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Trans-Siberian Orchestra will return with a heavy metal holiday tour, ‘The Ghosts of Christmas Eve’

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Trans-Siberian Orchestra — the heavy metal, classical music, theater production, pyrotechnics and laser lightshow hybrid — will return this winter.“The Ghosts of Christmas Eve — the Best of TSO & More,” will hit 62 cities and deliver 104 performances in both matinee and evening sets. It kicks off on Nov. 15 at the Resch Center in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and runs through Dec. 30, concluding at the Xcel Energy Center in Saint Paul, Minnesota.Al Pitrelli, TSO’s guitarist and music director, says that since the band started 28 years ago, their winter tours have become a tradition for loyal fans and their families. “I call them repeat offenders,” he jokes.Pitrelli estimates that nearly half the attendees have been “coming to us since the jump.”Fans can expect a memorable performance that references the band’s 1999 “The Ghosts of Christmas Eve” television film and album. The story follows a young girl who runs away from home on Christmas Eve; sheR...

Tehran and Baghdad reach a deal to disarm and relocate Iranian dissident groups based in north Iraq

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iran and Iraq have reached an agreement to disarm members of Iranian Kurdish dissident groups based in northern Iraq and relocate their members from their current bases, officials from the two countries said Monday.Nasser Kanaani, the spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, said in a news briefing Monday that the Iraqi government had agreed “to disarm the armed terrorist groups stationed in Iraq’s territory by September 19, and then, evacuate and transfer them from their military bases to camps designated by the Iraqi government.”He added that the deadline would not be extended and that while relations between the two countries are “entirely friendly and warm … the presence of terrorists in the northern region of Iraq is an unpleasant stain on mutual ties.”Iran has periodically launched strikes targeting members of the Kurdistan Democratic Party in Iran, or KDPI, and other Iranian Kurdish dissident groups based in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region near the bo...

Top Pakistani court in southwest quashes sedition case against imprisoned ex-PM Imran Khan

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) — A court in southwest Pakistan on Monday quashed a sedition case against imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan, his lawyer said, a sign of some relief for the former cricket hero-turned-politician who has been embroiled in more than 150 cases since his ouster in parliament last year.The 70-year-old Khan is currently being held at a high-security Attock prison in eastern Punjab province. He was arrested after another court in Islamabad sentenced him to three years for concealing assets after selling gifts he received while in office. The sedition case was registered against Khan in the southwestern city of Quetta in March on charges of inciting people to violence and spreading hate against national institutions — a phrase which is used for the military and spy agencies.According to Khan’s lawyer, Iqbal Shah, a top court in Quetta, quashed the sedition case and suspended the arrest warrants for Khan.The latest development comes hours after another co...

The long road to an ‘epidemic’ of intimate partner violence

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

In today’s Big Story Podcast, in 2015, three women were murdered in rural Ontario by a former partner who had been stalking them. Last summer an inquest into the murders came back with more than 80 recommendations. This month, the federal government joined Toronto and other municipalities in Canada in following one of them: Declaring intimate partner violence an “epidemic” in this country.Julie Lalonde is an educator, advocate, and expert on intimate partner violence. You can find Julie’s resources on stalking and harassment here. She says that the pandemic declaration is an encouraging sign that the federal government is taking this issue seriously, but that it doesn’t mean the fight is over.“We have to continue to hold the government accountable, and that includes provincial governments, because they do have a tremendous role in this conversation,” says Lalonde.This declaration is a massive step, but will we follow it up with concrete action to address the escalating d...

An evacuation order finds few followers in northeastern Ukraine despite Russia’s push in the region

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

KUPIANSK, Ukraine (AP) — The thunder of mortar fire echoes in the distance as 5-year old David approaches his mother with an innocent request: Can he play with the baseball bat a relative gave him as a gift?Valeria Pototska rolls her eyes and tells her son no for the umpteenth time. It’s a toy for big kids, she scolds. The boy, who doesn’t so much as flinch when the weapons not far from their town in northeast Ukraine shoot off more rounds, pouts and pedals away on his bicycle.Other neighborhood children frolic in a playground in Kupiansk-Vuzlovyi, seemingly immune to the war unfolding 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) away. Ukrainian authorities this month ordered a mandatory evacuation of the village and three dozen other populated areas as war returned to Kharkiv province. So far, most residents have refused to go as the battle inches closer to their backyards. “It’s normal,” Pototska said of the soundtrack of weapons that punctuates the monotony of their daily lives. Olena Kanivet...

Clashes between US-allied Arab and Kurdish fighters in east Syria kill 3 and raise tensions

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

BEIRUT (AP) — Clashes broke out Monday between two U.S.-backed groups in eastern Syria, leaving three gunmen dead and raising tensions in the region where hundreds of American troops are deployed, opposition activists said.The clashes raise concerns of more divisions between U.S.-backed Kurdish and Arab fighters in eastern Syria that borders Iraq and where the Islamic State group once enjoyed wide presence. U.S.-backed fighters play a major role in targeting sleeper cells of the Islamic State group that still carry out deadly attacks.Monday’s clashes came a day after the U.S.-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces detained the commander a formerly allied group and several other members of his faction after they were invited to a meeting in the northeastern city of Hassakeh on Sunday.The SDF did not confirm the detention of Ahmad Khbeil, better known as Abu Khawla. He heads the Deir el-Zour Military Council, which was allied with the SDF in its yearslong battle against the I...

Man seriously hurt after motorcycle, SUV collide in Scarborough intersection

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

A man is in hospital with serious injuries after a crash involving a motorcycle and an SUV in Scarborough.Emergency crews were called to the intersection of Victoria Park and Lawrence around 5:10 a.m. Monday.Paramedics confirm the motorcyclist, a man in his 50s, was taken to hospital with serious but non-life-threatening injuries. The driver of the SUV suffered minor injuries.The intersection is closed in all directions.

Monday Forecast: Temps near 80 with mainly sunny conditions

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

CHICAGO — Temperatures near 80 degrees with mainly sunny conditions. Cooler lakeside, Winds: ESE 5-10. High: 80/75. Interactive Radar: Track showers and storm here Mostly clear tonight. Winds: SW 0-5. Low: 63.Tuesday Forecast: Mostly sunny, 30 percent chance of rain/storm. Winds: NNE 5-10 G20. High: 83/79.Full forecast details and more at the WGN Weather Center blog

Son stolen from mother's arms at birth 42 years ago hugs her for first time

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — "Hola, Mama.”What seems like an unremarkable greeting between mother and son was in this case anything but.Forty-two years ago, hospital workers took Maria Angelica Gonzalez’ son from her arms right after birth and later told her he had died. Now, she was meeting him face-to-face at her home in Valdivia, Chile.“I love you very much,” Jimmy Lippert Thyden told his mother in Spanish as they embraced amid tears.“It knocked the wind out of me. ... I was suffocated by the gravity of this moment,” Thyden told The Associated Press in a video call after the reunion. “How do you hug someone in a way that makes up for 42 years of hugs?”His journey to find the birth family he never knew began in April after he read news stories about Chilean-born adoptees who had been reunited with their birth relatives with the help of a Chilean nonprofit Nos Buscamos.This undated image provided by Jimmy Thyden shows Thyden as a child with cat Rusty. Now 42, Thyden got to embrace his birth m...

1 killed in shooting at Ohio mall; 2 teens arrested

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 15:35:30 GMT

ABOVE: Raw video of Columbus police evacuating Easton Town Center Sunday.COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) - One person is dead and two teens have been arrested after a mall in Columbus, Ohio, was locked down following a shooting Sunday evening.According to a Columbus police dispatcher, the initial call for the incident at Easton Town Center was received at approximately 6:14 p.m. Shelter in place order lifted after threat in Sunbury Within one minute of the call, the victim was found by an officer working special duty at the center, Columbus Police Sgt. Joe Albert said. The officer rendered aid to the victim, but the person was pronounced dead at 6:50 p.m. at a local hospital.Police confirmed on Monday morning that the victim was a juvenile male and that two 13-year-old boys were arrested, with one charged with murder and the other charged with obstructing justice. Albert said law enforcement officers immediately locked down the area and began investigating near where the victim was found an...