Inside a shrine overlooking snow-capped mountains, Hindu priests heaped spoonfuls of puffed rice and ghee into a crackling fire. They closed their eyes and chanted, hoping their prayers would somehow turn back time and save their holy — and sinking — town.
For months, the roughly 20,000 residents in Joshimath, burrowed in the Himalayas and revered by Hindu and Sikh pilgrims, have watched the earth slowly swallow their community. They pleaded for help that never arrived, and in January their desperate plight made it into the international spotlight.

A scorching volley from Theo Hernandez led to the opening goal, Zlatan Ibrahimovic made his season debut and goalkeeper Mike Maignan returned after five months out during an encouraging 2-0 win for AC Milan over Atalanta in the Italian league on Sunday.
The victory moved the defending Serie A champion level on points with second-place Inter Milan, which lost 1-0 at Bologna, 18 points behind runaway leader Napoli.

A trip to Almeria offered a perfect chance for Barcelona to deal a major blow to Real Madrid's Spanish title defense and move past its still-stinging elimination from the Europa League.
But with Xavi Hernández feeling compelled to rest some of his best players, Barcelona put in what its coach admitted was the "worst game of the season."

With a first trophy secured, thoughts now turn to what else a transformed Manchester United can achieve in a season that is shaping up nicely for manager Erik ten Hag.
While a quadruple remains unlikely, United's four-pronged challenge is still alive after beating Newcastle 2-0 in the League Cup final on Sunday.

Kylian Mbappé scored twice and Lionel Messi got the other goal as the World Cup final stars combined to give French league leader Paris Saint-Germain a 3-0 win at title challenger Marseille.
Mbappé tops the league's scoring charts outright with 17 goals, and he matched Edinson Cavani's PSG club-record tally of 200 in the process on Sunday.

Pope Francis will visit Hungary at the end of April, the Vatican said Monday, in a trip expected to focus on migration to Europe and Russia's war in Ukraine.
The April 28-30 trip to Budapest represents a proper state visit after Francis made a brief, hours-long stopover in 2021 to close out a church conference. That visit was visibly awkward, given that Prime Minister Viktor Orban's hard-line views on migration and Francis' call for countries to welcome those fleeing war, hardship and poverty.

The unlikely awards season juggernaut "Everything Everywhere All at Once" marched on at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday, and even gathered steam with wins not just for best ensemble, Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan but also for Jamie Lee Curtis.
The SAG Awards, often an Oscar preview, threw some curve balls into the Oscars race in a ceremony streamed live on Netflix's YouTube page from Fairmont Century Plaza in Los Angeles.

Nearly all flights at Germany's Cologne-Bonn airport and the majority at nearby Duesseldorf were canceled or diverted on Monday as a result of strikes that also affected local transportation, day-care facilities and local administration in Germany's most populous region.
Cologne-Bonn airport said that all but two of the day's 136 planned flights wouldn't depart from or arrive there, German news agency dpa reported. In Dusseldorf, only 89 of the planned 330 flights were expected to take place as scheduled, with most of the rest being canceled.

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres on Monday stressed the importance of legal challenges against "climate-wrecking corporations" like fossil-fuel producers, ratcheting up his call for the fight against climate change—- this time before the U.N.'s top human rights body.
Guterres opened the latest session of the Human Rights Council, part of an address that decried summary executions, torture and sexual violence in places like Ukraine; antisemitism, anti-Muslim bigotry and the persecution of Christians; inequality and threats to free expression, among other issues.

French President Emmanuel Macron will unveil on Monday his country's changing economic and military strategy in Africa for the coming years, as France's influence substantially declines on the continent.
Macron is expected to call for a more balanced partnership with African nations, in a speech at the Elysee presidential palace before he begins an ambitious Africa trip on Wednesday to Gabon, Angola, the Republic of Congo and Congo.
