Missing Wordle score helps end US hostage ordeal
When Denyse Holt failed to text her daily Wordle score, her daughter knew something must be wrong. Hours later a police SWAT team rescued the 80-year-old Chicago woman from a naked home intruder who had been holding her hostage with a pair of scissors.
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S.Africa's Ramaphosa vows 'decisive steps' to stem graft
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa delivered a state of the nation address on Thursday promising "decisive" action to stem corruption, as he faces demands for a plan to reverse widening disillusionment with his government.
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France's Nobel winner for co-discovery of HIV virus dies
French scientist Luc Montagnier, who won the Nobel prize for medicine for his co-discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS, has died aged 89, the mayor of the Paris suburb where he was hospitalised said Thursday.
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US calls for talks with Mexico on endangered porpoise
Washington has invoked the environmental provisions of the North American free trade pact to urge Mexico to do more to protect the critically endangered vaquita porpoise, officials announced Thursday.
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US, Belarus army chiefs speak to avoid drill 'miscalculation': Pentagon
US and Belarusian defense chiefs held rare telephone talks on Thursday to avoid a "miscalculation" during Russia-Belarus joint military drills, the Pentagon said, at a time of heightened tensions over the Kremlin's massing of troops near Ukraine.
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NBA Nets trade Harden to 76ers in deal for Simmons, others: reports
Three-time NBA scoring champion James Harden was traded by the Brooklyn Nets to the Philadelphia 76ers in a deal for Australian Ben Simmons and others, according to mutliple reports Thursday.
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US woman held hostage saved after failing to share Wordle score
A woman in the US city of Chicago was rescued from being held hostage for hours, after her failure to share her daily Wordle score alerted her family something was wrong.
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Boxer-turned-mayor Klitschko vows 'to take up arms' for Ukraine
Heavyweight boxing champion turned Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko says he is ready "to take up arms" defending Ukraine against a feared Russian invasion.
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Russia launches Belarus drills, revving up fears of Ukraine invasion
Russia rolled its tanks across Belarus on Thursday for live-fire drills that drew an ominous warning from NATO and added urgency to Western efforts to avert a feared invasion of Ukraine.
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Musk to give rare presentation on ambitious Starship rocket
Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk is set Thursday night to deliver an eagerly-awaited update on SpaceX's Starship, a prototype rocket the company is developing for crewed interplanetary exploration.
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