By MAURICIO SAVARESE and GABRIELA SÁ PESSOA

BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) — Brazil’s federal police said that messages found on the telephone of embattled former President Jair Bolsonaro show that at one point he wanted to flee to Argentina and request political asylum, according to documents seen Wednesday by the Associated Press.

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Bolsonaro is currently waiting for a Supreme Court ruling next month about an alleged coup attempt and he might face another case as police formally accused him and one of his sons of obstruction of justice in connection with his pending trial.

The AP had access to the police investigation and reviewed the documents, which were sent to Brazil’s Supreme Court. The Argentine government did not respond a request for comment from the AP.

Silas Malafaia, an evangelical pastor who is a staunch ally of Bolsonaro’s, was also targeted by police. He had his passport seized by investigators but was not formally accused of obstruction of justice.

Brazilian federal police investigators said in a 170-page report that Bolsonaro had a draft of a request for political asylum from Argentine President Javier Milei’s government dated Feb. 10, 2024. The former president saved the document two days after authorities searched his home and office as part of an investigation into an alleged coup plot.

In a 33-page letter addressed to Milei, Bolsonaro claimed he was being politically persecuted in Brazil.

“I, Jair Messias Bolsonaro, request political asylum from Your Excellency in the Republic of Argentina, under an urgent regime, as I find myself in a situation of political persecution in Brazil and fear for my life,” the Brazilian leader wrote.

On Feb. 12, Bolsonaro reportedly spent two nights at the Hungarian Embassy in Brasília, fueling speculation among critics that he may have been attempting to avoid arrest.

Brazilian federal police investigators also said in their report that Bolsonaro’s decision to ignore precautionary measures established for his house arrest and spread content to his allies “sought to directly hit Brazilian democratic institutions, notably the Supreme Court and even Brazil’s Congress.”

Sá Pessoa reported from Sao Paulo.

As of Wednesday afternoon, the Twins still hadn’t announced who would be pitching for them a day later in their series finale against the Athletics of Sacramento, but they had made their pitching plans clear for Triple-A St. Paul, where Saints fans will be treated to a double dose of rehabbing major leaguers Thursday.

Pablo López will make his long-awaited first rehab start for the Saints on Thursday and will be followed to the mound by Simeon Woods Richardson, who will make his second rehab appearance.

The plan for López, who has been out since suffering a Grade 2 teres major strain on June 3, is to throw three innings or 45 pitches, whichever comes first, head athletic trainer Nick Paparesta said. Should that go well, he would likely progress to another rehab start in which he throws around four innings or 60 pitches.

“It’s just a matter of building him up, building the workload, get the work capacity … up and really just making sure his pitches are where they need to be and that he’s comfortable with them and that he’s happy with what it looks like,” Paparesta said.

After him, Woods Richardson, who has said he’s feeling much better after dealing with a parasite earlier this month, is scheduled to throw around four innings. Woods Richardson previously made a rehab start last Friday, throwing two scoreless innings while striking out four.

After that, “it’s more of a baseball decision than a health decision at that point in time, so we’ll kind of see where we are and if they want to send him back for some more or if they’re ready to activate him,” Paparesta said.

And in some more good news on the starting pitching front, David Festa is scheduled to throw live batting practice in St. Paul on Saturday. Festa has been out for nearly a month dealing with right shoulder inflammation.

Vázquez update

Christian Vázquez is currently at his home in Miami recuperating after having a surgical procedure to clear out an infection in his left shoulder earlier this month.

He is getting IV antibiotics and will continue to do so for three weeks, four total. In early September, he will fly back to Minnesota. He will have his PICC catheter line removed and start moving shortly after, Paparesta said.

The catcher is currently doing physical therapy for his shoulder and is working out. And while he might run out of time for a return, the Twins haven’t ruled that out.

“You always thinking long-term for these guys, and he is an (impending) free agent, so I’d love for him to get on the field and show everybody … that he’s able to play and he’s back and he’s good to go,” Paparesta said. “So when we get him back here, the plan is to get that thing out and start cranking him up and see how quickly we can get him back into playing again.”

Surgery for Roden

Alan Roden, out for the season, will have surgery on Friday to repair his ulnar collateral ligament in his left thumb.

Roden first injured his finger making a catch in a game against the Kansas City Royals on Aug. 10. He further aggravated it with a headfirst slide at home plate last Thursday.

Acquired as part of the trade that sent Louie Varland and Ty France to Toronto, Roden played in just 12 games for the Twins and hit .158 before his season-ending injury.

Minnesota Twins’ Christian Vazquez (8) celebrates after hitting a three-run home run during the fourth inning in the first baseball game of a doubleheader against the Baltimore Orioles, Wednesday, May 14, 2025, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

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By THOMAS ADAMSON

PARIS (AP) — When Olivier Baroin moved into an apartment in Montmartre about 15 years ago, it felt like he was living in a village in the heart of Paris. Not anymore.

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Stores for residents are disappearing, along with the friendly atmosphere, he says. In their place are hordes of people taking selfies, shops selling tourist trinkets, and cafés whose seating spills into the narrow, cobbled streets as overtourism takes its toll.

Baroin has had enough. He put his apartment up for sale after local streets were designated pedestrian-only while accommodating the growing number of visitors.

“I told myself that I had no other choice but to leave since, as I have a disability, it’s even more complicated when you can no longer take your car, when you have to call a taxi from morning to night,” he told The Associated Press.

Overtourism in European cities

From Venice to Barcelona to Amsterdam, European cities are struggling to absorb surging numbers of tourists.

A banner reading “Montmartre under threat. Are residents being forgotten?” hangs at windows in the Montmartre district in Paris, France, Monday, Aug. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

Some residents in one of Paris’ most popular tourist neighborhoods are now pushing back. A black banner strung between two balconies in Montmartre reads, in English: “Behind the postcard: locals mistreated by the Mayor.” Another, in French, says: “Montmartre residents resisting.”

Atop the hill where the Basilica of Sacré-Cœur crowns the city’s skyline, residents lament what they call the “Disneyfication” of the once-bohemian slice of Paris. The basilica says it now attracts up to 11 million people a year — even more than the Eiffel Tower — while daily life in the neighborhood has been overtaken by tuk-tuks, tour groups, photo queues and short-term rentals.

“Now, there are no more shops at all, there are no more food shops, so everything must be delivered,” said 56-year-old Baroin, a member of a residents’ protest group called Vivre a Montmartre, or Living in Montmartre.

Tourists stroll in the Montmartre district in Paris, France, Monday, Aug. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

The unrest echoes tensions across town at the Louvre Museum, where staff in June staged a brief wildcat strike over chronic overcrowding, understaffing and deteriorating conditions. The Louvre logged 8.7 million visitors in 2024, more than double what its infrastructure was designed to handle.

A postcard under pressure

Paris, a city of just over 2 million residents if you count its sprawling suburbs, welcomed 48.7 million tourists in 2024, a 2% increase from the previous year.

Sacré-Cœur, the most visited monument in France in 2024, and the surrounding Montmartre neighborhood have turned into what some locals call an open-air theme park.

Local staples like butchers, bakeries and grocers are vanishing, replaced by ice-cream stalls, bubble-tea vendors and souvenir T-shirt stands.

Paris authorities did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Visitors seemed largely to be enjoying the packed streets on a sunny Tuesday this week.

Tourists stroll in the Montmartre district in Paris, France, Monday, Aug. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

“For the most part, all of Paris has been pretty busy, but full of life, for sure,” said American tourist Adam Davidson. “Coming from Washington, D.C., which is a lively city as well, I would say this is definitely full of life to a different degree for sure.”

Europe’s breaking point

In Barcelona, thousands have taken to the streets this year, some wielding water pistols, demanding limits on cruise ships and short-term tourist rentals. Venice now charges an entry fee for day-trippers and caps visitor numbers. And in Athens, authorities are imposing a daily limit on visitors to the Acropolis, to protect the ancient monument from record-breaking tourist crowds.

Urban planners warn that historic neighborhoods risk becoming what some critics call “zombie cities” — picturesque but lifeless, their residents displaced by short-term visitors.

A banner reading “The City Hall despises us” hangs from a balcony in the Montmartre district in Paris, France, Monday, Aug. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Aurelien Morissard)

Paris is trying to mitigate the problems by cracking down on short-term rentals and unlicensed properties.

But tourism pressures are growing. By 2050, the world’s population is projected to reach nearly 10 billion, according to United Nations estimates. With the global middle class expanding, low-cost flights booming and digital platforms guiding travelers to the same viral landmarks, many more visitors are expected in iconic cities like Paris.

The question now, residents say, is whether any space is left for those who call it home.

By KEN MORITSUGU and NG HAN GUAN

TALATAN, China (AP) — High on the Tibetan plateau, Chinese government officials last month showed off what they say will be the world’s largest solar farm when completed — 235 square miles, the size of the American city of Chicago.

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China has been installing solar panels at a blistering pace, far faster than anywhere else in the world, and the investment is starting to pay off. A study released Thursday found that the country’s carbon emissions edged down 1% in the first six months of the year compared to a year earlier, extending a trend that began in March 2024.

The good news is China’s carbon emissions may have peaked well ahead of a government target of doing so before 2030. But China, the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, will need to bring them down much more sharply to play its part in slowing global climate change.

For China to reach its declared goal of carbon neutrality by 2060, emissions would need to fall 3% on average over the next 35 years, said Lauri Myllyvirta, the Finland-based author of the study and lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air.

“China needs to get to that 3% territory as soon as possible,” he said.

China’s emissions have fallen even as it uses more electricity

China’s emissions have fallen before during economic slowdowns. What’s different this time is electricity demand is growing — up 3.7% in the first half of this year — but the increase in power from solar, wind and nuclear has easily outpaced that, according to Myllyvirta, who analyzes the most recent data in a study published on the U.K.-based Carbon Brief website.

A solar farm is visible in Hainan prefecture of western China’s Qinghai province on Tuesday, July 1, 2025. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

“We’re talking really for the first time about a structural declining trend in China’s emissions,” he said.

China installed 212 gigawatts of solar capacity in the first six months of the year, more than America’s entire capacity of 178 gigawatts as of the end of 2024, the study said. Electricity from solar has overtaken hydropower in China and is poised to surpass wind this year to become the country’s largest source of clean energy. Some 51 gigawatts of wind power was added from January to June.

Li Shuo, the director of the China Climate Hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute in Washington, described the plateauing of China’s carbon emissions as a turning point in the effort to combat climate change.

“This is a moment of global significance, offering a rare glimmer of hope in an otherwise bleak climate landscape,” he wrote in an email response. It also shows that a country can cut emissions while still growing economically, he said.

But Li cautioned that China’s heavy reliance on coal remains a serious threat to progress on climate and said the economy needs to shift to less resource-intensive sectors. “There’s still a long road ahead,” he said.

One solar farm can power 5 million households

A seemingly endless expanse of solar panels stretches toward the horizon on the Tibetan plateau. White two-story buildings rise above them at regular intervals. Sheep graze on the scrubby vegetation that grows under them.

Tibetan sheep graze at a solar farm in Hainan prefecture of western China’s Qinghai province on Tuesday, July 1, 2025. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

Solar panels have been installed on about two-thirds of the land. When completed, it will have more than 7 million panels and be capable of generating enough power for 5 million households.

Like many of China’s solar and wind farms, it was built in the relatively sparsely populated west. A major challenge is getting electricity to the population centers and factories in China’s east.

“The distribution of green energy resources is perfectly misaligned with the current industrial distribution of our country,” Zhang Jinming, the vice governor of Qinghai province, told journalists on a government-organized tour.

Part of the solution is building transmission lines traversing the country. One connects Qinghai to Henan province. Two more are planned, including one to Guangdong province in the southeast, almost at the opposite corner of the country.

Making full use of the power is hindered by the relatively inflexible way that China’s electricity grid is managed, tailored to the steady output of coal plants rather than more variable and less predictable wind and solar, Myllyvirta said.

“This is an issue that the policymakers have recognized and are trying to manage, but it does require big changes to the way coal-fired power plants operate and big changes to the way the transmission network operates,” he said. “So it’s no small task.”

Moritsugu reported from Beijing. Associated Press video producer Wayne Zhang contributed.

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