HELSINKI (AP) – Heavy social media use contributes to a stark decline in well-being among young people, with the effects particularly worrying in teenage girls in English-speaking countries and Western Europe, according to the World Happiness Report 2026 published Thursday. The report found that Finland is the happiest land in the world for the ninth year in a row.
WASHINGTON (AP) – A key question hangs over the Federal Reserve’s two-day meeting that ends Wednesday: Will central bank policymakers still reduce short-term interest rates this year, now that the Iran war has sent oil prices higher and gas prices spiking? Or will they have to stand pat for months to see how the conflict plays out?
WASHINGTON (AP) – Attorney General Pam Bondi was subpoenaed Tuesday to answer questions from Congress about the Justice Department’s sex trafficking investigation of Jeffrey Epstein and the agency’s handling of millions of files related to the disgraced financier.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) – Israel kept up its campaign of targeting Iran’s leaders on Wednesday, killing the country’s intelligence minister, and an Iranian offshore natural gas field was struck in a sign of the war’s mounting pressure – from both sides — on the region’s economic lifeblood: energy.
Today is Wednesday, March 18, the 77th day of 2026. There are 288 days left in the year. Today in history: On March 18, 1925, nearly 700 people died when the Tri-State Tornado struck southeastern Missouri, southern Illinois and southwestern Indiana; it remains the deadliest single tornado in U.S. history.
WASHINGTON (AP) – Joe Kent, the former counterterrorism director who resigned this week over concerns about the Iran war, said Wednesday that he and other senior officials with doubts about the airstrikes “were not allowed” to share them with President Donald Trump.
TOKYO (AP) – Japan recorded a trade surplus of 57.3 billion yen ($360 million) in February, according to government data released Wednesday, reversing from a deficit a month earlier. Exports grew at a better-than-expected 4.2% in February to 9.57 trillion yen, the Finance Ministry’s seasonally adjusted preliminary data show. Imports grew 10.2%.
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) – Iran’s state media said Wednesday that Israel attacked its South Pars gas field – the largest in the world and one that is shared with Qatar to the south across the Persian Gulf. Facilities associated with the gas field near Asaluyeh on Iran’s Gulf coastline were on fire on Wednesday, state media reported.
NEW YORK (AP) – The COVID-19 pandemic’s early death toll was much higher than the official U.S. count, according to a new study that spotlights dramatic disparities in the uncounted deaths.
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