Some 1,500 African elephant tusks — the biggest seizure ever — were found this week hidden within timber planks and destined for China’s ivory market. Shocked conservationists noted 2012 will now go down as the worst year in 24 years of records — and warned that 2013 could be even worse.
“In 2011 we thought the threats to elephants couldn’t get any worse and 2012 draws to a close with the depressing news that the slaughter …

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House speaker John Boehner has left open the door for a quick bill that would halt tax increases for the vast majority of Americans on January 1.

Boehner twice ducked questions from reporters during a press conference on Capitol Hill on Thursday about whether he was prepared to allow a vote on a bill that would see the top 2% of the country’s richest face tax rises but exempt the remaining 98%.

With just over two weeks …

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The Los Angeles Police Commission on Tuesday approved a plan from Los Angeles Police Department Chief Charlie Beck to no longer turn over illegal immigrants arrested in low-level crimes to federal authorities for deportation.

The new rules, which are expected to go into effect early next month and affect about 400 people arrested each year, mark a significant move by the state’s most influential local police agency to distance itself from federal immigration policies that Beck …

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New uncertainty over the country’s economy added to the political turmoil. On Tuesday, Mr. Morsi’s government postponed a $4.8 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund that was intended to help Egypt avert financial collapse, saying that the delay would give Egyptian officials more time to discuss the related package of economic policy changes with the public, the country’s finance minister told Reuters.

The monetary fund’s board had been expected to approve the loan this month …

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The world’s biggest and oldest living trees are disappearing and will never be replaced, according to a new review of global ecosystems.

The study, published last week in the journal Science, found that trees between 100 and 300 years old are dying off at an alarming rate.

“What we’re seeing is a global phenomenon,” said the paper’s lead author, ecologist David Lindenmayer of Australian National University. “There are different sets of drivers—it might be fire, logging, drought, …

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The photojournalist Fernando Moleres has been awarded the second Tim Hetherington Grant, an annual visual journalism award focusing on human rights, Human Rights Watch and World Press Photo announced today.

Human Rights Watch and World Press Photo established the grant to honor the legacy of Hetherington, a photojournalist and filmmaker who was killed during fighting in Libya in April 2011. The €20,000 grant was given to Moleres for his project “Waiting for an Opportunity,” in which …

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After hours of speculation Mexican officials announced late Sunday that a plane carrying Mexican American singer Jenni Rivera was found and that they believed there were no survivors.

Gerardo Ruiz Esparza, Mexico’s transportation and communications minister, said authorities found what remained of the plane in mountainous terrain in northeastern Mexico, just south of Monterrey, on Sunday night.

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The daughter of Mexican immigrants, Rivera, was born and raised in Long Beach, California. She was fluent in Spanish, …

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In its landmark $660-million settlement with victims of sexual abuse five years ago, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles agreed to make public the confidential personnel records of all priests accused of molesting children.

Victims said the release of the files would provide accountability for church leaders who let pedophiles remain in ministry, and law enforcement officials suggested that the documents could lead to criminal cases against those in charge.

After years of delays and legal wrangling, the …

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An old man in Gaza held a placard that read: “You take my water, burn my olive trees, destroy my house, take my job, steal my land, imprison my father, kill my mother, bombard my country, starve us all, humiliate us all, but I am to blame: I shot a rocket back.”

The old man’s message provides the proper context for the latest episode in the savage punishment of Gaza. The crimes trace back to 1948, …

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican lawmakers on Tuesday blocked a treaty to protect people with disabilities from discrimination despite a passionate plea from former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, who was severely wounded in World War Two.

The Senate voted 61-38 to pass the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, falling short of the 66 votes needed to ratify the treaty.

Read the full story here. …