JOHANNESBURG (AP) — At least 49 people have died in flooding in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province after an extreme cold front brought heavy rain and snow to parts of the country, officials said Wednesday. Eastern Cape Premier Oscar Mabuyane said police provided the death toll. The dead include six high school students who were washed away when their school bus was caught in floodwaters near a river on Tuesday, Mabuyane told journalists. He said four other students were missing. He said the death toll was likely to rise: “As we speak here, other bodies are being discovered.”

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BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - Argentina’s Supreme Court has upheld the six-year prison sentence for former president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner over irregularities in public works contracts during her time in office. The country’s highest court rejected an appeal filed by Fernandez’s legal team against lower-court rulings, confirming both the prison term and her lifetime ban from holding public office. The ruling stemmed from the so-called “Vialidad case”, which investigated the awarding of 51 road construction contracts in the southern province of Santa Cruz to companies owned by businessman Lazaro Baez during the administrations of Nestor Kirchner (2003-2007) and Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner (2007-2015), the widow of Nestor Kirchner.

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RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro appeared before the Supreme Court for the first time and denied participation in an alleged plot to remain in power and overturn the 2022 election result as he faces charges that could bring decades behind bars. Many Brazilians followed the trial, which was streamed online. The country was shaken by the January 2023 riot in which the Supreme Court, Congress and presidential palace were ransacked. Bolsonaro said in his testimony that the rioters were “crazy,” not coup mongers.

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BRUSSELS (AFP) - The world experienced its second-warmest May since records began this year, a month in which climate change fuelled a record-breaking heatwave in Greenland, scientists said on Wednesday. Last month was Earth’s second-warmest May on record – exceeded only by May 2024 – rounding out the northern hemisphere’s second-hottest March-May spring on record, the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said in a monthly bulletin. Global surface temperatures last month averaged 1.4 degrees Celsius higher than in the 1850-1900 pre-industrial period, when humans began burning fossil fuels on an industrial scale, C3S said.

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COPIAPO, Chile (Reuters) - As the northern Chilean city of Copiapo was preparing last week to hold earthquake drills, it was hit by a real-life one: a 6.4-magnitude quake that cut power to thousands and caused structural damage to buildings. The drills - temporarily suspended - and last week’s tremor in the Andean nation that sits on the seismically active Pacific Ring of Fire, underscores rising concern a big quake could hit soon after the last severe one fifteen years ago. “The probability of a 7.8 magnitude earthquake or larger is around 64% this year, and those odds go up as time goes on,” said Sergio Barrientos, director of Chile’s National Seismology Center. 

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SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea’s military said on Wednesday it had suspended loudspeaker broadcasts near the border targeting North Korea, nearly a year after resuming the propaganda and K-pop blasts during a time of growing tension with its neighbor. The step makes good on a promise by President Lee Jae-myung, who took office this month vowing to resume dialogue with the North, suspend the loudspeaker broadcasts and restore a suspended military pact with Pyongyang. Lee ordered the pre-emptive measure to ease tension, reduce military confrontation and build trust, his spokesperson, Kang Yu-jung, told a briefing, as North Korea has refrained from provocations lately.