A gas explosion at a department store in Taiwan on Thursday killed four people and injured 26, fire authorities said.

The blast occurred at the food court on the 12th floor of the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi department store in Taichung city, the Taichung Fire Bureau said. The higher floors of the upscale department store were blown out, raining debris on pedestrians below.

Among the dead were two people visiting from Macau, Macao's Tourism Office confirmed Thursday. Local media reported that they were part of a family of seven who were there for tourism. The other five were also injured are now being treated at local hospitals in Taichung.

TAIWAN AIR FORCE OFFICER KILLED AFTER BEING ‘INHALED’ BY FIGHTER JET’S ENGINE

Part of the store was under renovation, but it's not clear if the work was connected to the explosion, Taichung Vice Mayor Cheng Chao-hsin told reporters at the scene. "If it's found there were illegal actions or parts that violated renovation regulations, it will be dealt with appropriately," Cheng said.

Dozens of firefighters were deployed to the scene at about 11:30 a.m. Parts of the building's exterior were damaged and scattered fragments were strewn on the streets.

Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen told reporters at the scene that she felt the shock at her office nearby. She said the fire bureau would focus on a rescue operation first, but an investigation was also underway and officers were checking whether there were other sources of danger.

Taiwan's President Lai Ching-te said he had asked all relevant government agencies to investigate the cause of the accident.

The book on which she collaborated with two fellow feminists drew global attention to the repression of women under their country’s dictatorship.

Attacked by two justices, lower-court judges and litigants, the 1964 ruling in New York Times v. Sullivan keeps getting cited approvingly in the Supreme Court’s decisions.

Senator Andy Kim (D-NJ) said Sunday on NBC’s "Meet the Press" that the Trump administration's actions directed toward USAID was an "American retreat."

The post Dem Sen. Kim: Trump Cutting USAID Is ‘American Retreat’ appeared first on Breitbart.

Emily Sundberg’s business newsletter, Feed Me, has made her a rising Substack star.

Mr. Penny, who was acquitted after choking a mentally ill subway passenger to death, will work for Andreessen Horowitz. Before the killing, he had been an architecture student.

An Iraqi man who carried out several Quran burnings in Sweden has been killed in a shooting near Stockholm, authorities said Thursday.

Salwan Momika, 38, staged several burnings and desecrations of Islam's holy book in Sweden in 2023. Videos of the Quran burnings got worldwide publicity and raised anger and criticism in several Muslim nations, leading to riots and unrest in many places.

THOUSANDS OF PROTESTERS RALLY ACROSS IRAQ FOR A 2ND DAY TO CONDEMN THE BURNING OF A QURAN IN SWEDEN

The Stockholm District Court said a verdict scheduled Thursday in a trial in which Momika was a defendant was postponed because one of the defendants had died. A judge at the court, Göran Lundahl, confirmed that the deceased was Momika. He said he didn't have any information on when or how Momika died.

Police said they were alerted to a shooting Wednesday night at an apartment building in Sodertalje, near Stockholm, and found a man with gunshot wounds who later died.

Broadcaster SVT reported that the victim was Momika.

Prosecutors said five people were arrested overnight on suspicion of murder. They said all were adults but gave no further details.

Prosecutor Rasmus Öman said the investigation is still in its early stages and that the suspects and others still have to be questioned.

Momika came to Sweden from Iraq in 2018 and was granted a three-year residence permit in 2021, according to SVT.

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said Sweden's security service was involved because "there is obviously a risk that there is a connection to a foreign power," Swedish news agency TT reported.

Momika argued that his protests targeted the religion of Islam, not Muslim people. He said he wanted to protect Sweden’s population from the messages of the Quran. Swedish police allowed his demonstrations, citing freedom of speech, while filing charges against him.

Last March, he was arrested in neighboring Norway after stating that he would seek asylum there, and was sent back to Sweden, TT reported.

Momika and a co-defendant were charged in August with incitement to hatred because of statements they made in connection with the Quran burnings. A verdict was supposed to be handed down on Thursday morning.

Authorities in the eastern Caribbean nation of St. Kitts and Nevis said Thursday they are investigating the circumstances that led to the discovery of at least 19 bodies found drifting at sea.

CRUISE SHIP PASSENGERS FROM ACROSS US SUE AFTER WORKER SENTENCED FOR PLACING HIDDEN CAMERAS IN GUEST ROOMS

At around 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday the St. Kitts and Nevis Coast Guard responded to a report of a drifting vessel off the coast of Nevis. The partially submerged boat contained decomposed human remains. It was towed to St. Kitts, where police and medical officials are conducting investigations.

"It was a fishing vessel, which is not typically found in the Caribbean," Police Commissioner James Sutton told The Associated Press. "We are not certain, but we believe that this vessel originated off the West African coast."

Sutton said officials now face the difficult task of determining the exact number of bodies and identifying them. The advanced state of decomposition, he said, has made it difficult.

This is the first such discovery in recent memory in the twin-island nation.

The White House received over 7,000 applications from people interested in the "new media" seat for independent journalists, podcasters, social media influencers, and content creators, according to several reports.

The post White House Receives More Than 7,000 Applications for ‘New Media’ Seat in Press Briefing Room appeared first on Breitbart.

Belarus' authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko extended his more than three decades in power in an orchestrated weekend election that the opposition and the European Union rejected as a farce.

The Central Election Commission declared early Monday that Lukashenko won the election with nearly 87% of the vote after a campaign in which four token challengers all praised his rule.

Members of the country's political opposition, many of whom are imprisoned or exiled abroad by Lukashenko's unrelenting crackdown on dissent and free speech, called the election a sham — much like the last one in 2020 that triggered months of protests that were unprecedented in the history of the country of 9 million people.

SECRETARY OF STATE RUBIO HAILS RELEASE OF US PRISONER IN BELARUS AS CONTROVERSY HANGS OVER NATION'S ELECTION

Since then, more than 65,000 people were arrested and thousands beaten, with the crackdown bringing condemnation and sanctions from the West.

The EU rejected Sunday's vote as illegitimate and threatened new sanctions.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said the election offered no choice to voters, marking "a bitter day for all those who long for freedom and democracy."

"Instead of free and fair elections and a life without fear and arbitrariness, they experience daily oppression, repression and human rights violations," she said in a post on X.

Lukashenko has been in power since 1994 and has ruled the country with an iron fist. He has relied on subsidies and political support from Russian President Vladimir Putin, himself in office for a quarter-century, a relationship that helped him survive the 2020 protests.

Lukashenko allowed Moscow to use the country’s territory to invade Ukraine in 2022 and later hosted some of Russia’s tactical nuclear weapons.

Putin called Lukashenko on Monday to congratulate him on his "convincing victory." Chinese President Xi Jinping also sent congratulations.

Some observers believe Lukashenko feared a repeat of those mass demonstrations amid economic troubles and the fighting in Ukraine, and so scheduled the vote in January, when few would want to fill the streets again, rather than hold it in August.

Leading opponents have fled abroad or were thrown in prison. Activists say the country holds nearly 1,300 political prisoners, including Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ales Bialiatski, founder of the Viasna Human Rights Center.

Since July, Lukashenko has pardoned more than 250 people. At the same time, authorities have sought to uproot dissent by arresting hundreds more in raids targeting relatives and friends of political prisoners.

Opposition leader-in-exile Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who fled Belarus under government pressure after challenging Lukashenko in 2020, denounced the election as a "senseless farce" and urged voters to cross off everyone listed on the ballot.

Colombia’s president issued a decree Friday giving him emergency powers to restore order in a coca-growing region bordering Venezuela that has been wracked in recent days by a deadly turf war among dissident rebel groups.

President Gustavo Petro's decree, which can be extended, gives him 90 days to impose curfews, restrict traffic and take other steps that would normally violate Colombians' civil rights or require congressional approval.

AT LEAST 80 PEOPLE KILLED IN NORTHEAST COLOMBIA AS PEACE TALKS FAIL, OFFICIAL SAYS

It is the first time in more than a decade that a Colombian president has used such an extreme measure and underscores the seriousness of the current conflict in a country that for decades was paralyzed by political violence.

However, it applies only to the rural Catatumbo region near the border with Venezuela, where the Colombian state has struggled for decades to gain a foothold. In the past week, at least 80 people have been killed and an estimated 36,000 more displaced as fighting intensifies between the National Liberation Army, or ELN, and holdouts from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Petro's conservative opponents have criticized the move, accusing the former guerrilla of riding roughshod over the constitution. But some activists have celebrated it, saying they are hopeful the move translates into better infrastructure, health care and schools in the traditionally lawless region.

"Why are the armed groups here? Because the last government hasn't made investments. They've abandoned us," Jaime Botero, an activist in the town of Tibu, told The Associated Press.

Earlier this week Petro reactivated arrest orders against 31 top ELN commanders that had been suspended as part of an effort to woo the the Cuban revolution-inspired insurgency into a peace deal to end its 60 year war against the state. Petro also suspended all peace talks, which have advanced slowly since he took office in 2022.

The ELN has traditionally dominated in Catatumbo but has been losing ground to holdouts from the FARC, a guerrilla group that largely disbanded after signing a peace deal in 2016 with the government.

The current conflict is spilling across the border into Venezuela, where some of those fleeing the violence have sought refuge.

The current whereabouts of the ELN peace negotiators is unknown. But Cuba's government this week said they are not there, leading some to speculate they may be hiding in Venezuela, which is one of the sponsors of Petro's peace initiative with the ELN.

Associated Press announced Thursday its style guide will recognize President Donald Trump's renaming of the "Gulf of Mexico" to the "Gulf of America."

The post AP Yields to Trump, Changes Style Guide to Officially Include ‘Gulf of America’ appeared first on Breitbart.

A beloved illustrator died in the middle of a project. His son, who had been drifting away from art for years, was given the chance to finish the work.

Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen on Sunday announced that he would meet with far-right politician Herbert Kickl as speculation grows that he will ask the Freedom Party leader to form a government.

Van der Bellen made the announcement after meeting with Chancellor Karl Nehammer and others at his presidential palace. Nehammer has announced his intention to resign after coalition talks between his conservative Austrian People's Party and the center-left Social Democrats collapsed over the budget.

Nehammer has ruled out working with Kickl, but others within his party are less adamant. Earlier Sunday, the People's Party nominated its general secretary, Christian Stocker, as interim leader, but the president said Nehammer would remain chancellor for now.

Van der Bellen said that he had spent several hours talking to key officials, after which he got the impression that "the voices within the People's Party who exclude working with the Freedom Party under its leader Herbert Kickl have become quieter."

GERMANY ACCUSES ELON MUSK OF TRYING TO INTERFERE IN ITS NATIONAL ELECTIONS

The president said that this development has "potentially opened a new path," which has prompted him to invite Kickl for a meeting on Monday morning.

Kickl's Freedom Party topped the polls in the autumn's national election with 29.2% of the vote, but Van der Bellen tasked Nehammer with putting together a new government because no other party was willing to work with Kickl.

That decision drew heavy criticism from the Freedom Party and its supporters, with Kickl saying in October that it was "not right and not logical" that he did not get a mandate to form a government.

"We are not responsible for the wasted time, the chaotic situation and the enormous breach of trust that has emerged," Kickl said Sunday afternoon on social media. "On the contrary: It is clear that the Freedom Party has been and continues to be the only stable factor in Austrian politics."

Stocker addressed reporters on Sunday afternoon and confirmed that he had been appointed "unanimously" by his party to serve as interim leader. "I am very honored and happy," he said.

He also welcomed the decision by the president to meet with Kickl and said that he now expects that the leader of the party that emerged as the clear winner from the last election would be tasked with forming a government.

"If we are invited to negotiations to form a government, we will accept this invitation," Stocker added.

In the past, Stocker has criticized Kickl, calling him a "security risk" for the country.

In its election program titled "Fortress Austria," the Freedom Party calls for "remigration of uninvited foreigners," for achieving a more "homogeneous" nation by tightly controlling borders and suspending the right to asylum via an emergency law.

The Freedom Party also calls for an end to sanctions against Russia, is highly critical of Western military aid to Ukraine and wants to bow out of the European Sky Shield Initiative, a missile defense project launched by Germany. The Freedom Party has also signed a friendship agreement in 2016 with Putin’s United Russia Party that it now claims has expired.

Kickl has criticized "elites" in Brussels and called for some powers to be brought back from the European Union to Austria.

Austria was thrown into political turmoil on Friday after the liberal party Neos pulled out of coalition talks with the the People's Party and the Social Democrats. On Saturday the two remaining parties, who have only a one-seat majority in Parliament, made another attempt to form a government — but that also ended in failure after a few hours, with negotiators saying they were unable to agree on how to repair the budget deficit.

Mr. Carter’s 1979 confrontation with a swimming rabbit was a “throwaway story” that became emblematic of his problems at home and abroad.

Warren Upton, the oldest living survivor of the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the last remaining survivor of the USS Utah, has died. He was 105.

Upton died Wednesday at a hospital in Los Gatos, California, after suffering a bout of pneumonia, said Kathleen Farley, the California state chair of the Sons and Daughters of Pearl Harbor Survivors.

TRAVEL IN TIME TO 5 DESTINATIONS THAT SALUTE BATTLES AND WAR HEROES RIGHT HERE AT HOME

The Utah, a battleship, was moored at Pearl Harbor when Japanese planes began bombing the Hawaii naval base in the early hours of Dec. 7, 1941, in an attack that propelled the U.S. into World War II.

Upton told The Associated Press in 2020 that he had been getting ready to shave when he felt the first torpedo hit the Utah. He recalled that no one on board knew what made the ship shake. Then, the second torpedo hit and the ship began to list and capsize.

The then-22-year-old swam ashore to Ford Island, where he jumped in a trench to avoid Japanese planes strafing the area. He stayed for about 30 minutes until a truck came and took him to safety.

Upton said he didn't mind talking about what happened during the attack. Instead, what upset him was that he kept losing shipmates over the years. By 2020, there were only three crew members of the Utah still alive, including himself.

There were an estimated 87,000 military personnel on Oahu on the day of the attack, according to military historian J. Michael Wenger. After Upton's death, only 15 are still alive.

Road crews were repairing a short stretch of Interstate 80 in northern New Jersey on Friday where a sinkhole forced the eastbound lanes to shut down, but it was still unknown when they will reopen.

MASSIVE SINKHOLE COLLAPSES SOCCER FIELD AT ILLINOIS PARK

The highway's guardrail still hung suspended in the air across the gaping 40-foot-wide (12-meter) hole, which opened up when an abandoned mine collapsed under the highway's right shoulder Thursday morning, according to the New Jersey Department of Transportation.

The sinkhole has forced motorists to take a short detour near Wharton, which is about 40 miles (64 kilometers) west of New York City.

Crews have stabilized the area and started excavating. They will work around the clock to the repair the roadway, the highway department said Friday.

The timing of when the eastbound lanes will upon depends on how extensive the repairs will be and the upcoming weather, the department said. Drivers should continue to expect delays and use alternate routes.

After a nearly weeklong search, Athena found her way home to her Florida family in time for Christmas Eve and even rang the doorbell.

Athena, a 4-year-old German Shepherd and Husky mix, escaped her home in Green Cove Springs, Florida, on Dec. 15, prompting a search among the community and nearby towns for her. Her owner, Brooke Comer, said her family left for church that day and got a message from her neighbor with a picture of Athena outside the house.

MISSING DOG IN VIRGINIA CAPTURED AFTER 6 MONTHS ON THE RUN: 'ALMOST LOST HOPE'

Comer panicked. Her family rushed home to find her collar in the crate and no visible opening Athena could have gotten out from. How she escaped remains a mystery.

The next week's events continued to be an "unbelievable" story for Comer, where neighbors and community members from nearby towns would contact her from her missing dog ads and send any footage or photos where they may have spotted Athena. Based on all the alerts Comer got, it looked like Athena made a nearly 20-mile (32-kilometer) roundtrip while she was missing.

At every alert, Comer and her family would go to the spot within minutes and search for Athena — to no avail.

"She was the hide-and-seek all time grand champion," Comer said. "With every sighting my heart jumped, and it honestly was excitement and then your heart's crushed because we were always one step behind."

The entire search was a terrifying and scary experience for Comer, who was worried about where her already skittish dog could have gone or could have encountered. That was until 2:30 a.m. Christmas Eve, when she got a Ring video notification from her doorbell and her other dog began barking.

"I was kind of like in a daze, and the dog was barking, and as soon as I heard that ring, I looked at my phone and you could see in the video it was Athena and she was jumping at the door, ringing the doorbell," Comer said.

As soon as Comer opened the door, Athena bolted inside and went to go lick her son's face, who was on the couch half-asleep. After that, she immediately grabbed her ball to play and shortly went to her cage to go back to sleep.

Comer said the experience gave so much hope because of the neighbors and the large community looking for Athena for the past week. The next plan was to get Athena a full exam, flea and tick treatments and a microchip.