(SEOUL, South Korea) — North Korea fired a pair of projectiles on Tuesday morning believed to be cruise missiles, a South Korean official told ABC News.
An official with the South Korean Ministry of National Defense said the projectiles were detected by South Korean and U.S. intelligence agencies, which are analyzing the launch. Further details were not immediately available.
North Korea has test-fired missiles at least five times this year. North Korean state media boasted the successful launches of hypersonic missiles on Jan. 5 and Jan. 11, followed by a short-range ballistic missile from a train car on Jan. 14 and another short-range ballistic missile from the Sunan airport in the capital, Pyongyang, on Jan. 17.
The latest launch came just five days after North Korea implied it would withdraw from a self-imposed moratorium on testing nuclear weapons and long-range ballistic missiles, blaming the U.S. for the failed trust between the two countries.
“The hostile policy and military threat by the U.S. have reached a danger line that cannot be overlooked anymore despite our sincere efforts for maintaining the general tide for relaxation of tension in the Korean peninsula since the DPRK-U.S. summit in Singapore,” North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency reported last Thursday.
Testing cruise missiles does not violate the resolutions the United Nations Security Council imposed on North Korea to curb its nuclear and missile activities, but Seoul-based analysts presumed that Pyongyang’s latest launch was aimed at South Korea and the U.S.
Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in South Korea’s capital, said the reclusive regime wants “to prove to the outside world that they are capable of bolstering its defense.”
“North Korea aims to enhance its presence in the international community ahead of their most revered anniversaries of the late leader and founder of the country,” Yang told ABC News on Tuesday.
Cha Du-hyeogn, a visiting research fellow at the Asan Institute of Policy Studies in Seoul, said North Korea is purposely launching missiles that will be detected by South Korean and U.S. radars in order to be noticed.
“The continued missile testing is nothing new in North Korea’s viewpoint because Kim Jong Un forewarned during last year multiple times that the regime will keep developing missiles and nuclear weapons for their defense,” Cha told ABC News on Tuesday. “Pyongyang aims to show its citizens that the leader’s words will eventually come true despite the economic difficulties, and also prove to the international community that they are gearing up the military capabilities, enough to become a threat.”
ABC News’ Morgan Winsor contributed to this report.
Jeopardy! champion Amy Schneider is officially in second place for consecutive wins on the iconic quiz show with her 39th victory.
Schneider, whose Jeopardy! run began Nov. 17, overtook Matt Amodio‘s 38-game winning streak with Monday’s victory. She is now about halfway to overtaking Ken Jennings‘ 74-game winning record, which he has held since 2004.
Already the winningest woman in Jeopardy! history, Schneider’s total winnings are now $1,319,800, the fourth-highest ever in terms of regular-season play. This puts her in striking territory of Amodio, who earned $1,518,601 last year.
Schneider, an engineering manager from Oakland, California, has a ways to go if she wants to overtake the top two Jeopardy! earners, as she is still more than $1 million behind James Holzhauer and Jennings, who won $2,462,216 and $2,520,700, respectively, during their original runs.
In an interview Monday, Schneider told Good Morning America that Jennings is “limited” in what advice he can give her so he can “stay neutral” as host. So, he gives all contestants the same tip: “to relax and have fun and enjoy the moment.”
Schneider also said she is looking forward to the next Tournament of Champions, which will see her face off against Amodio. “It’s going to be really challenging; a lot of strong players there, but it should be a lot of fun,” she said.
(LONDON) — At least eight people died in a stampede outside a stadium hosting a game at Africa’s top soccer tournament in Cameroon on Monday, officials said.
The deadly crush occurred at the southern entrance of the Olembe Stadium in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde, as fans jostled to watch the host country play Comoros in a round-of-16 knockout match in the Africa Cup of Nations. Another 38 people were injured during the incident, including seven seriously, according to a press release from the Cameroonian Ministry of Communication.
The dead were taken to Yaounde Emergency Center, while the injured were admitted to four different hospitals across the city, the ministry said.
The ministry added that Cameroonian President Paul Biya “sends his deepest condolences to the hard-hit families, as well as his wishes of a speedy recovery to the injured, to whom he sends the profound compassion of the entire nation.”
The Confederation of African Football (CAF), which organizes the Africa Cup of Nations, said in a statement Monday that it “is aware of the incident.”
“CAF is currently investigating the situation and trying to get more details on what transpired,” CAF added. “We are in constant communication with Cameroon government and the Local Organizing Committee.”
The International Federation of Football Association (FIFA), soccer’s world governing body, said in a statement Tuesday that it “sends its deepest condolences to the families and friends of the victims who lost their lives following the tragic incident.”
“The thoughts and prayers of the global football community are with the victims, the ones who have been injured in this incident, and all the staff of both CAF and the Cameroonian Football Association (FECAFOOT) at this difficult moment,” FIFA said.
It’s the first time in 50 years that Cameroon is hosting the much-anticipated Africa Cup of Nations. The Central African country was supposed to host the monthlong competition in 2019 but was stripped of that right due to serious delays with its preparations. That year’s event was ultimately hosted by Egypt.
Alberto Rodriguez/E! Entertainment/NBCUniversal/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images
Cardi B has won a $1 million defamation lawsuit against YouTuber Tasha K.
The ruling came on Monday, with a jury siding with the “WAP” rapper, who accused Tasha K, full name Latasha Kebe, of making false claims that the rapper was a prostitute, contracted herpes, and used drugs, among other things, according to Billboard.
Cardi was awarded $1.25 million in damages, however, that number could potentially grow when proceedings on Tuesday decide whether Tasha K owes punitive damages and whether she will have to pay Cardi’s legal expenses.
Following the verdict, Tasha tweeted that she and her legal team “fought really hard” and thanked them for their “long hours and sleepless nights.” In a following tweet, she also thanked her viewers for their “support.”
“In this business, this is part of the protocol. Everyone in my seat has been through this, & this ain’t the last. This comes with the territory,” she wrote. “See y’all Friday! It’s long overdue!”
Cardi, who filed the libel lawsuit against Tasha in 2019, hasn’t directly commented on the verdict, but she did share a cryptic tweet Monday evening, asking, “Why am I happy but sad at the same time?”
Whether the tweet is in relation to the lawsuit remains unclear.
(PITTSBURGH) — A once-dormant power plant is humming with activity outside Pittsburgh as thousands of miners work 24 hours a day.
The miners at this site aren’t people, but supercomputers running complex math equations. The first to solve the equation is rewarded with the digital financial token known as bitcoin.
But the large amount of power needed to run these computers has re-ignited a debate in Pennsylvania and around the country about the potential climate consequences of cryptocurrency.
Bitcoin is a type of digital money not regulated by any company or government. It can be exchanged online between people anywhere in the world without going through a bank. While coins like quarters or pennies are physically minted — bitcoin is minted as a virtual token by computers, through a process called “mining.”
Some investors see bitcoin as the currency of the future. The value of one bitcoin has skyrocketed from around $10,000 two years ago to more than $33,000 as of this publishing.
Jeff Campbell, who oversees the bitcoin mining operation at the Scrubgrass Power Plant in Kennerdell, Pennsylvania, said each of their computers generates an average of $30 a day mining bitcoin.
“These are computers that are just designed to do one thing. They’re designed to run as fast as possible 24 hours a day,” he told ABC News Live.
The computers in a bitcoin mining operation need a lot of power both to run and to operate fans that stop them from overheating. By one estimate from the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance, annual global bitcoin mining uses more electricity than the entire nation of The Netherlands.
Climate activists question whether the growth of cryptocurrency mining operations could generate more carbon emissions and create a new market for fossil fuels at a time when the world is trying to reduce energy use and cut carbon emissions as fast as possible.
Under fire for their emissions and reliance on fuels like coal and natural gas, some bitcoin mining companies in the U.S. are transitioning to more renewable types of power like solar or wind.
Stronghold Digital Mining, which owns the Scrubgrass plant, has found its power source in the form of coal waste, which is abundant at this 221-acre pit just outside of Pittsburgh. Coal waste is a combination of rock, coal, and other materials that were deemed unsuitable for burning and left abandoned since the 1970s when coal mines in the area were closed.
There are 220 million cubic yards of waste coal pits like the one in Russellton across 9,000 acres in Pennsylvania, according to testimony from Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Director Patrick McDonnell. The agency says the pits cause environmental problems like leaching acid into nearby rivers and streams. There are also 40 continual fires in waste coal pits across the state that can release carbon dioxide and other pollutants as they burn, according to a document from a waste coal industry group.
The entrepreneur behind Stronghold, Bill Spence, said that while burning waste coal isn’t the cheapest form of energy, the bitcoin operation keeps the plant viable through its constant demand for power. This helps achieve his goal of reducing the toxic waste piles across the state, Spence said.
“What cryptocurrency and bitcoin has done for us is, it’s enabled us to sustain the work that this power plant does as an environmental plant cleaning up the waste coal, the remnants of the mining industry here in the state of Pennsylvania,” he told ABC.
The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection says the state has benefited from waste coal power plants because the state has limited funding to clean up the piles and address the environmental problems.
“Waste coal-fired units burn waste coal to generate electricity thereby reducing the size, number and impacts of these piles otherwise abandoned and allowed to mobilize and negatively impact air and water quality in Pennsylvania,” Press Secretary Jamar Thrasher said in an emailed statement.
Pennsylvania provides up to $20 million a year in subsidies to waste coal power plants and Thrasher said the state includes their CO2 emissions in the state’s carbon budget in an effort to help them compete with cheaper forms of energy like natural gas.
Waste coal is burned using a different process than traditional coal but still releases carbon dioxide that contributes to warming the atmosphere. The EPA says the type of waste coal found in Pennsylvania also releases more acid gas and sulfur dioxide than other types of coal.
Stronghold says they have put technology in place to capture pollutants like sulfur dioxide or methane emissions from their plant, but according to publicly available data they still released about 365,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2019 — the equivalent of about 80,000 cars on the road for a year, according to an EPA emissions calculator. The facility also released more than 1,000 metric tons of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, and nitrogen oxides, or NOx, that contribute to air pollution
Rob Altenburg, director of the environmental nonprofit Penn Future, said bitcoin is “wasteful by design” and that there are better alternatives for generating that power than burning waste coal.
“They’re not removing pollution. They’re moving pollution. They’re moving pollution from the land and they’re moving it to the air,” Altenburg told ABC News.
And because waste coal contains less coal than what would typically be used to generate energy, more of it needs to be burned to create the same amount of power which could generate more CO2 emissions and air pollution.
“The dirtiest source of power we have in the state should be your last choice for you for generating that electricity,” he said.
Altenburg said that instead of burning waste coal, the state and federal government should provide more funding to move the material to lined landfills where it can no longer contaminate the soil or water.
The federal infrastructure bill has allocated $11 billion toward abandoned mine cleanups, some of which could be used to clean up waste coal in Pennsylvania.
Spence acknowledges that Stronghold’s operation generates carbon dioxide and that their operation isn’t perfect, but they’re trying to improve further by testing technology to capture the carbon they emit. And he said the bitcoin operation is helping fund his efforts to use up the waste coal which otherwise won’t go anywhere on its own.
“I don’t think we should stop what we’re doing in order to get the perfect,” Spence told ABC.
“Let’s evolve into perfect.”
ABC News’ Seiji Yamashita contributed to this report.
(LONDON) — The British prime minister’s political future is in the balance.
“If Boris Johnson is still PM by the end of the week, I’d be very surprised,” an unnamed source told the Telegraph.
Boris Johnson has been increasingly under fire for his actions during the COVID-19 pandemic. A string of news reports have claimed that numerous parties were held at Downing Street in 2020 and 2021, while the rest of the country was under strict lockdown and social contact was extremely limited.
The latest revelation that Downing Street staffers held a birthday party for Johnson last June has led to Dame Cressida Dick, head of London’s Metropolitan police, confirming her force will be investigating whether lockdown rules were broken in Downing Street.
“As a result of the information provided by the Cabinet office and my officers own assessment,” Dick told politicians at the London Assembly, “I can confirm the Met is now investigating a number of events that took place at Downing St and Whitehall in the last two years in relation to breaches of COVID-19 regulations.”
Johnson has been fighting to save his position since these reports first started to emerge. As news of discos in the basement and wine bottles being brought in by the suitcase filled the front pages public anger grew. The resentment toward Johnson and his staff reached fever pitch with the report that staff had been partying the night before Prince Philip’s funeral — a particularly painful juxtaposition with the images of Queen Elizabeth seated alone, abiding by the COVID-19 regulations as she said goodbye to her husband.
Downing Street sent a formal apology to the Queen, with Johnson telling journalists: “I deeply and bitterly regret that that happened. I can only renew my apologies both to Her Majesty and to the country for misjudgments that were made, and for which I take full responsibility.”
Johnson has maintained that he never knowingly breached any COVID-19 regulations, admitting that he attended what he described as “a work event” in the Downing Street garden last May. He told parliament, “When I went into that garden just after 6 on 20 May 2020, to thank groups of staff before going back into my office 25 minutes later to continue working, I believed implicitly that this was a work event.”
He has commissioned a report into these various gatherings to determine whether any rules were indeed broken. The senior civil servant in charge of this report, Sue Gray, was expected to release her findings this week but this report will now be delayed while the police investigate.
Many of his own members of parliament have said they are withholding judgement on his leadership until this report is published.
What could happen next?
There are four possible scenarios:
1. The report finds that Johnson deliberately misled parliament and therefore breached ministerial code. He will then have to resign.
2. The report doesn’t prove Johnson lied to parliament but is so damning his reputation is destroyed and he feels compelled to resign.
3. His fellow members of parliament decide they no longer have confidence in him and trigger a no confidence vote.
4. The report exonerates Johnson, the mutinous air within his party subsides and he continues as prime minister.
What happens if he resigns?
According to its (unwritten) constitution, the UK cannot be without a prime minister, so Johnson could continue to serve while a leadership contest is played out. A less likely scenario is that a member of his cabinet will become prime minister until a new leader is chosen.
How can the Conservatives trigger a no confidence vote?
Fifteen percent of Conservative members of parliament — which amounts to 54 of the 359 currently serving — need to write to the chairman of the 1922 Committee (an influential group of backbench members), saying they no longer have confidence in the prime minister’s leadership.
The current chairman of the 1922 Committee is Sir Graham Brady. We know some letters have been sent but this process is clouded in secrecy with Brady famously telling the BBC during the last leadership contest that not even his wife knew how many letters were coming in.
Once 54 letters have been received, Brady will initiate a no confidence vote.
What is the process for a no confidence vote?
If Johnson wins more than 50% of his members of parliament’s votes, then he stays on as prime minister and there cannot be another no confidence vote until 12 months later.
But if he does not reach that threshold, then he is out and cannot contest it.
How does a leadership contest pan out?
If Johnson has resigned or loses the no confidence vote, then the Conservative Party leadership contest will begin, and there will be a series of votes to determine who will be the next leader and prime minister.
Any Tory member of parliament can stand, providing they have enough support from their colleagues. There are a series of rounds to whittle down candidates; if candidates don’t meet a certain threshold in each round, then they are eliminated. This shortlisting process continues until only two candidates remain.
What is the timeframe for a leadership contest?
These first elimination rounds can take a few weeks. For the last leadership contest in 2019, it was two weeks.
Once the two final candidates have been selected, all Conservative Party members are then called to vote on which one of the two will be their next leader. Whoever wins the majority in this ballot becomes the next Conservative Party leader and prime minister.
The 1922 Committee determines the time frame for each step.
Who are the likely contenders?
Likely contenders include Chancellor Rishi Sunak, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, Cabinet Minister Michael Gove, Health Secretary Sajid Javid and former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt.
What happened last time?
In 2019, Theresa May resigned, prompting a Conservative Party leadership contest. Johnson won, securing 66% of the votes, while his rival, Jeremy Hunt, took the remaining 34%. The candidates, besides Hunt, that stood against Johnson, were Michael Gove, Sajid Javid, Rory Stewart, Esther McVey and Andrea Leadsom. Three others — James Cleverly, Sam Gyimah and Kit Malthouse — dipped their toes in but never formally ran.
(NEW YORK) — Canada’s foreign affairs department was hit with a cyberattack last week, according to the Treasury Board of Canada.
The hack of Global Affairs Canada, the government entity responsible for diplomatic and global relations, occurred on Wednesday, according to a statement provided by the Treasury Board to ABC News.
The statement does not identify who carried out the cyberattack.
As a result of the attack, some access the internet and internet-based services are not currently available, but mitigation measures were being taken to restore them.
The Treasury Board said no other government department experienced a cyberattack.
“We are constantly reviewing measures to protect Canadians and our critical infrastructure from electronic threats, hacking, and cyber espionage. We encourage all government and non-government partners to use cyber security best practices,” the statement says.
The attack comes amid tensions over Ukraine and two days after the Canada Centre for Cyber Security warned malware was being used to target Ukrainian organizations.
New cyber vulnerability poses ‘severe risk,’ DHS says.
On Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security warned that the U.S. could be a target of Russian cyberattacks if the government responds to a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine.
(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Monday’s sports events:
NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Cleveland 95, New York 93
Chicago 111, Oklahoma City 110
New Orleans 117, Indiana 113
Phoenix 115, Utah 109
NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE
Dallas 3, Philadelphia 1
Anaheim 5, Boston 3
Vegas 1, Washington 0
NY Rangers 3, Los Angeles 2 (SO)
Minnesota 8, Montreal 2
Calgary 7, St. Louis 1
Colorado 2, Chicago 0
TOP-25 COLLEGE BASKETBALL
Kansas 94, Texas Tech 91
Southern Cal 78, Arizona St. 56
Gunna shocked the music world when his new album, DS4Ever, outsold The Weeknd‘s Dawn FM and debuted at the top of the Billboard 200 chart.
The 19-track project features an all-star cast, including Drake, Chris Brown, Chloe Bailey and Kodak Black.
“I expect the unexpected,” Gunna tells Complex about his success. “I’m definitely cherishing it, because it’s a moment. The Weeknd is a very, very big artist. I mean, he’s done the Super Bowl and everything. Just to be fighting with him — good sportsmanship fighting, because I’m cool with him — it’s love.”
The Grammy nominee has also set social media on fire with his phrase “pushing P,” named after the album track featuring Future and Young Thug.
“I’ve actually been keeping it P and pushing P,” Gunna explains. “The world is just now catching on because of the song, but Atlanta and LA people who know me know. That’s why it hit hard, too, because I really been kicking P outside of music. So when I bring it to music, it’s like, yeah, that’s really him. He ain’t lying.”
“Pushin P” essentially means keeping it real or player.
“[I] always keep it cool,” Gunna says. “I don’t really like all that chaos. I’m more calm, more playa. That’s where the P started.”
The “King of Drip” inspired another viral sensation last year when Rihanna dressed up like him for Halloween and posted the photo on social media. The Atlanta rapper jokes that Riri paid tribute to him even though they’ve never spoken.
“How are you going to dress like a motherf***** and then never talk to him?” he says with a laugh. “You just too GOATed.”
However, he is hoping for a collaboration.
“We’re going to make some godd***** tropical s***,” Gunna boasts.
Sam Hunt‘s hit single “23,” was years in the making. In fact, it originally had a different title and hook until he and co-writers Shane McAnally, Josh Osborne and Chris LaCorte landed on the defining version of the track.
“That was one that I’ve tried to write for a couple of years. I started writing it, it was ’22’ originally. ‘I’ll never be 22 with anyone but you,'” Sam describes of the initial approach. “And for whatever reason, one day we decided to try ’23,’ and that was the thing that broke it open for us and [we] ended up writing it in a couple of hours.”
While the Georgia native has a skill for writing hit songs, he reveals that the songs he writes evolve over time and sometimes end up on future projects.
“You try to write a good handful of songs and then you hope a few of those songs end up making it on the record,” he explains of his songwriting process. “Then you also have an excess of ideas that maybe are skeletons or bones that never really get finished and they float around, and then you hope one day maybe they will get finished.”
“23” is the lead single from the superstar’s forthcoming third studio album. It’s currently climbing its way up the top 10 on country radio.
