Category Archives: Georgia

More US states report measles cases amid vaccine misinformation

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Ohio, Maryland and Alabama among states to report new cases, with 378 confirmed in first few months of 2025

More US states are reporting measles cases as the Texas outbreak expands, surpassing last year’s total, amid vaccine misinformation and hesitancy.

The Texas outbreak could take a year to get under control, one health official said – during which time it may spread to more states. Yet the parents of the six-year-old girl who died of measles in Texas have spoken against measles vaccination as misinformation continues to proliferate, including from figures such as the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr.

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Pentagon official condemned over tweet about Jewish victim lynched by Georgia mob

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Kingsley Wilson cast doubt on circumstances of death of Leo Frank, in echo of white supremacist talking point

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has condemned a past social media post by the Pentagon spokesperson Kingsley Wilson that disputed the innocence of Leo Frank, a Jewish businessman whom most historians agree was wrongfully convicted of killing a 13-year-old factory worker and lynched in 1915 during a wave of antisemitism in the US.

“Leo Frank raped & murdered a 13-year-old girl. He also tried to frame a Black man for his crime,” Wilson wrote on X in response to an August 2024 tweet by the ADL marking the 109th anniversary of Frank’s lynching. “The ADL turned off the comments because they want to gaslight you.”

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Two Georgia opposition leaders arrested at anti-government protest

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Nika Melia and Gigi Ugulava detained as thousands try to block highway into Tbilisi amid unrest against ruling party

Georgian police arrested two opposition leaders during a street protest against the ruling party on Sunday, a move quickly denounced by the EU, which condemned Tbilisi’s “brutal crackdown”.

The Black Sea nation has been rocked by daily mass protests since the Georgian Dream party claimed victory in October parliamentary elections rejected by the opposition as falsified.

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Southwest Airlines pilot charged with DUI while preparing for takeoff

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Officers said pilot had bloodshot eyes and smelled of alcohol before planned flight from Savannah to Chicago

Police at a Georgia airport arrested an airline pilot on a DUI charge as he was making pre-flight checks aboard a Southwest Airlines flight with bloodshot eyes and reeking of what smelled like alcohol, according to a police report.

Passengers had boarded the Southwest Airlines flight from Savannah to Chicago and were awaiting takeoff on Wednesday morning when police boarded the plane and took the pilot away in handcuffs.

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Voting rights group founded by Stacey Abrams fined for illegal campaigning

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New Georgia Project, fined $300,000 by state ethics body, admitted to 16 violations of election law, officials say

The New Georgia Project, a prominent voting rights organization founded by Stacey Abrams, has been fined $300,000 by the state ethics commission of Georgia for illegally campaigning for Abrams and other Democratic candidates during the 2018 election cycle.

The consent order ends a years-long investigation that the voting rights group had broken state campaign finance laws by raising and spending millions in support of candidate without proper registration and disclosure. The fine is the largest in Georgia history, according to the state ethics commission.

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Winter storm across US south disrupts travel and closes schools

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Flight cancellations pile up and state officials warn of dangerous roads on Saturday with biting cold and wet snow

Flight cancellations piled up and state officials warned of continuing dangerous roads on Saturday in the wake of a winter storm that closed schools and disrupted travel across parts of the southern US.

A storm that brought biting cold and wet snow to the south was moving out to sea off the east coast on Saturday, leaving behind a forecast of snow showers in the Appalachian mountains and New England. But temperatures are expected to plunge after sundown on Saturday in the south, raising the risk that melting snow will refreeze, turning roadways treacherous and glazed with ice.

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Days-long funeral procession for Jimmy Carter begins in south Georgia

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Motorcade with flag-draped casket heads to boyhood home in Plains before moving to Atlanta, then Washington

Jimmy Carter’s long public goodbye began Saturday in south Georgia, where the 39th US president’s life began more than 100 years ago.

A motorcade with Carter’s flag-draped casket is heading to his hometown of Plains and past his boyhood home on the way to Atlanta. The procession began at the Phoebe Sumter medical center in Americus, where former Secret Service agents who had protected the late president served as pallbearers. A mournful train whistle filled the clear air as the pallbearers turned to face the hearse for a final goodbye, their hands on their hearts.

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Jimmy Carter to be honored in Washington funeral and laid to rest in Georgia

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State funeral to be held for former president on national day of mourning before he is buried next to wife in Plains

Jimmy Carter, the former US president who died at age 100 on Sunday, will be honored with a state funeral before being laid to rest in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, next to his wife, Rosalynn.

The state funeral for Carter will be held in Washington DC on Thursday, 9 January. The date has also been declared a national day of mourning in the United States.

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Jimmy Carter’s death comes at a time when rancour and uncertainty prevail

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The ex-president died as Biden, a fellow one-term president heads for the door and chaos agent Trump returns to power

Early in Mike Bartlett’s 2022 stage play, The 47th, the funeral of former US president Jimmy Carter is held at Washington National Cathedral. Joe Biden, Barack Obama, George W Bush and Bill Clinton are all in attendance. Donald Trump is not invited but turns up anyway – and late. “He’s here to pay his disrespects, and use / A funeral for self-promotion,” Kamala Harris observes.

Life – or rather death – is about to imitate art as Washington prepares to bid farewell to Carter, who died at home in Georgia on Sunday at the age of 100. He was the longest-lived president in US history and the first Democratic president to die since Lyndon Johnson more than half a century ago.

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Georgia’s pro-west president says she remains ‘only legitimate president’ as new leader sworn in

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Salome Zourabichvili tells protesters she will leave presidential palace as far-right successor Mikheil Kavelashvili takes power

Georgia’s pro-western president, Salome Zourabichvili, has said she will leave the palace but remain the country’s legitimate officeholder, after refusing to hand over the keys to her successor in the wake of a controversial general election.

Zourabichvili spoke as thousands of protesters gathered in the capital, Tblisi, to demonstrate against the inauguration of Mikheil Kavelashvili, a former football player turned far-right politician backed by the ruling pro-Moscow and increasingly authoritarian Georgian Dream (GD) party, who was sworn in as president at a parliamentary ceremony.

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‘Let’s see who will be leaving’: Georgia’s presidential standoff nears crunch point

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Georgian Dream government threatens pro-west president with jail if she refuses to leave office on Sunday

All eyes in Georgia are fixed on the elegant 19th-century Orbeliani Palace in Tbilisi, where a defining moment looms. Who will occupy its halls on 29 December?

On Sunday, Georgia’s pro-western president, Salome Zourabichvili, is supposed to hand over the keys to her successor, Mikheil Kavelashvili, a former football player turned far-right politician who is backed by the ruling and increasingly authoritarian Georgian Dream (GD) party.

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‘Let’s see who will be leaving’: Georgia’s presidential standoff nears crunch point

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Georgian Dream government threatens pro-west president with jail if she refuses to leave office on Sunday

All eyes in Georgia are fixed on the elegant 19th-century Orbeliani Palace in Tbilisi, where a defining moment looms. Who will occupy its halls on 29 December?

On Sunday, Georgia’s pro-western president, Salome Zourabichvili, is supposed to hand over the keys to her successor, Mikheil Kavelashvili, a former football player turned far-right politician who is backed by the ruling and increasingly authoritarian Georgian Dream (GD) party.

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Georgia opposition leader arrested as mass anti-government protests stretch into seventh night

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Nika Gvaramia among numerous other opposition members to be arrested on Wednesday as police raid homes and offices

Georgian police have raided the offices of an opposition party and arrested its leader in an apparent attempt to quash a wave of mass protests triggered by the governing party’s decision to suspend negotiations on joining the European Union.

Protesters on Wednesday night gathered for a seventh consecutive night of protests, facing off against riot police who have used water cannon and teargas to disperse them on previous nights. Protesters have thrown fireworks at police officers and built barricades on the Georgian capital’s central boulevard.

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Georgian police fire teargas at pro-EU protesters as political crisis deepens

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Tbilisi experiences fifth day of demonstrations amid anger over ruling party’s decision to shelve EU accession talks

Georgian police have fired teargas to try to disperse thousands of pro-EU demonstrators rallying in the centre of Tbilisi amid a deepening political crisis in the Black Sea nation.

The country’s prime minister hours earlier had vowed “no negotiations” with the opposition, enraged by the ruling Georgian Dream party’s decision to shelve EU accession talks after it claimed victory in an election they decried as fraudulent.

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Georgian opposition leader arrested after fourth night of protests

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Police detained Zurab Japaridze as he was leaving rally outside parliament against suspension of EU accession talks

Georgian police have arrested a prominent opposition leader after using water cannon and teargas to scatter anti-government protesters who rallied outside parliament for a fourth consecutive night.

The protests were sparked by the government’s announcement last week that it was suspending talks on joining the EU. Critics saw that as confirmation of a Russian-influenced shift away from pro-western policies, something the ruling party denies.

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Protesters rally in Georgia for fourth night as opposition grows to freeze on EU talks

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Georgian media reports protests in at least eight cities and towns after Saturday’s demonstrations leave 44 in hospital

Protesters rallied in Georgia’s capital for a fourth consecutive night on Sunday and there were signs that opposition was spreading to the government’s decision to suspend talks on joining the European Union.

For months, tensions have been rising between the ruling Georgian Dream party and opponents who accuse it of pursuing increasingly authoritarian, anti-western and pro-Russian policies.

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Georgian president calls government illegitimate, claiming rigged election

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Salome Zourabichvili says she will not stand down as parliament is invalid, after PM halts EU accession talks

The Georgian president, Salome Zourabichvili, has called the country’s government illegitimate and said she would not leave office when her term ends next month, defying the prime minister as he accused pro-EU opposition forces of plotting revolution.

The South Caucasus country was thrown into crisis on Thursday when the prime minister of the Georgian Dream party, Irakli Kobakhidze, said it was halting EU accession talks for the next four years over what it called “blackmail” of Georgia by the bloc, abruptly reversing a long-standing national goal.

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Georgia protesters clash with police after PM suspends EU membership talks

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President accuses government of declaring ‘war on its own people’, as thousands take to streets over fears government is steering country towards Russia

Police clashed with protesters in the Georgian capital Tbilisi early on Friday, after the country’s ruling party said the government would suspend talks on European Union accession until 2028.

The country’s interior ministry said three police officers were injured, two of whom were hospitalised.

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Car found in Georgia pond may contain couple missing since 1980

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Lincoln Continental with one human bone inside could belong to New York couple who disappeared on drive home from Florida

A Georgia police department says it has found a car that could contain the remains of a New York couple who have been missing since 1980.

The car, a Lincoln Continental with one human bone inside, was found in a pond between the Royal Inn Hotel and Interstate 95 on New Jesup Highway, by a nonprofit investigative group from Florida called the Sunshine State Sonar Team, police said.

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Paint thrown over Georgia elections chief as ruling party victory confirmed

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US and EU have called for investigation into alleged irregularities in pro-Russia ruling party’s election victory

The head of Georgia’s election commission was splashed with paint as the body confirmed the ruling party’s victory in the parliamentary elections.

David Kirtadze, a member of the former president Mikheil Saakashvili’s United National Movement (UNM), splashed black paint on the central election commission chair, Giorgi Kalandarishvili, on Saturday, resulting in an eye injury, a video broadcast on local TV channels showed. Hundreds of opposition supporters staged a rally outside the commission’s headquarters during the session.

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