Category Archives: US News

New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern responds to Texas school shooting

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Prime minister says after 2019 Christchurch massacre, country made a ‘pragmatic’ decision to get guns off streets: ‘We saw something that wasn’t right and we acted’

New Zealand’s prime minister Jacinda Ardern says her country’s swift change to gun laws after the 2019 mass shooting in Christchurch was a “pragmatic” response, where “we saw something that wasn’t right and we acted on it”.

The prime minister was speaking as her visit to the United States coincided with the mass killing of 19 children at a school in Uvalde, Texas.

Ardern appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, which was filmed shortly after the Uvalde shooting. “When I watch from afar and see events such as this today, it’s not as a politician. I see them just as a mother,” an emotional Ardern said. “I’m so sorry for what has happened here.”

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North Korea fires suspected ICBM amid signs of preparation for nuclear test

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South Korea calls launches ‘grave provocation’ and detects experiment that suggests forthcoming nuclear test

North Korea has fired three ballistic missiles into the sea off its east coast, including one believed to have long-range capabilities, the South Korean military has said, a day after Joe Biden ended his first presidential visit to Asia.

Hours after the missile tests, South Korea said it had detected signs North Korea had conducted an experiment with a detonation device in preparation for a possible nuclear test, according to Yonhap news agency.

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Nineteen students and two adults killed in Texas elementary school shooting

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  • Joe Biden calls for action to stand up to gun lobby after worst school shooting since Sandy Hook
  • The gunman, identified by Governor Greg Abbott as an 18-year-old man, died at the scene, reportedly killed by the police

A teenage gunman has killed at least 19 children and two adults after storming into an elementary school in Texas, officials have said, the latest bout of gun-fueled mass killings in the United States and the nation’s worst school shooting since Sandy Hook a decade ago.

The carnage began when the 18-year-old suspect, identified as Salvador Ramos, shot his own grandmother, who is in a critical condition, authorities said.

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Five key takeaways: the US midterm elections

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Races from Georgia to Texas were a litmus test of Donald Trump’s hold on the Republican party with some significant losses

Brian Kemp, the Republican governor of Georgia, defeated former Senator David Perdue, who had been endorsed by Donald Trump. Perdue’s loss marked a significant defeat for Trump’s reputation as a kingmaker in the Republican party, as the former president has used the power of his endorsement to wield influence over candidates and lawmakers.

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Sandy Hook families speak out after Uvalde school shooting

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Bereaved say it is ‘beyond time to take action’ on gun control in the wake of the killing of 19 children in Texas

The families of people killed in the Sandy Hook elementary school shooting have pleaded for action on gun control in the wake of the killings at Robb elementary school in Texas.

Erica Leslie Lafferty, whose mother was killed in the massacre in Connecticut in 2012, said that it was “beyond time to take action” in the wake of the attack in Uvalde which has left at least 19 children and two adults dead.

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FBI says it foiled Islamic State sympathizer’s plot to kill George W Bush

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Bureau says in warrant that Ohio man Shihab Ahmed Shihab Shihab planned assassination out of revenge for Iraq war

The FBI claims an Islamic State sympathizer living in Ohio plotted to assassinate George W Bush, but confidential informants helped federal agents foil the plan, according to court records.

Details of the alleged scheme to kill the former president are laid out in a warrant that the FBI obtained in March to search the accused operative’s cellphone records, a 43-page document that was only unsealed in recent days.

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Cruelty of Canada’s residential schools ‘unimaginable’, governor general says

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Mary Simon, first Indigenous person to hold post, attends service at Kamloops school to honor thousands of children who died

Canada’s governor general has described the country’s residential schools as places of unimaginable cruelty, in a eulogy to honour the thousands of Indigenous children who died while attending the institutions.

“Today, we make ourselves heard across the country. Although it is hard, we are telling Canadians and the world about our wounds and pain,” Mary Simon, the Queen’s representative in Canada, told hundreds gathered on the grounds of the former Kamloops Indian residential school.

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FBI seeks arrest of man claiming to be North Korea ‘special delegate’

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Spaniard alleged to have conspired with cryptocurrency expert to help Pyongyang evade US sanctions

The FBI has issued an arrest warrant for a Spanish man who claims to be a “special delegate” working for the government of North Korea, accusing him of recruiting a cryptocurrency expert in an attempt to help Pyongyang circumvent US sanctions.

Alejandro Cao de Benós, a 47-year-old Spanish national who describes himself as Pyongyang’s special delegate for the committee for cultural relations with foreign countries, is alleged to have conspired with Virgil Griffith, a US cryptocurrency expert, to “illegally provide cryptocurrency and blockchain services to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK)”.

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‘The US is completely insane’: David Cronenberg on Roe v Wade at Cannes film festival

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The Canadian director made the comments at a press conference for his latest body horror film Crimes of the Future

David Cronenberg, director of Crash, The Naked Lunch and A History of Violence, has said that “the US is completely insane”.

Speaking to the press at the Cannes film festival premiere of his new film Crimes of the Future, Cronenberg referred specifically to attempts to overturn Roe v Wade. “In Canada … we think everyone in the US is completely insane. I think the US has gone completely bananas, and I can’t believe what the elected officials are saying, not just about Roe v Wade, so it is strange times.”

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Albanese insists ‘we will determine our values’ after Chinese premier reaches out to new PM

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Prime minister in Tokyo says no ‘serious person’ had believed Coalition line that a Labor government would adopt a softer approach towards Beijing

The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, says his government will not bend to demands from China to reset the strained relationship despite overtures from Beijing in the wake of Labor’s election win.

Speaking after a meeting of the quadrilateral security dialogue (Quad) in Tokyo on Tuesday, Albanese confirmed the Chinese premier, Li Keqiang, had sent a congratulatory letter to him following Saturday’s election win. The letter was first reported by Chinese state media Xinhua on Monday.

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Amazon bags £425m in work from UK government as it is criticised over tax

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Report claims public money from countries around the world is funding growth of tech company

Amazon has reaped a total of £425m in UK government contracts in the past two years, it has emerged in a report, prompting fresh criticism that the tech giant is failing to pay a fair share of tax in the country.

The report, by the Centre for International Corporate Tax Accountability and Research (CICTAR) with assistance from investigative thinktank Taxwatch, finds Amazon’s highly profitable cloud computing business is increasingly being indirectly supported by taxpayers through hundreds of billions of dollars in government contracts around the world.

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Joe Biden: invasion of Ukraine shows need for free and open Indo-Pacific

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Leaders of US, India, Japan and Australia meet in Tokyo for Quad summit Beijing claims is an attempt to contain China

The turmoil caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has underlined the need for a free Indo-Pacific region, Joe Biden has said at a meeting with regional partners that Beijing has condemned as part of a US-led attempt to contain China.

Biden and the leaders of a loose alliance known as the Quad – India, Japan and Australia – reaffirmed their commitment to a “free and open” Indo-Pacific during talks in Tokyo on Tuesday. The comments came one day after the US president said Washington would be ready to intervene militarily to defend Taiwan, prompting China to accuse him of “playing with fire”.

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Capitol rioter who sprayed police with fire extinguisher sentenced to three years

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Matthew Ryan Miller from Maryland draped himself in a far right-affiliated flag and used a barricade as a ladder to scale walls

A Maryland man who draped himself in a far right-affiliated flag and sprayed a fire extinguisher at police during the deadly Capitol attack on January 6 has been sentenced to nearly three years in prison, according to federal court records.

Matthew Ryan Miller, 23, pleaded guilty in February to felony obstruction of an official proceeding – that day’s joint congressional session to certify Joe Biden’s win over Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election – as well as assaulting, resisting or impeding police officers.

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Roman sculpture up for auction in US linked to disgraced dealer

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Exclusive: researcher calls for sale of marble head of Greek philosopher Antisthenes to be halted

An archaeologist is calling for a US auction house to withdraw a monumental Roman sculpture from sale, claiming he has photographic evidence of its direct link to a dealer involved with illicit trade.

Prof Christos Tsirogiannis, whose academic research focuses on antiquities and trafficking networks, said Hindman Auctions in Chicago should cancel its auction of the portrait head of Antisthenes, the Greek philosopher, scheduled for Thursday.

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New York subpoenas Trump’s longtime assistant in business dealings inquiry

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Rhona Graff will be questioned about the former president’s involvement in the Trump Organization’s financial records

The New York attorney general’s office has subpoenaed Donald Trump’s longtime executive assistant and plans to question her under oath next week as part of its civil investigation into the former president’s business dealings.

The subpoena for Rhona Graff was disclosed by a lawyer for the attorney general Letitia James’ office in court papers opposing Trump’s latest bid to rid himself of a contempt of court order for being slow to respond to a subpoena for documents and other evidence.

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Surgeon casts doubt on Johnny Depp’s account of how he severed finger

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Richard Moore says he is sceptical of claim that Depp injured finger during Amber Heard fight, as defamation trial enters final week

The defamation trial of Johnny Depp and Amber Heard entered its fifth and final week of testimony on Monday, with a witness for Heard testifying that Depp could not have lost the tip of his finger during a domestic fight in the way he had recounted.

The serious injury to his middle finger, which occurred during a March 2015 row in Australia between Depp and Heard during their brief marriage, has been one of several key points of dispute in the civil case.

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Military plane rushes baby formula to US health systems

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Stores remain low on supplies but flight brings enough to fill half a million bottles for children with allergies

Store shelves across the US remain short of baby formula after a military plane carrying enough to fill half a million baby bottles arrived in the US on Sunday but its contents were rushed to health system outlets to feed babies with specific allergies.

The first of several such flights from Europe, aimed at relieving a nationwide shortage that has sent parents scrambling to find enough to feed their infants, was packed with specialty hypoallergenic formula to be distributed through channels such as hospitals, doctors’ officers and pharmacies, for babies intolerant of the protein in cow’s milk.

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Activision Blizzard’s Raven Software workers vote to form industry’s first union

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The vote marks a victory for labor advocates in an industry mired with allegations of abuse and poor working conditions

Workers in a division of video game company Activision Blizzard have voted to unionize, creating the first labor union at a major US gaming firm.

A small group of Wisconsin-based quality assurance testers at Activision Blizzard’s Raven Software, which develops the popular Call of Duty game franchise, voted 19-3 in favor of unionizing on Monday.

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Joe Biden says US recession ‘is not inevitable’ despite rampant inflation – live

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Poll finds 77% of Americans ‘pessimistic’ about cost of goods and services in coming months

• US would defend Taiwan if attacked by China, says Joe Biden

• Capitol attack panel to hold six public hearings

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The House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol is expected to stage six public hearings in June on how Donald Trump and some allies broke the law as they sought to overturn the 2020 election results, according to sources familiar with the inquiry.

The hearings are set to be a pivotal political moment for the country as the panel aims to publicly outline the potentially unlawful schemes that tried to keep the former president in office despite his defeat at the hands of Joe Biden.

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Man shot and killed on New York subway in latest ‘unprovoked’ attack

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Police investigate death of Daniel Enriquez on busy train on Sunday morning

An unidentified man shot and killed a passenger on a subway train in New York in what police officials said appeared to be an unprovoked attack.

The incident happened on a Q train travelling over the Manhattan Bridge at about 11.40am on Sunday, a time when the subway is often filled with families, tourists and people heading to brunch.

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