COLU @ CONCEPTS

AMMAN, Jordan (AP) — Life as a refugee in Jordan suddenly ended for a Syrian carpenter when he was summoned for interrogation, blindfolded and sent on a bus back to Syria with his wife and four children the next morning. After more than four years in Jordan, the 31-year-old is back in a war zone where he fears for his family’s safety and struggles to find work. He hasn’t heard from parents left behind in Jordan, presumably because they fear the same fate if they make contact. “Everyone is afraid,” he said by Skype from Syria’s Daraa province. Deportations from Jordan have spiked in recent months, with entire Syrian families sent back for the first time, including large numbers of children, said two international aid officials. One official said that more than one-third of several thousand refugees who went back to Syria between January and April were forcibly deported, while others returned voluntarily. The international group Human Rights Watch said it has documented “num...

BEIJING (AP) — China will seek to burnish President Xi Jinping’s stature as a world-class statesman at an international gathering centered on his signature foreign policy effort that envisions a future world order in which all roads lead to Beijing. The Belt and Road Forum opening Sunday is the latest in a series of high-profile appearances aimed at projecting Xi’s influence on the global stage ahead of a key congress of the ruling Communist Party later this year. All feed a fundamental yearning among ordinary Chinese: to see their country’s prestige and status rise. “Xi is now seen as a world leader with a lot of influence and respect internationally and that will definitely boost his domestic appeal,” said Joseph Cheng, a long-time observer of Chinese politics now retired from the City University of Hong Kong. Leaders from 28 countries are set to attend, including Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines. The most prominent attendee fr...

WASHINGTON (AP) — A Marine in full combat gear moves through dark, frigid water, gripping an M-16 rifle, before plunging under barbed wire and through a submerged drainage pipe. It is only when the fighter shouts an order over the sound of explosions does the historical nature of the TV advertisement become clear: the Marine is a woman. For a Corps that has struggled with the perception that it is the least welcoming of women among the military services, the new ad is part of a campaign to appeal to a new generation of Marines. It is also a bid for more female recruits for “the few, the proud,” particularly athletes capable of meeting the tough physical standards required. “The water was 27 degrees and coated with a layer of thick ice,” said Marine Capt. Erin Demchko, describing the great difficulty of the gauntlet, all while being surrounded by camera crews. “Giving the film production staff what they wanted, while maintaining my bearing as a Marine officer and trying not to ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — China will finally open its borders to U.S. beef while cooked Chinese poultry is closer to hitting American supermarket shelves as part of a U.S.-China trade agreement. Trump administration officials hailed the deal as a significant advance toward boosting U.S. exports and close America’s trade gap with the world’s second-largest economy. The United States would also allow U.S. companies to ship liquefied natural gas to China as part of the bilateral agreement reached following President Donald Trump’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in April. It covers a range of long-standing barriers from agriculture to energy to the operation of American financial firms in China. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross hailed the agreement as “a herculean accomplishment” forged in record time. “This is more than has been done in the whole history of U.S.-China relations on trade,” Ross told reporters Thursday evening at the White House. “Normally trade deals are deno...

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Analia Pasantino served in Argentina’s federal police as a man for 20 years, then she came out as a transgender woman and was forced to resign. She is smiling these days, though, beaming with pride to be wearing a police badge again. And the sign on her office door reads: “Chief.” Nearly a decade after psychiatric reports said Pasantino suffered from an “irreconcilable” illness that made her unfit to serve, she was welcomed back to the police force this week and appointed deputy police commissioner in the judicial communications department. “This is a milestone,” Pasantino, 49, told The Associated Press on Thursday. “I’m the first transgender police chief in Latin America. It’s an unprecedented and important step to show Latin America and the world that we are an open institution.” Argentina became a world leader in transgender rights in 2012 when it gave people the freedom to change their legal and physical gender identity simply because the...

FATIMA, Portugal (AP) — Pope Francis and pilgrims from around the world are flocking to a Catholic shrine town in Portugal to honor two poor, illiterate shepherd children whose visions of the Virgin Mary 100 years ago marked one of the most important events of the 20th-century Catholic Church. Francis arrives Friday to celebrate the centenary of the apparitions and canonize the children. He is hoping the message of peace that they reported 100 years ago, when Europe was in the throes of World War I, will resonate with the Catholic faithful today. For days now, church groups, families and individuals have made their way to Fatima, about 150 kilometers (90 miles) north of Lisbon, some on their knees in prayer. Carrying candles, rosaries and roses, they have made their way to the statue dedicated to Our Lady of Fatima or tossed wax body parts — ears, hearts, limbs — into a huge fire to pray for healing. “For me it is the second time I am here with a pope, first with John Paul I...

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Authorities in the Philippines have rescued four girls and arrested a mother and two other women for allegedly livestreaming sexually exploitative videos of children to men paying by the minute to watch from the United States. Three sisters ages 8, 9 and 12, and an 11-year-old found in a separate rescue, are now in a shelter for abused children while the women face prosecution. The arrests came just two weeks after Filipino authorities raided the home of an American man suspected of similar cybersex crimes, arresting David Timothy Deakin, 53, in his townhouse. During that bust, agents from the National Bureau of Investigation rescued two girls, 10 and 12, who had spent time in Deakin’s home, and  made one of the largest seizures  of illicit digital content in the Philippines. Dozens of hard drives and a handful of computers must now be analyzed to search for other possible victims, as well as buyers. Deakin denied wrongdoing. “They got i...

CAIRO (AP) — Ballet dancer Fady el-Nabarawy feels he can finally breathe again the moment he enters the gates of the Cairo Opera House after a commute from his ramshackle, poor neighborhood. This is where he and his fellow dancers practice, perform, love and create. “Every day, I cannot wait to come here. My oxygen is here,” he said. Ballet is in its own bubble in Egypt, removed from the surrounding society. The elite Western art form is far from Egypt’s own rich traditions of classical Arabic music and dance, let alone the electro-beat sweeping the Arabic pop music scene. The country has grown more conservative, and in the eyes of some Muslims, ballet is outright “nudity.” Social pressure to conform is overpowering, so the idea of someone dancing on stage in tights strikes many Egyptians as just plain odd. Still, the young men who found their passion dancing ballet are hardly isolated elites. They’re firmly rooted in the middle and lower-middle classes, managing to carve ou...

Nick Perry on New Zealand’s ambitious plan to save the birds. (AP Video) WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — New Zealand has set itself an environmental goal so ambitious it’s been compared to putting a man on the moon: ridding the entire nation of every last rat, opossum and stoat. The idea is to give a second chance to the distinctive birds that once ruled this South Pacific nation. When New Zealand split away from the supercontinent Gondwanaland 85 million years ago, predatory mammals hadn’t evolved. That allowed birds to thrive. Some gave up flight altogether to strut about the forest floor. Then humans arrived, bringing predators with them. Rats stowed away on ships. Settlers introduced opossums for the fur trade and weasel-like stoats to control rabbits. The pests destroyed forest habitats and feasted on the birds and their eggs. More than 40 species of birds died out and many others remain threatened, including the iconic kiwi. Willowbank Wildlife Reserve keeper ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Contradicting previous White House explanations, President Donald Trump has declared he had planned to fire FBI Director James Comey all along, regardless of whether top Justice Department officials recommended the stunning step. His assertions came as Comey’s temporary replacement joined in, contradicting other administration statements on the snowballing controversy. In an interview with NBC News, Trump also said he’d asked Comey point-blank if he was under investigation and was assured three times he was not. Trump showed no concern that the request might be viewed as interference in an active FBI probe into his 2016 campaign’s possible ties to Russia’s election meddling. Piece by piece, the FBI’S Acting Director Andrew McCabe, during Senate testimony Thursday, undermined the White House’s explanations about Director James Comey’s firing. (May 11) “I said, ‘If it’s possible, would you let me know, am I under investigation?’ He said you are not under...