(Reuters) - Former Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara took several shots at the administration of President Donald Trump on Thursday, calling for “facts not falsehoods” as the basis for political discourse and a more welcoming stance towards immigrants in his first public speaking event since being fired one month ago. Bharara sprinkled the hour-long speech with humor, including a joke about the size of the crowd clearly aimed at Trump. But Bharara also made a series of thinly veiled criticisms of the new administration, referring multiple times to Trump’s campaign pledge to “drain the swamp” in Washington. “You don’t drain a swamp with a slogan. You don’t drain it by replacing one set of partisans with another. You don’t replace muck with muck,” Bharara, 48, said at the Cooper Union in New York.  “To drain a swamp you need an army corps of engineers, experts schooled in service and serious purpose. Not do-nothing, say-anything, neophyte opportunists who know a lot about how to bully and bluster but not so much about truth, justice and fairness.”  Bharara was fired by Trump on March 11 after refusing to step down. While he was among 46 U.S. attorneys told to submit their resignations, his dismissal was a surprise because Trump had asked him in November to stay in the job. Bharara has said it was not made clear to him at first whether or not he was being dismissed. He joked about that initial confusion with a reference to Trump’s TV reality show in which he regularly fired people on the spot. “I don’t really understand why this was such a big deal, especially to this White House. I had thought that was what Donald Trump was good at,” Bharara said.  As the chief federal prosecutor for the Southern District of New York, Bharara oversaw several notable corruption and white-collar criminal cases, as well as cases involving national security. He said he was equally proud of the less high-profile work his office did to combat gangs and consumer fraud. Bharara said he expected his successor to carry on with the office’s reputation for independence. He did not comment on who his possible successor. As for his own future, Bharara ruled out running for public office. “I don’t have any plans to enter politics just like I have no plans to join the circus. And I mean no offence to the circus.”

Summary: Ex-U.S अटॉर्नी भरारा आलोचना और चुटकुलों के साथ ट्रम्प पर निशाना साधते हैं


MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Russian Defence Ministry on Thursday denied allegations that Russian and Syrian jets had killed at least 150 civilians in over a week of bombing, saying it had been careful not to hit civilians. The ministry was responding to comments made on Wednesday by opposition rescue workers who accused Moscow and Damascus of killing at least 150 civilians and of injuring dozens in air strikes in Idlib Province. Major-General Igor Konashenkov said in a statement that the opposition-run Civil Defence group which made the allegations was made up of  charlatans  who could not be regarded as objective sources of reliable information.   Russian air force planes do not strike residential districts in populated areas in order to avoid casualties,  Konashenkov said.  Targets are terrorist bases, armored vehicles and ammunition stories which are always identified by drones and always confirmed by other channels beforehand.  He said Russian planes operating in Idlib Province had only targeted militant fighters and their equipment in the last week.

Summary: रूस ने नागरिकों की मौतों पर सीरियाई विपक्ष के आरोपों का खंडन किया


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House is looking into how embarrassing details of President Donald Trump’s recent tense phone conversations with his counterparts in Australia and Mexico were leaked to news organizations, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said on Fox News Channel. “The president takes these leaks very seriously,” Spicer said in an interview with Fox News Channel, which on Friday provided a transcript of a segment set to air on Saturday. Trump cut short a phone call with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull after an acrimonious discussion about a refugee swap deal, a conversation that threatened ties between the two allies after details appeared in The Washington Post. In an earlier call with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto about paying for a wall on the southern U.S. border, Trump said he might send the U.S. military to Mexico to stop drug cartels - details from a transcript obtained by a Mexican news organization Aristegui Noticias and the Associated Press. The White House later said the comments were meant to be lighthearted. “That’s troubling and I think the president has asked the team to look into this because those are very serious implications,” Spicer said. Spicer described the conversations as “candid” but respectful, and has noted that both the Australian and Mexican governments have disputed some of the details. White House officials did not respond to requests for comment on the investigation into the leaks. Trump told politicians and faith leaders at a prayer breakfast that he was having difficult conversations with world leaders as he worked to overhaul immigration rules. “Believe me, when you hear about the tough phone calls I’m having - don’t worry about it. Just don’t worry about it,” Trump told the leaders.

Summary: व्हाइट हाउस ने ऑस्ट्रेलिया, मैक्सिको में ट्रम्प के कॉल लीक होने की जांच की


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former NAACP President Ben Jealous said on Wednesday he would seek the Democratic nomination for Maryland governor next year, charging that the Republican incumbent lacked the courage to stand up to President Donald Trump. Jealous, an ally of U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders during his 2016 bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, said incumbent Larry Hogan had failed to oppose Trump policies that would weaken healthcare and education as well as environmental protection of the Chesapeake Bay. Jealous, making his first bid for elected office, is the latest Democrat to try to link an opponent to the Republican president. Approval ratings have sagged for Trump, who has been embroiled in controversy since his May 9 firing of FBI Director James Comey who was overseeing an investigation into possible collusion between Trump’s presidential campaign and Russia. “It seems like every week our governor becomes a little more like the lion in ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ all strength and no political courage,” Jealous, 44, said as he declared his candidacy outside a cousin’s flower shop in Baltimore. Hogan, who did not endorse Trump in the 2016 election, has not said if he will seek re-election. A spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton won Maryland by 26 percentage points in last November’s election. Jealous led the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the biggest U.S. civil rights group, from 2008 to 2013. He is the second Democrat to announce his candidacy ahead of Maryland’s June 2018 primary, joining entrepreneur and author Alec Ross. Jealous, if elected, would be Maryland’s first black governor. Jealous, who spearheaded the NAACP’s successful campaign to overturn Maryland’s death penalty in 2012, said he backed raising the minimum wage to $15 a hour from the current $8.75, improving teacher quality, expanding mass transit and improving training for police officers. Hogan has followed a moderate agenda focused on economic growth and cutting regulations and fees. He also has banned fracking, which involves injecting water, sand and chemicals into shale to release natural gas and oil, thus aligning himself with Maryland’s heavily Democratic voter base. He held a 65 percent approval rating among registered voters in a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll in March, but only 41 percent backed him for a second term. Hogan, 61, scored an upset victory in 2014 over Democratic Lieutenant Governor Anthony Brown.

Summary: एन. ए. ए. सी. पी. के पूर्व प्रमुख बेन ईर्ष्या मैरीलैंड के गवर्नर के लिए चुनाव लड़ेंगे


UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump criticized the United Nations for bloated bureaucracy and mismanagement on his first visit on Monday to U.N. headquarters, calling for  truly bold reforms  so it could be a greater force for world peace. Ahead of his maiden speech to the annual U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, Trump hosted a short event to boost support for changes to the United Nations.  In recent years the United Nations has not reached its full potential because of bureaucracy and mismanagement, while the United Nations on a regular budget has increased by 140 percent and its staff has more than doubled since 2000,  Trump said.  The United Nations must hold every level of management accountable, protect whistleblowers and focus on results rather than on process,  Trump said.   I am confident that if we work together and champion truly bold reforms the United Nations will emerge as a stronger, more effective, more just and greater force for peace and harmony in the world,  Trump said in his first remarks at the U.N. in New York since his inauguration as president in January. In a building where long statements are commonplace, Trump spoke for just four minutes.  Some 128 countries were invited to attend Monday s reform meeting after signing on to a U.S.-drafted 10-point political declaration backing efforts by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres  to initiate effective, meaningful reform.  U.N. Security Council veto powers Russia and China did not sign the declaration.  Businessman Trump, who complained during his 2016 election campaign about the United States paying a disproportionate amount of money to the United Nations, made the point again on Monday.  We must ensure that no one and no member state shoulders a disproportionate share of the burden and that s militarily or financially.   The United States is the biggest U.N. contributor, providing 22 percent of its $5.4 billion biennial core budget and 28.5 percent of its $7.3 billion peacekeeping budget. The contributions are agreed on by the 193-member General Assembly. Guterres, who also took office in January, told the meeting:  To serve the people we support and the people who support us, we must be nimble and effective, flexible and efficient.  He agreed that U.N bureaucracy was a problem that kept him up at night.      Our shared objective is a 21st century U.N. focused more on people and less on process,  Guterres said.  Value for money while advancing shared values   that is our common goal.  Trump also said that all peacekeeping missions should  have clearly defined goals and metrics for evaluating success.  The United States is reviewing each of the U.N. peacekeeping missions as annual mandates come up for Security Council renewal in a bid to cut costs. The United States is a veto-wielding council member, along with Britain, France, Russia and China. On Sunday night, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson met with U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi.  When asked if the U.N. refugee agency could perform its current missions if the United States cut its voluntary contributions to the budget, according to a pool report Grandi answered:  I would say no.   U.S. aid is vital to what we do to support refugees around the world and to find solutions to their situations,  Grandi said.

Summary: पहली यात्रा में, ट्रम्प ने सुधार का आग्रह किया ताकि संयुक्त राष्ट्र पूरी क्षमता से काम ले सके


(Reuters) - China s ruling Communist Party on Wednesday unveiled its core decision-making body, the Politburo Standing Committee, headed by President Xi Jinping. Here is the list of the new committee, all men, by order of seniority: - Xi Jinping, 64, is widely seen as China s most powerful leader since Chairman Mao Zedong. He was once viewed as a drab  princeling  child of the elite. But since soaring to power in 2012, Xi has centralized authority under his own leadership with a signature anti-graft battle. His political theory -  Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era  - was written into the Party constitution on Tuesday.  - Li Keqiang, 62, as premier has overseen China s economy for the last five years. Li s policies have sought to spur entrepreneurship and innovation, but he has been increasingly overshadowed by Xi, who has thrown his weight behind reforms to make state sector firms  stronger, better and bigger  and to manage financial stability.  - Li Zhanshu, 67, heads the party s General Office. He worked his way up from Hebei province, which surrounds Beijing, and graduated from Hebei Normal University. A former governor of the northeastern province of Heilongjiang and one-time party boss of the southwestern province of Guizhou, Li Zhanshu is considered one of Xi s closest advisors and often accompanies him on overseas trips. Their friendship dates back to their days working together in Hebei in the 1980s. - Wang Yang, 62, is a vice premier with an economic portfolio and a former party chief of Guangdong province, an export powerhouse, where he served from 2007-2012. Born into a poor rural family in eastern Anhui province, Wang went to work in a factory at age 17 to support his family after his father died. Concerned about the impact of three decades of rapid development, he lobbied for social and political reform. However, he backed down after drawing criticism from party conservatives.     - Wang Huning, 62 this month, was a top policy researcher for the party under former presidents Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, a position he has kept under Xi as head of the Central Policy Research Office. Wang coined the  Three Represents  and  Scientific Outlook of Development  - respectively Jiang and Hu s contributions to party thought, as well as the  Chinese Dream , Xi s own vision. Wang was formerly an academic at Shanghai s Fudan University, specializing first in international relations and then law. He is also considered one of Xi s closest advisors. - Zhao Leji, 60, was also named the Chinese Communist Party s new anti-corruption chief on Wednesday. He was named vice governor of the northwestern province of Qinghai in 1994 at age 37. Zhao spent 29 years in Qinghai before being picked by Xi to serve as party boss of Shaanxi province, in the northwest, in 2007. Both Zhao and Xi are natives of Shaanxi. Zhao heads the powerful organization department, which oversees personnel decisions, and is a Politburo member. He has a degree in philosophy from Peking University.  - Han Zheng, 63, is party chief of Shanghai, China s financial hub, where he has spent his entire career. Han was briefly promoted from Shanghai mayor after the then-party boss was sacked amid a corruption scandal in 2006. He resumed his mayoral role as Xi Jinping and then Yu Zhengsheng - currently the party s fourth-ranked leader - became party chief. Han became Shanghai party boss in 2012.    (This version of the story has been refiled to fix spelling of Politburo in headline)

Summary: चीन की नई पोलित ब्यूरो स्थायी समिति लाइनअप


WASHINGTON/PARIS (Reuters) - Key U.S. allies in Europe are quietly expressing concern over President-elect Donald Trump’s approach to Syria, warning that his pledge to work more closely with Russia, Damascus’ main backer, will do little to diminish the terrorist threat emanating from Syria. The diplomatic persuasion campaign has taken on new importance in recent days as the Syrian army, backed by Russia, Iran and Shi’ite militias, appears poised to retake all of Aleppo city in a major defeat for Western-backed rebels. Moscow and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad are expected to cast Aleppo’s fall as the end of a revolt against Assad that began in March 2011, although Western analysts predict the civil war, which has killed more than 300,000 people and made more than half of Syrians homeless, will continue, perhaps for years. Western diplomats, who described discussions with Trump advisers on condition of anonymity, said their message was that a U.S. alliance with Russia, and by extension Assad, to crush groups like Islamic State will backfire. Trump has said defeating Islamic State was a higher priority than persuading Assad to step down. “On Syria the new administration says crushing Islamic State is its priority, but we’ve explained our view that without a  political solution in Syria those efforts will be fruitless because new pockets of radicals will re-form,” a senior French diplomat told Reuters. France has been the target of coordinated attacks claimed by Islamic State. Western capitals fear that a prolonged conflict will exacerbate mass refugee flows in which radicalized individuals might hide. A political solution in Syria, as envisioned by Western powers, would involve a transition in which Assad eventually left power. Assad, from the minority Alawite sect, cannot unite Syria and quash extremists after nearly six years of warfare, they argue. In a rare public speech in London on Thursday, Alex Younger, chief of Britain’s MI-6 intelligence agency, said, “we cannot be safe from the threats that emanate from (Syria) unless the civil war is brought to an end. And brought to an end in a way that recognizes the interests of more than a minority of its people and their international backers.” Trump has frequently said that he wants to work with Russia to fight Islamic State, which holds territory in Iraq and Syria, and other militant groups. “When you think about it, wouldn’t it be nice if we got along with Russia?” he said during a campaign rally in July. “Wouldn’t it be nice if we got together with Russia and knocked the hell out of ISIS?” Trump added, using another name for Islamic State. U.S. defense officials have repeatedly said the vast majority of Russian strikes in Syria are not against Islamic State. How Trump will actually proceed remains unclear. He has not named a secretary of state, and some current and prospective members of the president-elect’s national security team have voiced more skeptical views of Russia. Trump’s transition team did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the allies’ concerns. “What we’re getting from our conversations with the Trump administration is that already they are toning down the prospect of a Russia-U.S. deal on fighting Islamic State and a full-on rapprochement with Moscow,” the senior French diplomat said. A senior Arab diplomat also was cautious about Trump’s Syria policy. “We can’t really predict it now,” the diplomat said. A diplomat from another U.S. ally, while declining to discuss the American political transition, expressed doubts about the advisability of a Western alignment with Moscow and Assad. “There is no way that allying with Assad would do anything to reduce the terrorist threat to the West. Rather, it would drastically increase it,” the diplomat said. “It’s an inconvenient truth of the conflict,” he said. “The Russians have Grozny-ified Aleppo,” the diplomat said, referring to the total destruction the Russian military inflicted on the capital of Chechnya. Former U.S. ambassador to Syria Robert Ford said that once Aleppo falls, the Russian-backed Syrian government will not turn its attention to Islamic State, but rather try to destroy the remainder of the secular anti-Assad rebellion. The United States has three options, said Ford, a fellow at the Middle East Institute think-tank. “The first option is to switch and join the Russians and implicitly the Syrian government and the Iranians against Sunni extremists. But the problem is that the Russians and the Syrian governments ... aren’t really fighting Sunni extremists very much,” he said. The second option, Ford said, is for Washington to walk away from the conflict, which would likely mean diminished U.S. influence in the region, and continued refugee flows. The third is to work with Turkey and Saudi Arabia to get a partial ceasefire. “None of them are good, there is no easy answer, we ran out of easy answers in 2012 and 2013,” Ford said.

Summary: अमेरिकी सहयोगियों ने सीरिया रणनीति पर ट्रम्प को आगाह किया


WASHINGTON/PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - Voters and civil rights groups reported long lines, isolated cases of malfunctioning equipment and some harassment at polling places in Tuesday’s U.S. presidential election but fears of widespread violence at the polls did not materialize. Nationwide, civil rights groups logged unusual levels of voter intimidation complaints, receiving about 35,000 calls through a national voter complaint hotline as of Tuesday evening. Democratic Party officials, however, said they did not see systemic voter suppression efforts. Civil rights groups, who have enlisted 7,000 volunteers, said 40 percent of the calls they had received through the telephone hotline by early afternoon were from African-American and Latino voters. Complaints of voter intimidation were especially prevalent in Florida, Georgia, Ohio and Arizona with a disproportionate share coming from minority voters. “We are hearing more complaints about voter intimidation than we have in presidential cycles from prior years,” said Kristen Clarke, president of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has repeatedly said the election would be “rigged” and called on his supporters to watch for signs of fraud in urban areas, raising fears they could clash with minority voters. Numerous studies have found that voter fraud is exceedingly rare in the United States. Absent on Tuesday were reports of the kind of hostile political displays, vandalism and violence that have cropped up regularly throughout the campaign. A polling station was locked down in Southern California after one person was killed and three wounded by gunfire but police saw no immediate indication the incident was linked to Election Day. But isolated reports of voter intimidation and harassment flooded the voter complaint hotline run by a coalition of civil rights groups throughout the day. An African-American voter called the hotline from Alabama’s Shelby County to report that a white poll worker had indicated she would have to wash her hands after handling the voter’s photo identification card.  Shelby County lawyers persuaded the U.S. Supreme Court in 2013 to strike down a key provision of the landmark Voting Rights Act requiring states with a history of voter discrimination to get federal clearance for changes to their election laws. Clarke said many voter complaints to the hotline came from states formerly covered by that provision. Some voters in Florida reported a heavy, unexplained police presence at several polling sites around the state. A group of students in the state were told their votes would not count because their college dormitory was considered a hotel.  In Ohio’s Franklin County, the hotline received complaints that Somali-American voters were told they would have to vote provisionally because their addresses did not match their identification cards - and then were told that the polling site had run out of provisional ballots. In Georgia’s DeKalb County, a group calling itself Defenders of Democracy was pressuring voters in line to fill out sample ballots and sign pledges that they would cast the same votes on the real ballot, according to reports received by the hotline. The federal government reduced its election monitoring program in the wake of a 2013 U.S. Supreme Court decision that weakened federal oversight of states with a history of racial discrimination. Revised voting laws and lengthy court battles in many states also have left voters uncertain about when and where they can cast their ballot and whether they will need to present photo identification.  A Nevada judge on Tuesday rejected a request from Trump for records from a Las Vegas polling place that his campaign said had improperly remained open last week to accommodate people who were lined up to vote. The judge agreed with a county attorney who argued that election officials already preserve records.  Malfunctioning machines dominated voter complaints out of Pennsylvania, Arizona, New York, North Carolina and Virginia. Trump cited reports that polling machines were switching votes for Republican candidates to votes for Democrats as cause for concern that the election outcome might not be valid, once again warning of a rigged system. Speaking to Fox News, Trump provided no evidence to support the allegations or say where polling machines were breaking down, although there were some problems in Pennsylvania. Voters in at least four Pennsylvania counties said touch-screen voting machines were mistakenly switching votes. State officials, however, said they did not believe any ballots had been wrongly counted as a result of the machine malfunctions. Pennsylvania is one of a handful of states that relies on electronic voting machines without a paper backup that would allow officials to double-check the outcome if it is challenged. The machines can record votes incorrectly if they are not calibrated properly, a problem that is magnified as the screens degrade with age.  But ES&S, the company that makes the machines, said voters have a chance to confirm their choices before they cast their ballot, making it impossible for the machine to flip a vote from one candidate to another. Local officials test machines to make sure they are calibrated properly before each election. The Philadelphia district attorney’s office, which monitors voting in the state’s largest city, said on Twitter it was not receiving any complaints out of the ordinary. Electronic voting rolls in Durham County, North Carolina, malfunctioned early on Tuesday, prompting the county to ask the state board of elections to extend voting hours in eight precincts until 9 p.m., an hour and a half later than they were supposed to be open. The state elections board on Tuesday evening agreed to extend voting hours in the precincts by between 20 and 60 minutes.

Summary: धमकी, गड़बड़ियों के बावजूद अमेरिकी चुनाव काफी हद तक शांतिपूर्ण


SYDNEY (Reuters) - The resurgence of Australian nationalist politics has been halted at a state election in coal-rich Queensland, with Pauline Hanson s One Nation party at risk of being almost completely wiped from the state assembly. Australia s center-left Labor party is leading in the tight race after three-quarters of votes were counted following Saturday s poll, while Hanson s party has yet to confirm victory in a single seat. The official result may not be known for several days although political analysts believe Labor will win the 47 seats it needs to govern in Queensland 93-seat assembly, a result that would allow it to form a government without support from independents or minor parties.  I am confident of a Labor majority,  Queensland s Labor Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk told reporters on Sunday. Hanson, a senator in the federal parliament, had anticipated a surge in support in her electoral heartland, to give momentum to the resurgence her anti-immigration, populist party enjoyed  in the national election last year. But despite attracting support from around 14 percent of voters, One Nation has not recorded decisive victories in individual seats. It is tipped to win just one seat in state parliament, according to analysis by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). Griffith University political analyst Paul Williams said despite a lack of seats, Hanson s party had likely polled higher than 20 per cent in some regional seats.  All the anger, the disenchantment, the bitterness, the resentment to the major parties and elites, it s still as strong as it was 12 months ago,  he told Reuters by telephone on Sunday. The election has been held in one of Australia s powerhouse mining states with debate over a A$16.5 billion ($12.6 billion) coal mine, rail and port project proposed by Indian energy giant Adani Enterprises dominating much of the campaign. While both major parties support the Queensland resources project, Labor has vowed to veto a near billion-dollar concessional loan Adani has asked Australia to provide for the proposed rail line, should it win government. The conservative opposition Liberal National Party, which the ABC forecasts will win 41 seats, supports the government loan. Hanson had been hoping her party would hold the balance-of-power in Queensland, and with it the ability to decide who the next premier would be.  As the results rolled in late on Saturday, she told reporters in Buderim, an urban center near Queensland s coast, that while disappointed with some of the emerging numbers, the fight would go on.     I think this is a clear indication that One Nation is not going anywhere, we are going to be around for a while yet,  Hanson said.

Summary: ऑस्ट्रेलियाई राज्य चुनाव में राष्ट्रवादियों का सफाया


MONTREAL (Reuters) - A young Montreal couple tried to use Christmas lights and sandpaper to make a homemade bomb, a prosecutor told a Canadian court on Wednesday in opening statements in the terrorism trial of the former college students. The items and a handwritten bomb-making recipe copied from a propaganda magazine published by al Qaeda militants were found after the Royal Canadian Mounted Police searched a condo rented by El Mahdi Jamali and Sabrine Djermane in 2015, prosecutor Lyne Decarie said in Quebec Superior Court in Montreal.  It is not clear how the lights would have been used to make a bomb.  Jamali, 20, and Djermane, 21, have pleaded not guilty to charges of trying to leave Canada to join a terrorist group, possessing an explosive substance, facilitating a terrorist activity, and committing an offense for a terrorist group.   The 2015 arrest of the couple, teenagers at the time, came at a time when international security forces reported that waves of young people, including college students from Montreal, were heading to Syria to join Islamic State militants.  Decarie said investigators found other materials, jihadist propaganda and evidence that the couple had watched a video by a Canadian fighter for the Islamic State. New luggage and clothes, along with passport applications were discovered during the search. The pair reiterated their not-guilty pleas before Decarie began her remarks and then listened from a high-security prisoners  box that was enclosed in thick glass. RCMP began investigating the couple after receiving a tip, Decarie said, and arrested them days later. The prosecutor said she would call family and friends of the accused as well as police experts in terrorism and explosives as witnesses in the trial, which is expected to last 10 weeks.

Summary: कनाडाई किशोरों ने बम बनाने के लिए क्रिसमस की रोशनी का इस्तेमाल करने की कोशिश कीः अभियोजक


HALABJA, Iraq (Reuters) - When poison gas killed thousands of Kurds in Halabja in 1988, its residents never imagined they would ever escape Saddam Hussein s grip, let alone vote one day in a referendum on secession from Iraq. The long-oppressed Kurds across northern Iraq are expected to get the chance to vote on Monday despite fierce opposition from the Baghdad government and regional powers who feel threatened by the referendum. It will be a bittersweet moment for the people of Halabja, a rundown city of around 75,000 people still facing the after-effects of the attack by Iraqi government forces. At a memorial to honor the victims is a statue of Omar Khawar, whose image holding his two dead twin babies which appeared in photographs around the world has come to symbolize the tragedy in Halabja. Halabja residents interviewed by Reuters said they would vote  Yes . But they were only cautiously optimistic. They wonder whether feuding Kurdish political parties can deliver on promises of a viable independent state when basic needs such as specialized medical care, jobs and infrastructure have not been met.  He would rest peacefully knowing that we will vote Yes,  said Khawar s nephew Borhan Gharib.  We think freedom is better than anything. There is no country that gets independence without a price.  The referendum will be the culmination of a century-long struggle for self-determination for the Kurds. When the Middle was carved up by the West in a deal in 1916 after the fall of the Ottoman empire, the Kurds were the largest ethnic group without a state. The region s roughly 30 million ethnic Kurds were left scattered across four countries   Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria.   Though they were widely mistreated, the Kurds suffered a particularly brutal fate in Iraq, where Saddam Hussein gassed them, buried them in mass graves and gave their land to Arabs. Halabja marked the peak of his campaign against the Kurds. Saddam accused the Halabja Kurds of siding with Iran during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. The gas attack was a turning point, winning the Iraqi Kurds worldwide sympathy. Five thousand people, mostly women and children, were killed and thousands more wounded starting at 1153 a.m. on March 16, 1988 and more are still suffering from cancer and other diseases related to poison gas.   Yet, near the memorial is a hospital built for victims of the tragedy   construction has been completed but the facility was never opened.  I am very, very angry,  said Lukman Abdel Qadir Mohammed, whose organization represents the families of the victims.   We still send more than 1,000 people every month to Iran for treatment.  Mohammed was speaking to Reuters in the house of Omar Khawar, donated by Borhan to the Halabja Chemical Attack Victims  Society.  On the pavement outside is the spot where Khawar died, face down on the ground, trying to protect his sons. Gas crept into homes and along streets. His wife and eight daughters perished. Years later, the Kurds enjoyed unprecedented protection when Western powers set up a no-fly zone to protect them from Saddam Hussein s air force in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War. The U.S.-led invasion which toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003  enabled the Kurds to eventually set up a semi-autonomous region.  But neighboring countries worried that Iraqi Kurdish ambitions would embolden their own restive Kurdish populations to agitate for change. Despite those concerns, stronger than ever because of the referendum, jubilant Kurds waved flags in the streets in the run-up to the vote.   Halabja seemed less enthusiastic, unlike other cities where banners drawing attention to the referendum hang on buildings. Kurdish President Masoud Barzani has resisted pressure from Turkey and Iran, as well as Western powers, to postpone the vote for fears it could trigger regional chaos. Kashwar Mawloud spends works as a tour guide at the museum. Like others, she says she suffers from cancer from the attack and has to travel to a major city to get treatment every month. She never wants anyone to forget about the massacre. First she walks visitors through a room illustrating Halabja s rich political history and culture.  Then there are re-creations of iconic images of the day of the attack and reminders of who orchestrated the suffering.  They include the rope that museum officials say was used to hang Saddam s cousin Ali Hassan al-Majid, who earned the nickname  chemical Ali  for directing a series of chemical attacks on Kurds, including Halabja.   Nearby is the death certificate issued after Saddam Hussein was executed following his trial. But when it comes to the future, Halabja Kurds wonder whether anything will change.  No one has invested anything in Halabja except for this museum,  said Mawloud. The region has long been plagued by political disunity between Barzani s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and decades-old rival Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), headed by Jalal Talabani. It was most recently exacerbated by the extension of Barzani s term.  The KDP controls the western part of the region while the PUK runs the east, where Halabja is located. The two fought a civil war during the 1990s. Kurdish officials were not immediately available for comment on allegations that Halabja has been neglected. Galawish Kareem, 70, lives across the street from Omar Khawar s former home. She has not relied on any Kurdish political leaders for help since the attack destroyed her neighborhood and killed 70 relatives, including her son.  Barzani, Talabani have done nothing for us,  she said.  We rebuilt our houses ourselves.  She laughed when asked if the central government in Baghdad had helped. For some, like Gibrael Omar, Halabja s dark past, not the path to independence, is still the overriding issue.  Omar and his mother take turns visiting the mass grave where 33 members of their family were buried in the days following the attack.  I will vote for neither Yes or No,  he said at a cemetery. Some residents worry that the vote will only bring more bloodshed to the region, with fierce opposition from Turkey and Iran. The Baghdad government has called the vote unconstitutional.  Tensions are running high between Iranian-backed Shi ite militias and Kurdish fighters   who cooperated in the fight against Islamic State   over the prospect of an independent Kurdistan. Despite the uncertainty, Mohammed, the head of the victims  organization, says sacrifices must be made for the sake of liberty. He lost his siblings, mother and  wife and is still suffering from medical issues.  Conflict (between Kurds and Shi ite militias) will happen maybe not today or tomorrow. But it has to,  he said.  But ultimately we will be fine.  One hundred fighters from Halabja died fighting Daesh (Islamic State). We can send one hundred more to fight the militias.

Summary: सद्दाम द्वारा गैस से घिरे कुर्द शहर को उम्मीद है कि जनमत संग्रह बेहतर दिनों की शुरुआत करेगा


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has designated White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney to be acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau until a permanent director is nominated and confirmed, the White House said on Friday. The six-year-old bureau, which has been controversial since its creation, had been led by Richard Cordray, who formally resigned on Friday.

Summary: ट्रम्प ने व्हाइट हाउस के बजट निदेशक मुलवेनी को उपभोक्ता एजेंसी का कार्यवाहक प्रमुख नामित किया


(Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will take aggressive action against cyber hacking in the early days of his government, Vice President-elect Mike Pence told reporters in New York on Friday. In a brief statement he delivered outside Trump Tower, Pence commented on a report by U.S. intelligence agencies that concluded Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian government to use hacking to try to help Trump win the Nov. 8 election. Trump was briefed on the contents of the report earlier on Friday in what Pence called “a constructive and respectful dialogue.” “The president-elect has made it very clear that we are going to take aggressive action in the early days of our administration to combat cyber attacks and protect the American people from this type of intrusion in the future,” Pence said.

Summary: पेंस ने कहा कि साइबर हैकिंग से निपटने के लिए ट्रंप आक्रामक कार्रवाई करेंगे


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two television hosts assailed by Donald Trump questioned his mental health on Friday and charged that the White House had tried unsuccessfully to get them to apologize to the president for unfavorable coverage in exchange for his getting a negative tabloid story about them killed. “He appears to have a fragile, impetuous, child-like ego that we’ve seen over and over again, especially with women,” Mika Brzezinski, co-host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” said on the program. “He attacks women because he fears women,” added co-host Joe Scarborough, a former Republican U.S. congressman. Brzezinski and Scarborough fired back on their program and in an opinion piece in The Washington Post after Trump’s Twitter messages on Thursday, which attacked them, particularly Brzezinski, in highly personal terms. Trump called Brzezinski “low I.Q. Crazy Mika” and alleged that she was “bleeding badly from a face-lift” when she visited his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida around New Year’s Eve. He called Scarborough “Psycho Joe.” Scarborough said Trump packed “five or six lies into two tweets,” including mischaracterizing their meetings at Mar-a-Lago. Brzezinski said she has never had a face-lift. Presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway, speaking on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” defended Trump’s “ability to fight back when he is attacked.” She declined to endorse the content of his tweets. “Well it’s incredible to watch people play armchair psychologist, outright ridiculing the president’s physicalities, his mental state, calling him names that you won’t want your children to call people on a playground,” Conway told Fox News. Trump’s tweets, his latest attacks on the U.S. news media, were roundly condemned by lawmakers in both parties and became a distraction as his fellow Republicans in the Senate try to iron out their differences over major healthcare legislation. Brzezinski and Scarborough, who were on friendly terms with Trump in the past but have been critical of him since he took office in January, described White House pressure over a planned negative story about them in the National Enquirer tabloid newspaper.  Trump was friends with David Pecker, chief executive of the National Enquirer’s parent company, American Media, Inc. The tabloid specializes in scandalous stories about celebrities and has been supportive of Trump.  “This year, top White House staff members warned that the National Enquirer was planning to publish a negative article about us unless we begged the president to have the story spiked. We ignored their desperate pleas,” they wrote in the Post. Scarborough said on the program he received calls from three top administration officials asking the co-hosts to call Trump and apologize for their coverage of his administration. They told him that if he called and apologized, Trump would get the story killed, Scarborough said. He did not identify the administration officials. “The calls kept coming, and kept coming. And they were like ‘Call, you need to call. Please call. Come on, Joe. Just pick up the phone and call him,’” Scarborough said. “That’s blackmail,” said MSNBC panelist Donny Deutsch. In a Twitter post on Friday, Trump gave a different account, saying Scarborough “called me to stop a National Enquirer article. I said no!” American Media said in a statement “we have no knowledge of any discussions between the White House and Joe and Mika about our story, and absolutely no involvement in those discussions.” “I am very concerned as to what this once again reveals about the president of the United States,” Brzezinski, who is engaged to be married to Scarborough, said of Trump’s Twitter attacks. “President Trump launched personal attacks against us Thursday, but our concerns about his unmoored behavior go far beyond the personal. America’s leaders and allies are asking themselves yet again whether this man is fit to be president,” the co-hosts wrote in the Post column.

Summary: एम. एस. एन. बी. सी. के मेजबानों ने व्हाइट हाउस पर कवरेज पर दबाव बनाने की कोशिश करने का आरोप लगाया


BERLIN (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel s Christian Democrats (CDU) and the rival Social Democrats (SPD) are nearly tied ahead of a crucial regional election in the state of Lower Saxony, a poll conducted by a German newspaper showed on Monday. The poll by the Hannoverschen Allgemeine Zeitung put the CDU on 33.1 percent, while the Social Democrats - who now rule the state with the environmentalist Greens - were at 32.8 percent.     The Oct. 15 election is being followed closely because it follows just three weeks after national elections and will delay federal coalition talks since parties are reluctant to alienate core voters by making compromises ahead of the vote. The poll showed the Greens were in third place with 9.9 percent of the vote, followed by far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party with 8.1 percent, the pro-business Free Democrats with 8 percent and the far-left Left party at 5.4 percent.

Summary: मर्केल के रूढ़िवादियों ने राज्य के मतदान से पहले एसपीडी के साथ गठबंधन कियाः सर्वेक्षण


BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thai authorities have arrested a local tour guide for indecent behavior at a temple after she posted a photograph online that showed her standing on a pagoda, police said on Saturday. The arrest came as photographs of Naranon Narakamin 44  circulated on social media earlier in the week, including one that showed her standing behind a tourist with one of her foot placed on a pagoda at Bangkok s iconic Temple of Dawn. It is unclear when the photograph of Naranon was taken but it has outraged many conservatives who say her behavior was  disrespectful to Buddhism. Tourist Police Deputy commissioner Police Major General Surachet Hakpal told a press conference on Saturday that the tour guide has exhibited  inappropriate behavior at a Buddhist temple,  and set a bad example for Thais and foreign tourists.  Naranon, who has publicly apologized for her action, will be charged with breaching the national archaeological site act and could face up to one month jail term and a fine of up to 10,000 baht ($307.50), the police said. In Thailand, using feet to point at people or objects, particularly sacred objects is considered very rude. Revealing clothing and inappropriate action at places of worship is also considered offensive in the predominantly Buddhist country. Last month two American tourists were arrested and fined for public indecency after posing for a  butt selfie  at a temple in Bangkok.

Summary: थाई टूर गाइड बौद्ध मंदिर में अनुचित व्यवहार के लिए गिरफ्तार


SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea s environment ministry will announce on Monday its approval of an environmental assessment report for the deployment of a U.S. anti-missile defense system in the country, a ministry official told Reuters. South Korea said in June that it will hold off installing remaining components of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) until it completes an assessment of the system s impact on the environment. The ministry will hold a briefing on the decision at 3:30 p.m. (0630 GMT) on Monday, the official said.

Summary: दक्षिण कोरिया सोमवार को थाड की तैनाती के लिए पर्यावरण रिपोर्ट की मंजूरी की घोषणा करेगाः अधिकारी


ROME (Reuters) - In a post-Harvey Weinstein world, logic would dictate that Silvio Berlusconi, who hosted wild parties with young women and brags about his sexual prowess, would not have a ghost of a chance at political resurrection. But logic and Italian politics have never been synonymous. On Monday, the four-time former prime minister s right-wing bloc relished a huge political victory in regional elections in Sicily. Silvio, as his die-hard adoring acolytes simply call him, was back in the driver s seat.  Berlusconi is Alive,  was the headline in La Verita, a right-wing newspaper, on Tuesday. The mainstream Corriere della Sera ran a cartoon showing Berlusconi, wrapped in a burial shroud, emerging from a tomb like Lazarus in the New Testament. The regional Sicilian ballot, in which Berlusconi s candidate, Nello Musumeci, won big, was seen as a dry run for nationwide elections due before May. As the 81-year-old media tycoon campaigned tirelessly for Musumeci, betting that a victory in Sicily would be the springboard for a national return to power of the center-right, the ex-premier s sex scandals were no issue.  Unfortunately, this is a country where if one violates rules on sexual ethics, he is admired,  said Anna Foa, a history professor who is on a team of women who write a monthly edition on women s issues of the Vatican newspaper L Osservatore Romano. Earlier this month, British Defence Secretary Michael Fallon resigned after admitting touching a radio presenter s knee repeatedly in 2002 - relatively tame behavior compared to Berlusconi s past sex scandals.  This is a country - and I am sorry to have to say this - where breaking the rules brings votes,  Foa said.  Everyone wants to be the one who breaks the rules and gets away with it, and Berlusconi did this in a sphere that people like best - the sexual sphere.   Bunga Bunga  - the term of uncertain origin that the billionaire media magnate gave to his wild parties with young women at his plush residence near Milan - is now part of the modern Italian lexicon. Partly as a result of the sex scandals, Berlusconi went through a very public divorce from his second wife, Veronica Lario, in 2014. His current partner, Francesca Pascale, is 49 years his junior. Berlusconi is due to stand trial on charges he bribed witnesses to silence them over accusations he paid for sex with young women. In an earlier, related case, he was acquitted of having sex with one when she was still 17. He denies all wrongdoing. But far from being a hindrance, commentators say that in Italian politics, scandals can help, if only because voters believe there is little left to hide.  Berlusconi is like a used car that comes with a guarantee. You know what you are going to get,  said Giovanni Orsina, professor of modern history at Rome s Luiss University.  Even a person who is 81 years old and has gone through all these issues and scandals can seem appealing..., not because of his own strength but because of the weaknesses of others.  For now, Berlusconi cannot run for office due to a 2013 tax fraud conviction. But he hopes the European Court of Human Rights overturns this ban in time for him to run next year. Even if the courts deny him the chance, he would still be calling the shots as leader of the center-right in the event of a victory at the national elections. More than 50 women have accused Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein of having sexually harassed or assaulted them over the past three decades. He has denied having non-consensual sex with anyone. The allegations against Weinstein have prompted many more women as well as men to share stories in the media about improper behavior by powerful men in their countries. Not so in Italy, where women have for the most part remained silent despite confidential polls showing that many were asked for sexual favors in order to keep their jobs or advance their careers.  We are still a backwards country where women who speak out about sexual abuse are accused of exaggerating,  said Michela Marzano, an Italian philosopher who teaches at Paris Descartes University.  There is an unconscious adoption of the concept of a patriarchal order and male superiority and there is very little solidarity among women.

Summary: बर्लुस्कोनी की नजर राजनीतिक पुनरुत्थान पर, यौन घोटालों से अबाधित


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Homeland Security will study whether to discontinue using privately run detention centers, which the Justice Department recently called unsafe, for migrants and shares of private prison operators fell on Monday after the news. Department Secretary Jeh Johnson said he directed his advisory council to evaluate whether the agency should continue to contract with private prison operators and make a recommendation by Nov. 30. Advocates for immigrants have accused the companies of withholding proper mental health and medical care from detainees to boost profits.  Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a division of DHS, currently uses detention facilities run by Corrections Corp of America (CXW.N) and The GEO Group (GEO.N).  Corrections Corp of America’s stock slid 9.4 percent and The GEO Group’s stock fell 6 percent immediately after news of the review. Both stocks were rebounding later in the afternoon. Corrections Corp of America earned $689 million from ICE contracts since 2008, 12 percent of its revenue from state and federal contracts over that time, according to the website SmartProcure which tracks government contracts. The company currently manages a facility for Central American women and children in Dilley, Texas. The GEO Group runs a similar facility in Karnes City, Texas and has earned $1.18 billion from contracts with ICE since 2008, about 35 percent of its total revenue from government contracts, according SmartProcure data. The GEO Group said in a statement, “GEO’s facilities under contract with ICE are highly rated and provide high-quality, cost-effective services in safe, secure, and humane residential environments pursuant to strict contractual requirements and the federal government’s national standards,” the statement said.  Corrections Corp of America spokesman Steve Owen said,    “We’re proud of the quality and value of the services we provide and look forward to sharing that information.”        Immigration advocates and members of Congress have ramped up pressure on DHS to end its contracts with the private prison companies since the Justice Department announced on Aug. 18 it would do so.  That was prompted by an inspector general’s report that criticized the safety and effectiveness of private prisons.  “Rather than wait for a review and a report from a committee, the president should ensure that the phase-out of private prisons ... is extended to DHS operations immediately,” said Greg Chen, advocacy director at the American Immigration Lawyers Association.  Senator Bernie Sanders, former Democratic presidential candidate, and Democratic Representative Raul Grijalva asked DHS in a letter last week to end the practice.  A Department of Homeland Security official told Reuters on Aug. 19 that ICE needed private prison companies because they offer flexibility to quickly build facilities and adjust detention space as migration flows fluctuate.  Both companies also contract with state and local prison systems, which make up about half of their revenue. A Reuters survey of 10 states with the largest contracts with private prison companies, including California and Texas, showed none had immediate plans to drop their contracts.

Summary: अमेरिका निजी आप्रवासन जेलों के उपयोग की समीक्षा करेगा, शेयरों में गिरावट


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - White House legislative director Marc Short said he expects Congress to pass a short-term spending bill to fund the federal government at least into January, he told CNBC in an interview on Monday, days before current funding expires on Friday.  “I don’t think anybody wants to see government shut down,” Short told CNBC. “We’re very optimistic that we’re going to find a resolution this week.”

Summary: व्हाइट हाउस को उम्मीद है कि कांग्रेस सरकार के बंद होने से बचेगी


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy on Monday provided a temporary reprieve for President Trump s order blocking most refugees from entering the United States, putting on hold a lower court s ruling loosening the prohibition. Kennedy s action gave the nine justices more time to consider the Justice Department s challenge filed on Monday to the lower court s decision allowing entry to refugees from around the world if they had a formal offer from a resettlement agency. The full Supreme Court could act within days. The Justice Department opted not to appeal another part of last Thursday s ruling by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that related to Trump s ban on travelers from six Muslim-majority nations. The 9th Circuit ruling broadened the number of people with exemptions to the ban to include grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins of legal U.S. residents. Without Kennedy s intervention, the appeals court decision would have gone into effect on Tuesday. Kennedy asked refugee ban challengers to file a response to the Trump administration s filing by noon on Tuesday. Under the 9th U.S. Circuit s ruling, up to 24,000 additional refugees would become eligible to enter the United States than otherwise would be allowed, according to the administration. Trump s March 6 order banned travelers from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days and locked out most aspiring refugees for 120 days in a move the Republican president argued was needed to prevent terrorist attacks. The order, which replaced a broader January one that was blocked by federal courts, was one of the most contentious acts of his presidency. Critics called it an unlawful  Muslim ban  that made good on Trump s promise as a candidate of  a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.  The broader question of whether the travel ban discriminates against Muslims in violation of the U.S. Constitution, as lower courts previously ruled, will be argued before the Supreme Court on Oct. 10. The Supreme Court in June partially revived the order after its provisions were blocked by lower courts. But the justices said a ban could be applied only to those without a  bona fide  relationship to people or entities in the United States. New litigation was brought by Hawaii over the meaning of that phrase, including whether written assurances by resettlement agencies obligating them to provide services for specific refugees would count. Hawaii and other Democratic-led states, the American Civil Liberties Union and refugee groups filed legal challenges after Trump signed his order in March.  The Trump administration has ended its odd and ill-advised quest to ban grandmas from the country,  Hawaii Attorney General Douglas Chin said on Monday.  With respect to the admission to the United States of refugees with formal assurances and the Supreme Court s temporary stay order, each day matters,  Chin added, promising to respond soon to the administration s filing. In court papers filed earlier on Monday, the Justice Department said the 9th Circuit refugees decision  will disrupt the status quo and frustrate orderly implementation of the order s refugee provisions.  Omar Jadwat, an ACLU lawyer, contrasted Trump s efforts to keep alive his travel ban with the Republican president s decision last week to rescind a program that protected from deportation people brought to the United States illegally as children, dubbed  Dreamers.   The extraordinary efforts the administration is taking in pursuit of the Muslim ban stand in stark contrast to its unwillingness to take a single step to protect 800,000 Dreamers,  Jadwat said.

Summary: सुप्रीम कोर्ट के न्यायाधीश ने अस्थायी रूप से ट्रम्प शरणार्थी प्रतिबंध को बरकरार रखा


PALERMO, Italy (Reuters) - Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi looked poised on Monday for a stunning political comeback as his rightist bloc claimed victory in an election in Sicily that puts it in pole position for a national vote due by next May. The regional Sicilian ballot, held on Sunday, was seen as a dry run for the nationwide election, with many of the island s problems reflecting those of the country as a whole - high unemployment, a debt mountain and sluggish economic growth. An influx of migrants, many of whom arrive in Sicily after being rescued in the Mediterranean, was also a key issue. With all of the votes counted, a center-right bloc backed by the four-times prime minister was more than 5 percentage points ahead of the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement, with the center left, which governs at the national level, a distant third.  Sicily, just as I asked, has chosen the path of real, serious, constructive change, based on honesty, competence and experience,  the 81-year-old said in a video posted on Facebook. Nello Musumeci, the center right s candidate for governor of the island, had 39.8 percent of the vote, while the 5-Star s Giancarlo Cancelleri had 34.7 percent. The center left s Fabrizio Micari was lagging on 18.7 percent. The result puts Berlusconi back on the political map after years of sex scandals and graft allegations which had seemed to have reduced the billionaire media mogul to a spent force. Berlusconi cannot run for office due to a 2013 tax fraud conviction. But he hopes the European Court of Human Rights overturns this ban when it reviews his case later this year,  which would pave the way for a possible national challenge. He returned to the fray after open-heart surgery last year and campaigned actively in Sicily. Even if the courts deny him the chance to run, he would be an influential figure should the center right capture power again nationally. The result on the island deals a stinging blow to another former prime minister, Matteo Renzi, head of the ruling Democratic Party (PD), which is locked in feuding with erstwhile leftist partners. After a raft of vote setbacks in recent years, Renzi has many critics inside the PD who may now try to mount a challenge to his leadership.  Defiant in its defeat, the anti-system 5-Star Movement vowed to reach national government next year, and its leader Luigi Di Maio declared the PD  politically dead . Opinion polls suggest the center right will win next year s national vote, but a recent change to the electoral law is likely to stop any one bloc winning an absolute majority of seats, resulting in political gridlock. Sicily is traditionally a center-right stronghold which was poached by the PD in 2012 thanks to splits in the conservative bloc. This time, Berlusconi reunited the coalition behind a widely respected leader with a far-right background. Berlusconi s allies, the Brothers of Italy and the Northern League, reaped rewards with anti-immigrant campaigns, suggesting this will remain high on the agenda for the national vote.  From Sicily we will demonstrate that this is a winning model that can triumph at a national level,  said Giorgia Meloni, the leader of the right-wing Brothers of Italy party which is the junior partner in the center-right alliance. The centre-left government has moved this year to shut down the flow of migrants from Libya after more than 600,000, mainly Africans, reached Italy over the past four years. But the issue has dented support for the center left, which has further damaged itself by falling prey to ferocious schisms. The maverick 5-Star, founded by comedian Beppe Grillo, had campaigned relentlessly for months in Sicily, looking to take charge of its first region after a string of successes in municipal ballots in recent years, including in Rome and Turin. Di Maio said the party had been penalized in Sicily by low turnout - a record of fewer than half of those eligible cast a vote, showing flagging interest in politics in Italy following years of economic downturn.  In two or three months I think many of those who abstained will regret not going to vote,  Di Maio said, insisting that if turnout had been 3 or 4 points higher it could have tilted the result in the movement s favor. Despite losing to the center right, the 5-Star Movement s result was a leap from 2012, when its candidate won only 18 percent of the vote in the regional polls.   Investors are worried 5-Star might win control of the country. The party bases its appeal mainly on a campaign against corruption and vested interests in Italy, but it has pulled back from a pledge to hold a referendum on continued membership of the euro. Markets were little changed on Monday.

Summary: राष्ट्रीय वोट पर नजर, बर्लुस्कोनी ने सिसिली में सेंटर राइट के लिए जीत का जश्न मनाया


(Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump met with auto executives on Tuesday and gave the energy industry a boost with action on pipelines. Highlights of the day follow: Trump signs orders smoothing the path for the controversial Keystone XL and Dakota Access oil pipelines, aiming to expand energy infrastructure and roll back key Obama administration environmental actions. Trump is expected to sign executive orders starting on Wednesday that include a temporary ban on most refugees and a suspension of visas for citizens of Syria and six other Middle Eastern and African countries, according to several congressional aides and immigration experts briefed on the matter. Trump urges the chief executives of General Motors Co, Ford Motor Co and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV to build more cars in the country. Trump signs an executive order directing that the permitting process and regulatory burden for domestic manufacturers should be streamlined to reduce what he calls an “incredibly cumbersome, long, horrible” system.     The Environmental Protection Agency and the Agriculture Department will hold off on some rules as part of a freeze on regulations imposed by the Trump administration, trade groups say.         Trump’s administration has moved since last week to curb the flow of information from several government agencies whose mandate affects environmental issues, in actions that appear designed to tighten control and discourage dissenting views. {nL1N1FE5FE] Trump, poised to restore the Supreme Court’s conservative majority, says he will announce his choice next week to fill the seat left vacant since the death of conservative Justice Antonin Scalia more than 11 months ago, with three federal appeals court judges among those under close consideration. Trump intends to retain FBI Director James Comey amid reports that law enforcement and intelligence agencies are scrutinizing Trump associates over their ties to Russia. The U.S. Senate votes overwhelmingly to confirm South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley as ambassador to the United Nations. Representative Tom Price, Trump’s nominee for health secretary, tells a Senate panel he wants to ensure people with pre-existing conditions have access to insurance and he does not support Medicare privatization. Mexico could pull out of the North American Free Trade Agreement if a renegotiation of terms does not benefit the country, its economy minister says. The White House says Trump stands by his belief that millions of people voted illegally in the presidential election but offered no evidence to support the contention.

Summary: हाइलाइटः 24 जनवरी को ट्रम्प प्रेसीडेंसी


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration reiterated its concerns about Israeli settlement activity, the two sides said on Thursday, as a round of talks ended without agreement over limiting future construction on land the Palestinians want for a state. The four days of high-level meetings in Washington marked the latest step by President Donald Trump’s aides aimed at opening the way to renewed peace diplomacy between Israel and the Palestinians, despite deep skepticism in the United States and Middle East over the chances for success. Trump’s Middle East envoy, Jason Greenblatt, who recently returned from a visit to the region, led the U.S. delegation in what were described as “intensive discussions” with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s chief of staff Yoav Horowitz and foreign policy adviser Jonathan Schachter. Despite setting a more positive tone toward Israel than his predecessor Barack Obama, Trump urged Netanyahu during a White House visit last month to “hold back on settlements for a little bit.” The two then agreed that their aides would seek an accommodation on how much Israel can build and where. “The United States delegation reiterated President Trump’s concerns regarding settlement activity in the context of moving towards a peace agreement,” according to a joint statement released by the White House. “The Israeli delegation made clear that Israel’s intent going forward is to adopt a policy regarding settlement activity that takes those concerns into consideration,” it said. “The talks were serious and constructive, and they are ongoing.” Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians have been frozen since 2014 and settlements are one of the most heated issues. Palestinians want the West Bank and East Jerusalem for their own state, along with the Gaza Strip. Most countries consider Israeli settlements, built on land captured in the 1967 Middle East war, to be illegal. Israel disagrees, citing historical and political links to the land, as well as security interests. Trump has expressed some ambivalence about a two-state solution, the mainstay of U.S. policy for the past two decades. But he recently invited Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to visit. Trump has not publicly detailed what kind of agreement he wants with Israel on settlements. But many supporters of a two-state solution have urged a formula that restricts construction to the large settlement blocs that Israel is expected to retain under any final peace accord. In the talks, officials discussed measures for improving the climate for peace, according  to the joint readout. It said a key focus was on steps that “could have a meaningful impact on the economic environment in the West Bank and Gaza,” and specifically a desire to advance efforts toward “self-sustainability” in electricity and water.

Summary: वाशिंगटन वार्ता इजरायली बस्तियों पर समझौते के बिना समाप्त हो गई


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Donald Trump speaks volumes in what he doesn’t say. The Republican presidential hopeful often fails to finish his thoughts during his speeches, abruptly breaking off a sentence or substituting a vague word for a more precise one. Those half-finished sentences aren’t throwaways. They’re enthymemes, a rhetorical device at the heart of a persuasive speaking style that has helped catapult the billionaire to the top of national polls ahead of the November 2016 election. To his supporters, Trump is a politician who doesn’t sound like one: He says what he thinks, happily insults rivals and can appear unscripted, particularly when he leaves his thoughts to trail off unfinished or peppers sentences with ambiguities.  Take his comments during a recent Republican debate in which he defended his call for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States: “I talked about Muslims,” he said. “We have to have a temporary something, because there’s something going on that’s not good.” It was left up to the listener to decipher what Trump was saying. What this means in practice is that supporters can tailor his statements to their own beliefs, rhetoric professors said. It also allows Trump, consciously or not, to avoid boxing himself in with quotes that rivals can use against him.  Strictly speaking an enthymeme is a form of argument in which at least one premise remains unstated. The concept isn’t new - it was described by the Greek philosopher Aristotle - and has been used in American politics in the past.  In practice, enthymemes come in various forms, including dramatic pauses, unfinished sentences and the place-filling “somethings” Trump employs, according to the experts, who study U.S. public and political speech. In each case, listeners fill in the blanks. Trump has used enthymemes when taking on Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly and one-time rival Carly Fiorina; he has used them in describing his opposition to a New York City mosque; he routinely uses them in speeches when talking about subjects ranging from immigration to trade wars. In the case of Kelly, Trump, recounting a heated exchange between them during a televised debate, said she had “blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her - wherever.” His statement caused a furor among many who concluded Trump had meant Kelly was menstruating and hormonal and therefore irrational. Trump denied it and supporters came to his defense, pointing out he had never spoken the words. Trump’s habit of leaving listeners to fill in the blanks isn’t new; it’s apparent in recorded interviews done well before his presidential bid. And it’s not clear whether he does it consciously. His spokeswoman, Hope Hicks, called it a symptom of a racing mind. “People have said Mr. Trump’s speeches are like a game of chess - an intricate web of great genius,” she said.      Enthymemes can have a potent effect on listeners, said Baylor University rhetoric professor Martin Medhurst. “You have involved them psychologically and helped to persuade them by having them persuade themselves.” But the rhetorical device carries risks, especially in instances where the unfinished thought is so vague that listeners can complete it with either a positive or a negative statement. In a Jan. 29 speech, for example, Trump described his views that China is exploiting the United States. “They’ve taken our jobs, they’ve taken our base, they’ve taken our money, and I love China, they get along great with me, I told you I have all these people, I do business with China, they agree with me. They can’t —.” A clip of the statement was shown by Reuters to a group of students in a public policy class at New York’s Hunter College, who disagreed among themselves about what Trump’s next words would have been.  One student, Alexandre Alvalade Ximenes, a freshman studying political science and philosophy, completed Trump’s unfinished thought this way: “They can’t believe how intellectually inferior we are.”  Another, Matthew Locastro, also a political science major, filled in the blank with, “There’s no way they can disagree with him because of his working relationship with them.”  Trump isn’t alone in using enthymemes to effect.  In an interview last September with Rolling Stone, Trump mocked the looks of Fiorina. “Look at that face. Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?”  To some listeners, Trump was communicating that he thought Fiorina was ugly. Trump later denied he meant that. Fiorina responded with her own enthymeme: “I think women all over this country heard very clearly what Mr. Trump said.”

Summary: ट्रम्प एक है------: व्हाइट हाउस आशावादी मतदाताओं के साथ रिक्त स्थान भरता है


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will visit Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam, the Philippines and Myanmar as part of President Donald Trump s trip to Asia starting on Friday, the Department of State said on Thursday.  In a statement, the department said Tillerson would represent Trump at the East Asia Summit in Manila before traveling to Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, on Nov. 15 to address the humanitarian crisis and discuss U.S. support for its democratic transition.

Summary: अमेरिकी शीर्ष राजनयिक ट्रम्प यात्रा के हिस्से के रूप में एशिया की यात्रा करेंगेः विदेश विभाग


MOSCOW (Reuters) - Hundreds of Russian celebrities, sportspeople and politicians  nominated President Vladimir Putin for re-election on Tuesday, hours after the Kremlin said it wanted opposition leader Alexei Navalny investigated for calling for a boycott of the vote.  Navalny called for the boycott of the March 18 election on Monday after Russia s central election commission ruled he was not eligible to run for president due to a suspended prison sentence hanging over him. The 41-year-old lawyer, who says he s being excluded on false grounds because the Kremlin is running scared, said he would use his campaign headquarters across the country to call the election s legitimacy into question and organize protests.  The Kremlin, which points to polls that show Putin is the runaway favorite with Navalny trailing far behind, on Tuesday set the scene for possible police action against Navalny and his supporters whose protests have been broken up before.   The calls for a boycott will require scrupulous study, to see whether or not they comply with the law,  Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call. Declining to comment on the election commission s decision to bar Navalny, Peskov shrugged off allegations that the presidential poll would be a farce without the opposition leader who has made a name for himself by leveraging social media and conducting corruption investigations into senior officials.  The fact that one of the would-be candidates is not taking part has no bearing on the election s legitimacy,  said Peskov. Hours later, Putin, 65, was feted by his supporters, almost 700 of whom pledged to back him for re-election   above the minimum 500 required to initiate a presidential bid. Putin s own schedule was too busy for him to attend the Moscow nomination event, the Kremlin said, though he is expected to personally submit the necessary paperwork to the central election commission in the coming days. The former KGB officer is running as an independent, a move seen as a way of strengthening his image as a  father of the nation  rather than as a party political figure. The ruling United Russia party and the Just Russia party have both said they will support him.  I have worked under the leadership of the president for quite a long time so I know that everything will be alright for us with President Putin,  Sergei Kislyak, Russia s former ambassador to the United States, now a senator, told Reuters at Tuesday s nomination meeting. The commander of a nuclear submarine, Sergei Novokhatsky, told the same meeting that Putin had helped revive the Russian Navy, which he described as mired in apathy at the end of the 1990s with many of its ships stuck in ports. Now, he said, wages were up and Russian ships served throughout the world.  The course the motherland is on is the right one,  Novokhatsky told the meeting. If, as expected, he wins re-election, Putin, who has dominated Russia s political landscape for the last 17 years, will be eligible to serve another six years until 2024, when he turns 72. Allies laud him for restoring national pride and expanding Moscow s global clout with interventions in Syria and Ukraine. But Navalny, the opposition leader, says Putin s support is exaggerated and artificially maintained by a biased state media and an unfair system which excludes genuine opponents.  Navalny, who says he could defeat Putin in a fair election, has been jailed three times this year and charged with breaking the law for organizing public meetings and rallies designed to bolster his presidential campaign. He has said millions of voters will be disenfranchised unless the authorities relent and allow him to run.   The European Union has also questioned the decision to bar Navalny.  (It) casts a serious doubt on political pluralism in Russia and the prospect of democratic elections next year,  the EU s External Action Service said in a statement on Tuesday.  Politically motivated charges should not be used against political participation,  it said, urging Moscow to ensure a  level playing field  for all Russian elections.

Summary: क्रेमलिन ने पुतिन प्रतिद्वंद्वी द्वारा बुलाए गए मतदान बहिष्कार की जांच की मांग की


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has chosen Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a conservative health policy expert with deep ties to the pharmaceutical industry, to lead the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the White House said on Friday. If confirmed by the Senate, Gottlieb would be in charge of implementing Trump’s plan to dramatically cut regulations governing food, drugs, cosmetics, dietary supplements and tobacco. Gottlieb is well known on Capitol Hill, where he has testified multiple times on hot-button health issues, including complex drug pricing matters, and is viewed favorably by drug companies and pharmaceutical investors. He sits on the boards of several small drug and biotech companies and is an adviser to GlaxoSmithKline Plc (GSK.L). “Thank God it’s Gottlieb,” Brian Skorney, an investment analyst at Robert W. Baird, wrote in a research note. “We view this as a favorable development for the sector.” Gottlieb was chosen over Jim O’Neill, a libertarian investor close to Silicon Valley billionaire Peter Thiel, a PayPal co-founder who now advises Trump on technology and science matters. O’Neill’s stated view that drugs should be approved before being proven effective generated widespread alarm. Gottlieb, 44, is a resident fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute think tank and a partner at a large venture capital fund. He is a former FDA deputy commissioner who has advocated a loosening of requirements needed for approval of new medical products. “Scott knows how the agency works and he will move it forwards, though maybe not always in ways the agency is comfortable with,” said John Taylor, a lawyer and president of compliance and regulatory affairs with the consulting firm Greenleaf Health and a former acting FDA deputy commissioner. In addition to his public health and health policy roles, Gottlieb has for the past decade been a partner at New Enterprise Associates, a large venture fund with investments in the life sciences, medical technology and healthcare services. Critics of the nomination say Gottlieb’s financial background present an array of potential conflicts of interest. Dr. Michael Carome, director of Public Citizen’s Health Research Group, said Gottlieb “has spent most of his career dedicated to promoting the financial interests of the pharmaceutical industry.” If confirmed, he added, “he will have to be recused from key decisions time and time again.” Stephen Ubl, a spokesman for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said it “looks forward to working with Dr. Gottlieb in his new role and engaging with him and the Agency as they seek to modernize the drug discovery and review process.” Gottlieb, who declined to comment on the nomination, is unlikely to up-end the FDA in the way O’Neill might have, but he is nonetheless expected to bring significant change, including moving the agency to increase flexibility in the clinical trial development process. In this he will be supported by the recently passed 21st Century Cures Act which instructs the FDA among other things to consider the use of “real world evidence” to support new drug applications. This could include anecdotal data, observational studies and patient reports  “People don’t want to take chances with safety, but there’s increasingly some clamor to be more flexible on the efficacy side,” said Kathleen Sanzo, who leads the FDA practice at the law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius. “You need to have some signal of efficacy. The question is, how much?” The FDA has attempted to push back against moves to sideline randomized clinical trials, long considered the gold standard. In January it issued a report documenting 22 cases in which drugs that appeared to show promise in early trials turned out to be either ineffective or unsafe or both in larger trials. One of Gottlieb’s priorities will likely be to streamline the process for approving generic versions of complex, difficult-to-copy therapeutics. He has stated publicly that he does not believe the FDA has good tools or policies to move such products and has advocated the creation of different approval standards. “He’s a thoughtful and nuanced kind of guy, and not solely an industry shill,” said Jim Shehan, head of Lowenstein Sandler’s FDA regulatory practice.  A survey conducted by Mizuho Securities USA Inc of 53 pharmaceutical executives found that 72 percent favored Gottlieb over other potential candidates. Many described him as knowledgeable, experienced and balanced. “Gottlieb is someone who the industry and investors view as an incremental positive,” said RBC Capital Markets analyst Michael Yee. “The industry and investors need rational scientific logic and an understanding of risks and benefits.” Patient advocates welcomed the news. Gottlieb “has firsthand experience at the FDA and as a physician that has treated patients understands the breadth of work that needs to be achieved on their behalf,” said Ellen Sigal, founder of Friends of Cancer Research.

Summary: ट्रंप ने एफडीए चलाने के लिए गॉटलीब को चुना, फार्मा ने ली राहत की सांस


DUBLIN (Reuters) - Irish musician and activist Bob Geldof called Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi  a hand maiden to genocide  on Monday as he returned his Freedom of the City of Dublin award in protest over his fellow recipient s response to the repression of Rohingya Muslims.  I don t want to be on a very select roll of wonderful people with a killer,  Geldof told state broadcaster RTE.      Someone who is at best a handmaiden to genocide and an accomplice to murder.   More than 600,000 Muslims from Myanmar s Rakhine state have fled to refugee camps in Bangladesh after military operations described by the United Nations as ethnic cleansing. Their plight has drawn outrage around the world. But Suu Kyi, long seen as a champion of human rights, has been criticized for failing to speak out against violence. There have been calls for her to be stripped of the Nobel Peace Prize she won in 1991. Suu Kyi was given the Freedom of Dublin in 1999 while she    was held under house arrest by Mayanmar s then military government. She received her award at a reception in Ireland in 2012, two years after her release.  Her association with our city shames us all and we should have no truck with it, even by default. We honored her, now she appals and shames us,  Geldof said in a statement.  The Lord Mayor of Dublin, Micheal Mac Donncha, said the city council had discussed taking away the honor and the matter was still under review. Last month she was stripped of a similar honor by the British university city of Oxford, where she was an undergraduate.  But Mac Donncha, a councillor for the Irish nationalist Sinn Fein party, also criticized Geldof s gesture, saying it was ironic as Geldof held a British knighthood despite  the shameful record of British imperialism across the globe .  The former Boomtown Rats singer was given an honorary knighted in 1986 in recognition of his charity work, including organizing the 1985 Live Aid concert to help those suffering from starvation and disease in Ethiopia. Other foreign recipients of the Freedom of Dublin include John F. Kennedy, Nelson Mandela and Mikhail Gorbachev. Irish rockers U2, who had campaigned for Suu Kyi s release while she was a political prisoner, also voiced disappointment and said her silence was  starting to look a lot like assent .  Who could have predicted that if more than 600,000 people were fleeing from a brutal army for fear of their lives, the woman who many of us believed would have the clearest and loudest voice on the crisis would go quiet,  the band said in a statement.  For these atrocities against the Rohingya people to be happening on her watch blows our minds and breaks our hearts.  The Myanmar military says it launched the crackdown in response to attacks by Rohingya militants.

Summary: बॉब गेल्डोफ़ ने आंग सान सू की को 'नरसंहार की दासी' कहा


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Democrat Hillary Clinton’s lead over Republican rival Donald Trump widened to 6 percentage points in the latest Reuters/Ipsos U.S. presidential tracking poll, released on Friday, showing Trump losing support among women. The Oct. 21-27 opinion poll shows 42 percent of people who either voted already or expect to vote in the Nov. 8 election support Clinton, versus 36 percent for Trump. Clinton’s lead a week ago was 4 points. The polling was conducted before Clinton’s campaign was hit on Friday by the FBI announcement that it was investigating more emails as part of a probe into her use of a private email server while secretary of state.  FBI Director James Comey said in a letter to several congressional Republicans that the agency had learned of the existence of emails that appeared to be pertinent to its investigation. However, he said the FBI did not know if the emails were significant and did not provide a time frame for the probe. (GRAPHIC: Race to the White House tmsnrt.rs/298mTyD)    Trump, a New York businessman seeking his first elected office, has consistently trailed Clinton in the poll. His level of support has remained below 40 percent among all likely voters since the beginning of September. Clinton leads Trump by 10 points among likely women voters, up from a 4-point lead the previous week. Clinton has led Trump among women over the last two months, though the size of her advantage has varied widely from 1 point to 11 points. In a 2005 video that emerged this month, Trump could be heard bragging in vulgar terms about groping and kissing women.  At least a dozen women have since publicly accused him of making unwanted sexual advances. Trump denies the allegations.  Trump still has an edge among white women, a key source of strength for Republicans. Trump leads Clinton by 2 points with this group, down from a 12-point lead the previous week. Women tend to lean Democratic, but Reuters/Ipsos polling this month shows a majority of women have an unfavorable view of the former U.S. secretary of state and believe she is not honest and truthful.     Clinton also led Trump by 6 points in a separate Reuters/Ipsos poll that included alternative party candidates.  Both polls, conducted online in English in all 50 states, included 1,627 American adults who were considered to be likely voters from their voting history, registration status and stated intention to vote. That sample included 965 likely women voters and 776 likely white women voters. Individual responses were adjusted to reflect the overall U.S. population.  The poll has a credibility interval, a measure of accuracy, of 3 percentage points for the total sample and 4 percentage points for the women voters. The RealClearPolitics website, which tracks most major polls, shows Clinton leading Trump by an average of 5 percentage points.

Summary: महिलाओं का समर्थन खोने के कारण क्लिंटन ने ट्रम्प को 42 से 36 प्रतिशत की बढ़त दीः सर्वेक्षण


MOSCOW (Reuters) - The scandal that erupted in the United States over allegations Russia hacked Democratic Party emails has not been in Moscow’s interests and both sides in the U.S. election campaign are just using Russia to score points, Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday. The U.S. government on Friday formally accused Russia for the first time of a campaign of cyber attacks against Democratic Party organizations ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential election. And the White House said on Tuesday it would consider a variety of responses to the alleged hacks. “They started this hysteria, saying that this (hacking) is in Russia’s interests. But this has nothing to do with Russia’s interests,” President Putin told a business forum in Moscow.  Putin said the accusations were a ploy to divert U.S. voters’ attention at a time when public opinion was being manipulated. “Everyone is talking about ‘who did it’ (the hacking),” said Putin. “But is it that important? The most important thing is what is inside this information.” The Kremlin said earlier on Wednesday it took a negative view of White House statements about a planned “proportional” response to the alleged cyber attacks. Putin complained that all sides in the U.S. presidential race were misusing rhetoric about Russia for their own ends, but said Moscow would work with whoever won the election “if, of course, the new U.S. leader wishes to work with our country”. “About a decade ago, they wouldn’t mention Russia at all, because it was not even worth talking about, such a third-rate regional power and not interesting at all. Now Russia is problem number one in the entire election campaign,” said Putin. “All they do is keep talking about us. Of course it’s pleasant for us, but only partly because all participants are misusing anti-Russian rhetoric and poisoning our bilateral relations.”

Summary: पुतिन का कहना है कि अमेरिकी हैकिंग घोटाला रूस के हित में नहीं है


BERLIN (Reuters) - German rail operator Deutsche Bahn is facing a siege of online criticism over a proposal to name a high-speed train after Holocaust victim Anne Frank, who was deported by train to the Auschwitz concentration camp. The idea to name the high-speed ICE 4 train after Frank came from proposals made by Deutsche Bahn customers and the German public, which a panel reviewed. Of 19,400 submissions, Anne Frank was one of the most popular names, it said.  Aware of the historical responsibility we bear, we made a deliberate decision to help keep Anne Frank s memory alive,  Bahn said in a statement.  It was not our intention to disrespect the memory of Anne Frank in any way whatsoever.  Critics say the plan was insensitive. Frank was deported from her home in Amsterdam and taken to Auschwitz by train in September 1944. She was later moved the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, where she died in early 1945. Iris Eberl, a conservative Bavarian lawmaker, said on twitter the plan was  disrespectful. Mirjam Wenzel, director of the Jewish Museum in Frankfurt, where Frank was born, tweeted that the idea was  based on historical amnesia . The Anne Frank House, the museum that preserves the family s hiding place in Amsterdam, said in a statement that the idea of naming the train after her  is painful for the people who experienced these deportations, and causes fresh pain to those who still bear the consequences of those times within them.

Summary: जर्मन रेलवे ने ट्रेन का नाम 'ऐनी फ्रैंक' रखने का प्रस्ताव रखा


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A vote to block the Obama administration’s ambitious climate regulation was one of Antonin Scalia’s last acts as a Supreme Court justice. His sudden death may have opened a new path to the rule’s survival. Scalia died Saturday. Four days earlier, he voted with the other conservative members of the high court to put a hold on the administration’s plans to implement the Clean Power Plan while it is litigated. The regulation is designed to lower carbon emissions from U.S. power plants by 2030 to 32 percent below 2005 levels. The rule is the United States’ main tool to meet the emissions reduction target pledge it made at U.N. climate talks in Paris in December.  It was challenged by 27 states, along with business and industry groups, in a case now before an appeals court in Washington, D.C. The Supreme Court could be asked to weigh in again later this year. Without Scalia, the conservative members of the court no longer have a majority, at least in the short term. The sudden shift has given a boost to the supporters of the emissions rule.   “Last week, the Clean Power Plan was basically dead,” said Brian Potts, a lawyer with the Foley & Lardner law firm who represents companies on environmental regulatory issues. “But with Scalia’s death, everything has changed.” Environmental lawyers involved in the litigation who support the regulation told Reuters Monday that even before Scalia’s death they had been hopeful the Supreme Court would ultimately uphold it upon close consideration. But they said the change in the high court bolsters the rule’s chances. “There are still no guarantees, but the Clean Power Plan faces much better odds now than it did on Friday,” said Jack Lienke, a lawyer with the Institute for Policy Integrity at New York University School of Law, which backs the regulation. Industry lawyers said they remained confident the regulation will be struck down. “While Justice Scalia’s untimely passing creates more uncertainty, the Clean Power Plan is still predicated on an extraordinarily shaky legal foundation,” said Scott Segal, a lawyer with the Bracewell law firm, which represents companies that oppose the regulation.  In January, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit had unanimously rejected the same request for a stay that the Supreme Court granted last week. The appellate panel has set oral arguments on the merits of the case for June 2. The randomly-drawn appeals court panel is viewed by lawyers on both sides as relatively favorable for the administration, featuring two Democratic appointees and one Republican appointee. One of the Democratic appointees is Sri Srinivasan, a judge many legal experts see as a leading candidate for President Barack Obama to nominate to replace Scalia. If the appeals court upholds the rule and the challengers take the case to the Supreme Court, they would face an uphill battle in getting the five votes needed for a win without Scalia. The four liberal justices are seen as likely to uphold the rule. So, the best result the challengers would be likely to get is a 4-4 split. When the court is evenly divided, the lower court ruling stands, meaning the regulation would survive. An unknown factor is how soon a ninth member will be appointed and whether it will be a Democratic or Republican president who makes it. Some Republican leaders have said Obama should not appoint a successor, leaving it to the next president, who would take office in January 2017. Obama has said he plans to announce a nomination but will face an uphill ban to win confirmation in the Republican-controlled Senate. If a Democratic appointee replaces Scalia, it would tilt the balance of the court leftward for the first time in decades. A Republican appointee would extend the narrow conservative tilt the bench had until Scalia’s death. If Srinivasan were appointed, he would have to step aside on the Clean Power Plan case because of his involvement in the case at the appellate level. That would increase the chances of a 4-4 split. (This version of the story corrects date when new president takes office to January 2017 in paragraph 15)

Summary: स्कैलिया की मृत्यु ओबामा की जलवायु योजना के लिए कानूनी संभावनाओं को बढ़ाती है


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. officials are discussing whether to withhold a portion of U.S. assistance to Egypt to protest Egyptian passage of a law that imposes restrictions on non-governmental organizations, a senior administration official said on Wednesday. Officials have not reached an agreement on whether to proceed with a recommendation to President Donald Trump and his senior leadership, but there is a feeling that some action is necessary in reaction to the move by Egypt, the official told Reuters. U.S. aid to Egypt has long been sacrosanct. Egypt is one of Washington’s closest allies in the Middle East, receiving $1.3 billion in U.S. military aid and about $200 million in economic assistance annually. “We told them over and over again don’t do this, that they are putting at risk U.S. aid, but they did it anyway,” the official said. “We’re figuring out how to respond.” The discussions involve cutting off a portion of American aid, not all of it, the official said. The Egyptian law restricts NGO activity to developmental and social work and introduces jail terms of up to give years for non-compliance. Egyptian lawmakers said the law was necessary to protect national security. The government has long accused human rights groups of taking foreign funds to sow chaos and several are facing investigation over their funding. In May, when the law was issued after being ratified by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, U.S. senators criticized it. Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham called it “draconian legislation” and they said the U.S. Congress should in response “strengthen democratic benchmarks and human rights conditions on U.S. assistance for Egypt.”  U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, and nine other senators sent Trump a letter on June 19 urging the president to press Sisi on the issue. “The U.S. Congress will take the Egyptian government’s recent actions into consideration as we review our bilateral assistance to Egypt to ensure that the American people’s tax dollars are used appropriately,” the letter said. U.S. President Barack Obama froze aid to Egypt for two years after Sisi, then a general, overthrew Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in mid-2013 after mass protests against Mursi’s rule. Trump has been intent on rebooting the bilateral relationship with Sisi and building on the strong connection the two presidents established when they first met in New York last September. Trump gave Sisi firm backing and vowed to work together to fight Islamist militants when Sisi visited the White House in April.

Summary: अमेरिकी अधिकारी एनजीओ कानून पर मिस्र को कुछ सहायता रोकने पर चर्चा कर रहे हैं