(AP) --- A judge on Tuesday prohibited several federal agencies and officials of the Biden administration from working with social media companies about “protected speech,” a decision called “a blow to censorship” by one of the Republican officials whose lawsuit prompted the ruling.

BEIJING (AP) — Global stock markets fell Wednesday as traders awaited a U.S. jobs update and notes from the latest Federal Reserve meeting for guidance on interest rates.

London, Shanghai, Paris and Tokyo declined. Wall Street futures were lower as U.S. markets prepared to reopen after a holiday. Oil prices were mixed.

July 4 (Reuters) - Ten people were killed and 38 wounded in mass shootings in Philadelphia, Baltimore and Fort Worth ahead of the Fourth of July holiday, officials said, prompting a fresh call from President Joe Biden to pass gun control legislation.

In Fort Worth, three people were killed and eight wounded in a mass shooting after a local festival to mark the U.S. Independence Day holiday, police said on Tuesday.

WASHINGTON, July 4 (Reuters) - A white powder found inside the White House late on Sunday was identified by Washington's fire department and emergency services as cocaine, a source familiar with the matter said on Tuesday.

The source said the powder was found in the West Wing, but gave no further details.

The West Wing is attached to the executive mansion where President Joe Biden lives. It houses the Oval Office, the cabinet room and press area, and offices and workspace for the president's staff.

BEIJING (AP) — China has imposed export curbs on two metals used in computer chips and solar cells, expanding a squabble with Washington over high-tech trade ahead of Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s visit to Beijing this week.

The controls on gallium and germanium are intended to “safeguard national security,” the Commerce Ministry said late Monday. It said exports will require official permission once the rules take effect Aug. 1 but did not say what restrictions might be applied.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (AP) — Nine people were shot and wounded, including two juveniles, early Wednesday in Washington, D.C., police said.

Shortly before 1 a.m. police responded to a report of a shooting on Meade Street in the northeastern quadrant of the U.S. capital, Assistant Chief Leslie Parsons of the Metropolitan Police Department said in a statement on Twitter.

Upon their arrival officers discovered multiple shooting victims, including a 9-year-old and a 17-year-old, Parsons said.

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union’s executive on Wednesday chided Poland and Hungary for democratic deficiencies that have been accerbated by measures taken or left unaddressed by the current governments.

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — China has abruptly canceled a visit to Beijing by the European Union’s top diplomat, the EU said Wednesday, amid ongoing disagreements between the two powers over trade, human rights and the Ukraine war.

(AP) --- The confidential documents stolen from schools and dumped online by ransomware gangs are raw, intimate and graphic. They describe student sexual assaults, psychiatric hospitalizations, abusive parents, truancy — even suicide attempts.

“Please do something,” begged a student in one leaked file, recalling the trauma of continually bumping into an ex-abuser at a school in Minneapolis. Other victims talked about wetting the bed or crying themselves to sleep.

BEIJING (AP) — China on Wednesday dismissed criticism of racially tinged comments by its top diplomat, who said Westerners are incapable of distinguishing among Chinese, Koreans and Japanese.

KANGVAI, India (AP) — Zuan Vaiphei is armed and prepared to kill. He is also ready to die.

Vaiphei spends most of his days behind the sandbag walls of a makeshift bunker, his fingers resting on the trigger of a 12-gauge shotgun. Some 1,000 yards ahead of him, between a field of tall green grass and wildflowers, is the enemy, peering from parapets of similar sandbag fortifications, armed and ready.

PUERTO IGUAZU (Argentina), July 5 (NNN-XINHUA) — Bolivian President Luis Arce on Tuesday rejected constraints imposed by the US financial system, urging the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) to “reduce dependence on the US dollar.”

In a speech at the 62nd Summit of Heads of State of Mercosur and Associated States in Puerto Iguazu, Argentina, Arce said the region “is seriously impacted by the restrictions and regulations imposed by the US financial system, which limit financing options and chances to access international markets.”