By ILLIA NOVIKOV, Associated Press

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian activists called for more protests Wednesday against a law they say weakens the country’s anti-corruption watchdogs, following the first major demonstration against the country’s government in more than three years of war. The legislation has also drawn rebukes from European Union officials and international rights groups.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, under pressure as the change threatened to endanger his public support at a critical time in the war, convened the heads of Ukraine’s key anti-corruption and security agencies Wednesday morning in a response to the outcry against his decision to approve the new law that was passed by Parliament.

“We all hear what society says,” Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram after the meeting. But he insisted the new legal framework was needed to crack down harder on corruption.

A man waves a flag during a protest against a law targeting anti-corruption institutions in central Kyiv, Ukraine, Tuesday, July 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Alex Babenko)

“Criminal cases should not drag on for years without verdicts, and those working against Ukraine must not feel comfortable or immune from punishment,” the Ukrainian leader said.

He said all government agencies agreed to work constructively and respond to public expectations for fairness and effectiveness. A detailed joint action plan is expected within two weeks, aimed at addressing institutional weaknesses, removing legal hurdles, and ensuring justice across the board, he said.

Thousands of people gathered in the capital and other cities across Ukraine on Tuesday evening to urge Zelenskyy to veto the controversial bill. After Zelenskyy approved it, activists called on social media for another demonstration in the center of Kyiv at 8 p.m. Wednesday.

The legislation tightens government oversight of two key anti-corruption agencies. Critics say the step could significantly weaken the independence of those agencies and grant Zelenskyy’s circle greater influence over investigations.

EU officials warn of possible setback to joining bloc

Fighting entrenched corruption is crucial for Ukraine’s aspirations to join the EU and maintain access to billions of dollars in Western aid in its fight against Russia’s three-year invasion.

“Limiting the independence of Ukraine’s anti-corruption agency hampers Ukraine’s way towards the EU,” German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul warned Wednesday in a post on X.

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EU Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius, also on X, noted: “In war trust between the fighting nation and its leadership is more important than modern weapons — difficult to build and to keep, but easy to lose with one significant mistake by the leadership.”

The Ukrainian branch of Transparency International criticized Parliament’s decision, saying it undermines one of the most significant reforms since what Ukraine calls its Revolution of Dignity in 2014, and damages trust with international partners. It accused authorities of “dismantling” the country’s anti-corruption architecture.

Zelenskyy has been the international face of Ukraine’s determination to defeat Russia’s all-out invasion, and his domestic troubles are an unwelcome diversion from the war effort.

Zelenskyy said the new law clears out “Russian influence” from the fight against corruption and ensures punishment for those found guilty of it, after what he said were yearslong delays in criminal proceedings involving huge amounts of money.

“The cases that have been lying dormant must be investigated,” Zelenskyy said in a Telegram post after midnight Wednesday. “For years, officials who have fled Ukraine have been casually living abroad for some reason – in very nice countries and without legal consequences – and this is not normal,” he said.

He didn’t provide examples of what he said was Russian interference.

Russian officials relished Zelenskyy’s difficulties. Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova mocked Zelenskyy’s claim of Russian infiltration into the anti-corruption agency, noting sarcastically that “they might just as well pull a couple of bears out of the corner.”

Russia and Ukraine plan talks in Istanbul

Delegations from Russia and Ukraine were set to meet in Istanbul on Wednesday for their third round of direct talks in two months, the Kremlin and Ukrainian officials said. The meeting wasn’t expected to make progress on ending the war and would likely focus on exchanges of prisoners of war.

The legal changes in Ukraine would grant the prosecutor general new authority over investigations and cases handled by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO).

The mood of anger and frustration among the war-weary Ukrainians prevailed in the crowd Tuesday. Some protesters accused Ukraine’s leadership of prioritizing loyalty and personal connections over the fight against corruption.

“Those who swore to protect the laws and the Constitution have instead chosen to shield their inner circle, even at the expense of Ukrainian democracy,” said veteran Oleh Symoroz, sitting in a wheelchair because both his legs were amputated after he was wounded in 2022.

By MATT O’BRIEN and ALI SWENSON, Associated Press

An artificial intelligence agenda that started coalescing on the podcasts of Silicon Valley billionaires is now being forged into U.S. policy as President Donald Trump leans on the ideas of the tech figures who backed his election campaign.

Trump on Wednesday is planning to reveal an “AI Action Plan” he ordered after returning to the White House in January. He gave his tech advisers six months to come up with new AI policies after revoking President Joe Biden’s signature AI guardrails on his first day in office.

The unveiling is co-hosted by the bipartisan Hill and Valley Forum and the All-In Podcast, a business and technology show hosted by four tech investors and entrepreneurs who include Trump’s AI czar, David Sacks.

The plan and related executive orders are expected to include some familiar tech lobby pitches. That includes accelerating the sale of AI technology abroad and making it easier to construct the energy-hungry data center buildings that are needed to form and run AI products, according to a person briefed on Wednesday’s event who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

It might also include some of the AI culture war preoccupations of the circle of venture capitalists who endorsed Trump last year.

Blocking ‘woke AI’ from tech contractors

Countering the liberal bias they see in AI chatbots such as ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini has long been a rallying point for the tech industry’s loudest Trump backers.

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Sacks, a former PayPal executive and now Trump’s top AI adviser, has been criticizing “woke AI” for more than a year, fueled by Google’s February 2024 rollout of an AI image generator that, when asked to show an American Founding Father, created pictures of Black, Asian and Native American men.

“The AI’s incapable of giving you accurate answers because it’s been so programmed with diversity and inclusion,” Sacks said at the time. Google quickly fixed its tool, but the “Black George Washington” moment remained a parable for the problem of AI’s perceived political bias, taken up by X owner Elon Musk, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, Vice President JD Vance and Republican lawmakers.

The administration’s latest push against “woke AI” comes a week after the Pentagon announced new $200 million contracts with four leading AI companies, including Google, to address “critical national security challenges.”

Also receiving one of the contracts was Musk’s xAI, which has been pitched as an alternative to “woke AI” companies. The company has faced its own challenges: Earlier this month, xAI had to scramble to remove posts made by its Grok chatbot that made antisemitic comments and praised Adolf Hitler.

Streamlining AI data center permits

Trump has paired AI’s need for huge amounts of electricity with his own push to tap into U.S. energy sources, including gas, coal and nuclear.

“Everything we aspire to and hope for means the demand and supply of energy in America has to go up,” said Michael Kratsios, the director of the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy, in a video posted Tuesday.

Many tech giants are already well on their way toward building new data centers in the U.S. and around the world. OpenAI announced this week that it has switched on the first phase of a massive data center complex in Abilene, Texas, part of an Oracle-backed project known as Stargate that Trump promoted earlier this year. Amazon, Microsoft, Meta and xAI also have major projects underway.

The tech industry has pushed for easier permitting rules to get their computing facilities connected to power, but the AI building boom has also contributed to spiking demand for fossil fuel production that will contribute to global warming.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday called on the world’s major tech firms to power data centers completely with renewables by 2030.

“A typical AI data center eats up as much electricity as 100,000 homes,” Guterres said. “By 2030, data centers could consume as much electricity as all of Japan does today.”

A new approach to AI exports?

It’s long been White House policy under Republican and Democratic administrations to curtail certain technology exports to China and other adversaries on national security grounds.

But much of the tech industry argued that Biden went too far at the end of his term in trying to restrict the exports of specialized AI computer chips to more than 100 other countries, including close allies.

Part of the Biden administration’s motivation was to stop China from acquiring coveted AI chips in third-party locations such as Southeast Asia or the Middle East, but critics said the measures would end up encouraging more countries to turn to China’s fast-growing AI industry instead of the U.S. as their technology supplier.

It remains to be seen how the Trump administration aims to accelerate the export of U.S.-made AI technologies while countering China’s AI ambitions. California chipmakers Nvidia and AMD both announced last week that they won approval from the Trump administration to sell to China some of their advanced computer chips used to develop artificial intelligence.

AMD CEO Lisa Su is among the guests planning to attend Trump’s event Wednesday.

Who benefits from Trump’s AI action plan

There are sharp debates on how to regulate AI, even among the influential venture capitalists who have been debating it on their favorite medium: the podcast.

While some Trump backers, particularly Andreessen, have advocated an “accelerationist” approach that aims to speed up AI advancement with minimal regulation, Sacks has described himself as taking a middle road of techno-realism.

“Technology is going to happen. Trying to stop it is like ordering the tides to stop. If we don’t do it, somebody else will,” Sacks said on the All-In podcast.

On Tuesday, 95 groups including labor unions, parent groups, environmental justice organizations and privacy advocates signed a resolution opposing Trump’s embrace of industry-driven AI policy and calling for a “People’s AI Action Plan” that would “deliver first and foremost for the American people.”

Amba Kak, co-executive director of the AI Now Institute, which helped lead the effort, said the coalition expects Trump’s plan to come “straight from Big Tech’s mouth.”

“Every time we say, ‘What about our jobs, our air, water, our children?’ they’re going to say, ‘But what about China?’” she said in a call with reporters Tuesday. She said Americans should reject the White House’s argument that the industry is overregulated and fight to preserve “baseline protections for the public” as AI technology advances.

Associated Press writer Seung Min Kim in Washington contributed to this report.

By REBECCA BOONE, Associated Press

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — A judge is expected to order Bryan Kohberger to serve four life sentences without parole this week for the brutal stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho students nearly three years ago.

Wednesday’s sentencing hearing will give the families of Xana Kernodle, Madison Mogen, Ethan Chapin and Kaylee Goncalves the opportunity to describe the anguish they’ve felt since their loved ones were killed in the early morning hours of Nov. 13, 2022.

Brian Kohberger, charged in the murders of four University of Idaho students, appears at the Ada County Courthouse, Wednesday, July 2, 2025, in Boise, Idaho. (AP Photo/Kyle Green, Pool)

Kohberger was a graduate student at Washington State University when he broke into a nearby rental home through a kitchen sliding door and killed the four friends who appeared to have no connection with him.

Police initially had no suspects, and the killings terrified the normally quiet community in the small, western Idaho city of Moscow. Some students at both universities left mid-semester, taking the rest of their classes online because they felt unsafe.

But investigators had a few critical clues. A knife sheath left near Mogen’s body had a single source of male DNA on the button snap, and surveillance videos showed a white Hyundai Elantra near the rental home around the time of the murders.

Police used genetic genealogy to identify Kohberger as a possible suspect, and accessed cellphone data to pinpoint his movements the night of the killings. Online shopping records showed Kohberger had purchased a military-style knife months earlier, along with a sheath like the one at the home.

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Kohberger was arrested in Pennsylvania about six weeks after the killings. He initially stood silent when asked to enter a plea, so a judge entered a “not guilty” plea on his behalf.

Both the investigation and the court case drew widespread attention. Discussion groups proliferated online, members eagerly sharing their theories and questions about the case. Some self-styled armchair web-sleuths pointed fingers at innocent people simply because they knew the victims or lived in the same town. Misinformation spread, piling additional distress on the already-traumatized community.

As the criminal case unfolded, Latah County Prosecutor Bill Thompson announced that he would seek the death penalty if Kohberger was convicted. The court-defense team, led by attorney Anne Taylor, challenged the validity of the DNA evidence, unsuccessfully pushed to get theories about possible “alternate perpetrators” admitted in court, and repeatedly asked the judge to take the death penalty off of the table.

But those efforts largely failed, and the evidence against Kohberger was strong. With an August trial looming, Kohberger reached a plea deal. Prosecutors agreed to drop their efforts to get a death sentence in exchange for Kohberger’s guilty plea to four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary. Both sides agreed to a proposed sentence of four consecutive life sentences without parole, plus an additional 10 years for the burglary charge. Kohberger also waived his right to appeal any issues in the case.

By ANDREW DALTON, Associated Press Entertainment Writer

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A doctor charged with giving Matthew Perry ketamine in the weeks leading up to the “Friends” star’s overdose death is expected to plead guilty Wednesday.

Dr. Salvador Plasencia would be the fourth of five people charged in connection with Perry’s death to plead guilty.

Plasencia was to have gone on trial in August until the doctor agreed last month to plead guilty to four counts of distribution of ketamine, according to the signed document filed in federal court in Los Angeles.

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He had previously pleaded not guilty, but in exchange for the guilty pleas prosecutors have agreed to drop three additional counts of distribution of ketamine and two counts of falsifying records.

Plasencia’s attorneys emphasized in an email after he reached his agreement that he “was not treating Matthew Perry at the time of his death and the ketamine that caused Mr. Perry’s death was not provided by Dr. Plasencia.”

The remaining charges can carry a maximum sentence of 40 years in prison, and there is no guarantee he’ll get less, but he’s likely to. Plasencia has been free on bond since shortly after his arrest in August. He will not be sentenced until a future hearing.

The only remaining defendant who has not reached an agreement with the U.S. Attorney’s Office is Jasveen Sangha, who prosecutors allege is a drug dealer known as the “Ketamine Queen” and sold Perry the lethal dose. Her trial is scheduled to begin next month. She has pleaded not guilty.

According to prosecutors and co-defendants who reached their own deals, Plasencia illegally supplied Perry with a large amount of ketamine starting about a month before his death on Oct. 28, 2023.

According to a co-defendant, Plasencia in a text message called the actor a “moron” who could be exploited for money.

Perry’s personal assistant, his friend, and another doctor all agreed to plead guilty last year in exchange for their cooperation as the government sought to make their case against larger targets, Plasencia and Sangha. None have been sentenced yet.

Perry was found dead by the assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa. The medical examiner ruled that ketamine, typically used as a surgical anesthetic, was the primary cause of death.

The actor had been using the drug through his regular doctor in a legal but off-label treatment for depression, which has become increasingly common. Perry, 54, began seeking more ketamine than his doctor would give him.

Plasencia admitted in his plea agreement that another patient connected him with Perry, and that starting about a month before Perry’s death, he illegally supplied the actor with 20 vials of ketamine totaling 100 mg of the drug, along with ketamine lozenges and syringes.

He admitted to enlisting another doctor, Mark Chavez, to supply the drug for him, according to the court filings.

“I wonder how much this moron will pay,” Plasencia texted Chavez, according to Chavez’s plea agreement.

After selling the drugs to Perry for $4,500, Plasencia allegedly asked Chavez if he could keep supplying them so they could become Perry’s “go-to,” prosecutors said.

Perry struggled with addiction for years, dating back to his time on “Friends,” when he became one of the biggest stars of his generation as Chandler Bing. He starred alongside Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc and David Schwimmer for 10 seasons from 1994 to 2004 on NBC’s megahit.