Officials in South Korea entered the compound of President Yoon Suk Yeol to try to take him in for questioning over insurrection charges Friday. But after clearing away crowds of supporters attempting to block their path, they appeared to be in a standoff inside the residence with the president’s personal security team as the high-stakes drama unfolded.

It was the latest move by officials to hold Yoon accountable for his short-lived declaration of martial law last month that plunged the country into a political crisis.

Yoon, who was impeached by parliament last month, has ignored repeated summonses from the investigators to appear for questioning, saying it was within his powers as president to place his country under military rule for the first time in 45 years. Thousands of his supporters have camped near his residence in recent days, vowing to block officials from detaining him. Large numbers of police officers were deployed around the neighborhood to maintain order.

Lawyers for Yoon repeated their assertion Friday that the attempt to detain him was illegal. “The execution of an illegal and invalid warrant is clearly unlawful,” they said.

As the motorcade carrying the officials with the detention warrant approached Yoon’s residence Friday morning, supporters who had camped out overnight on a nearby pavement erupted in anger. But police held them off with barricades, preventing the protesters from trying to stop the officials from reaching Yoon’s residence.

White House girds for bird flu outbreak

The Biden administration, in a final push to shore up the nation’s pandemic preparedness before President-elect Donald Trump takes office, announced Thursday that it would nearly double the amount of money it was committing to ward off a potential outbreak of bird flu in humans.

Federal health officials have been keeping a close eye on H5N1, a strain of avian influenza that is highly contagious and lethal to chickens, and has spread to cattle. The virus has not yet demonstrated that it can spread efficiently among people.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that the current risk to humans remains low and that pasteurized milk products remain safe to consume. But should human-to-human transmission become commonplace, experts fear a pandemic that could be far more deadly than COVID-19.

On Thursday, the administration said it was committing $306 million toward improving hospital preparedness, early stage research on therapeutics, diagnostics and vaccines. About $103 million will help maintain state and local efforts to track and test people exposed to infected animals, and for outreach to livestock workers and others at high risk.

Biden barely surpasses Trump’s judicial picks

In public remarks Thursday, President Joe Biden celebrated the confirmation of 235 federal judges over the course of his presidency, the culmination of an intense effort by Democrats in his term’s waning months to match President-elect Donald Trump’s total four years ago.

The 235 federal judges confirmed to lifetime positions by the Senate, including one Supreme Court justice, barely surpassed the 234 confirmed under Trump during his first term.

In reaching that milestone, Biden said his legacy would be creating a bulwark against threats to democracy and empowering individuals who would respect legal precedent — a subtle nod to the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade and other major reversals that occurred during his presidency.

Court system won’t refer Thomas to DOJ

The federal courts will not refer allegations that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas may have violated ethics laws to the Justice Department, the judiciary’s policymaking body said Thursday.

Thomas has agreed to follow updated requirements on reporting trips and gifts, including clearer guidelines on hospitality from friends, the U.S. Judicial Conference wrote to Democratic senators who had called for an investigation into undisclosed acceptance of luxury trips.

Thomas has previously said he wasn’t required to disclose the many trips he and his wife took that were paid for by wealthy benefactors like Republican megadonor Harlan Crow because they are close personal friends. The court didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.

3 dead in Honolulu fireworks explosion

Emergency crews arrived to a chaotic and gruesome scene in a Honolulu neighborhood after a large New Year’s firework tipped over after being lit and ignited a fiery, shrapnel-studded blast that killed three people and injured more than 20 others, several of them critically.

Two women died at the scene and a third woman died at a hospital, authorities said Wednesday as they implored people to abandon their New Year’s tradition of setting off fireworks across the city. Officials promised tougher penalties for illegal fireworks.

Hawaii Gov. Josh Green graphically described the deaths in a news conference Wednesday to emphasize the potential danger of fireworks. “We’re talking about the worst possible, war-zone injuries that took their lives.”

Police were investigating whether charges for the person who lit the firework near midnight were warranted.

2 dead as plane crashes into California factory

Two people died and 18 were injured Thursday when a small plane crashed through the roof of a sprawling furniture manufacturing building in Southern California where at least 200 people were working, police said.

The identities of the people who died, and whether they had been in the plane or on the ground, was not yet known, said Kristy Wells, a Fullerton police spokesperson.

The plane crashed less than two minutes after taking off from the Fullerton Municipal Airport in Orange County, located just six miles from Disneyland, according to the flight-tracking website FlightAware. Security camera footage from Rucci Forged, a wheel manufacturer across the street, shows the plane was tilted on its side as it dived into the building, causing a fiery explosion and black plume of smoke to rise.

The Federal Aviation Administration said the plane was a single-engine Van’s RV-10, a four-seat aircraft. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the crash.

$20K diamond tops White House gifts

President Joe Biden and his family were given tens of thousands of dollars in gifts from foreign leaders in 2023, according to an annual accounting published by the State Department on Thursday, with first lady Jill Biden receiving the single most expensive present: a $20,000 diamond from India’s leader.

The 7.5-carat diamond from Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was easily the most costly gift presented to any member of the first family in 2023.

Federal law requires executive branch officials to declare gifts they receive from foreign leaders and counterparts that have an estimated value of more than $480. Many of the gifts that meet that threshold are relatively modest, and the more expensive ones are typically — but not always — transferred to the National Archives or put on official displays.

The $20,000 diamond was retained for official use in the White House East Wing, according to a State Department document.

Mother orca repeats rite for her dead calf

An endangered Pacific Northwest orca that made global headlines in 2018 for carrying her dead calf for over two weeks is doing so once again following the death of her new calf, in another sign of grief over lost offspring, researchers said.

The mother orca, known as Tahlequah or J35, has been seen carrying the body of the deceased female calf since Wednesday, the Washington state-based Center for Whale Research said in a Facebook post.

“The entire team at the Center for Whale Research is deeply saddened by this news and we will continue to provide updates when we can,” the post said.

In 2018, researchers observed J35 pushing her dead calf along for 17 days, propping it up for more than 1,000 miles. The calf had died shortly after it was born, and the mother and her closely knit pod of whales were seen taking turns carrying the body.

NYC subway victim expected to recover

A man survived being shoved onto subway tracks ahead of an incoming train in New York City on New Year’s Eve and is expected to fully recover, relatives said, while the person accused of pushing him was being held without bail Thursday on attempted murder and assault charges.

Joseph Lynskey, 45, was standing on the platform in the West 18th Street station in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood on Tuesday afternoon when another man pushed him onto the tracks as a 1 train approached. Police called it a random attack.

Lynskey’s condition has been upgraded from critical to stable, police said. His injuries include a fractured skull, broken ribs and a ruptured spleen.

Space junk falls in Kenyan village

A glowing ring of metal, more than 8 feet in diameter and weighing more than 1,100 pounds, fell from the sky and crash-landed in a remote village in Kenya this week, causing no injuries but frightening residents who feared a bomb or worse.

The object turned out to be space debris — junk left over from six decades of space exploration and a growing number of commercial launches, the Kenya Space Agency said Wednesday. It identified the object as a separation ring from a launch rocket and said that it was investigating the ring’s origin and ownership.

“Such objects are usually designed to burn up as they reenter the Earth’s atmosphere or to fall over unoccupied areas, such as the oceans,” the space agency said, describing the incident as “an isolated case.”

Federal agents search home of ex-NYC cop

Federal agents on Thursday searched the home of a former top New York City police official who resigned late last month after he was accused of demanding sex from a subordinate in exchange for opportunities to earn extra pay.

Law enforcement officials executed warrants on multiple locations, including the home of Jeffrey Maddrey, the highest-ranking uniformed officer in the NYPD, as part of a joint investigation, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said in a statement.

An FBI spokesperson confirmed that agents had carried out “court-authorized law enforcement activity” at Maddrey’s Queens address. It was not immediately known what other locations were searched.

Wayne Osmond, member of troupe, dies

Wayne Osmond, an original member of the family singing group the Osmonds, which had a string of pop hits in the 1970s and helped launch the careers of his more renowned siblings Donny and Marie, died Wednesday in Salt Lake City. He was 73.

His death, at University of Utah Hospital, was caused by complications from a recent stroke, his daughter Amy Cook said.

As an original member of the group, which began as a sibling quartet initially called the Osmond Brothers, Wayne and his brothers were child stars who later became ubiquitous pop stars in the 1970s. As practicing Mormons, the family built a brand around resisting the temptations of fame while capturing the spirit of the era with their flared jumpsuits and rollicking dance choreography.

— News service reports