(MANILA, Philippines) — Archaeologists who discovered fossil bones and teeth of a previously unknown human species that thrived more than 50,000 years ago in the northern Philippines said Thursday they plan more diggings and called for better protection of the popular limestone cave complex where the remains were unearthed.

Filipino archaeologist Armand Salvador Mijares said the discovery of the remains in Callao Cave in Cagayan province made the Philippines an important research ground on human evolution. The new species is called Homo luzonensis after the main northern island of Luzon, where the remains were dug up starting in 2007.

Beaming with pride, Mijares displayed the six fragments of bones from the feet, hands and thigh and seven teeth of three individuals from that bygone era in a news conference at the state-run University of the Philippines. Tests showed two of the fossil fragments had minimum ages of 50,000 years and 67,000 years, according to a study published by the sc..

A senior Ecuadorian official says a Swedish software developer living in Quito and who is allegedly close to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has been arrested as authorities attempt to dismantle a blackmail ring that in recent days had threatened to retaliate against President Lenin Moreno.

The official said Ola Bini was arrested Thursday at Quito’s airport as he was preparing to board a flight for Japan.

The official spoke on the condition of anonymity and didn’t provide any additional details about Bini.

On a blog, a Swedish man by the same name describes himself as a software developer working in Quito for the Center for Digital Autonomy, a group based in Ecuador and Spain focused on privacy, security and cryptography issues. It makes no mention of any affiliation with Wikileaks.

On Twitter earlier Thursday, Bini called claims by the Interior Minister that Russian hackers and someone close to Wikileaks were working inside Ecuador “very worrisome” news. “This seems like a witch ..

Wikileaks is at the center of major questions in Robert Mueller’s investigation, including whether anyone involved in Donald Trump’s presidential campaign assisted the organization in releasing hacked materials. But the charge in the one-count indictment against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange unsealed on Thursday shortly after his arrest doesn’t speak to those questions or broader First Amendment issues.

In an indictment dated March 6, 2018, the United States charges Assange with one count of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion. The indictment alleges “that in March 2010, Assange engaged in a conspiracy with Chelsea Manning, a former intelligence analyst in the U.S. Army, to assist Manning in cracking a password stored on U.S. Department of Defense computers connected to the Secret Internet Protocol Network, a U.S. government network used for classified documents and communications.”

Conspiracy to commit computer intrusion, which violates the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, is th..

(YEHUD, Israel) — An Israeli spacecraft lost contact with Earth and crashed just moments before it was to land on the moon late Thursday, failing in an ambitious attempt to make history as the first privately funded lunar mission.

The spacecraft lost communication with ground control as it was making its final descent to the moon. Moments later, the mission was declared a failure.

“We definitely crashed on surface of moon,” said Opher Doron, general manager of the space division of Israel Aerospace Industries. He said the spacecraft was in pieces scattered at the planned landing site.

Doron said that the spacecraft’s engine turned off shortly before landing. By the time power was restored, he said the craft was moving too fast to land safely. Scientists were still trying to figure out the cause of the failure.

“One of the inertial measurement units failed. And that caused an unfortunate chain of events we’re not sure about,” he said. “The engine was turned off. The engine was stopp..