North America

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Like many liberals, Lara Smith considers herself a feminist, favors abortion rights and believes the nation’s immigration policies under the Trump administration have just been “vile.”

But when it comes to guns, Smith sounds more like a conservative: She opposes reviving the nation’s assault weapons ban, enacting red-flag laws or creating a registry of firearms. The 48-year-old California lawyer owns a cache of firearms, from pistols to rifles such as the AR-15.

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — The Democrats’ 2020 primary season enters a critical four-day stretch that will help determine whether the party rallies behind Bernie Sanders or embraces a longer and uglier slog that could carry on until the national convention.

This marks a dangerous moment for a political party desperate to replace President Donald Trump but deeply conflicted over whether Sanders, the undisputed Democratic front-runner and a self-described democratic socialist, is too extreme to defeat the Republican president.

SAN DIEGO (AP) — A 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel voted unanimously Friday to suspend an order it issued earlier in the day to block a central pillar of the Trump administration’s policy requiring asylum seekers to wait in Mexico while their cases wind through U.S. courts.

The three-judge panel told the government to file written arguments by the end of Monday and for the plaintiffs to respond by the end of Tuesday.

WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s longest war may finally be nearing an end.

The United States and the Islamists it toppled from power in Afghanistan are poised to sign a peace deal Saturday after a conflict that outlasted two U.S. commanders in chief and is now led by a third eager to fulfill a campaign promise to extricate America from “endless wars.”

NEW YORK (AP) — The coronavirus outbreak began to look more like a worldwide economic crisis Friday as anxiety about the infection emptied shops and amusement parks, canceled events, cut trade and travel and dragged already slumping financial markets even lower.

More employers told their workers to stay home, and officials locked down neighborhoods and closed schools. The wide-ranging efforts to halt the spread of the illness threatened jobs, paychecks and profits.

(AP) --- Stocks sank around the globe again Friday as investors braced for more economic pain from the coronavirus outbreak, sending U.S. markets to their worst weekly finish since the 2008 financial crisis.

The damage from the week of relentless selling was eye-popping: The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 3,583 points, or 12.4%. Microsoft and Apple, the two most valuable companies in the S&P 500, lost a combined $300 billion. In a sign of the severity of the concern about the possible economic blow, the price of oil sank 16%.

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 28 (APP): No country should make the “fatal mistake” of assuming it will be spared the Covid-19 coronavirus, the World Health Organization, a Geneva-based UN agency, has said as several governments across the world raced to contain the epidemic’s rapid spread.

Issuing an appeal after a new crop of countries confirmed that they had identified cases of infection for the first time, WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said on Thursday.

Tedros said that it was the responsibility of all governments to ensure that they acted swiftly.

28 February 2020; AFP: Canada will no longer pick up the security tab for protecting Prince Harry and his wife Meghan starting in March, the office of Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said Thursday.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been living part-time in an oceanside mansion in westernmost British Columbia province since November.

Last month, they made a shock exit from life as working royals.

28 February 2020; AFP: One of the murderers of acclaimed journalist and AFP contributor Javier Valdez Cardenas was sentenced Thursday to 14 years and eight months in prison by a Mexican court.

Heriberto Picos Barraza, nicknamed "El Koala", was one of the perpetrators of the crime committed in the northwestern city of Cualiacan in May 2017, according to the prosecution.

He had served as a driver for two men, Juan Francisco Picos Barrueto and Luis Idelfonso Sanchez, who shot Valdez outside his office.

MEXICO CITY, Feb 28 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Mexico has returned an ancient bronze sculpture to Nigeria after thwarting an attempt to smuggle it into the country, officials say.

The artefact is from Nigeria’s south-western Ife city, famous for works depicting royalty and deities of the once-powerful Yoruba kingdom.

The sculpture is of a man sitting cross-legged, wearing a head dress and holding an object.

Customs officers seized it at the main airport in Mexico City.