US AND CANADA

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President Donald Trump delivered a politically charged speech Wednesday carried live in prime time on network television, seeking to pin the blame for economic challenges on Democrats while announcing he is sending a $1,776 bonus check to U.S. troops for Christmas.

The remarks came as the nation is preparing to settle down to celebrate the holidays, yet Trump was focused more on divisions within the country than a sense of unity. His speech was a rehash of his recent messaging that has so far been unable to calm public anxiety about the cost of groceries, housing, utilities and other basic goods.

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The United States has announced plans for a wide-ranging arms package for Taiwan valued at approximately $11.1 billion, marking one of the largest proposed weapons sales to the self-ruled island in recent years. The move underscores Washington's continued support for Taipei as tensions with China remain elevated across the Taiwan Strait.

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The United States gained a decent 64,000 jobs in November but lost 105,000 in October as federal workers departed after cutbacks by the Trump administration, the government said in delayed reports.

The unemployment rate rose to 4.6% last month, highest since 2021.

The November job gains were higher than the 40,000 economists had forecast. The October job losses were caused by a 162,000 drop in federal workers, many of whom resigned at the end of fiscal year 2025 on Sept. 30 under pressure from billionaire Elon Musk’s purge of U.S. government payrolls.

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Authorities in Australia have charged a 24-year-old man in connection with the shooting at a Hanukkah celebration in Bondi Beach over the weekend that killed 15 people and injured multiple others.

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President Donald Trump has filed a sweeping $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the BBC, accusing the British broadcaster of deceptively editing his Jan. 6, 2021, speech in a documentary aired ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential election.

The complaint, filed Monday in federal court in Miami, alleges that a BBC "Panorama" documentary titled Trump: A Second Chance misrepresented Trump's remarks by stitching together nonconsecutive portions of his speech to falsely suggest he encouraged violence. Trump's legal team argues the edits amounted to election interference and caused significant reputational harm.

According to the lawsuit, the documentary combined Trump's early call for supporters to march to the Capitol with a statement made nearly an hour later in which he urged them to "fight like hell," while omitting his instruction to protest "peacefully and patriotically." His attorneys contend that the editing created a misleading narrative that portrayed Trump as directly inciting the Capitol riot.

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The Department of State announced Tuesday that the United States is designating Clan del Golfo, one of Colombia’s largest illegal armed groups, as a terrorist organization.

The move marks the latest step by Washington to bolster counter-narcotics and security efforts near the Colombia–Venezuela border. Tensions in the region have escalated after President Donald Trump accused Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro of facilitating criminal operations tied to drug trafficking.

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An Amazon error led to a child being shown a 15-rated film instead of a PG movie, prompting an apology from the company. The incident occurred on its Prime Video service when a parent, attempting to rent "Diary of a Wimpy Kid," found that "Love & Other Drugs"—a film the British Board of Film Classification warns contains "strong sex and sex references"—was streaming incorrectly. They complained to the media regulator Ofcom, which found Amazon in breach of its rules.