An international team of codebreakers said Wednesday they have found and deciphered the long lost secret letters of 16th-century monarch Mary, Queen of Scots, one of the most argued-over figures in British history.. The long-rumoured missing letters, which were found mislabelled in the digital archive of a French library, were hailed by excited historians as the most significant discovery about the Scottish queen in a century.
Peru said Tuesday that 585 sea lions and 55,000 wild birds have died of the H5N1 bird flu virus in recent weeks, the latest report on the disease's impacts.. Following the discovery of 55,000 dead birds in eight protected coastal areas, rangers found the bird flu that killed them had also claimed 585 sea lions in seven protected marine areas, the Sernanp natural areas protection agency said.
Violent flooding from glacier lakes formed or enlarged by climate change threatens at least 15 million people worldwide, most of them in four countries, researchers said Tuesday. . Some 90 million people across 30 countries live in 1,089 glacial lake basins, they found. 15 million of them reside within one kilometre of the track an outburst flood would take.
Containing and cleaning up environmental pollution, especially in waterways, is crucial to controlling increasingly bullet-proof superbugs which could kill tens of millions by mid-century, a new UN report said Tuesday.. A new report Tuesday said pollution is a key driver in the "development, transmission and spread" of AMR, calling for urgent action to clean up the environment.
The UN's cultural agency UNESCO said on Tuesday it was ready to provide assistance after two sites listed on its World Heritage list in Syria and Turkey sustained damage in the devastating earthquake.. - 'Rapidly secure' sites - In Turkey, UNESCO said it was saddened by the "collapse of several buildings" at the World Heritage site of the Diyarbakir Fortress and the adjacent Hevsel Gardens.
A 10-year-old French-Japanese boy will become the first officially recognised dual-national kabuki actor, following in the footsteps of his grandfather, a star of the traditional art form.. It is the first time a dual national has officially become a kabuki actor, although Ichimura Uzaemon who was adopted into a kabuki family in 1878 is said to have had a French-American father.
Defying a polar freeze, 50 long canoes are lined up at the foot of Old Quebec City, their boaters preparing to brave dangerous ice slabs and swirling currents to cross the St. Lawrence River under heavy snow.. The objective is to race from the port of Quebec to the city of Levis, on the opposite shore of the river, and back -- a distance of 3.2 kilometers (two miles).
British author Salman Rushdie said he finds it "very difficult" to write after being stabbed last year, in an interview published Monday ahead of the release of his new novel "Victory City.". "Victory City" will be released in Britain on Thursday. jwp-pdh/mlm
Black and Hispanic adults on dialysis experience more staph bloodstream infections than white patients receiving the treatment for kidney failure, US health officials said Monday.. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), citing 2017-2020 data, said adults on dialysis for end-stage kidney disease (ESKD) were 100 times more likely to have a Staphylococcus aureus bloodstream infection than adults not receiving the treatment.
Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby urged unity among Anglicans on Monday as he opened a General Synod meeting set to be dominated by controversy over allowing priests to marry same-sex couples. . In a sign of the different stances being adopted, Welby has said he will not personally offer the new blessings to same-sex couples, given he is the ceremonial head of the Anglican Communion.
