Biden administration has come under pressure to share vaccine, which has been authorized in other countries but not yet in US
The United States plans to send roughly 4m doses of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine that it is not using to Mexico and Canada in loan deals with the two countries.
Mexico will receive 2.5m doses of the vaccine and Canada will receive 1.5m doses, the official said.
Continue reading...A Georgia sheriff’s captain was criticised for appearing to characterise the actions of the suspect in a mass shooting in Atlanta as him having had 'a really bad day'.
Robert Aaron Long, 21, was charged with killing eight people in Atlanta, six of them women of Asian descent, on Wednesday.
Atlanta police said Long had declared Tuesday’s attack was not racially motivated. He claimed to have a 'sex addiction' and authorities have said he apparently lashed out at what he saw as sources of 'temptation'
Continue reading...Advocates for sex workers say the spa attacks combined sexism and toxic Asian stereotypes
On Tuesday night, a 21-year-old man named Robert Aaron Long allegedly went on a deadly rampage at three Atlanta spas, killing eight people, including six Asian women. Long’s shooting spree, police say, began at Youngs Asian Massage Parlor on the city’s outskirts, where he killed four people, two of whom were Asian, and injured one; he then allegedly fled the scene and proceeded to Gold Spa, killing three more people, all Asian women; and then he entered a spa right across the street, Aromatherapy Spa, where he killed his final victim.
Following an interview with authorities, the Cherokee county sheriff, Frank Reynolds, maintained that Long “gave no indicators” that his crimes were racially motivated. “We asked him that specifically and the answer was no,” Reynolds said on Wednesday.
Continue reading...Researchers found cows belched out 82% less methane after putting small amount of seaweed in their feed for five months
Feeding seaweed to cows is a viable long-term method to reduce the emission of planet-heating gases from their burps and flatulence, scientists have found.
Researchers who put a small amount of seaweed into the feed of cattle over the course of five months found that the new diet caused the bovines to belch out 82% less methane, a potent greenhouse gas, into the atmosphere.
Continue reading...Canada criticises pair’s detention as ‘arbitrary’ as Beijing says trial will begin on Friday
China has announced it will begin trials for the two Canadians it detained in apparent retaliation for Canada’s arrest of a telecoms executive.
Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor were detained in December 2018, days after Canada arrested Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou at the request of the United States.
Continue reading...The suspect behind shooting attacks that killed eight people in Atlanta was charged with eight counts of murder on Wednesday, with officials saying he may have planned further attacks.
Police and city leaders also indicated they believe Robert Aaron Long, 21, who did not resist arrest when he was apprehended, was on his way to Florida after Tuesday evening’s attack, where they suspect he may have planned to “carry out additional shootings”.
Continue reading...Capt Jay Baker also reportedly posted images on Facebook of T-shirts with racist slogan on China and coronavirus
A Georgia sheriff’s captain has faced widespread criticism for appearing to characterise the actions of Robert Aaron Long, the 21-year-old charged with killing eight people in Atlanta, six of them women of Asian descent, as “having a really bad day”.
Speaking at a news conference on Wednesday, Capt Jay Baker of the Cherokee county sheriff’s office said investigators had interviewed Long that morning.
Continue reading...Kamala Harris said the Atlanta massage parlour shootings were ‘tragic’ and spoke to the larger issue of violence in American society. ‘We must ... never tolerate it and always speak out against it,’ Harris said. Joe Biden said violence against Asian Americans was ‘very, very troubling’, but said was making ‘no connection at this moment of the motivation of the killer’.
President claims sanction for Mohammed bin Salman would have been diplomatically unprecedented but overstates US-Saudi ties
Joe Biden has defended his decision to waive any punishment for Saudi Arabia’s crown prince in the murder of a US-based journalist, claiming that acting against the Saudi royal would have been diplomatically unprecedented for the United States.
In an ABC News interview that aired on Wednesday, the US president discussed his administration’s decision to exempt Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman from any penalties for the October 2018, killing of Jamal Khashoggi. Last month, the Biden administration released a declassified US intelligence report which concluded that the crown prince authorized the team of Saudi security and intelligence officials that killed Khashoggi.
Continue reading...Cultured stem cells turn into blastoid ‘balls’, like natural blastocysts after egg fertilisation
Scientists have made clumps of human tissue that behave like early-stage embryos, a feat that promises to transform research into the first tentative steps of human development.
The clumps of cells, named blastoids, are less than a millimetre across and resemble structures called blastocysts, which form within a few days of an egg being fertilised. Typically blastocysts contain about 100 cells, which give rise to every tissue in the body.
Continue reading...Wainscott, a hamlet in the Hamptons, offers a new obstacle in Biden’s renewable energy plans as ‘Nimbys’ fight back with petitions, lobbyists and lawsuits
Should Joe Biden’s plans for a huge expansion of renewable energy across the US survive the gamut of congressional bickering, a very different obstacle threatens progress – wealthy homeowners who enjoy sweeping scenic views.
Wainscott, a hamlet in the wealthy New York enclave of the Hamptons, is the unlikely setting for a rancorous battle over what would be the state’s first offshore wind farm. A flurry of angry letters to the local newspaper has escalated to petitions, the hiring of high-powered lobbyists and now lawsuits, in what could presage similar quarrels elsewhere as the Biden administration seeks to support a national boom in new wind turbines at sea and on land.
Continue reading...At least eight people have been killed in a series of shootings at three Atlanta area massage parlors. Authorities described a number of victims as women of Asian descent. A 21-year-old man, Robert Aaron Long, has been taken into custody. The first shooting occurred at Young’s Asian Massage near Acworth in Cherokee county, just north-west of Atlanta. Police officers responded to a reported robbery at Gold Spa in the city’s north-east and were then alerted to another shooting across the street at the Aromatherapy Spa
Continue reading...Brothers Patrick and John Collison’s online payments empire is now valued at $95bn
The latest fundraising round by the digital payments firm Stripe has boosted the net worth of its co-founders, Patrick and John Collison, to about $11.5bn (£8.3bn) each, catapulting them into the top bracket of the world’s millennial billionaires. Not bad for two brothers from the tiny Tipperary village of Dromineer, population: barely 100.
Related: Silicon Valley's Stripe valued at $95bn after fundraising
Continue reading...Man taken into custody after attacks, as police say many victims believed to be Asian women
At least eight people have been killed in a series of shootings at three Atlanta area massage parlours, with a number of the victims described by authorities as women of Asian descent.
A 21-year-old man, Robert Aaron Long, has been taken into custody following an hours-long manhunt as police told local media that he was the suspect in all three shootings. An alleged motive has not been described.
Continue reading...Two commuters in southern Idaho are lucky to be alive after their pickup truck plunged off a bridge - saved only by the quick work of emergency crews, and a set of 'safety chains' attaching the Ford F50 to the 30ft camper trailer it was carrying, which miraculously held firm.
Continue reading...Safety chains attaching pickup truck to camper trailer prevented it from falling
Authorities say a set of camper trailer safety chains and quick, careful work by emergency crews saved two people after their pickup truck plunged off a bridge, leaving them dangling above a deep gorge in southern Idaho.
Idaho state police responded to the accident at about 2.45pm on Monday, said Lynn Hightower, a police spokesperson. A trooper found a man and a woman inside the pickup truck that was dangling, nose-down, off the side of the bridge spanning the Malad Gorge.
Continue reading...In a new docuseries, the singer says she was assaulted as a teen and after telling somebody, the rapist ‘never got taken out of the movie they were in’
Demi Lovato has said she was raped as a teenager while working for the Disney Channel in the late 2000s by someone who faced no repercussions when she revealed what happened. The singer does not say who the offender was, only that she “had to see this person all the time” afterwards.
Related: Demi Lovato says she had three strokes and heart attack after 2018 overdose
Continue reading...Intelligence report underscored allegations that Trump allies played into Moscow’s hands by amplifying claims against Biden
Russia tried to influence the 2020 US presidential election by proliferating “misleading or unsubstantiated allegations” largely against Joe Biden and through allies of Donald Trump, US intelligence officials said on Tuesday.
The assessment was contained in a 15-page report published by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. It underscored allegations that Trump’s allies played into Moscow’s hands by amplifying claims against Biden by Ukrainian figures with links to Russia.
Continue reading...Kamala Harris spoke about democracy and its connection with women's equality in her debut address to the UN as US vice-president. 'This year, in considering the status of women, especially the participation of women in decision making, we must also consider the status of democracy,' Harris told the 65th session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women. 'It is a means to establish peace and shared prosperity. It should ensure every citizen, regardless of gender, has an equal voice'
Continue reading...Biden heads to Pennsylvania in push to sell US Covid relief plan to nation, while Kamala Harris visits Colorado
This may not be overtly party political but there is no doubt it’s political. The trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, accused of murdering George Floyd last May, continues with jury selection and legal arguments.
Ex-officer on trial for George Floyd's death asks to show jury an earlier arrest https://t.co/UJzU8Vw1kQ pic.twitter.com/QiuOk37jkF
In the arrest of May 6, 2019, a panicking Floyd swallowed several opioid pain-killer pills as police approached. Eric Nelson, Chauvin’s lead lawyer, has argued that the main cause of Floyd’s death a year later, which was ruled a homicide, was the opioid fentanyl found in his blood at autopsy.
“The similarities are incredible, it’s the exact same behavior in two incidents almost exactly one year apart,” Nelson told the court before the resumption of jury selection, noting Floyd called out for his “mama” in both arrests, according to video footage.
More on the coronavirus, as federal leaders and officials warn the country not to relax at what we all hope is the eleventh hour of the main thrust of the pandemic.
The Associated Press reports from North Carolina:
Duke University saw nearly as many cases of the coronavirus last week as it did during the entire fall semester, according to data released today.
The vast majority of the 231 new cases reported from March 8 through Sunday occurred within the university’s undergraduate student population.
welp this was a surprise to no one, given the recent disaffiliation of many fraternities from Duke into their own council, in response to being told to wait until fall 2021 for rush. And instead hold in person parties/rush events and why is Greek life still a thing?? https://t.co/SA1kgZWMh6
There's a strong reaction among Duke students after off-campus fraternity activities led to increased COVID-19 cases and a new stay-in-place order. https://t.co/mO0jdOpSxd
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