Putin calls Kerch Bridge attack "a terrorist act" by Kyiv

ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday called the attack that damaged the huge bridge connecting Russia to its annexed territory of Crimea “a terrorist act” masterminded by Ukrainian special services.

The Kerch Bridge, which holds important strategic and symbolic value to Russia in its faltering war in Ukraine, was hit a day earlier by what Moscow has said was a truck bomb. Road and rail traffic on the bridge were temporarily halted, damaging a vital supply route for the Kremlin’s forces.

“There’s no doubt it was a terrorist act directed at the destruction of critically important civilian infrastructure of the Russian Federation,” Putin said during a meeting with the chairman of Russia’s Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin. "And the authors, perpetrators, and those who ordered it are the special services of Ukraine.”

Bastrykin said Ukrainian special services and citizens of Russia and other countries took part in the attack. He said a criminal investigation had been launched into an act of terror.

“We have already established the route of the truck,” he said, saying it had been to Bulgaria, Georgia, Armenia, North Ossetia and Krasnodar, a region in southern Russia.

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'War crime:' Industrial-scale destruction of Ukraine culture

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The exquisite golden tiara, inlaid with precious stones by master craftsmen some 1,500 years ago, was one of the world’s most valuable artifacts from the blood-letting rule of Attila the Hun, who rampaged with horseback warriors deep into Europe in the 5th century.

The Hun diadem is now vanished from the museum in Ukraine that housed it — perhaps, historians fear, forever. Russian troops carted away the priceless crown and a hoard of other treasures after capturing the Ukrainian city of Melitopol in February, museum authorities say.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine, now in its eighth month, is being accompanied by the destruction and pillaging of historical sites and treasures on an industrial scale, Ukrainian authorities say.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Ukraine's culture minister alleged that Russian soldiers helped themselves to artifacts in almost 40 Ukrainian museums. The looting and destruction of cultural sites has caused losses estimated in the hundreds of millions of euros (dollars), the minister, Oleksandr Tkachenko, added.

“The attitude of Russians toward Ukrainian culture heritage is a war crime,” he said.

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20 years later, Bali bombing survivors still battling trauma

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Thiolina Marpaung still panics anytime she smells smoke, immediately recalling the bomb explosion that upended her life 20 years ago.

Marpaung, now 48, was in a car with her colleagues on the Indonesian resort island of Bali in 2002 when the blast shook their vehicle from behind. Marpaung was temporarily blinded as shards of glass pierced her eyes. She remembers calling out for help and someone bringing her to the sidewalk, before an ambulance raced her to a hospital with other victims.

“I was traumatized by the sound of ambulance sirens,” Marpaung said.

She is one of dozens of Indonesian survivors who were outside of Sari Club on the night of October 12, 2002, when a car bombing there and the nearly simultaneous suicide bombing at nearby Paddy’s Pub killed 202 people, mostly foreign tourists, including 88 Australians and seven Americans.

Marpaung later had surgery in Australia to remove the glass from her eyes, but the pain still bothers her and requires treatment to this day. At the urging of her psychologist, she has thrown away and burned photographs, news articles, clothing and other reminders of that day. She even tossed the shards of glass that were removed from her eyes onto Kuta Beach in Bali, not far from the attack site.

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'A time bomb': Anger rising in a hot spot of Iran protests

SULIMANIYAH, Iraq (AP) — Growing up under a repressive system, Sharo, a 35-year-old university graduate, never thought she would hear words of open rebellion spoken out loud. Now she herself chants slogans like “Death to the Dictator!” with a fury she didn't know she had, as she joins protests calling for toppling the country's rulers.

Sharo said that after three weeks of protests, triggered by the death of a young woman in the custody of the feared morality police, anger at the authorities is only rising, despite a bloody crackdown that has left dozens dead and hundreds in detention.

“The situation here is tense and volatile,” she said, referring to the city of Sanandaj in the majority Kurdish home district of the same name in northwestern Iran, one of the hot spots of the protests.

“We are just waiting for something to happen, like a time-bomb," she said, speaking to The Associated Press via Telegram messenger service.

The anti-government protests in Sanandaj, 300 miles (500 kilometers) from the capital, are a microcosm of the leaderless protests that have roiled Iran.

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Noem's balancing act: Big ambitions, South Dakota reelection

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (AP) — They had waited in the desert heat in a line that wrapped around the block and now the excitement was palpable when South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem took the stage in a suburban Phoenix convention hall. “She's our governor!” someone yelled.

Kari Lake, the Republican nominee for governor in Arizona who hosted the event this past week, stood beside Noem and joined in the praise. She called Noem an “inspiration” who stood up for families against intrusive government mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The warm reception was familiar to Noem, who has made such appearances part of building her national profile as a potential 2024 White House contender.

“I wish I could vote for a woman like that,” Lake said. “But I don’t live in South Dakota.”

If Noem has ambitions beyond her state, she must first take care of political business back home: winning a second term in November.

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Florida school shooter may have been his own worst witness

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — It's possible Florida school shooter Nikolas Cruz talked himself into a death sentence.

Prosecutors played video last week at Cruz's penalty trial of jailhouse interviews he did this year with two of their mental health experts. In frank and sometimes graphic detail, he answered their questions about his massacre of 17 people at Parkland's Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Feb. 14, 2018 — his planning, his motivation, the shootings.

While it can’t be known what the 12 jurors are thinking, if any are wavering between voting for death or life without parole, his statements to Dr. Charles Scott, a forensic psychiatrist, and Robert Denney, a neuropsychologist, did not help his cause.

“All of this made Cruz himself perhaps one of the state’s best witnesses,” said David S. Weinstein, a Miami defense attorney and former prosecutor who has been monitoring the trial.

The jury will likely decide Cruz's fate this week. For the 24-year-old to get a death sentence, the jury must be unanimous on at least one victim. But if all 17 counts come back with at least one vote in favor of life in prison, then that would be his sentence. Closing arguments are scheduled Tuesday, with deliberations beginning Wednesday.

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Rain-fueled landslide sweeps through Venezuela town; 22 dead

LAS TEJERÍAS, Venezuela (AP) — A landslide fueled by flooding and days of torrential rain swept through a town in central Venezuela, leaving at least 22 people dead as it dragged mud, rocks and trees through neighborhoods, authorities said Sunday. Dozens of people are missing.

Residents of Las Tejerías in Santos Michelena, an agro-industrial town in Aragua state 54 miles (87 kilometers) southwest of Caracas, had just seconds to reach safety late Saturday as debris swept down a mountainside onto them.

The official death toll rose to 22 after the recovery of 20 bodies on Sunday, Vice President Delcy Rodríguez told state-owned Venezolana de Televisión.

“There was a large landslide in the central area of Las Tejerías” where five streams overflowed, she said from the scene of the disaster. “We have already found 22 dead people; there are more than 52 missing.”

“There are still people walled in," Rodríguez said. "We are trying to rescue them, to rescue them alive.”

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UN ponders rapid armed force to help end Haiti's crisis

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres submitted a letter to the Security Council on Sunday proposing the immediate activation of a rapid action force following a plea for help from Haiti as gangs and protesters paralyze the country.

The letter, which was seen by The Associated Press but has not been made public, said the rapid action force would be deployed by one or several member states to help Haiti’s National Police. That force would “remove the threat posed by armed gangs and provide immediate protection to critical infrastructure and services,” as well as secure the “free movement of water, fuel, food and medical supplies from main ports and airports to communities and health care facilities.”

The letter also states the secretary-general may deploy “additional U.N. capacities to support a ceasefire or humanitarian arrangements.”

However, the letter notes that “a return to a more robust United Nations engagement in the form of peacekeeping remains a last resort if no decisive action is urgently taken by the international community in line with the outlined options and national law enforcement capacity proves unable to reverse the deteriorating security situation.”

A Canadian official who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter told the AP on condition of anonymity that “we are watching the situation in Haiti closely and will be working with our international partners to assess Haiti’s broader request for international support.”

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Senator: Dems back reparations for those who 'do the crime'

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville asserted that Democrats support reparations for the descendants of enslaved people because “they think the people that do the crime are owed that.”

The first-term Alabama Republican spoke at a Saturday evening rally in Nevada featuring former President Donald Trump, a political ally. His comments were part of a broader critique in the final weeks before the Nov. 8 election, when control of Congress is at stake, about how Democrats have responded to rising crime rates. But Tuberville's remarks about reparations played into racist stereotypes about Black people committing crimes.

“They’re not soft on crime,” Tuberville said of Democrats. “They’re pro-crime. They want crime. They want crime because they want to take over what you got. They want to control what you have. They want reparation because they think the people that do the crime are owed that.”

He ended his appearance with a profanity as the crowd cheered.

Tuberville is falsely suggesting that Democrats promote crime and that only Blacks are the perpetrators. In fact, crime has slowed in the last year and most crimes are committed by whites, according to FBI data.

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Musgrove pitches hometown Padres past Mets 6-0 and into NLDS

NEW YORK (AP) — Joe Musgrove brushed off chants of “Cheater!” after a bizarre spot check by umpires on the mound, pitching his hometown San Diego Padres into the next round of the playoffs Sunday night with seven innings of one-hit ball in a 6-0 victory over the New York Mets.

Trent Grisham hit an RBI single and made a terrific catch in center field that helped the Padres take the best-of-three National League wild-card series 2-1. Austin Nola and Juan Soto each had a two-run single.

San Diego advanced to face the top-seeded Los Angeles Dodgers in a best-of-five Division Series beginning Tuesday — ensuring the Padres will play in front of their home fans in the postseason for the first time in 16 years when they return to Petco Park for Game 3.

“We know that. We would love for them to be able to see some postseason games,” manager Bob Melvin said Sunday afternoon. “To an extent, we feel like they’re a part of us.”

It was the fifth time the Padres have won a playoff series. They took a first-round matchup against St. Louis in their own ballpark with no fans permitted after the pandemic-shortened 2020 season before being swept in the Division Series by the eventual World Series champion Dodgers.

News from © The Associated Press, 2022