A plane is engulfed in flames after skidding off the runway in South Korea, killing at least 177
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - A passenger plane burst into flames Sunday after it skidded off a runway at a South Korean airport and slammed into a concrete fence when its front landing gear apparently failed to deploy. Most of the 181 people on board died in one of the country´s worst aviation disasters.
The Jeju Air passenger plane crashed while landing in the town of Muan, about 290 kilometers (180 miles) south of Seoul. The Transport Ministry said the plane was a 15-year-old Boeing 737-800 jet that was returning from Bangkok and that the crash happened at 9:03 a.m.
At least 177 people - 84 women, 82 men and 11 others whose genders weren´t immediately identifiable - died in the fire, the South Korean fire agency said. Emergency workers pulled two people, both crew members, to safety. Health officials said they are conscious and not in life-threatening condition.
Two people remained missing about nine hours after the incident. Among the 177 bodies found, officials have so far identified 57 of them, the fire agency said. The passengers were predominantly South Korean, as well as two Thai nationals.
The fire agency deployed 32 fire trucks and several helicopters to contain the blaze. About 1,570 firefighters, police officers, soldiers and other officials were also sent to the site, according to the fire agency and transport ministry.
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Trump appears to side with Musk, tech allies in debate over foreign workers roiling his supporters
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) - President-elect Donald Trump appears to be siding with Elon Musk and his other backers in the tech industry as a dispute over immigration visas has divided his supporters.
Trump, in an interview with the New York Post on Saturday, praised the use of visas to bring skilled foreign workers to the U.S. The topic has become a flashpoint within his conservative base.
"I´ve always liked the visas, I have always been in favor of the visas. That´s why we have them," Trump said.
In fact, Trump has in the past criticized the H-1B visas, calling them "very bad" and "unfair" for U.S. workers. During his first term as president, he unveiled a "Hire American" policy that directed changes to the program to try to ensure the visas were awarded to the highest-paid or most-skilled applicants.
Despite his criticism of them and attempts to curb their use, he has also used the visas at his businesses in the past, something he acknowledged in his interview Saturday.
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Tornadoes in Texas and Mississippi kill 2 and injure 6 as severe weather system moves east
HOUSTON (AP) - At least two people were killed and six more injured as several tornadoes touched down in Texas and Mississippi on Saturday, damaging homes and flipping vehicles as the storm system moved east across Alabama early Sunday.
The National Weather Service's severe storm tracker indicated the system was moving east through Alabama into Georgia shortly before 4 a.m. The agency issued severe thunder storm warnings with the possibility of tornadoes in western Georgia and the northwestern tip of Florida directly above the Gulf of Mexico.
One person died in the Liverpool area, located south of Houston, and four people suffered injuries that were not considered critical, according to Madison Polston of the Brazoria County Sheriff´s Office.
There were "multiple touchdown points" in the county between Liverpool, Hillcrest Village and Alvin. Officials knew of around 10 damaged homes but were working to determine the extent of the damage, Polston said.
In Mississippi, one person died in Adams County and two people were injured in Franklin County, according to the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.
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A Palestinian was shot dead in her West Bank home. Her family blames Palestinian security forces
JENIN, West Bank (AP) - A Palestinian woman was shot and killed in her home in the volatile northern West Bank town of Jenin, where the Palestinian Authority is carrying out a rare campaign against militants.
The family of Shatha al-Sabbagh, a 22-year-old journalism student, said she was killed by a sniper with the Palestinian security forces late Saturday while she was with her mother and two small children. They said there were no militants in the area at the time.
A statement from the Palestinian security forces said she was shot by "outlaws" - the term it has been using for local militants who have been battling Israeli forces in recent years. The security forces condemned the shooting and vowed to investigate it.
Separately, a fourth infant has died of hypothermia in the Gaza Strip, where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced by nearly 15 months of war are huddled in tents along the rainy, windswept coast.
The Western-backed Palestinian Authority exercises limited self-rule in parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank. It is deeply unpopular among Palestinians, largely because it cooperates with Israel on security matters, even as Israel accuses it of incitement and of generally turning a blind eye to militancy.
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Syria's embassy in Lebanon suspends services as Lebanon hands over former Syrian army officers
BEIRUT (AP) - Syria´s embassy in Lebanon suspended consular services Saturday, a day after two relatives of deposed Syrian President Bashar Assad were arrested at the Beirut airport with allegedly forged passports.
Also on Saturday, Lebanese authorities handed over dozens of Syrians - including former officers in the Syrian army under Assad - to the new Syrian authorities after they were caught illegally entering Lebanon, a war monitor and Lebanese officials said.
The embassy announced on its Facebook page that consular work was suspended "until further notice" at the order of the Syrian foreign ministry. The announcement did not give a reason for the suspension.
Two Lebanese security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, said the suspension was ordered because the passports belonging to Assad´s relatives - the wife and daughter of one of his cousins - were believed to have been forged at the embassy.
Assad´s uncle, Rifaat Assad - who has been indicted in Switzerland on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity - had flown out the day before on his real passport and was not stopped, the officials said.
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2024 was a year of triumphs and setbacks for Russian leader Vladimir Putin. Here's how it unfolded
In 2024, President Vladimir Putin further cemented his grip on power and sought to counter Russia's isolation from the West over the war in Ukraine. But he faced continuing challenges, with a deadly attack by gunmen in Moscow and an incursion by Kyiv's troops on his territory.
As Russia's nearly 3-year-old war in Ukraine enters a new, potentially pivotal phase amid a new U.S. administration and its uncertain support for Kyiv, here's a look back at how the year unfolded for Putin:
Putin ran for a fifth term in office with his top opponents either jailed or exiled abroad. But in a rare show of defiance, thousands of Russians queued in the January cold to sign petitions for an unlikely challenger. Boris Nadezhdin, a 60-year-old legislator and war critic, got the 100,000 signatures needed to put him on the ballot, but election authorities eventually barred him from running. Still, the support he received reflected anti-war sentiment and public longing for political competition in an embarrassment for Putin.
On Feb. 16, Putin's longtime foe Alexei Navalny died in an arctic prison colony while serving a 19-year sentence on charges widely seen as politically motivated. The news of his death at age 47 shocked the world and robbed the opposition of its most charismatic leader. No exact cause of death was given, and his family and allies blamed the Kremlin, which denied involvement. Tens of thousands of mourners attended his Moscow funeral two weeks later in a show of defiance.
On March 17, Putin secured his expected election triumph, which will keep him in office until 2030, following the harshest crackdown on dissent since Soviet times. Five days later, gunmen stormed a concert hall on Moscow's outskirts, killing over 140 people and setting the venue ablaze. An affiliate of the Islamic State group claimed responsibility, although the Kremlin, without evidence, tried to blame Ukraine for the deadliest attack on Russian soil in almost two decades. The assault stunned the capital and rekindled memories of other attacks in the early years of Putin´s presidency.
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What is known about a plane crash in Kazakhstan after Putin apologized for a "tragic incident"?
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday apologized to his Azerbaijani counterpart for what he called a "tragic incident" following the crash of an Azerbaijani airliner in Kazakhstan that killed 38 people, but stopped short of acknowledging that Moscow was responsible.
Putin´s apology to President Ilham Aliyev came as allegations mounted that the plane had been shot down by Russian air defense systems attempting to fend off a Ukrainian drone strike near Grozny, the regional capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya, where the plane was heading.
Here are some things to know about the crash that killed 38 out of the 67 people on board:
Azerbaijan Airlines´ Embraer 190 was en route from the Azerbaijani capital of Baku to Grozny in the North Caucasus on Wednesday when it was diverted. It crashed while trying to land near the city of Aktau, Kazakhstan, after flying hundreds of kilometers (miles) east across the Caspian Sea.
The plane went down near the coast about 3 kilometers (2 miles) from Aktau. Cellphone footage circulating online appeared to show the aircraft making a steep descent before hitting the ground and exploding in a fireball.
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Bolivia's former leader Evo Morales seeks a political comeback from his stronghold in the tropics
LAUCA Ñ, Bolivia (AP) - Bolivia's former leader Evo Morales has a campaign pitch for 2025 that has worked elsewhere: Other politicians of recent years have brought you nothing but misery. It's time for a return to the past.
His supporters are looking to Morales for a rescue from the five tumultuous years since his 2019 resignation. The country's first Indigenous president, Morales is credited with spreading the wealth of a commodities boom and ushering in a rare stretch of social and economic stability during his nearly 14 years in office.
His detractors say Morales - who built an economy uncomfortably dependent on natural gas reserves and sought to stay in power longer than Bolivia´s constitution allows - bears responsibility for much of the turmoil that followed his tenure.
A bitter political battle is looming between Morales, 65, and his former economy minister and once-protégé, President Luis Arce, over who will lead their long-dominant leftist Movement Toward Socialism, or MAS, into the August 2025 election.
Arce has unleashed allies in the judiciary against Morales, with the Constitutional Court disqualifying Morales' candidacy and ousting him from the leadership of MAS, a party he helped found in the 1990s.
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Belgium will ban sales of disposable e-cigarettes in a first for the EU
BRUSSELS (AP) - Belgium will ban the sale of disposable electronic cigarettes as of Jan. 1 on health and environmental grounds in a groundbreaking move for European Union nations.
Health minister Frank Vandenbroucke said the inexpensive e-cigarettes had turned into a health threat since they are an easy way for teenagers to be drawn into smoking and get hooked on nicotine.
"Disposable e-cigarettes is a new product simply designed to attract new consumers," he said in an interview.
"E-cigarettes often contain nicotine. Nicotine makes you addicted to nicotine. Nicotine is bad for your health. These are fact," Vandenbroucke added.
Because they are disposable, the plastic, battery and circuits are a burden on the environment. On top of that, "they create hazardous waste chemicals still present in what people throw away," Vandenbroucke said.
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Nasty norovirus is back in full force with US cases of the stomach virus surging
Cases of a wretched stomach bug are surging in parts of the United States this winter, according to government data.
The most recent numbers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show there were 91 outbreaks of norovirus reported during the week of Dec. 5, up from 69 outbreaks the last week of November.
Numbers from the past few years show a maximum of 65 outbreaks reported during that first week of December.
A norovirus infection is characterized by sudden vomiting and diarrhea. Outbreaks are often seen on cruise ships, in congregate living situations like nursing homes and jails, as well as schools and places where people are close together.
Here are a few things to know about the virus.
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