Town Hall News

By Noel Randewich and Ankika Biswas (Reuters) – Wall Street closed lower on Tuesday after evidence of a cooling economy exacerbated worries that the Federal Reserve’s campaign to rein in decades-high inflation may cause a deep downturn. All three major indexes fell as data showed U.S. job openings in February dropped to the lowest level in nearly two years, suggesting that the labor market was cooling, while factory orders fell […]

(Reuters) -Donald Trump has been indicted by a Manhattan grand jury after a probe into hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels, becoming the first former U.S. president to face criminal charges. He pleaded not guilty in court on Tuesday to 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. The charges from an investigation led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg come as Trump seeks the Republican nomination to run […]

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli police attacked dozens of worshippers in Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque compound before dawn on Wednesday, witnesses said, in what Israeli police said was a response to rioting. The Palestinian Red Crescent reported injuries but did not elaborate on how many people were hurt. It said in a statement that Israeli forces were preventing its medics from reaching the mosque. “I was sitting on a chair reciting (Qur’an),” […]

(Reuters) – Japan’s services sector activity at the fastest pace in over nine years in March, a private sector survey showed on Wednesday, suggesting that the post-COVID bounce was gathering steam and providing some offset to a still-weak factory sector. The final au Jibun Bank Japan Services purchasing managers’ index (PMI) rose to a seasonally adjusted 55.0 last month, from February’s 54.0, marking the quickest rate of expansion since October […]

(Reuters) – The New Zealand women’s soccer team will swap their home kit’s white shorts for teal blue to ease players’ period anxieties, the country’s football association (NZF) said on Monday. New Zealand will wear the kit in friendlies against Iceland on Friday and Nigeria next week and at the Women’s World Cup, which they will co-host with Australia from July 20 to Aug. 20. “The absence of white shorts […]

TAIPEI (Reuters) – Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen met with senior security officials on Tuesday to discuss the “regional situation” ahead of her meeting with U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in California, which China has demanded not take place. China, which claims Taiwan as its own territory, has threatened unspecified retaliation if the get-together, scheduled for Wednesday, happens. After then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taipei in August, China staged war games […]

By Luc Cohen and Jack Queen NEW YORK (Reuters) – The Manhattan District Attorney’s office on Tuesday unveiled charges against Donald Trump over hush money payments to suppress accounts of his alleged extramarital affairs, becoming the first former U.S. president to face criminal charges. Below is an explanation of the charges he faces and his possible defenses: WHAT IS TRUMP ACCUSED OF DOING? Prosecutors led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin […]

TAIPEI (Reuters) – U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy will host a meeting in California on Wednesday with Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen, part of a sensitive U.S. stopover that has drawn Chinese threats of retaliation. Here are the key issues in Taiwan-U.S., China-U.S. and Taiwan-China relations, why China is so angry about the meeting and what it might do to express its anger: WHY IS CHINA SO ANGRY? Taiwan is a […]

By Pavel Polityuk KYIV (Reuters) – Ukraine’s armed forces said they had repelled 45 Russian attacks over the past 24 hours, as Bakhmut and Avdiivka remained the epicenter of fighting on Wednesday and Ukrainian aircraft had launched seven strikes on Russian forces and two command posts. The founder of Russia’s Wagner mercenary force, Yevgeny Prigozhin, recently claimed his forces had captured Bakhmut, a mining city and logistics hub, “in a […]