PHOENIX (AP) — Phoenix Suns guard Devin Booker will miss at least the next two games with left groin soreness in the latest blow to the team's starting lineup.
Booker left Thursday's game against the Indiana Pacers in the second half and didn't return. The four-time All-Star is averaging 25.1 points and 6.4 assists per game this season.
The Suns said Saturday that Booker would be reevaluated early next week.
Phoenix's All-Star trio of Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal and Booker has rarely been on the floor together over the past month. Beal and Durant both missed 10 games this season with various injuries, which is a big reason the Suns have lost 11 of their past 17 games.
Booker will miss games against the Detroit Pistons on Saturday and the Denver Nuggets on Monday.
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Phoenix Suns guard Devin Booker (1) drives between Indiana Pacers guard Bennedict Mathurin and center Myles Turner (33) during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024, in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri)
Phoenix Suns guard Devin Booker (1) drives on Indiana Pacers guard T.J. McConnell during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024, in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri)
TIRANA, Albania (AP) — Albania's prime minister said Saturday the government will shut down the video service TikTok for one year, blaming it for inciting violence and bullying, especially among children.
Albanian authorities held 1,300 meetings with teachers and parents following the stabbing death of a teenager in mid-November by another teen after a quarrel that started on TikTok.
Prime Minister Edi Rama, speaking at a meeting with teachers and parents, said TikTok “would be fully closed for all. ... There will be no TikTok in the Republic of Albania." Rama said the shutdown would begin sometime next year.
It was not immediately clear if TikTok has a contact in Albania.
TikTok in an email response Saturday to a request for comment asked for “urgent clarity from the Albanian government” on the case of the stabbed teenager. The company said it had "found no evidence that the perpetrator or victim had TikTok accounts, and multiple reports have in fact confirmed videos leading up to this incident were being posted on another platform, not TikTok.”
Albanian children comprise the largest group of TikTok users in the country, according to domestic researchers.
There has been increasing concern from Albanian parents after reports of children taking knives and other objects to school to use in quarrels or cases of bullying promoted by stories they see on TikTok.
TikTok's operations in China, where its parent company is based, are different, “promoting how to better study, how to preserve nature ... and so on,” according to Rama.
Albania is too small a country to impose on TikTok a change of its algorithm so that it does not promote “the reproduction of the unending hell of the language of hatred, violence, bullying and so on," Rama’s office wrote in an email response to The Associated Press' request for comment. Rama's office said that in China TikTok "prevents children from being sucked into this abyss.”
Authorities have set up a series of protective measures at schools, starting with an increased police presence, training programs and closer cooperation with parents.
Rama said Albania would follow how the company and other countries react to the one-year shutdown before deciding whether to allow the company to resume operations in Albania.
Not everyone agreed with Rama’s decision to close TikTok.
“The dictatorial decision to close the social media platform TikTok ... is a grave act against freedom of speech and democracy,” said Ina Zhupa, a lawmaker of the main opposition Democratic Party. “It is a pure electoral act and abuse of power to suppress freedoms.”
Albania holds parliamentary elections next year.
Follow Llazar Semini at https://x.com/lsemini
FILE - A view of the TikTok app logo, in Tokyo, Japan, Sept. 28, 2020. (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File)
