Category Archives: US News

‘Case closed’: 99.9% of scientists agree climate emergency caused by humans

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Trawl of 90,000 studies finds consensus, leading to call for Facebook and Twitter to curb disinformation

The scientific consensus that humans are altering the climate has passed 99.9%, according to research that strengthens the case for global action at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow.

The degree of scientific certainty about the impact of greenhouse gases is now similar to the level of agreement on evolution and plate tectonics, the authors say, based on a survey of nearly 90,000 climate-related studies. This means there is practically no doubt among experts that burning fossil fuels, such as oil, gas, coal, peat and trees, is heating the planet and causing more extreme weather.

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Religious exemptions threaten to undermine US Covid vaccine mandates

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In California hundreds of public employees, including police and firefighters, are claiming ‘sincerely held’ objections to the vaccine

This month, California became the first state to require Covid-19 vaccines for all schoolchildren but the provision came with a loophole: students will be granted religious exemptions.

California, which currently has the lowest coronavirus case rate in the US, has been issuing a series of sweeping mandates, requiring that healthcare workers, state employees, care workers and schoolteachers staff all get the vaccine. But in each case, Californians are able to ask for personal belief exemptions – and they are doing so in droves.

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Colin Powell: the man who might have been America’s first Black president

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The ex-general seriously considered running in 1995 but later felt himself increasingly out of step with the Republican party

Colin Powell wrote a speech in November 1995 announcing a run for US president. He wrote another speech announcing a decision not to run.

When he faced reporters in a hotel in Alexandria, Virginia, Powell delivered the second speech.

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Washington mourns death of ‘trailblazer’ Colin Powell as tributes pour in – live

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Joe Biden reflected on Colin Powell’s legacy of service and offered condolences to his family following the former US secretary of state’s passing.

“Jill and I are deeply saddened by the passing of our dear friend and a patriot of unmatched honor and dignity, General Colin Powell,” said Biden in a newly released statement.

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Colin Powell, former US secretary of state, dies aged 84 – video obituary

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Colin Powell, the first Black US secretary of state, has died at the age of 84 from Covid complications. Powell was a retired four-star general who served as chairman of the joint chiefs of staff in the early 1990s, before joining the George W Bush administration as secretary of state. Before the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, Powell made the case to the United Nations security council that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had biological weapons and was developing nuclear weapons. He later said that this represented 'a blot' that will 'always be a part of my record'. Although he was a Republican, in 2008 he endorsed Barack Obama for president. In the years that followed, he felt increasingly detached from the party, ultimately leaving it in the wake of the 6 January insurrection on the Capitol

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‘The court of God will be waiting for him’: Iraqis react to Colin Powell’s death

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A country still struggling with the aftermath of a disastrous occupation has a mixed opinion of the former general

For many Iraqis, Colin Powell was the face of the US invasion which caused an estimated 200,000 deaths, unleashing nearly two decades of domestic chaos and precipitating turmoil throughout the region.

His death, at the age of 84, was unlamented by many in a country still grappling with the aftermath of a disastrous occupation and an Islamist insurgency that followed the 2003 war – a conflict that Powell himself was later to acknowledge as a stain on his legacy.

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Joe Biden leads tributes to ‘dear friend’ and ‘patriot’ Colin Powell

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Political leaders from Tony Blair to Dick Cheney praise the former soldier and diplomat in the wake of his death from Covid

Tributes poured in for former Republican secretary of state Colin Powell after the announcement of his death on Monday morning at the age of 84.

Leading praise from the US and around the world, Joe Biden hailed “a dear friend and patriot of unmatched honor and dignity” on behalf of himself and the first lady, Jill Biden.

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Colin Powell’s UN speech: a decisive moment in undermining US credibility

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Analysis: His security council presentation didn’t directly lead to the Iraq invasion – but it was a turning point in US-UN relations

Colin Powell will be most remembered for the act he most regretted, his 2003 presentation to the UN security council laying out US evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, which turned out not to exist.

It did not directly lead to the Iraq invasion because George W Bush was going to invade anyway, and the presentation did not succeed in its goal of persuading the council to pass a second resolution backing military action against Iraq.

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US ‘very concerned’ despite China denials over hypersonic missile

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Disarmament ambassador casts doubt on ability to defend against technology after reports of test

The United States is “very concerned” about China’s development of hypersonic technology, the US disarmament ambassador, Robert Wood, has said, after reports that Beijing had recently launched a hypersonic missile with a nuclear capacity.

“We are very concerned by what China has been doing on the hypersonic front,” Robert Wood told reporters in Geneva.

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US and China urged to find way to work together before Cop26

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Former UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon appeals to Joe Biden and Xi Jinping to meet and find common ground

US president Joe Biden and the president of China, Xi Jinping, have been urged to meet before the UN Cop26 climate talks to search for common ground by the former UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon and other prominent global voices.

“We are appealing to the leaders of the US and China to see their common interest and find a way to work together. We need an ambitious 2030 [carbon] target from China and the US to deliver what they have pledged,” said Ban, speaking on behalf of the Elders group of former world statespeople and prominent community and business leaders.

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Colin Powell discusses the most important element of leadership in 2011 speech – video

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Colin Powell, the former US secretary of state who played a pivotal role in attempting to justify the 2003 invasion of Iraq, has died from complications from Covid-19 aged 84, it was announced on Monday. He was fully vaccinated. 

After his time in government, Powell remained a hugely influential commentator on US politics and public life. During a 2011 speech, he spoke about what he considered the most important element of leadership

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Facebook to create 10,000 jobs in EU to help build ‘metaverse’

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Social network says it wants to ensure virtual world is built responsibly

Facebook is creating 10,000 jobs in the EU as part of its push to build a virtual world for its users.

The company has trumpeted the “metaverse” as the next big phase of growth for large tech companies and recently announced a $50m (£36m) investment programme to ensure that this metaworld is built “responsibly”.

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A nurse’s journey from treating Covid in Brazil to death in the US desert

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Lenilda dos Santos left her home in rural Amazonia, part of a South American exodus driven by a coronavirus-era depression

As coronavirus tore through the Valley of Paradise, a farm-flanked backwater in the Brazilian Amazon, Lenilda dos Santos, a nurse technician, stood on the frontline clutching hands most feared to touch.

“She was a warrior during the pandemic,” said Lucineide Oliveira, a friend and colleague at the town’s small, understaffed hospital. “She’d say: ‘If we have to die, we’ll die. But we must fight.’”

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Malcolm Turnbull on Murdoch, lies and the climate crisis: ‘The same forces that enabled Trump are at work in Australia’

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Systematic partisan lying and misinformation from the media, both mainstream and social, has done enormous damage to liberal democracies, the former PM writes

The United States has suffered the largest number of Covid-19 deaths: about 600,000 at the time of writing. The same political and media players who deny the reality of global warming also denied and politicised the Covid-19 virus.

To his credit, Donald Trump poured billions into Operation Warp Speed, which assisted the development of vaccines in a timeframe that matched the program’s ambitious title. But he also downplayed the gravity of Covid-19, then peddled quack therapies and mocked cities that mandated social distancing and mask wearing.

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Kenosha police accused of ‘deputizing’ militia vigilantes during Jacob Blake protests

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Lawsuit brought by Gaige Grosskreutz, who was wounded by Kyle Rittenhouse during anti-police brutality protests in August 2020

The police department in the Wisconsin city of Kenosha is facing new legal action after being accused of “deputizing” a group of militia vigilantes during anti-police brutality protests last year in which 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse killed two people.

The action, brought by Gaige Grosskreutz, who was wounded during the incident, alleges that local police effectively deputized a “band of white nationalist vigilantes” during protests sparked by the shooting of Jacob Blake, who is now paralyzed from the waist down, by a white police officer.

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US urges UK to rebuild relations with Paris after submarine contract row

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Exclusive: diplomatic effort by US following Australia cancelling $66bn deal with France not matched by London

The US has urged Britain to follow its example and try to repair its relations with Paris in the wake of the row over France’s loss of its submarine contract with Australia.

Australia pulled out of the $66bn (£48bn) contract for 12 diesel electric-powered submarines, signed in 2016, to opt instead for nuclear-powered submarines to be developed with America and the UK. The secretive and sudden cancellation of the contract has created a crisis of trust between Paris on the one hand and London, Canberra and Washington on the other.

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Chinese military condemns US and Canada over warships in Taiwan Strait

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Countries ‘colluded to provoke and stir up trouble’ in region that China claims as its territory

The Chinese military has condemned the United States and Canada for each sending a warship through the Taiwan Strait last week, saying they were threatening peace and stability in the region.

China claims democratically ruled Taiwan as its own territory, and has mounted repeated air force missions into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone (ADIZ) over the past year, provoking anger in Taipei.

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Has Interpol become the long arm of oppressive regimes?

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Once used in the hunt for fugitive criminals, the global police agency’s most-wanted ‘red notice’ list now includes political refugees and dissidents

Flicking through the news one day in early 2015, Alexey Kharis, a California-based businessman and father of two, came across a startling announcement: Russia would request a global call for his arrest through the International Criminal Police Organization, known as Interpol.

“Oh, wow,” Kharis thought, shocked. All the 46-year-old knew about Interpol and its pursuit of the world’s most-wanted criminals was from novels and films. He tried to reassure himself that things would be OK and it was just an intimidatory tactic of the Russian authorities. Surely, he reasoned, the world’s largest police organisation had no reason to launch a hunt for him.

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