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BEIJING — The announcement by administrators of the SAT college entrance test that scores are being withheld for students from China and South Korea who took the exam this month has infuriated many and raised anxiety about what for a number of them is a high-stakes college application process.
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NEW YORK — Around the time New Yorkers started fretting over the city’s first diagnosis of Ebola on Thursday, Sal Pain began drawing up plans for four decontamination chambers, customized for a cramped Harlem hallway.
A final October warmup
Even though November is just around the corner, the Institute will experience temperatures more typical of mid-to-late September in the next couple of days. As a cold front approaches from the west, a high pressure system will remain situated to our southeast, leading to mostly sunny skies and warm-air advection. Until the front reaches eastern New England, winds will be from the south and southwest, allowing temperatures to rocket into the high 60s and low 70s (°F) this afternoon and tomorrow. The cold front will pass through tomorrow evening, bringing the possibility of rain showers as it returns temperatures to more seasonally-appropriate levels.
Trying to raise profile of climate change for Washington voters
SEATTLE — The effort by a California billionaire named Thomas F. Steyer to bolster global climate change measures in Washington has turned the battle over the state Senate into one of the most expensive legislative elections in state history.
School gunman used texts to gather victims at lunch, police say
SEATTLE — The student who opened fire with a handgun in his high school cafeteria Friday morning in northwest Washington state, killing two and wounding three, arranged through text messages for the five fellow students to be there together, police investigators said Monday.
Seeking unity, US revamps Ebola protocol
WASHINGTON — The U.S. government on Monday tried to take charge of an increasingly acrimonious national debate over how to treat people in contact with Ebola patients by announcing guidelines that stopped short of tough measures in New York and New Jersey and were carefully devised, officials said, not to harm the effort to recruit badly needed medical workers to West Africa.
Netanyahu expedites plan for new homes in East Jerusalem
JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Monday that Israel would fast-track planning for more 1,060 new apartments in populous Jewish neighborhoods of East Jerusalem, a move that appears calibrated to appeal to the maximum number of Israelis while causing the minimum damage to Israel internationally, according to Israeli analysts.
Shorts (right)
KIEV, Ukraine — In a parliamentary election with historic ramifications, Ukrainians overwhelmingly reaffirmed on Sunday their support for the ideals of the February revolt in the Maidan and the country’s push to the West, while rejecting far-right nationalist parties.
New York City agency and vendor bilked Medicaid, US says
NEW YORK — Federal authorities have accused New York City officials of a five-year scheme to defraud Medicaid, working with a contractor to exploit loopholes in Medicaid’s computerized billing system to collect reimbursements that amount to tens of millions of dollars.
UN urges China to allow free elections in Hong Kong
HONG KONG — The U.N. Human Rights Committee urged China on Thursday to allow elections in Hong Kong without restrictions on who can run as a candidate. The move appeared likely to draw strong criticism from Beijing, where officials decided in August to set strict guidelines for the 2017 election of the city’s next leader, prompting mass sit-in protests.
Taliban gain strength in Afghanistan’s north
CHAHAR DARA, Afghanistan — The last time that Afghans in the northern province of Kunduz felt so threatened by the Taliban was in 2009, just before President Barack Obama deployed thousands of troops to push the insurgents back from the outskirts of the province’s capital.
Clearing skies just in time for the weekend
MIT students had to deal with more than just Psets and exams this week. A potent low pressure system formed just off the coast of New England, bringing gusty winds and heavy rain to the area. Since Monday, Boston has picked up over 3 inches of rain and winds have gusted to as high as 60 mph!
South Korea tears down Christmas tower on border
SEOUL, South Korea — South Korean marines have dismantled a 43-year-old Christmas tower on the border with North Korea that the North had threatened to attack with artillery, officials here said Wednesday.
Germany is sending a military training mission to northern Iraq
BAKU, Azerbaijan — Germany is sending a mission to northern Iraq to examine whether its military, and possibly those of other European nations, can expand the training of Kurdish forces battling jihadists there, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said Thursday.
Canada worries as extremism lures more abroad
In January 2013, strewn amid the rubble and debris left after a terrorist attack on a gas plant in the Algerian desert were the remains of two men who had traveled far from home to wage what they viewed as a holy war.
Shorts (left)
AMMAN, Jordan — Air and missile strikes in Syria by the United States and its allies during the past month have killed more than 500 extremist fighters as well as at least 32 civilians, a Syrian monitoring group said Thursday.
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Nine people in Connecticut who may have been exposed to the Ebola virus have been told to stay at home and are being monitored by local health authorities for symptoms, a spokesman for the State Public Health Department said Wednesday.
Dozens are killed in attacks on Shiite targets in Iraq
BAGHDAD — Militants unleashed a flurry of deadly attacks against Shiite targets in Iraq on Monday, including a quadruple car bombing near two of the holiest shrines in Shiite Islam, and a suicide attack inside a mosque, officials said.
Texas officials clear 43 people after Ebola monitoring
DALLAS — More than three dozen people who were monitored for the past three weeks for possible contact with the Ebola virus were cleared Monday to return to work or school, leaving 133 others still being watched for symptoms of the disease, Dallas County officials said.
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SAN FRANCISCO — Apple’s biggest cash cow, the iPhone, is gaining weight.