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Deng Yuwen, a prominent Chinese writer now living in exile in the Philadelphia suburbs, has regularly criticized China and its authoritarian leader, Xi Jinping. China’s response recently has been severe, with vulgar and menacingly personal attacks online.According to researchers at Clemson University and Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, a secret propaganda network linked to the country's security services bombarded not only Mr. Deng but also his teenage daughter with sexually suggestive and threatening posts on popular social media platforms. social media.The content, posted by users with fake identities, appeared in replies to Mr. Deng's posts on the social media platform arsonist and prostitute.“I tried to delete these posts,” Mr. Deng said of the online attacks, speaki...

Except for the worn posters of Iranian presidential candidates posted on highway overpasses, there were few signs this weekend that the country had held a presidential election on Friday and was heading for a runoff.There were almost no demonstrations to applaud the two major voters who come from opposite ends of the political spectrum and between whom the Iranians will decide on July 5.Even from the government's official numbers, it was clear that the real winner of Friday's election was Iran's silent majority who either left their ballots blank or did not vote at all. About 60 percent of eligible voters did not vote or cast a blank ballot.That's because there was no point in voting, said Bita Irani, 40, a housewife from Tehran, Iran's capital: "We had a choice between...

When I was a child, my father, who had left the country only a few times, told me about the trip to Europe he took with his parents when he was 14, in 1966. She told me how much Nonie loved the immaculate Swiss streets and the planters buzzing with flowers; the fireplace in the house on the hill outside Lugano, where her father was born, with ingenious niches on either side for hanging clothes or heating bread; the palpable poverty of the house in Pozzuoli, a city just outside Naples, where Nonie's aunt had covered the walls with newspapers to better insulate. Every now and then, my dad would take out the projector and show me his Kodachrome slides.As an adult, I spent years telling him that he and I should repeat the trip together, or at least a short version where we went to Switz...

French voters went to the polls on Sunday for the first round of snap legislative elections that President Emmanuel Macron unexpectedly called this month, a gamble that has thrown the country into deep uncertainty about its future.As of 5 p.m. local time on Sunday, the turnout was 59.39 percent, the Interior Ministry said. That's much higher than in the previous legislative election in 2022, when turnout over the same period was just 39.42 percent, demonstrating intense interest in a vote that will determine the future of Mr Macron's second term.Voters are choosing their 577 representatives in the National Assembly, the country’s lower and highest house of parliament. A new majority of lawmakers opposed to Mr Macron would force him to appoint a political opponent as prime minister,...

In Japan, engineers are trying to make robots imitate a uniquely human expression: the smile.They created a face mask from human skin cells and attached it to robots using a new technique that hides the bond and is flexible enough to transform into a grimace or a soft smile.The effect is halfway between the terrifying Hannibal Lecter mask and the claymation figurine of Gumby.But scientists say the prototypes pave the way for more sophisticated robots, with an outer layer that is elastic and strong enough to protect the machine while making it more humane.The “skin equivalent,” as researchers call it, made from living skin cells in the lab can scar, burn, and even heal itself, according to a study published June 25 in the journal Cell Reports Physical Science."Human-like faces and expressio...

Iranian voters demonstrated their displeasure with Iran’s clerical system of governance during Friday’s presidential election, turning out in record numbers to help two establishment candidates limp to a runoff.The July 5 runoff will offer voters a final choice between a reformist former health minister, Dr. Masoud Pezeshkian, and an ultraconservative former nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, neither of whom managed to secure more than 50 percent of the vote needed to win the presidency. That postpones for another week the question of who will lead Iran through challenges including an ailing economy, the divide between rulers and ruled, and a looming war that continues to threaten to drag Iran further into the fold.But despite being on different sides, neither is expected to bring major cha...

These early studies “highlighted both the potential that we could learn from dogs, but also that we would need much larger sample sizes to do that really well,” said Elinor Karlsson, a geneticist at UMass Chan Medical School and the Broad Institute. And so researchers began creating large citizen science projects, searching for DNA samples and data from dogs across the United States.Pet owners have risen to the challenge. The Golden Retriever Lifetime Study, which began recruiting in 2012, has followed more than 3,000 dogs in an attempt to identify genetic and environmental risk factors for cancer, which is particularly common in the breed. Since 2019, the Dog Aging Project, a long-term study of health and longevity, has enrolled nearly 50,000 dogs.The personal project of Dr. Karlsson, Da...

Miguel Martínez wasn't quite sure how to react. On Monday evening, he found himself standing outside a bar in Bilbao, tuning in and out of his colleagues' conversation, his eyes fixed on a television screen inside. He has been avidly following Spain's progress in the European soccer championship, he said, and a business trip would certainly not stand in his way.He had watched the country's first two matches with his 13-year-old son, at home in Seville. The city, he said, is hit by a strong dose of major tournament fever, a condition that consistently affects all of Europe on a biannual basis. The balconies are decorated with Spanish flags. The streets are full of Spanish shirts. Spain's victories sparked wild celebrations.As far as Mr. Martínez could tell, however...

Many travelers from the United States have lost a crucial tool for checking maps, making reservations, using ride-hailing apps and more due to a cellular data outage that began impacting users of AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon on Wednesday.Affected travelers, especially in Europe, posted on social media, seeking answers about what caused the outage and how long it would last. Some reported being unable to make phone calls, send text messages or use online services without Wi-Fi for 24 hours. It’s unclear what caused the outage, which appears to stretch from Britain to Turkey.An AT&T spokeswoman said the carrier’s network was operating normally, but that some customers traveling internationally may experience service disruptions due to an issue outside of AT&T’s network. The company said it was...

The Palestinian National Authority has lurched from crisis to crisis for years, struggling to pay its arrears amid a decline in international aid. Israel has often withheld taxes it collects on behalf of the authority in an effort to penalize its leadership. On other occasions, Israel has sent tens of millions of dollars to keep it afloat.But many have called the current economic situation in the West Bank the most difficult to date.After the Hamas-led attack on October 7, tens of thousands of Palestinians who had worked in Israel were no longer allowed to enter, creating mass unemployment almost overnight. Israeli military raids, road closures and tougher checkpoints have further stifled the Palestinian economy.Before the war, Mahmoud Abu Issa, 53, earned more than $2,000 a month – an ...