Category Archives: US News

New York and other north-eastern US states see a rapid fall in Covid cases

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Despite decreasing positivity rates, hospitals continue to struggle amid a surging patient load and staff shortages

New York City and some north-eastern US states appear to be seeing rapid decreases in their numbers of Covid-19 cases in recent days, raising the possibility that the Omicron wave has now already peaked in some parts of America.

In New York City the rolling seven-day average of new cases was less than 28,000 a day on 16 January, down from an average of more than 40,000 on 9 January.

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Capitol attack panel grapples with moving inquiry forward: to subpoena or not?

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The committee is undecided on making the near-unprecedented step as the threat of Republican retaliation looms

The House select committee investigating the Capitol attack is weighing whether to subpoena some of Donald Trump’s top allies on Capitol Hill as it considers its options on how aggressively it should pursue testimony to move forward its inquiry into the January 6 insurrection.

The Republican House minority leader Kevin McCarthy and Republican members of Congress Jim Jordan and Scott Perry may have inside knowledge about Trump’s plan to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election and whether it was coordinated with the Capitol attack.

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‘It’s a tough time’: why is Biden one of the most unpopular US presidents?

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Puzzle of Biden’s unpopularity has some pieces within his control and some not, experts say, as Covid casts a shadow over his first year in office

Joe Biden ends his first year in office at a particularly bleak moment for a US president who promised competency and normalcy.

Much of his domestic agenda is stalled on Capitol Hill, impeded by members of his own party. The virus is once again raging out of control: daily infections of Covid-19 have soared to record levels, hospitalizing more Americans than at any previous point during the pandemic. The administration’s vaccine-or-testing mandate for large employers was blocked by the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority. Inflation is at a nearly 40-year high. Diplomatic talks have so far failed to pull Russia back from the brink of war with Ukraine.

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MLK’s family and activists honor civil rights leader with voting rights march

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Martin Luther King III said ‘stakes could not be higher to protect and expand’ his father’s legacy of activism and racial justice

The family of Martin Luther King Jr and other civil rights activists in America are honoring the late civil rights leader on Monday by pushing for expanded federal voting rights legislation despite political opposition from Republicans.

Martin Luther King III, King’s eldest son, his wife, Arndrea Waters King, and their daughter, Yolanda Renee King, will lead a march on Monday morning across the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge in Washington DC.

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‘Florida’s Trump’: DeSantis focusing on nonexistent issues as election looms, critics say

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Opponents say the governor leans on ‘wokeness’ and culture war issues that are irrelevant to the real needs of Floridians

There are still almost 10 months until Florida’s voters elect their next governor, but the campaign of the Republican incumbent, Ron DeSantis, appears well under way.

In a red-meat-for-the-base address at the opening of Florida’s legislature last week, themed around the concept of “freedom” but described by critics as a fanfare of authoritarianism, DeSantis gave a clear indication of the issues he believes are on voters’ minds. They include fighting the White House over Covid-19, ballot box fraud, critical race theory in schools and defunding law enforcement.

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Joe Biden says Texas synagogue siege was an ‘act of terror’ – video

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The US president said the 10-hour hostage standoff in a Texas synagogue, which ended with an FBI Swat team rushing into the building and the captor's death, was 'an act of terror'. Authorities identified the hostage-taker as a 44-year-old British national, Malik Faisal Akram, who was killed on Saturday night after the last hostages ran out of Congregation Beth Israel at about 9pm. Late on Sunday, police in Manchester in the UK announced that two teenagers were in custody in connection with the standoff

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‘I have no intention of getting infected’: understanding Omicron’s severity

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Experts on whether getting Covid is inevitable and why, despite claims of ‘mildness’, the variant is highly dangerous

Leaders in the US have struck a pessimistic tone about the Covid-19 pandemic in recent weeks amid rapid spread of the Omicron variant.

Janet Woodcock, acting commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration, recently testified before Congress that “most people are going to get Covid”. Dr Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to Joe Biden, has also said that Omicron “​​will ultimately find just about everybody” in terms of exposure, though vaccines make an important difference in who develops the illness.

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Iran nuclear talks deadlock risks dangerous vacuum

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Analysis: As clock runs down on Vienna talks, key obstacles remain to be cleared by Tehran and the west

The countdown to the end of the six-month-long talks in Vienna on the future of the Iran nuclear deal has begun. No deadline has been formally set, but if there is no progress in less than two weeks the process will come to an end leaving a dangerous vacuum.

The White House has already been rolling the pitch preparing its political lines for a breakdown by saying the US withdrawal from the agreement by Donald Trump in 2018 has proved to be a disaster. If there is no agreement, the Biden team intend Trump will take the blame.

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How the Tonga volcano has been felt around the world – video

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A large underwater volcano in Tonga has sent huge swells around the world affecting countries bordering the Pacific Ocean. The tsunami waves caused damage to boats as far away as New Zealand and large swells were seen in California and Japan but did not appear to cause any widespread damage. Two people have drowned off a beach in northern Peru, local authorities say, after unusually high waves were recorded in several coastal areas

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Pacific tsunami damage unclear as volcano ash blankets Tonga

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Conditions hinder communications and surveillance of towns believed to have been inundated by waves

A thick blanket of ash from a huge undersea volcanic eruption has covered the Pacific Island nation of Tonga, contaminating water supplies, cutting off communications and preventing surveillance flights assessing the extent of damage from tsunami waves that are believed to have inundated entire towns.

Videos shared on social media after Saturday night’s eruption showed people running for higher ground as the metre-high floods hit coastal areas and made their way inland while the sky darkened with ash. A sonic boom could be heard as far away as Alaska.

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‘An act of terror’: Biden condemns Texas synagogue siege while FBI names Briton as hostage-taker

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All four hostages survived unharmed while Malik Faisal Akram, 44, was killed when FBI stormed synagogue after 11-hour standoff

US president Joe Biden has condemned a tense 11-hour hostage standoff at a synagogue in Texas on Saturday as “an act of terror”, as the FBI named the armed assailant as Malik Faisal Akram, a 44-year-old British national.

Akram was pronounced dead after the FBI stormed the Congregation Beth Israel synagogue in the Dallas suburb of Colleyville on Saturday evening. All four hostages survived the siege and were unharmed, according to local police.

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Tens of thousands without power as winter storm blasts US south-east

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Dangerous storm with high winds and ice sweeps through as highway patrols report hundreds of vehicle accidents

A dangerous winter storm combining high winds and ice began sweeping through parts of the US south-east on Sunday, knocking out power, felling trees and fences and coating roads with a treacherous frigid glaze.

Tens of thousands of customers were without power in Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Florida. Highway patrols were reporting hundreds of vehicle accidents, and a tornado ripped through a trailer park in Florida. More than 1,200 Sunday flights at Charlotte Douglas international were cancelled more than 90% of the airport’s Sunday schedule, according to the flight tracking service flightaware.com.

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Joe Biden’s first year: Covid, climate, the economy, racial justice and democracy

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How has the president fared on the four big issues he outlined at his inauguration – and the one he couldn’t ignore

One year ago on Thursday, Joe Biden took the oath of office as the 46th president at the US Capitol in an inauguration ceremony devoid of the usual crowds due to pandemic restrictions.

Biden identified four crises facing America: the coronavirus, the climate, the economy and racial justice. He could have added a fifth: a crisis of democracy in a divided nation where, just two weeks earlier, the Capitol had been overrun by insurrectionists.

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Texas synagogue siege: all four hostages released following 10-hour standoff

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Officials say suspect was killed hours after taking the people, including a rabbi, captive during services that were being livestreamed

All four hostages have been released and the hostage-taker reportedly killed after he took them captive at a synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, during services that were being livestreamed.

“Prayers answered. All hostages are out alive and safe,” the Texas governor, Greg Abbott, tweeted on Saturday night, more than 10 hours after the four people were taken hostage at Congregation Beth Israel.

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Woman pushed to her death in front of New York subway train

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Police have a man in custody in connection with the 40-year-old woman’s death at Times Square station in Manhattan

A woman was pushed to her death in front of a subway train at New York’s Times Square station.

The man believed responsible for the incident on Saturday morning fled the scene but turned himself in to transit police a short time later, the police commissioner, Keechant Sewell, said at a news conference with the mayor, Eric Adams, at the station.

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Tennis great Chris Evert having treatment for ovarian cancer

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Winner of 18 grand slam singles titles says she feels incredibly fortunate that the cancer was caught before it spread

Tennis great Chris Evert has been diagnosed with ovarian cancer and is undergoing treatment.

The 18-time grand slam singles champion said the diagnosis came in early December following a preventive hysterectomy after she had been informed she was at risk of cancer.

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Ghislaine Maxwell to be sentenced in New York in late June

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Maxwell was convicted last month of recruiting and grooming teenage girls for Jeffrey Epstein to abuse

Ghislaine Maxwell is due to be sentenced in late June after her conviction last month on charges including sex trafficking and conspiracy relating to the recruitment of teenage girls for financier Jeffrey Epstein to sexually abuse.

US district judge Alison J Nathan announced the 28 June date on Friday even as she waits to resolve defence claims that a new trial should be ordered after a juror’s public admissions after the verdict about his childhood sexual abuse.

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Wounds of Bronx fire felt half a world away in the Gambia

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People in two tiny West Africa towns are stunned by the deaths of sisters, nephews and mothers in a tight-knit immigrant community

Early on Sunday morning, Ebrima Dukureh, 60, answered a phone call at his home in the Gambian town of Allunhari.

It was his nephew, Haji Dukureh, 49, calling from New York City, to check in – as he often did. The two men caught up on news, asked after each other’s families and exchanged blessings.

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Texas scientists’ new Covid-19 vaccine is cheaper, easier to make and patent-free

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Dr Maria Bottazzi says their vaccine, called Corbevax, is unique because they do not intend to patent it

A new Covid-19 vaccine is being developed by Texas scientists using a decades-old conventional method that will make the production and distribution cheaper and more accessible for countries most affected by the pandemic and where new variants are likely to originate due to low inoculation rates.

The team, led by Drs Peter Hotez and Maria Bottazzi from the Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development at Baylor College of Medicine, has been developing vaccine prototypes for Sars and Mers since 2011, which they reconstructed to create the new Covid vaccine, dubbed Corbevax, or “the world’s Covid-19 vaccine”.

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Alec Baldwin hands over phone in film shooting investigation

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Actor’s phone is turned over to authorities investigating fatal shooting on New Mexico film set in October

Alec Baldwin has handed over his cellphone to investigators who are looking into the fatal shooting on the New Mexico set of the film Rust in October, his attorney and a law enforcement official said.

A search warrant for Baldwin’s iPhone was issued in December. The Santa Fe County, New Mexico, sheriff’s office had said earlier this week that it was still trying to obtain the device from the 30 Rock actor.

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