superhighways, and white people of French ancestry filled its cities.For that France, Ms. Bardot — bl...

The handsome actor, who appeared on a telenovela with salt and pepper locks under a baseball cap marked “POLICE,” seemed familiar to Venezuelan exiles who watched the show.It wasn’t long before he was recognized as the lieutenant colonel who ran a notoriously repressive military unit in Barquisimeto, Venezuela.Rafael Quero Silva, a...

The river rose as high as a coconut tree one November morning, depositing a 10-foot-high pile of logs that crushed almost every structure in the village of Sekumur on Indonesia’s Sumatra island. “My house is buried under these logs,” said Fauzi, one of many in similar straits.About 200 miles northwest, the deluge came a few hours e...

Earlier this year, a person who had filed a complaint with the Russian government’s human rights ombudsman went online to check its status.The person accidentally typed the wrong complaint number and, instead of receiving an error message, was shown an entirely different person’s complaint, according to Maxim Kurnikov, a Russian jo...

Confidential complaints filed by troops and their families reveal patterns of wrongdoing in the ranks that are hidden from the Russian public.

Devastating floods ravaged multiple regions of the world in 2025, from Southeast Asia to North America and the Middle East.We asked climate experts what is causing the devastation and what governments should be doing to prevent the situation from becoming even worse in the coming year.Which places were worst hit by floods in 2025?“...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is not the first president to want more room at the White House for entertaining, says the longest-serving top aide in the executive residence, offering some backup for the reason Trump has cited for his ballroom construction project.Gary Walters spen...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Fewer Americans applied for unemployment benefits last week with layoffs remaining low despite a weakening labor market.U.S. applications for jobless claims for the week ending Dec. 27 fell by 16,000 to 199,000 from the previous week’s 215,000, the Labor Department reported...

Scroll back through the last year, and the same words come up again and again.The top-trending terms of 2025, from artificial intelligence to Zohran Mamdani, shaped headlines across politics, conflict, technology and climate.As the year comes to a close, AJ Labs has compiled an A to Z list of names, places and issues that generated...

ATLANTA (AP) — A Georgia judge on Tuesday tossed racketeering charges against dozens of defendants accused of a yearslong conspiracy to halt the construction of a police and firefighter training facility that critics call “Cop City.”Fulton County Judge Kevin Farmer said in the order that Rep...

TOKYO (AP) — He turns 59 in February, and the globe’s oldest professional soccer player has a new club as he gets set for his 41st season.This is of course Kazuyoshi Miura who is known in Japan as “King Kazu.” Miura announced his signing this week with third-division J-League team Fukushima...

Zohran Mamdani will become mayor of New York City as the clock ticks over into 2026 — but the celebrations are set to last through New Year’s Day.The Democrat’s team is planning two separate swearing-in ceremonies Thursday — a small, private one with his family in an old subway station aroun...

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesian authorities have raised the alert level for the Mount Bur Ni Telong volcano in the country’s westernmost province of Aceh to its second highest following a series of increased activity and volcanic earthquakes, official said Wednesday.The 2,624-meter (...

HONG KONG (AP) — State-backed property developer China Vanke, once the country’s largest homebuilder by sales, narrowly avoided defaulting on a 2 billion yuan ($284 million) bond last week as the painfully slow recovery in China’s property market drags on.The Chinese developer also was seeki...

BANGKOK (AP) — Chinese factory activity expanded for the first time in eight months in December, as orders picked up ahead of holidays and builders rushed to finish projects, according to surveys released Wednesday.The official purchasing managers index for manufacturing, a monthly survey of...

NEW YORK (AP) — By nearly any measure, 2025 has been a rough year for anyone concerned about freedom of the press.It’s likely to be the deadliest year on record for journalists and media workers. The number of assaults on reporters in the U.S. nearly equals the last three years combined. The...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The CIA was behind a drone strike last week at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels, according to two people familiar with details of the operation who requested anonymity to discuss the classified matter.The first known direct operation on V...

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan reported fewer than half as many cases of polio in 2025 than the previous year, a sign of progress in its eradication campaign even as vaccinators faced repeated militant attacks, according to a statement from the government-run Polio Eradication Initiative.The anno...

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Huge crowds flocked to the area outside Bangladesh’s national parliament building in the capital Wednesday to attend the funeral prayers for former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia , who died a day earlier at the age of 80 after a prolonged illness.Waves of people from Dha...

BANGKOK (AP) — Thailand on Wednesday released 18 Cambodian prisoners of war held for five months, fulfilling the terms of a ceasefire agreement the two countries signed to end bitter fighting along their border.The release was stipulated in the ceasefire agreement signed Saturday by the defe...

BEIJING (AP) — Dressed in a red-and-white warrior costume, Peking opera actress Zhang Wanting balances on one foot on the narrow handle of a rosewood chair. She bends forward, lifts her other leg high and grasps the two long pheasant plumes on her helmet to strike a pose like a flying swallo...

Even as a kid, Alice Lovatt was always getting in trouble for being late.She was often embarrassed after letting down friends for her tardiness, and she was routinely stressed about arriving at school on time.“I just don’t seem to have that clock that ticks by in my head,” said Lovatt, a mus...

HONG KONG (AP) — Fireworks are typically a celebratory centerpiece of Hong Kong’s New Year celebrations. Not this year. The territory will ring in 2026 without spectacular and colorful explosions in the sky over its iconic Victoria Harbor after a massive fire in November that killed at least...

FRISCO, Texas (AP) — The Cowboys waived cornerback Trevon Diggs on Tuesday, ending a tumultuous final season a game early in a Dallas career that never lived up to the promise of a 2021 All-Pro performance that included 11 interceptions.The move came five days before Dallas’ season finale Su...

Syrian authorities imposed an overnight curfew in the coastal city of Latakia following deadly attacks on predominantly Alawite neighbourhoods as security tensions rise in the country’s western coastal region.Authorities in Latakia arrested 21 people allegedly linked to ousted leader Bashar al-Assad’s rule, state media reported on...

The United Arab Emirates has announced the withdrawal of its forces from Yemen, declaring an end to what it called “counterterrorism” operations there, after Saudi Arabia accused Abu Dhabi of supporting separatists in Yemen.The announcement on Tuesday came after Yemen’s internationally recognised government demanded the UAE pull it...

A federal judge in Boston on Tuesday blocked the Trump administration from ending temporary deportation protections for migrants from South Sudan, a move to halt any deportations that came a week before the migrants’ status was set to expire.The decision, by Judge Angel Kelley, temporarily preserved deportation protections for abou...

Most U.S. households have pets, and owners are willing to spend more on them, too.Whether you have a dog or a cat, pet grooming, for example, can be costly — even for rudimentary jobs like a simple clipping. That’s partly because the industry has evolved a lot since the days when grooming your pet meant a short cut and a flea bath....

Advice on … Improving Your Skin… Upgrading Your Makeup… Caring for Your Nails… Styling and Treating Your Hair… Grooming Like a ProfessionalAnd a Quiz to Help You Pick the Right Fragrance

Watch the on-screen siblings chat about food, cooking and the final season of their show — all while making a pie in the New York Times kitchen studio.

The United States military says it has killed or captured about 25 ISIL (ISIS) fighters in a wave of attacks over nine days in Syria.US Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees the US military’s Middle East operations, issued a statement on Tuesday marking the conclusion of the operations this month.Recommended Stories list of 3 i...

Washington, DC – The United States has issued sanctions against a Venezuelan company over accusations that it helped acquire Iranian-designed drones as Washington’s tensions with both Tehran and Caracas escalate.The penalties on Tuesday targeted Empresa Aeronautica Nacional SA (EANSA), a Venezuelan firm that the US Department of th...

It began on the first day of his second term, with instructions to the Department of Justice (DOJ) to end the "weaponisation" of prosecutorial power.But with those first strokes of his pen, President Donald Trump instead launched a year of dramatic changes to the Justice Department, the government body responsible for enforcing fed...

As the United States economy heads into 2026, the report card emerging on its performance is complicated.By many measures, the world’s largest economy appears to be in a strong position.After a tumultuous year marked by President Donald Trump’s return to the White House and his swing towards tariffs and protectionism, recent growth...

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Six-time IndyCar champion Scott Dixon was awarded a knighthood Wednesday in New Zealand’s New Year honors list.“I’ve been called a lot of things, but I never thought that ‘Sir’ was going to be one of them,” Dixon said. “That was kind of crazy. Totally out of th...

BRISBANE, Australia (AP) — Former cricketer Damien Martyn, who played 67 test matches for Australia, is in a serious condition in a Brisbane hospital, Australian media reported Wednesday.The 54-year-old former right-hand batter had fallen ill in recent days, with Nine Newspapers reporting he...

More from our inbox: Friction Over GreenlandImageTo the Editor:Re “Students Are Getting a Reader’s Digest of Books” (front page, Dec. 15):Kudos for calling attention to a troubling trend. Acknowledging the problem is the first step toward addressing it.The article highlights a widespread assumption that teenagers are no longer capa...

Growing up, I recall that my grandpa was never a fan of the concept of potential. Potential was for people who weren’t interested in learning (or doing) the job at hand. He worked at a dangerous paper mill in the Florida sun, and the last thing he wanted was someone with potential.Nearly four years ago, I wrote an opinion essay tit...

The C.I.A. conducted a drone strike last week in Venezuela, the first known U.S. operation inside the country since the Trump administration began its pressure campaign against the government of Nicolás Maduro.President Trump had mentioned the attack twice in recent days without disclosing that the spy agency was behind it. U.S. of...

A roar echoed in the windless afternoon air. Seconds later, smoke began to billow from the sea as if the horizon were on fire.Watching from the shore on Nov. 6, Erika Palacio Fernández pulled out her phone, she said, unaware that what she was recording was the only verified, independent video known to date of the aftermath of an ai...

In his first year back in office, President Trump has made unparalleled changes to the federal government, shrinking its footprint both in the services it provides and the size of its work force.The extent of the effect on the public so far is unclear. Some of the White House’s moves are stalled by a mountain of litigation — more t...

A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that funding for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau cannot lapse, a blow to the Trump administration, which had declared the agency’s cash stream illegal.In her motion, Judge Amy Berman Jackson of the Federal District Court in Washington wrote that the C.F.P.B. could continue to receive fundin...

Federal Reserve officials are grappling with two fundamental questions as they confront both rising unemployment and elevated inflation. How much more should they lower borrowing costs, and when should they deliver that relief?Minutes from the Fed’s final gathering of 2025 in December, released on Tuesday, underscore the difficult...

Masashi Ozaki, who had a brief professional baseball career in Japan before converting his powerful, free-swinging approach to golf and becoming the country’s most successful champion and a Hall of Famer with 113 victories, died on Dec. 23. He was 78.He was diagnosed with terminal colon cancer about a year ago, his son, Tomoharu Oz...

PHILLIPS STATION, Calif. (AP) — California is seeing ample rain and water stored in the state’s reservoirs but only about half the snow levels of a year ago, officials said Tuesday, adding it’s too soon to know how that could impact water supplies in the coming year.Officials at Phillips Sta...

Isiah Whitlock Jr., an actor who made frequent memorable appearances on the HBO series “The Wire” and “Veep” and in five films with director Spike Lee, died Tuesday. He was 71. Whitlock’s manager Brian Liebman told The Associated Press in an email that the actor died in New York after a shor...