Each year, more than 73,000 diabetics in the U.S. have to have limbs or appendages amputated. Some of these surgeries could be prevented if Heberprot-P, a drug developed and produced in Cuba, is approved by the FDA. Heberprot-P has been around for nine years in Cuba, where it has helped numerous people avoid amputations resulting from diabetic foot ulcers. American researchers hope the U.S. will allow the drug to undergo clinical trials once trade normalization takes effect.   read more

2014 was the warmest year recorded since 1880, when weather records began to be kept. The average temperature was 0.69 degrees C (1.24° F) warmer than the average 20th century temperature. Had you been hoping for a white Christmas? Chances are, you didn’t have one. No state capital had snow cover on December 25 for only the second time since 1946.   read more

Christians laud Serra for his tireless, impassioned efforts to convert Indians to the faith. Pope John Paul II beatified him in 1988. Others see the forced, if not brutal, denial of their native faith in a different light. The missions have been likened by critics to religious forced labor camps rather than churches.   read more

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said that the United States wanted to increase bilateral trade with India to $500 billion a year, a five-fold jump from $97 billion in 2013. He was in India for a two-day visit to set the stage for U.S. President Barack Obama's visit later in the month. This is the first time that a U.S. president has been invited to be the chief guest at the Republic Day celebrations on January 26.   read more

One thing the U.S. could do is mandate a higher rate for American corporations, which Norway did when it imposed the world’s first gender quota seven years ago. Businesses there must meet a 40% standard. Some other European countries have adopted their own floor for female representation in boardrooms. U.S. companies might even find it to their advantage to have more women on their boards. Studies have shown that companies with more women on their boards do better than those with less.   read more

The attacks included a 2002 attack on Hebrew University’s Frank Sinatra cafeteria; a machine-gunning that year on Jerusalem’s Jaffa Road; and a 2004 suicide bombing of a bus in Jerusalem. Lawyers for the PLO have condemned the attacks, which killed dozens and wounded hundreds of others. But they insist the defendants weren’t responsible for the terrorism, and inferred that Hamas and Fatah should be the ones being sued. “The men and women who did this aren’t here,” Mark Rochon told the jury.   read more

The legal battle over who controls the oil landed in a U.S. court in July, where lawyers for both sides filed competing motions. The following month, Judge Miller dismissed the lawsuit, concluding that U.S. maritime law is inapplicable to the case. Miller then accepted an Iraqi argument that showed U.S. courts do have jurisdiction in the case. Meanwhile, the oil has sat in the tanker United Kalavrvta, which has remained 60 miles off the coast of Galveston.   read more

Cubans are allowed to enter the United States without visas or background checks and are given permanent resident status after one year and one day. Those from other countries can wait years and even decades for their green cards. That access to the United States has made Cubans the leaders in Medicare fraud. Those born in Cuba represent less than 1% of the U.S. population but commit 41% of Medicare fraud.   read more

The target of the intimidation is journalist Shohret Hoshur, who works for Radio Free Asia in Washington. Hoshur fled China in 1994 after the government went after him for his reporting. But his continued coverage of events back home has resulted in three of his brothers being imprisoned, according to Hoshur. The harassment of Hoshur’s family began in 2009 when he reported on a Uighur torture victim.   read more

The U.S. imports about $30 billion worth of seafood annually. Americans eat 5 billion pounds of seafood per year, and about 90% of it is imported from countries that don’t protect marine mammals caught in fishing operators’ nets from being killed. The rule change would impact 122 countries that currently sell fish to American importers. Latin America, India and China are among the biggest of them.   read more

“We know nothing about what’s going on. No one has told us anything,” Reinyer Figueredo, the son of prisoner Haydee Gallardo, told Reuters. Opposition groups say the Castro government was holding about 100 political prisoners before the announced deal with the United States. People working for the Foundation for Human Rights in Cuba have called prisoners’ family members to ask if their relatives had been released, but have learned of no one who had, according to the Miami Herald.   read more

Papa Faal and Cherno Njie were involved in the recent failed attempt to oust Gambian President Yahya Jammeh, who has ruled the small African nation since 1994. Njie and Faal traveled to Gambia, as did about 10 others, where most of the group tried to storm the presidential palace on December 30. The longtime dictator was not in the country at the time of the botched coup. Njie would have been Gambia’s interim leader if the coup had been successful,   read more

This drop in the number of professionals who migrate to the U.S. may, to some degree, be the result of many immigrants choosing an Asian country as their new home. One bright spot in the research, they said, was “a recent rebound in the percentage of international students who choose the United States as their destination.” Additionally, the study “confirms that the United States is, in absolute terms, the top destination for international migrants.”   read more

Officials in the Department of Commerce have quietly changed the rules for companies seeking to export U.S. oil, which has been banned since 1975. The new regulations, adopted by the agency’s Bureau of Industry and Security, apply only to condensate, a form of light crude oil. Citigroup wrote that the rules could “open the floodgates to substantial increases in exports.”   read more

Although the number of immigrants picked up by U.S. Border Patrol agents has increased, the number of assaults against the officers has dropped, according to figures from the agency. There were 373 assaults of Border Patrol officers in the fiscal year ending September 30. That figure is down 20% from the previous year and is the sixth year in a row that the number of assaults has fallen. All but seven of those assaults occurred along the southwest border of the United States with Mexico.   read more

Cars carrying U.S. diplomats investigating whether Israeli settlers on the West Bank had destroyed a Palestinian olive grove were hit with rocks by the settlers on Friday. Israeli officials acknowledged the attack on the U.S. officials. “Rocks were thrown at them by residents of Adei Ad. We are investigating. Arrests have yet to be made,” a spokeswoman said, according to Haaretz. She also said the U.S. visit was made without coordinating with Israeli authorities.   read more