LOS ANGELES: A record heat wave with temperatures of up to 125 Fahrenheit (49 Celsius) was set to punish California starting on Friday as another extreme weather event raised risks of more forest fires and rolling blackouts. The “deadly heat wave” of “rare, dangerous and very possibly fatal” temperatures was forecast across Southern California for the US Labour Day holiday …

Britney Spears is welcoming public scrutiny of the court conservatorship that has controlled her life and money for 12 years as she seeks to push her father out of power, according to a Thursday court filing. Spears filed an objection unprecedented in the 12 years of the conservatorship to a motion from her father, James Spears, to seal a recent …

PORTLAND: Police shot and killed an anti-fascist activist in Washington state on Thursday night as they moved in to arrest him on suspicion that he fatally shot a right-wing counter-protester last weekend in Portland, Oregon, officials said. Michael Reinoehl, 48, was wanted on a charge of murder and was armed with a handgun when members of a US Marshals Service …

AMSTERDAM: Dutch politician Geert Wilders was acquitted by an appeals court on Friday of discrimination, in a partial legal victory for the far-right populist who leads the opposition in parliament and who is known for his anti-Islam rhetoric. The panel agreed with a lower court ruling from 2016 that dismissed the separate offence of inciting hatred and rejected a prosecution …

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) has decided that Saturday will be a working day for educational institutions until the exams while classes will be held in place of winter vacation to compensate students for the loss of time during the Covid-19 pandemic. The decision taken on the directive of the education ministry will be implemented once schools and …

LONDON: Patients involved in early tests of a Russian coronavirus vaccine developed antibodies with “no serious adverse events”, according to research published in The Lancet on Friday, but experts said the trials were too small to prove safety and effectiveness. Russia announced last month that its vaccine, named “Sputnik V” after the Soviet-era satellite that was the first launched into space in …

CAMORINO: Switzerland opened its Ceneri tunnel on Friday — completing a mammoth project cutting a new route through the Alps which should transform rail links between northern and southern Europe. After opening the Lotschberg Base Tunnel in 2007 and the Gotthard Base Tunnel in 2016, the Ceneri in Switzerland’s southern Ticino region is the final stage of the New Railway …

QUETTA: Another case of polio was found in Balochistan on Friday, showing that the number of poliovirus cases in the province continues to grow due to suspension of the vaccination campaign because of the coronavirus pandemic. A 34-month-old child was diagnosed with poliovirus in Pishin district. According to health department officials, samples of the child were collected on Aug 19 …

LAHORE: The city received one of the heaviest rain spells of the season on Friday morning, which inundated most of the roads for hours and spelled huge trouble for low-lying areas, especially those falling outside the jurisdiction of the Water and Sanitation Agency. The rain started at 5:30am and continued till 11am, showering the city, on average by 90 millimetres …

KARACHI: Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari on Friday pinned hopes on the prime minister’s visit to Karachi, anticipating Imran Khan would be coming to the city on Saturday (today) with massive financial support for disaster-hit Sindh. At the same time, the PPP leader termed Khan-led administration a “puppet government” which was allegedly weakening the federation by not releasing …