SANTO DOMINGO/CARACAS (Reuters) - Members of Venezuela s leftist government and opposition coalition began a new round of talks in the Dominican Republic on Friday aimed at resolving the OPEC nation s long-running and often bloody political standoff. Various mediation efforts have failed in recent years: foes accuse President Nicolas Maduro of exploiting dialogue to buy time, while he says the opposition prefers violence. Few Venezuelans expect a breakthrough this time, with opponents demoralized at seeing Maduro consolidate power and position himself for possible re-election in 2018. The Democratic Unity coalition - which failed to dislodge Maduro in months of street protests this year that led to about 125 deaths - is pressing primarily for a guarantee of free and fair voting next year.  It also wants a foreign humanitarian aid corridor to alleviate one of the worst economic crises in modern history, as well as freedom for several hundred jailed activists, and respect for the opposition-led congress.   We ve come to seek solutions to Venezuela s problems: food, medicines, free elections, and the need to restore democracy,  lead opposition negotiator Julio Borges said.  It s a difficult path.  The opposition s bargaining power has been weakened by a surprising defeat in October gubernatorial elections. Furthermore, the multi-party group is divided, with more militant sectors opposing the talks.   The dialogue they are planning to start is a parody ... an instrument for the regime to gain time and keep itself in power,  said Antonio Ledezma, an opposition leader who escaped house arrest this month to seek asylum abroad. Maduro has instructed negotiators to focus on opposition to U.S. sanctions against his government. He was strengthened by the October vote and anticipates another win in mayoral elections set for December, which the opposition is mainly boycotting.  President Donald Trump has slapped individual sanctions on a raft of officials for alleged rights abuses, corruption and drugs crimes, as well as economic measures intended to stop the Venezuelan government issuing new debt.  Maduro wants any potential deal with the opposition to include joint pressure on Washington to back off. He has blamed the U.S. measures for Venezuela s economic problems, which in fact began several years ago amid failed statist policies and a plunge in global oil prices.  We came to demand the immediate end of the economic aggressions against Venezuela,  said chief government negotiator and Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez. There is no indication, however, that Trump would be prepared to ease pressure on Maduro, whom he has called  a bad leader who dreams of becoming a dictator.   On the contrary, U.S. officials say Washington could strengthen sanctions unless Maduro enacts democratic changes. The government also wants recognition for Venezuela s Constituent Assembly, an entirely pro-Maduro superbody elected in July despite an opposition boycott and widespread international condemnation.  With an eye to its push to refinance more than $120 billion in foreign debt, Maduro would like the opposition-led congress to agree to approve any negotiations with bondholders, a potential loophole to get round the U.S. sanctions. Foreign ministers from Chile, Mexico, Bolivia, Nicaragua and host Dominican Republic were acting as guarantors at the talks over two days at the Foreign Ministry building in Santo Domingo.  Major near-term breakthroughs remain unlikely given the complexity of issues on the table and the distance between each side s preferences,  said Eurasia group consultancy.

Summary: वेनेजुएला सरकार और दुश्मनों ने बातचीत फिर से शुरू की, सफलता की संभावना नहीं


PARIS (Reuters) - French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday unveiled measures aimed at educating the public and schoolchildren about sexism and  violence against women and improving police support for victims. During his campaign Macron, who won the presidential election in May, promised to rethink sexual politics and gender equality, which he made a national cause for his five-year mandate. The Harvey Weinstein scandal in the United States has accelerated a rethink of attitudes toward sexual harassment in France, a country that cherishes its self-image as the land of seduction and romance.  Let s seal a pact of equality between men and women,  Macron said in a speech marking the International Day for Elimination of Violence Against Women. About violence and sexual abuse, he said:  It is essential that shame changes camp.  During his speech, Macron observed a minute s silence for the 123 women killed by their partner or ex-partner in 2016. Measures announced include educating secondary school children about pornography and simplifying the system for rape and assault victims to go to the police. Proposals that could be included in a 2018 draft law include criminalizing street harassment and extending the statute of limitation for the rape of minors to 30 years from 20 years. Macron also said he was personally in favor of setting the age of sexual consent at 15. Currently France has no minimum age for sexual consent. Planned changes to the police system include allowing victims of rape and sexual assault to make their initial complaints online, before going to a police station to bring criminal charges. Other measures include  on demand  bus stops, where women can stop a bus anywhere at night so they can get home safely.  French feminist group Osez le F minisme said the measures were going in the right direction but must be accompanied by adequate funding.  Without funding, any communication, training, awareness or help plan for the victims will be useless,  the statement said. France has often debated sexual harassment over the past decade following scandals involving French politicians. Six years ago a sex scandal forced former finance minister Dominique Strauss-Kahn to resign as head of the International Monetary Fund, provoking a round of soul-searching in France about sexual abuse that goes undetected in the upper echelons of power.

Summary: फ्रांस के मैक्रों ने महिलाओं के खिलाफ हिंसा पर अंकुश लगाने की योजना का खुलासा किया


(Reuters) - A federal judge ruled on Tuesday that Ohio violated voters’ rights in 2014 by cutting the number of days in which people were allowed to cast early ballots to 28 from 35. Judge Michael Watson of U.S. District Court in Columbus ordered Ohio to reinstate the 35-day period and also to grant residents a week-long opportunity to register and cast a ballot at the same time - a period known as “Golden Week.” If the ruling stands, voters in Ohio will be able to vote a full 35 days before the general election on Nov. 8. Watson said the earlier changes violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and were unconstitutional.  Ohio’s Republican-controlled legislature changed the system two years ago. The move was challenged by the state’s chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the American Civil Liberties Union.  The two groups argued that the limited opportunities for early voting directly affected minorities. Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, a Republican, said in a statement on Tuesday: “It is disappointing that a federal judge would again change the election rules after the current laws were upheld in the same federal district court by a settlement agreement we reached with the NAACP and the ACLU.” Husted said in a statement.  The settlement between Husted and the organizations allowed residents to vote on multiple Sundays leading up to a presidential election and gave access to additional evening voting hours, according to ACLU documents.  Husted said he plans to consult the leaders of the state Senate and state House of Representatives before deciding how to proceed.

Summary: ओहियो ने समय से पहले मतदान को कम करके मतदान के अधिकार का उल्लंघन कियाः अमेरिकी न्यायाधीश


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham and Bill Cassidy said on Thursday they were working with Republican Senator Ron Johnson and members of the House of Representatives to add more “flexibility provisions” to a proposed bipartisan bill to stabilize the healthcare insurance market in the short term. They said in a statement these provisions were needed to win support in the House for the stabilization measure introduced by Republican Senator Lamar Alexander and Democratic Senator Patty Murray to shore up the insurance markets created under the 2010 healthcare law by reviving subsidies for two years to help lower-income Americans obtain medical coverage. President Donald Trump said last week that he was discontinuing the subsidies. [nL2N1MU1CS]

Summary: दो रिपब्लिकन सीनेटर द्विदलीय स्वास्थ्य विधेयक में लचीलापन जोड़ना चाहते हैं


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, said on Wednesday he will review the Obama administration’s recent decision to lock in fuel efficiency rules. On Friday, outgoing EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy finalized a determination that the landmark fuel efficiency rules instituted by President Barack Obama should be locked in through 2025, a bid to maintain a key part of his administration’s climate legacy. “It merits review and I would review that,” Pruitt said during a contentious Senate confirmation hearing, questioning the decision of McCarthy to finalize the determination just two weeks after the public comment period closed on Dec. 30.  Pruitt said separately he would not commit to allowing California to continue its own clean vehicle rules under a 2009 decision by the Obama administration. Major U.S. and foreign automakers have appealed to Trump, who has been critical of Obama’s climate policies, to review the rules requiring them to nearly double fleet-wide fuel efficiency by 2025, saying they impose significant costs and are out of step with consumer preferences. As part of a 2012 regulation, EPA had to decide by April 2018 whether to modify the 2022-2025 model year vehicle emission rules requiring average fleet-wide efficiency of more than 50 miles per gallon. In 2011, Obama announced an agreement with major automakers to raise fuel efficiency standards to 54.5 miles per gallon. This, the administration said, would save motorists $1.7 trillion in fuel costs over the life of the vehicles, but cost the auto industry about $200 billion over 13 years.     The EPA said in July that because Americans were buying fewer cars and more SUVs and trucks, it estimated the fleet will average 50.8 mpg to 52.6 mpg in 2025. In November, the agency moved up the timetable for proposing that automakers can meet the 2025 standards. McCarthy said her determination, a legally binding decision to maintain the fuel efficiency rules, rested on an extensive technical record. She said the rules are “feasible, practical and appropriate” and in “the best interests of the auto industry.” Senator James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican, on Wednesday said McCarthy’s determination was an “extreme action” that “broke the deal” with automakers. Legal experts have said it will be more difficult for the Trump administration and Congress to undo the determination than to unwind other regulatory actions issued by the Obama administration during its final months in office. The 2025 determination is not a new regulation, so the EPA under Trump would likely have to go through an extensive process before withdrawing it and could face lawsuits from environmental groups if that step was taken. Separately. California’s new Democrat Senator Kamala Harris asked Pruitt whether he would commit to upholding the California waiver. Pruitt did not say outright that he would uphold the waiver, which allows California to pursue its own emission standards that are more stringent than the federal rules.

Summary: ई. पी. ए. द्वारा नामित व्यक्ति वाहन उत्सर्जन नियमों की समीक्षा करेगा।


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley said on Tuesday that amendments to a bill to lower sentences for certain non-violent drug offenders are close to being finished.  Grassley said the amendments, which go further to ensure violent offenders are not released, will build more support for the bill among Republican leadership in the Senate, which will decide whether to bring the bill up for a vote.  “We are very close to making some changes in this bill so we can get it brought before the United States Senate,” Grassley said. Lowering the sentences of drug offenders sentenced under older and more severe laws has been touted as one of the lone areas of bipartisan agreement in a sharply divided U.S. political climate.  Grassley, who once stood in opposition to sentencing reform, introduced a comprehensive criminal justice bill in October that was endorsed by the White House.  In January, a group of Republicans led by Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton raised concerns about the bill, citing its potential to qualify thousands of violent criminals for early release.  Criminal justice reform advocates say the legislation would not guarantee the release of violent criminals but simply allow their cases to be reevaluated by a judge.  Grassley called Cotton’s concerns “legitimate and reasonable” when speaking at Georgetown University Law School on Tuesday.  Though he did not provide specifics on the amendments, Grassley did say his team of legislators may have to drop parts of the bill that would have allowed offenders caught with firearms in their possession to have their sentences lowered.  “We may have to jettison some changes in the firearm offenses and we may be able to do a better job to make sure that no one with a serious history of violence can get any relief under the bill,” Grassley said.  Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has not made any guarantee that he will bring the bill to the Senate floor for a vote. But Grassley said the amendments will increase those chances.  “I’m confident that with the changes that we’re making in the bill that we’ll get even more support for our bill,” Grassley said.  “And with more support, I’m confident that we will be able to go to the leaders in the Senate and persuade them that this bill is exactly what the American people need to see happen in the United States Senate.”

Summary: अंतिम सजा सुधार विधेयक निकट हैः सीनेट के ग्रासली


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Twenty-two million Americans would lose insurance over the next decade under the U.S. Senate Republican healthcare bill, a nonpartisan congressional office said on Monday, complicating the path forward for the already-fraught legislation. After the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) score, Senator Susan Collins, a moderate Republican, said she could not support moving forward on the bill as written. Collins’ opposition highlights the delicate balance that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell must strike as he tries to deliver a legislative win to President Donald Trump by reconciling the Republican Party’s moderate and conservative wings. Moderate senators are concerned about millions of people losing insurance. Key conservative senators have said the Senate bill does not do enough to repeal Obamacare. The CBO assessment that an additional 15 million people would be uninsured in 2018 under the bill and its prediction that insurance premiums would skyrocket over the first two years prompted concern from both sides.  McConnell’s goal was to have a vote on the bill before the July 4 recess that starts at the end of this week. But several Republicans, including Collins, have said they would not approve a procedural motion that would clear the way for a vote. McConnell can afford to lose just two Republican senators from their 52-seat majority in the 100-seat Senate, which would allow passage of the bill with Vice President Mike Pence casting the tie-breaking vote.   “If you are on the fence ... this CBO score didn’t help you, so I think it’s going to be harder to get to 50, not easier,” Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said of the bill’s prospects. The CBO score is also likely to amplify criticism from industry groups such as the American Medical Association, which said earlier on Monday that the Senate’s bill violated the doctors’ precept of “first, do no harm.” The CBO is only able to assess the impact of legislation within a 10-year window, but it said that insurance losses are expected to grow beyond 22 million due to deep cuts to the Medicaid insurance program for the poor and disabled that are not scheduled to go into effect until 2025.  Trump and Republicans in Congress made repealing and replacing Obamacare, former Democratic President Barack Obama’s signature domestic legislation, a central campaign promise. The pressure is on for them to deliver now that they control the White House, House of Representatives and Senate. Republicans view Obamacare as costly government intrusion and say that individual insurance markets are collapsing. Obamacare expanded health coverage to some 20 million Americans by expanding Medicaid and mandating that individuals obtain health insurance. The CBO score was released just hours after Republicans revised the bill, adding a measure that would penalize people who let their insurance coverage lapse for an extended period. The move followed criticism that the original bill would result in a sicker - and more expensive - insurance pool.  At least four conservative Republicans - Senators Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Ron Johnson and Mike Lee - have expressed opposition to the Senate legislation.    Moderate Republicans have warned against replacing Obamacare with legislation that is too similar to the version passed by the House, saying it would cause too many people, especially those with low incomes, to lose health coverage. The CBO estimated that the House bill would cause 23 million people to lose insurance. Trump had called the House bill “mean” and asked Senate Republicans to come up with “more generous” legislation. Democrats uniformly oppose both the House and Senate versions of the bill. “CBO’s report today makes clear that this bill is every bit as ‘mean as the House bill,” Senator Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader, told reporters. The White House in a statement on Monday criticized the CBO for issuing a “flawed report” and said its assessments should not be “trusted blindly.” Trump and McConnell have been working to shore up support. The president called key conservative senators over the weekend, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said.  Both Cruz and Johnson said they were concerned about CBO estimates that insurance premiums would initially rise as much as 30 percent over the first two years before declining. “Doesn’t help the people whose premiums skyrocket next year,” Cruz told reporters. “Kind of a problem, isn’t it?” Johnson said of the short-term premium increase. Johnson and Paul have said they will oppose the procedural motion that would allow the Senate to move forward to a vote. Cruz is drafting suggested fixes. Paul remains opposed to the bill.     The first moderate Republican to oppose the bill, Senator Dean Heller, is already facing political fallout. America First Policies, a political group run by former Trump campaign staffers, said it would air healthcare-related attack ads against Heller, who faces a competitive re-election race in Nevada next year. Senator Rob Portman, of Ohio, who has not said whether he supports the bill, was “dressed down” by McConnell during a Monday leadership meeting, a senior Republican aide told Reuters.  Ohio participates in Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, and Republican Governor John Kasich has criticized the Senate bill. Portman’s office did not respond to a request to comment. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida said his governor, fellow Republican Rick Scott, would be on Capitol Hill this week to discuss the bill’s impact on the state. Constituent and industry groups have been critical of the Senate bill’s proposal to reduce the Medicaid healthcare program for the poor and point to the CBO analysis that it would disproportionately affect older adults. Under Senate rules, the bill must replicate savings projected in the House version that passed last month. It cleared that critical hurdle, with the CBO estimating it would decrease the budget deficit by $321 billion over 2017-2026. A revision to the bill that imposes a penalty for prolonged lapses in insurance coverage addresses the original bill’s provision to drop the Obamacare penalty on those who do not have insurance. Experts had warned that canceling the fine could lead to a sicker insurance pool because young and healthy people would not face consequences for failing to purchase insurance.  The bill would impose a six-month waiting period for anyone who lets their health insurance lapse for over 63 days and then wants to re-enroll in a plan in the individual market. The 15 million people the CBO estimates would be uninsured in 2018 is largely due to the repeal of the penalty associated with being uninsured. The CBO did not evaluate the revised version that included the new waiting period. Insurer Blue Cross and Blue Shield said it was encouraged by the inclusion of incentives for continuous coverage. Molina Healthcare said it preferred the Obamacare mandate, said that and the Senate bill, even after revised, would simply delay care. If the Senate passes a bill, it will either have to be approved by the House, the two chambers would have to reconcile their differences in a conference committee, or the House could pass a new version and bounce it back to the Senate.

Summary: रिपब्लिकन हेल्थकेयर बिल खतरे में, 22 मिलियन लोगों को बीमा का नुकसान होता देखा गया


(Reuters) - Alaska Governor Bill Walker urged state legislatures on Tuesday to compromise on a budget in order to avoid an unprecedented government shutdown next month. The state has a multibillion dollar deficit that must be sorted before July 1, the start of Alaska’ new fiscal year, in order to avoid shuttering government offices and services. Last week, Alaska warned thousands of state workers about potential layoffs unless legislators can agree on a fix to the fiscal crisis. The legislature has been convening through a special session, but Walker described the negotiations as in “a stalemate.” On Monday, Walker proposed a compromise package that would reduce the state’s deficit from at least $3.7 billion last year to a $300 million shortfall. “I’m not wild about the compromise,” said Walker, an independent, during a news conference on Tuesday. “But we’re running out of time.” Pete Kelly, a Republican representing Fairbanks and the Republican-led Senate president, told reporters on Tuesday evening that the governor’s message was “well received but that doesn’t mean we’ll agree to everything.” The Senate was evaluating the package, but a reduced budget was “still the priority,” Kelly said.  Leaders of the Democratic-controlled House declined to comment. Since 2013, Alaska has struggled with substantial consecutive budget deficits, in part caused by the state’s large reliance on oil revenues and the continued low prices of oil. The state has balanced its budget over the last few years by drawing $10 billion from its savings without adding new revenues. The state’s budget has been slashed from $7.8 billion in 2013 to $4.3 billion proposed for 2018.  “I know some people say, ‘We need to do some cuts.’ We’ve been doing that,” Walker said on Tuesday. “We have done that significantly.” Almost 2,300 state positions were eliminated in recent years, along with 70 state programs, and over 40 state facilities, such as prisons, youth detention, and motor vehicle sites, have been closed, Walker said.

Summary: अलास्का के राज्यपाल ने राज्य में बंद से बचने के लिए बजट समझौता करने का आग्रह किया


FLORENCE, Italy (Reuters) - Prime Minister Theresa May said that a Brexit implementation period would last for around two years.  During the implementation period, people will be continue to be able to come and live and work in the UK but there will be a registration system, an essential preparation for the new regime,  May said in Florence.  As of today, these considerations point to a implementation period of around two years,  she said.

Summary: ब्रिटेन के प्रधानमंत्री मे ने कहा कि ब्रेक्सिट संक्रमण अवधि लगभग दो साल तक रहेगी


NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya s opposition coalition has asked supporters to boycott three big companies it says benefit from ties to the government of President Uhuru Kenyatta, who won last week s repeat election after an opposition boycott.  Wearing hats embroidered  RESISTANCE , and speaking against a backdrop showing a clenched fist, members of parliament gave their supporters a week s notice to stop using products from telecoms giant Safaricom, dairy products from Brookside and Bidco cooking oils.   We are calling for a boycott that will be painful, a boycott that will bring these companies to their knees until they stand for electoral justice,  said Nakara Lodep, Turkana central lawmaker.  Opposition leader Raila Odinga has called for a  National Resistance Movement  to protest the outcome of the repeat election, which was ordered by the Supreme Court after it annulled the results of an August poll over procedural irregularities.  President Uhuru Kenyatta won a second, five-year term with 98 percent of the vote after Odinga boycotted the contest. Only 39 percent of registered voters took part.  Lawmakers said Safaricom was targeted because it had helped transmit election results. Brookside Dairy is partly owned by Kenyatta s family and partly by French dairy giant Danone.   A spokesman for Safaricom said the company had no immediate comment. Brookside and Bidco did not return messages seeking comment.  Odinga has until Monday to file a Supreme Court case seeking to overturn the election. If there are no outstanding legal proceedings, Kenyatta will be inaugurated on Nov. 14.

Summary: केन्या के विपक्षी समर्थकों ने तीन कंपनियों का बहिष्कार करने का आग्रह किया


HELSINKI (Reuters) - A former Miss Finland has accused U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump of groping her in 2006 when she was representing the country in the Miss Universe beauty contest. Ninni Laaksonen told the Ilta-Sanomat newspaper that the  Republican presidential nominee had grabbed her behind before she appeared on a television show in New York with other contestants. “He really grabbed my butt. I don’t think anybody saw it but I flinched and thought: ‘What is happening?’,” Laaksonen was quoted as saying in the newspaper. The accusation follows a stream of allegations of inappropriate conduct by Trump from other women in the United States which have put pressure on his campaign as he trails in  opinion polls ahead of the Nov. 8 election. Trump has denied the accusations. Laaksonen could not be reached for comment on Friday.

Summary: पूर्व मिस फिनलैंड का कहना है कि ट्रम्प ने उन्हें छुआ था


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Puerto Rico will ask the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday to validate a law that could let it cut billions of dollars from what it owes in debt at some public agencies, a key test in the island’s efforts to weather a massive fiscal crisis.  The U.S. territory, facing what its governor has called an unpayable $70 billion debt and a 45 percent poverty rate, will argue its case against financial creditors, including Franklin Advisers and OppenheimerFunds, who want to keep contentious restructuring talks out of court.  As Puerto Rico leaders, creditors and U.S. lawmakers seek a debt solution in the U.S. Congress, the question before the Supreme Court is whether the island should be allowed to restructure debts under a court-supervised regime similar to Chapter 9 bankruptcy laws used by U.S. cities such as Detroit and Stockton, California. “It is very significant that the Supreme Court took this case — we’re seeing efforts to try to determine with some more clarity the status of Puerto Rico,” said bankruptcy expert Melissa Jacoby, a professor at the University of North Carolina School of Law. Puerto Rico, which as a U.S. commonwealth is excluded from Chapter 9, passed the Recovery Act in 2014, a local restructuring law that lets it put public entities, such as power authority PREPA, into bankruptcy.  Two U.S. court decisions deemed the Recovery Act invalid after PREPA creditors sued, with the Supreme Court agreeing in December to hear an appeal. Creditors say the act contradicts federal bankruptcy law, which prohibits states from making their own debt restructuring laws. Puerto Rico argues that if it is exempt from Chapter 9, it must also be exempt from the limitation on states passing their own laws. “It makes no sense to read a limitation on Chapter 9 to apply to a jurisdiction … that is categorically excluded from that chapter,” it said in January. The outcome could threaten a hard-fought, consensual restructuring at PREPA, where creditors holding most of the utility’s $8.3 billion in debt agreed to take 15 percent reductions in payouts. Reinstating the Recovery Act could allow Puerto Rico to scrap that deal and instead put PREPA into bankruptcy, where it could impose deeper cuts and bind holdout creditors to the deal.  Jacoby said the decision might come down to the court focusing on how Congress previously interpreted bankruptcy law. “It’s all about legislative history,” said Jacoby.

Summary: प्यूर्टो रिको ने अमेरिकी उच्च न्यायालय में पुनर्गठन कानून लिया


GRAND RAPIDS, Mich./WASHINGTON (Reuters) - When President-elect Donald Trump returns to this factory town on Friday for a victory celebration, he will find a region that is already experiencing the manufacturing renaissance he promised on the campaign trail. With local factories employing more workers than any time since the late 1990s, assembly line jobs are not hard to find. Those that pay a decent wage, however, are harder to come by. “We can barely make ends meet and we’re stuck going nowhere,” said auto parts worker Michael Baum, 22, as he smoked a cigarette in the parking lot of a Family Dollar discount store.  Trump won the White House thanks to strong support from workers in Midwestern cities like Grand Rapids who have seen their living standards erode as the United States shed manufacturing jobs. He beat Democratic rival Hillary Clinton by a margin of 14 percent in the four counties that make up the Grand Rapids metropolitan area, helping him carry Michigan by a margin of 0.27 percent. Trump has promised to punish companies that shift work overseas, pressuring manufacturers like United Technologies Corp. to reverse their outsourcing plans. “Our jobs are being stolen like candy from a baby,” Trump said at a rally here the night before the Nov. 8 election.  Grand Rapids, a hub of furniture makers and auto parts suppliers, has not been immune to outsourcing. At least 488 people have lost their jobs over the past year as two manufacturers, Dematic Corp and Leon Automotive Interiors, have shifted work to other countries, U.S. Labor Department filings show. But new hiring has more than made up for those losses. The number of factory jobs in the region has grown by 40 percent since the depths of the recession in 2009, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, and unemployment stands at 2.9 percent, well below the national average of 4.6 percent.  Local businesses now say their top concern is finding qualified workers, according to Rick Baker, president of the Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce. Even as jobs have returned to Grand Rapids, earnings remain low. At $846 per week, average weekly wages in the region rank 46th among the 50 largest U.S. metropolitan areas, BLS data show. The Heart of West Michigan United Way, a local charity, said demand for its services has remained steady over the past several years even as the economy has picked up.  While manufacturing helped lift millions of unskilled workers into the U.S. middle class in the 20th Century, that is no longer the case, said Lou Glazier, president of Michigan Future, a think tank that focuses on the state’s economy. Factories still pay good wages to workers who have specialized skills, such as welding or computer programing, but routine work no longer pays enough to cover living expenses, he said. Grand Rapids is “participating in the old economy and doing well in it, in terms of jobs. It’s just that the economy is no longer producing high wages,” Glazier said. While Trump and others blame global competition for the decline in factory work, automation has played a large role as well, economists say. The U.S. manufacturing sector has more than doubled output over the past 35 years even as it had shed one-third of its work force, according to the nonpartisan Brookings Institution. “We’re doing more today with the same amount of people that we had eight years ago,” said Bob Roth, chief executive officer of RoMan Manufacturing, which make glass and electrical components.  At RoMan, assembly line workers start at $13 per hour but skilled workers can earn up to $30 an hour, Roth said. The company pays community college tuition for those who wish to upgrade their skills, but those who fail to improve their productivity enough to justify a higher wage within two years are fired, he said. Such prospects come as little consolation to workers like Baum, who are trying to figure out a way to boost their earnings on their own. For now, they are pinning their hopes on Trump. “If he can bring good paying jobs back to America,” he said, “I’ll vote for him again.”

Summary: ट्रम्प के गढ़ में, कारखाने गुनगुना रहे हैं लेकिन वेतन कम है


WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Monday approved legislation to give companies greater legal protections for their commercial secrets and allow them for the first time to sue in federal court if they are stolen. The Defend Trade Secrets Act passed 87-0, amid strong White House backing. Supporters hope the unanimous vote will boost the bill’s prospects in the House of Representatives. “Some thieves would rather not go through the trouble of developing products themselves; they’d rather just steal the fruits of others’ creativity,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said in urging passage of a bill he argued would “help protect American innovation.” Theft of intellectual property, including trade secrets, costs U.S. businesses more than $300 billion a year, according to a 2013 report by the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property, which was made up of a bipartisan group of high-ranking former U.S. officials.  For that reason, the bill has received support from a wide array of companies, including Boeing Co (BA.N) and Johnson & Johnson (JNJ.N), and trade groups such as the Biotechnology Industry Organization, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and a software lobby whose members include Apple Inc (AAPL.O) and Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O).   Trade secrets are confidential information that can give a business a commercial edge. They can vary widely depending on the industry, including manufacturing processes, formulas, computer algorithms, industrial designs, business strategies, and customer lists. Companies have become increasingly concerned about protecting themselves against threats, including hacking and rogue employees.  The legislation would give companies the right to sue in federal court to recover damages, enforce injunctions and prevent the further dissemination of stolen trade secrets.  It would also create a uniform standard for what constitutes trade secret theft. Currently, if companies want to sue, they are relegated to state courts, where there is a patchwork of state laws.  Trade secret theft is already a federal crime, but according to the bill’s sponsors, the U.S. Department of Justice lacks the resources to prosecute such crimes.   Some critics, including a group of legal scholars, has warned that broad legislation on trade secrets could lead to more frivolous litigation in federal courts. The House version of the bill has more than 120 sponsors, but the House Judiciary Committee has not yet considered it and it was not clear whether it would act in coming months.

Summary: सीनेट ने सर्वसम्मति से व्यापार गुप्तता विधेयक को मंजूरी दी


BEIJING (Reuters) - If Chinese President Xi Jinping was trying to impress U.S. President Donald Trump with lavish treatment during his visit to Beijing, it appears to have worked. Trump was effusive in his praise of Xi and China, even speaking admiringly of Beijing s ability to run up a huge trade surplus at U.S. expense, which Trump blamed on his predecessors. He described as  tremendous  his meetings with Xi on topics including trade, North Korea and controlling opioids, despite the lack of major breakthroughs on easing access to China for U.S. companies or further pressuring North Korea to halt its pursuit of nuclear weapons.  My feeling toward you is an incredibly warm one,  Trump said, standing beside Xi. The two had spent the previous afternoon and evening with their wives, touring the Forbidden City and dining there, a privilege rarely extended to visiting leaders.  As we said, there s great chemistry, and I think we re going to do tremendous things, both for China and the United States,  Trump said. That chemistry took shape in April, when the two first met at Trump s Mar-a-Lago resort, softening the edges on sharp differences over trade and North Korea, and concern in the West over an increasingly prosperous China s growing assertiveness. While Trump enjoys a chummy, golfing-buddy relationship with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, he has shown admiration for autocratic leaders such as Xi, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte. Stylistically, the leaders of the world s two largest economies are opposites: Xi is scripted and cautious, cultivating a down-to-earth image; Trump, a developer and reality TV star before his upset election win a year ago, is known for his off-the-cuff style, freewheeling tweets, and rhetorical hyperbole, both negative and positive. The two also face different political realities at home: Xi has never been more powerful, solidifying his grip at a twice-a-decade Communist Party Congress last month; Trump is saddled with low public approval ratings and dogged by investigations into Russian links to his election campaign, though he and his aides claim credit for the U.S. stock market s record highs. But Trump appears to recognize the clout that China - and by extension, Xi - wields as a rising power, recently likening Xi to a  king  - and is convinced he needs Beijing s leverage with North Korea to deal with his biggest global security challenge. The transactional currying of favor cuts both ways: China is eager to deflect U.S. pressure to do more on North Korea, and to avoid an escalation in trade tensions that seemed inevitable after Trump, during his presidential campaign, accused China of  raping  the United States with its trade practices.  China attaches great importance to guanxi (personal relationships) and it s especially important, given you have a top-down approach to leadership in China, to see Xi get on so well with a foreign leader,  said Wang Huiyao, head of the Center for China and Globalization, a think tank.  It s much easier to tackle structural problems with a good atmosphere,  he said. Some of their more personal exchanges won prominent play in Chinese social media, including the video of Trump s granddaughter singing to  Grandpa Xi  and  Grandma Peng . An exchange between the two leaders in the Forbidden City when Xi explained to Trump that China has the longest unbroken cultural history of any current nation was especially popular.  We are called the descendants of dragons,  Xi tells Trump.  That s great,  Trump replies and laughs. Trump went so far as to call Xi a  very special man  in a joint briefing on Thursday, and seemed so enthusiastic that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was asked if Trump had been too deferential.  I didn t detect that at all,  Tillerson said. However, the White House yielded to Beijing s wish that the two leaders not take questions during a joint press statement. Xi did not openly reciprocate Trump s personal praise, maintaining his usual stern demeanor, although he grinned when Trump said he did not blame China for the trade gap and again when he said Xi was someone who got things done.  I don t blame China,  Trump said of the trade deficit.   Who can blame a country for being able to take advantage of another country for benefit of their citizens? I give China great credit.

Summary: शी जिनपिंग की चीन यात्रा 'बहुत खास', ट्रंप ने की सराहना


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House is set to unveil President Donald Trump’s first full budget for the 2018 fiscal year on Tuesday - a plan that will include details about his proposed cuts to foreign aid and domestic spending, and his desired hikes for the military. Trump will not be in town for the occasion. He embarks on his first foreign trip on Friday to the Middle East and Europe. White House budget chief Mick Mulvaney revealed the date in a speech to the Federalist Society on Thursday. The White House had released what is known as a “skinny budget” in March, Trump’s first crack at a summary of his spending wishes for discretionary programs for the year that begins Sept. 30. The plan drew criticism even from members of his own Republican Party for being too severe. Republicans control both the Senate and House of Representatives. Congress holds the federal purse strings and seldom approves presidents’ budget plans. A $1.2 trillion federal spending deal for the 2017 fiscal year, passed last month, included about half of the extra military funding that Trump wanted. It included some funds for border security, but no money for Trump’s proposed U.S.-Mexico border wall.  Tuesday’s full budget request will include projections for mandatory spending on programs like Social Security and Medicare, and will include a decade’s worth of projections for spending and tax revenues, as well as economic forecasts.

Summary: व्हाइट हाउस का कहना है कि 2018 का पूर्ण वित्तीय बजट 23 मई को जारी किया जाएगा


ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistan angrily criticized Donald Trump, frontrunner for the U.S. Republican presidential nomination, for saying he would force the country to free a jailed Pakistani doctor believed to have helped the CIA hunt down al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Trump, a 69-year-old billionaire real estate developer, told Fox News on Friday that, if elected, he would get Pakistan to free Shakil Afridi “in two minutes”, saying that Islamabad receives a lot of development aid from the United States. “Contrary to Mr. Trump’s misconception, Pakistan is not a colony of the United States of America,” Pakistani Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar said in a statement on Monday. The statement said Afridi’s fate would be decided “by the Pakistani courts and the government of Pakistan and not by Mr. Donald Trump, even if he becomes the president of the United States”. The statement came on the fifth anniversary of the killing of bin Laden - architect of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on U.S. cities - during a secret raid in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad that damaged relations between the strategic allies. Washington views Afridi as a hero but Pakistan sentenced him in 2012 to 33 years in jail on charges of belonging to militant group Lashkar-e-Islam, which he denies. That sentence was overturned and Afridi is now awaiting trial on another charge. Trump has alarmed U.S. allies with his combative rhetoric and his calls for an “America First” agenda that many see as a threat to retreat from the world. In his comments about Pakistan and Afridi for Fox News, Trump said: “I would tell them let (him) out and I’m sure they would let (him) out. Because we give a lot of aid to Pakistan.” Afridi has also been accused in Pakistan of running a fake vaccination campaign in which he purportedly collected DNA samples to help the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) track down bin Laden. He has not been charged over those allegations. After his original conviction was overturned, he was charged in 2013 with murder relating to the death of a patient eight years earlier. He remains in jail. In the Fox interview Trump also said he supported leaving the roughly 10,000 U.S. troops still based in Afghanistan instead of withdrawing them by the end of 2017. “I would stay in Afghanistan,” he said. “It’s probably the one place we should have gone in the Middle East because it’s adjacent and right next to Pakistan which has nuclear weapons.” The United States led the military invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 to oust the Taliban for sheltering bin Laden and other al Qaeda leaders following the Sept. 11 attacks. (This story has been corrected to fix typo in Pakistan minister’s name in paragraph 3)

Summary: बिन लादेन का पता लगाने में मदद करने वाले डॉक्टर को रिहा करने के वादे पर पाकिस्तान ने ट्रंप की खिंचाई की


(Reuters) - Republican Donald Trump campaigned on a promise to shake up Washington and as president the brash real estate mogul will be in a position to dramatically change how the United States handles immigration, trade and a range of other policies. Yet many of his more ambitious proposals will require cooperation from Congress after he takes office on Jan. 20. While he will may enjoy a post-election honeymoon with congressional Republicans, a long-lasting romance is far from guaranteed, given his uneasy relationship with congressional leaders and some basic ideological differences he has with Republican orthodoxy. Following is an overview of Trump’s top policy plans: In his campaign, Trump argued that international trade agreements had hurt U.S. workers and the country’s competitiveness. He has promised to “get tough” on China and withdraw from the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, which is still not finalized. As president, Trump does have some power to raise tariffs on countries such as China.  President Barack Obama’s administration has suspended its efforts to win congressional approval for TPP, saying its fate was up to Trump and Republican lawmakers. Trump has also said he would renegotiate or scrap the North American Free Trade Agreement, the 1994 free-trade deal with Mexico and Canada. Both Canada and Mexico have indicated they are willing to discuss the agreement with Trump. Canada has indicated it would consider a free-trade agreement that excludes Mexico. Economists have warned that such moves would damage the economy by forcing consumers to pay dramatically higher prices on everything from refrigerators to T-shirts. U.S. exports, such as airplanes and soybeans, would likely suffer as well.      Trump has promised to build a wall along the Mexican border, deport millions of undocumented immigrants and ban immigration from countries that have been “compromised by terrorism.”  Since his election, he has said parts could be a fence instead of a wall, and he would act to deport up to 3 million immigrants in the country illegally who have criminal records. It was unclear where his figure comes from. Think tank Migration Policy Institute estimated in a 2015 report there were 820,000 unauthorized immigrants with criminal records.    Those policies would not come cheap. Trump has estimated the wall would cost $8 billion to $12 billion. Other estimates have run much higher. Politico estimated it would cost at least $166 billion to deport all of those in the country illegally and complete a border wall. While many congressional Republicans support those policies, they might blanch at the cost. Trump has said he would force Mexico to pay for the wall, but he has no power to force another country to spend money on something it does not want.  Trump also promised to withhold federal funds from “sanctuary cities” such as New York and Los Angeles that shield people who are in the country illegally.     More broadly, Trump could shift the broader debate over immigration, empowering skeptics like Republican Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama who want to reduce overall immigration levels and reduce the number of skilled guest workers. That would be a blow to business groups and Hispanic advocates who have sought to relax immigration laws. Trump has promised to repeal President Barack Obama’s signature Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare, and replace it with a plan that would give states more control over the Medicaid health plan for the poor and allow insurers to sell plans nationally. He would need Congress to act, and Republicans could have difficulty getting the 60 votes needed to advance a repeal effort through the 100-member Senate. Republicans could face a public backlash if they repeal a law that has provided healthcare to millions of Americans who previously had no healthcare. After the election Trump said he would consider retaining parts of Obamacare, including provisions letting parents keep adult children up to age 26 on insurance policies and barring insurers from denying coverage to people with existing conditions. Trump has vowed to make deep tax cuts, while also promising to protect popular health and retirement programs that account for more than a third of U.S. government spending. That combination of policies would massively increase the national debt, according to the nonpartisan Center for a Responsible Budget. He has also proposed increasing spending on the military and infrastructure, but has said he would reduce spending on categories other than health and retirement by 1 percent each year. On taxes, he would get plenty of help from Republicans in Congress, who have been laying the groundwork for a tax-code overhaul that would lower rates and close loopholes. But they will encounter fierce resistance from homeowners, businesses and other interest groups that benefit from current tax breaks. Trump’s promise to protect entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare will rile fiscal conservatives, who worry they will swamp the federal budget in the decades to come. But those programs are popular with the American public. Trump has promised a “dismantling” of the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law enacted following the financial crisis, but has given few details. Both Trump and the Republican Party have called for reinstating Glass-Steagall, the 1930s-era law that forced the separation of investment banks from deposit-taking institutions. Republican lawmakers have so far been unable to undo many of their most-despised pieces of the Dodd-Frank law, and many in their ranks oppose a return to Glass-Steagall. Trump appears to be leaning toward weakening the law in a manner similar to what was proposed in a bill known as the CHOICE Act this summer by Jeb Hensarling, the Republican chairman of the U.S. House Financial Services Committee.      Trump has offered few details about his plans to fight Islamic State but has said he would “knock the hell out of” the militant group. He says he is keeping the details of his strategy a secret so as not to disclose them to the enemy. Trump said that if he won, he would give U.S. generals 30 days after taking office on Jan. 20 to propose their own plans. Trump has said he opposes accepting refugees fleeing violence in Syria, and instead has said he would create “safe zones” there, which he says would be funded by Gulf states. Obama has said a safe zone in Syria would require a large U.S. military commitment, something that could prove to be unpopular with Americans weary of lengthy wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Trump has said he would have a “very, very good” relationship with Russia.  Trump has said could work with Russia to combat Islamic State. He also said he would look into recognizing Crimea, seized from Ukraine in 2014, as Russian territory and lifting sanctions on Russia imposed by Western nations for what they called an illegal land grab. Trump has criticized the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, saying some U.S. allies have not met their defense commitments. In July, he said if Russia attacked a NATO member, he would consider whether the country has paid up before providing defense. NATO leaders say the sanctions against Russia are key to persuading it to change that country’s behavior in Ukraine, where it has backed ethnic Russian separatists, and that the alliance has long been focused on fighting international terrorism. With one vacancy on the Supreme Court and several more possible in the coming four years, Trump will have a chance to put a conservative stamp on the courts for decades to come. His list of potential nominees has won praise from conservative activists and Republicans in the U.S. Senate, who will be eager to help him in that area. Trump has called global warming a hoax and said he wants to cancel the 2015 Paris Agreement among almost 200 nations that entered into force on Nov. 4. Instead, he says he will push ahead and develop cheap coal, shale and oil.  Trump’s advisers are considering ways to bypass a theoretical four-year procedure for leaving the accord, according to a source on his transition team.

Summary: फैक्टबॉक्सः नवनिर्वाचित राष्ट्रपति ट्रंप के शीर्ष लक्ष्य, सबसे बड़ी बाधाएं


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Donald Trump rejected criticism from the father of a soldier killed in Iraq who said the Republican presidential nominee had “sacrificed nothing and no one” and questioned whether the mother was allowed to speak during the couple’s appearance at the Democratic convention.  “I think I’ve made a lot of sacrifices,” Trump told ABC News in excerpts of an interview posted on Saturday. “I work very, very hard.”  Khizr Khan, a U.S. citizen of Pakistani origin and a Muslim, won widespread praise when he spoke Thursday at the Democratic National Convention, telling the story of his son, U.S. Army Captain Humayun Khan, who was killed by a bomb in Iraq in 2004.  He also attacked Trump for proposing a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States and asked if the candidate had read the U.S. Constitution. He pulled out a pocket-copy from the inside of his suit coat, in one of the most commented moments on the night that Hillary Clinton accepted her party’s nomination for president.   “Did Hillary’s script writers write it?” Trump asked ABC’s George Stephanopoulos in the interview, saying he has indeed sacrificed by employing thousands of people, and raising “millions of dollars” for veterans.  Trump said Khan appeared “very emotional and probably looked like a nice guy to me.” But the businessman also cast doubt on why Khan’s wife did not speak. “She was standing there, she had nothing to say, she probably, maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say, you tell me,” Trump said. Clinton at a campaign rally Saturday night in Youngstown, Ohio, said the Khans specifically and Muslims generally are the most recent recipients of Trump’s insults, and referenced his past statements about immigrants and the disabled. “It’s a long list my friends. I don’t know, maybe he doesn’t have anything positive to say,” Clinton said.  Earlier in the day, Clinton said in a statement that she was “very moved to see Ghazala Khan stand bravely and with dignity in support of her son on Thursday night. And I was very moved to hear her speak last night, bravely and with dignity, about her son’s life and the ultimate sacrifice he made for his country.” Ghazala Khan told MSNBC on Friday that she chose not to speak because she still cannot bear to see her son’s photographs. Khizr Khan told the New York Times that the Clinton campaign asked if he need speechwriting help or coaching. “I said: ‘I really don’t, I have my thoughts in my head,’” Khan told the Times, adding, “‘Just let me say what I want to say. It will be heart-to-heart’.”

Summary: ट्रंप ने डेमोक्रेटिक सम्मेलन में सेना के पिता की आलोचना का खंडन किया


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Federal Bureau of Investigation has found breaches in Illinois and Arizona’s voter registration databases and is urging states to increase computer security ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential election, according to a U.S. official familiar with the probe. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said on Monday that investigators were also seeking evidence of whether other states may have been targeted. The FBI warning in an Aug. 18 flash alert from the agency’s Cyber Division did not identify the intruders or the two states targeted. Reuters obtained a copy of the document after Yahoo News first reported the story Monday. Accessing information in a voter database, much of which is publicly accessible, does not necessarily suggest an effort to manipulate the votes themselves. When registering, voters typically provide their names, home addresses, driver’s license or identification numbers, and party affiliations.  But U.S. intelligence officials have become increasingly worried that hackers sponsored by Russia or other countries may attempt to disrupt the presidential election.  Officials and cyber security experts say recent breaches at the Democratic National Committee and elsewhere in the Democratic Party were likely carried out by people within the Russian government. Kremlin officials have denied that.  An FBI spokeswoman would not comment on the alerts but said the agency “routinely advises” on “various cyber threat indicators observed during the course of our investigations.” The intrusions come amid repeated unsubstantiated claims by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump that the U.S. election system is “rigged.” Trump has cited emails leaked from the DNC that indicated the party leadership favored Hillary Clinton over rival candidate Bernie Sanders as reason to cast doubt on the electoral process in general. David Kennedy, chief executive officer of information security consulting company TrustedSec, said the attacks referenced in the FBI alert appeared to be largely exploratory and not especially sophisticated. “It could be a precursor to a larger attack,” he added. Citing a state election board official, Yahoo News said the Illinois voter registration system was shut down for 10 days in late July after hackers downloaded personal data on up to 200,000 voters. State voter systems are often targeted by hackers, and 200,000 is a relatively small number compared to other recent incidents. An independent computer security researcher uncovered in December of last year a database on 191 million voters that was exposed on the open Internet due to an incorrect configuration. The Arizona attack was more limited and involved introducing malicious software into one state employee’s computer, said Matt Roberts, communications director for the Arizona secretary of state’s office.  That office publicly reported a cyber incident in June after being contacted by the FBI, which led to it temporarily shutting down its election site to deal with the potential threat.  Roberts said he was uncertain if the FBI advisory was in reference to that same June incident, during which investigators found no evidence of any data exfiltration. In that episode, the FBI told Arizona officials the hackers were believed to be Russian and described it as an “eight out of 10” on a threat severity scale, Roberts said. Arizona will hold Republican and Democratic primaries for congressional races on Tuesday.

Summary: एफ. बी. आई. ने दो राज्य मतदाता प्रणालियों के खिलाफ उल्लंघनों का पता लगाया


BERLIN (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump’s move to revise a travel ban on citizens of certain Muslim-majority countries will not lessen its impact on tourism, the head of the UN World Tourism Organization said. “People don’t go to places where they don’t feel welcome,” Taleb Rifai, the secretary general of the tourism organization, told Reuters, before the world’s biggest travel trade fair, ITB Berlin, opens on Wednesday. Trump on Monday signed a revised executive order banning citizens from six Muslim-majority nations from traveling to the United States but removing Iraq from the list, after his controversial first attempt was blocked in the courts. “It’s not about the details of which countries are included, it’s about the attitude,” Rifai said on Tuesday. Last week, he told Reuters that the United States had lost $185 million in one month after the first ban was introduced and stood to lose tens of millions more each month if similar policies continued. Data from travel analysis company ForwardKeys this week showed that demand for travel to the United States over the coming months had already flattened out following a positive start to the year. But any downturn in demand for travel to the United States is not expected to have an impact on travel in general. International tourist numbers are expected to grow 3 to 4 percent this year from last year’s 1.24 billion, Rifai said on Tuesday. “The world has opened up in incredible ways. There are so many options now. If you want to gamble, you don’t have to go to Las Vegas, you can go to Macau instead,” he said. Market researcher Euromonitor has cut its forecast for U.S. arrivals by 2020 to 84.2 million from 85.2 million amid uncertainty over the travel ban. Caroline Bremner, head of travel research at Euromonitor, said the seven countries included in the original travel ban represented only 0.1 percent of total inbound travelers there. “And so the impact on volume is not going to be as much as the message that the U.S. is sending to business and leisure travelers around the world, about the level of international openness and type of welcome they will receive under the new government,” she said.

Summary: संशोधित अमेरिकी यात्रा प्रतिबंध अभी भी पर्यटन में कटौती करेगा, संयुक्त राष्ट्र पर्यटन निकाय का कहना है


MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto on Wednesday told Donald Trump that Mexico would not pay for the Republican presidential candidate’s proposed wall along the Mexico-U.S. border, contradicting Trump’s assertion they didn’t discuss payment. “What the president said is that Mexico, as he has said on several occasions ... will not pay for that wall,” presidential spokesman Eduardo Sanchez told Reuters by telephone. Trump earlier told a joint news conference with Pena Nieto after their meeting in Mexico City that the pair had discussed the wall but not who would pay for it.

Summary: पेना नीटो ने ट्रम्प से कहा कि मेक्सिको दीवार-राष्ट्रपति के प्रवक्ता के लिए भुगतान नहीं करेगा


(Reuters) - Some of Donald Trump’s strongest conservative supporters are voicing anger and disappointment at the president-elect’s comments on Tuesday that he might back off his campaign pledge of pursuing a prosecution of former rival Hillary Clinton.     Trump, in an interview with the New York Times, took a more compassionate tone toward the Democratic presidential nominee than during his campaign, when he talked about a possible criminal investigation of the opponent he dubbed “Crooked Hillary” if he won the White House.  Chants of “Lock her up” echoed throughout his campaign rallies, with Trump supporters angrily alleging corruption related to her use of a private email server while secretary of state and to foreign contributions received by the Clinton Foundation charity. “She went through a lot and suffered greatly in many different ways, and I am not looking to hurt them at all. The campaign was vicious,” Trump told the Times, adding that launching an investigation was “not something I feel very strongly about.” Conservatives who had reveled in the possibility of a Clinton prosecution were not pleased. Breitbart News, the outlet once led by Trump’s chief strategist, Steve Bannon, published a story on Tuesday under the headline, “Broken Promise: Trump ‘Doesn’t Wish to Pursue’ Clinton email charges.” Writer and commentator Ann Coulter also balked at the news, tweeting: “Whoa! I thought we elected (Trump) president. Did we make him the FBI, & (U.S. Department of Justice)? His job is to pick those guys, not do their jobs.” She added no president should block “investigators from doing their jobs.” Radio personality Rush Limbaugh asked the 2 million people who like his Facebook page for reaction and received more than 2,000 responses, many of which were livid. “Donald J. Trump, I am hearing that you will not be pursuing Hillary email scandal and pay-to-play. If that is the case, you just proved to me and America that laws are for the poor people. That Lady Justice is not blind. That you are no different than the swamp you want to drain. If true, you have just spit in my face and so many others,” Facebook user Donald Marks wrote. Some Republicans have backed the shift, including former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a close Trump adviser, who told reporters on Tuesday that while he would have supported an investigation, Trump had to make a “tough choice.” “There is a tradition in American politics that after you win an election, you sort of put things behind you,” Giuliani told ABC News.

Summary: क्लिंटन के खिलाफ मुकदमा चलाने के फैसले का ट्रम्प ने किया समर्थन, रूढ़िवादियों ने की तीखी नोकझोंक


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump issued another warning to North Korea on Friday with a reference to American weapons as being “locked and loaded.” “Military solutions are now fully in place, locked and loaded, should North Korea act unwisely. Hopefully Kim Jong Un will find another path!” Trump wrote on Twitter, a day after his defense secretary said the United States was ready to counter any threat from Pyongyang.

Summary: उत्तर कोरिया के खतरे के खिलाफ सैन्य समाधान 'बंद और भरे हुए' हैंः ट्रम्प


SULAIMANIA/BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A senior Iranian military commander repeatedly warned Kurdish leaders in northern Iraq to withdraw from the oil city of Kirkuk or face an onslaught by Iraqi forces and allied Iranian-backed fighters, Kurdish officials briefed on the meetings said. Major-General Qassem Soleimani, commander of foreign operations for Iran s elite Revolutionary Guards, traveled to Iraq s Kurdistan region to meet Kurdish leaders at least three times this month before the Baghdad government s lightning campaign to recapture territory across the north. The presence of Soleimani on the frontlines highlights Tehran s heavy sway over policy in Iraq, and comes as Shi ite Iran seeks to win a proxy war in the Middle East with its regional rival and U.S. ally, Sunni Saudi Arabia. Soleimani met leaders from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), one of the two main Kurdish political parties in northern Iraq, in the city of Sulaimania the day before Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi ordered his forces to advance on Kirkuk, according to a PUK lawmaker briefed on the meeting. His message was clear: withdraw or risk losing Tehran as a strategic ally.  Abadi has all the regional powers and the West behind him and nothing will stop him from forcing you to return back to the mountains if he decides so,  the lawmaker quoted Soleimani as telling the PUK leadership.  The Iranian general evoked late Iraqi president Saddam Hussein s massive attack on a Kurdish rebellion in 1991, when almost the entire Kurdish population fled northern Iraq to the mountains, the PUK lawmaker said.  Soleimani s visit ... was to give a last-minute chance for the decision-makers not to commit a fatal mistake,  said the lawmaker, who like others interviewed in this story declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue. Commanders of the Iraqi Kurdish forces, known as the Peshmerga, have accused Iran of orchestrating the Shi ite-led Iraqi central government s push into areas under their control, a charge senior Iranian officials have denied. But Iran has made no secret of its presence in Iraq.  Tehran s military help is not a secret anymore. You can find General Soleimani s pictures in Iraq everywhere,  said an official close to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.  Now, beside political issues, Kirkuk s oil is a very key element for Iran, which is an OPEC member. Control of those oil fields by Iran s enemies would be disastrous for us. Why should we let them enter the oil market?.  Kirkuk fell to Iraqi government forces on Monday. Their offensive followed a referendum last month in which the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region voted to secede from Iraq against Baghdad s wishes. Kurds have sought an independent state for almost a century, after colonial powers divided up the Middle East after the fall of the Ottoman Empire and left Kurdish-populated territory split between Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria. But Iraq s two main Kurdish parties have been at odds over both the referendum and the approach to the crisis in Kirkuk, which the Kurds consider to be the heart of their homeland. The PUK, a close ally of Iran, accused its rival, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), of putting the Kurds at risk of military intervention and isolation by pushing hard for the vote, which won wide approval for independence. Soleimani has been allied to the PUK for years, but the referendum has drawn him even closer to Kurdish politics and expanded Iran s reach in Iraq beyond the Baghdad government. The Iranian general is no stranger to conflicts in Iraq, which fought an eight-year war with Iran in the 1980s. He has often been seen in footage from the frontlines, and Iran has long helped Baghdad to carry out its military strategy through paramilitary Shi ite militias which it funds and arms. Before the referendum, Soleimani suggested to Kurdish leaders that holding a vote on secession   which Iran feared would encourage its own Kurdish population to agitate for greater autonomy   would be risky.  The Iranians were very clear. They have been very clear that there will be conflict, that these territories will be lost,  said one prominent Iraqi Kurdish politician who met Soleimani ahead of the Sept. 25 referendum.  On Oct. 6, barely a week after the vote, Soleimani attended the funeral of PUK leader Jalal Talabani. Again, he wanted to make sure even his closest Kurdish allies understood the dangers of not withdrawing from Kirkuk, officials said. A senior Iranian diplomat in Iraq and an official in Iran close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei s office said Soleimani met with Kurdish leaders after Talibani s funeral and urged them to withdraw from Kirkuk and in exchange Tehran would protect their interests.    Soleimani met with one of Talabani s sons, Bafel, a few days after his father was buried, one of the PUK officials said.  Soleimani said Abadi should be taken very seriously. You should understand this,  the official said. An Iranian source in Iraq said Soleimani was in Kirkuk two nights before the Iraqi government offensive for  a couple of hours to give military guidance.  Iraqi intelligence sources said Tehran sent a clear signal to the PUK.   We understand from our sources on the ground that neighboring Iran played a decisive role in making the PUK chose the right course with Baghdad,  one Iraqi intelligence official told Reuters. Tensions over the referendum and Kirkuk have deepened divisions between the two main political parties in northern Iraq. The KDP accused the PUK of betraying the Kurdish cause by capitulating to Iran and striking a deal to withdraw.  The Talabani clan were behind the offensive on Kirkuk. They asked Qassem (Soleimani) for help and his troops were there on the ground,  said a source close to Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional Government and head of the KDP.   It is becoming clear that Iran is directing the operations to destroy the KDP.  The PUK strongly denies this. Talabani s son Bafel accused the KDP of missing a zero-hour chance to avoid losing Kirkuk by failing to reach a deal over a military base which Iraqi government forces had demanded to take back.  Unfortunately we reacted too slowly. And we find ourselves where we are today,  Bafel told Reuters. Two other Kurdish political sources gave a similar account. Iran and Soleimani offered early assistance to northern Iraq s Kurds in the fight against Islamic State, a rallying point for the Kurdish community. But after the devastating loss of Kirkuk, Iraqi Kurds have been left disillusioned.  They (both PUK and KDP leaders) just make decisions on their own and play with people s lives. In the end, we pay the price,  said pensioner Abdullah Ahmed in Sulaimania.   This is a disaster for everyone. Everyone was united against Daesh (Islamic State). Now they are back just looking out for themselves.

Summary: ईरानी कमांडर ने किर्कुक को लेकर इराकी कुर्दों को कड़ी चेतावनी दी


ZURICH (Reuters) - A Swiss man and a Colombian woman were among people arrested in Switzerland and France on Tuesday in raids against people suspected of breaking laws banning Al Qaeda and Islamic State, the Swiss attorney general s office (OAG) said. The man, a 27-year-old with Swiss nationality, was swept up in arrests in France, while the 23-year-old Colombian woman was detained in Switzerland in the investigation that began in June 2016, the OAG said, describing the probe as a coordinated  counter-terrorism  operation.  The OAG added it had no indication that any  concrete action  or attack had been planned in Switzerland.

Summary: स्विस, फ्रांसीसी पुलिस ने 'आतंकवाद-रोधी' छापों के लिए टीम बनाई


BOSTON (Reuters) - Maine voters have made the state the eighth in the United States to legalize the recreational use of marijuana, state officials said on Wednesday, following a recount of votes on a ballot initiative. The measure passed by 3,995 votes with the support of 381,768 people, Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap said in a statement. That was a slightly narrower margin of victory than the 4,073 vote gap reported following the Nov. 8 election. The measure now goes to Governor Paul LePage, who has 10 days under Maine law to issue a proclamation of the vote results. It would take effect 30 days later, setting the stage for the drug to become legal for adults over 21 beginning late next month. The result makes Maine the second state in the northeast to legalize recreational use of the drug, as voters in nearby Massachusetts approved a similar measure last month. Marijuana became legal to use and posses in limited quantities, but not yet to buy, in that state last week. LePage, a Republican, said earlier this week during a radio interview that he intended to seek legal advice before signing the proclamation, since the drug remains illegal under federal law. President-elect Donald Trump, who takes office on Jan. 20, has sent mixed signals about his views on it. During the campaign, Trump, a Republican, said that marijuana legalization was best left to the states. His pick for attorney general, U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama, has criticized Democratic President Barack Obama’s administration for not enforcing the federal ban aggressively enough. An October opinion poll by Gallup showed that 60 percent of Americans now support the legalization of recreational use of marijuana. Even more approve of the idea of legalizing marijuana for medical use, a step that 28 states have taken. In addition to Maine and Massachusetts, voters in Colorado, Washington, Alaska, Oregon, California, Nevada and the District of Columbia have legalized recreational use of the drug.

Summary: मेन के मतदाताओं ने मारिजुआना के उपयोग को वैध बनाने के उपाय को पारित कियाः अधिकारी


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department on Friday named 39 Russian defense- and intelligence-related entities under a new sanctions law, belatedly taking a step to enforce legislation passed overwhelmingly by Congress. The law, which President Donald Trump signed on Aug. 2, requires sanctions on individuals who engage in “a significant transaction” with the Russian entities. Friday’s action does not itself impose new sanctions, and determinations will be made on a case by case basis, State Department officials said. Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers have complained that Trump has been tardy in enforcing the law, which required the list of Russian entities be ready by Oct. 1. The list includes major Russian arms makers as well as Rosoboronexport, the state-run Russian arms exporter. Also listed is the St. Petersburg-based Special Technology Center, which former President Barack Obama sanctioned in December, saying it played a role in Moscow’s hacking and other interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Russia has denied such meddling. State Department officials, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity, indicated the Trump administration would move carefully in imposing sanctions and dealing with issues such as U.S. allies who buy Russian-made weaponry or spare parts. “There is a significance threshold that would exclude certain things that are less than significant,” one official said. “Obviously we’re going to consider the totality of circumstances.” State Department guidance released on Friday says that in determining whether a transaction is “significant,” officials would weigh its impact on U.S. national security; its size and scope; and the importance of the deal to Russia’s defense and intelligence sector. The law requires Trump to impose sanctions by Jan. 29 on transactions that are found to meet the definition and which took place after he signed the legislation in August. “We’ll be implementing the sanctions legislation robustly, in keeping with our understanding of Congress’ intent and the facts that precipitated that legislation, including interference in our election,” a second State Department official said. The same official did not dispute a report that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had eliminated a department office charged with coordinating economic sanctions. The office traditionally had been led by a senior U.S. diplomat. The official added that individuals throughout the department work on sanctions and that coordination of such work would continue.

Summary: अमेरिकी विदेश विभाग ने प्रतिबंध कानून के तहत रूसी रक्षा, खुफिया कंपनियों को नामित किया


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A tax plan proposed by Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz would cut federal revenues by $8.6 trillion over 10 years, adding substantially to the debt, according to an analysis published on Tuesday by a nonpartisan research center.  Cruz's plan, unveiled in November, would create a flat 10 percent individual income tax that with other changes would mainly benefit high-income households, the study by the Washington-based Tax Policy Center found. (tpc.io/1ToCN7M) Other changes include repealing the corporate income tax, as well as payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare, and estate and gift taxes; increasing the standard deduction and eliminating most other deductions except for mortgage interest and charity; and adding a broad-based 16 percent value-added consumption tax. “The plan would cut taxes at most income levels, although the highest-income households would benefit the most and the poor the least,” the Tax Policy Center said. The value-added tax proposed by Cruz, a Senator from Texas who won the Iowa caucuses among Republicans last month, would replace only 70 percent of the costs of the tax cuts, according to the center. Cruz is a favorite of the conservative Tea Party movement who helped provoke a 16-day government shutdown in September 2013 with his opposition to a spending bill. The goal was to gut the healthcare law known as Obamacare. The TPC analysis noted that high-income taxpayers would see an average tax cut in 2017 of about $6,100 or some 8.5 percent of after-tax income, while those with annual incomes over $3.7 million would see an average cut of nearly 29 percent, or more than $2 million. “Households in the middle of the income distribution would receive an average tax cut of $1,800, or 3.2 percent of after-tax income, while taxpayers in the lowest quintile would receive an average tax cut of $46, or 0.4 percent of after-tax income,” the TPC said. The changes would “boost incentives to work, save and invest,” but the lower revenue would require unprecedented cuts in government spending to avoid borrowing that would raise interest rates and discourage private investment, it said. The Tax Policy Center is a joint venture of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution, two Washington-based think tanks. It has issued studies of other candidates’ proposals.  (Reporting by Eric Walsh; Editing by Jonathan Oatis) SAP is the sponsor of this content. It was independently created by Reuters’ editorial staff and funded in part by SAP, which otherwise has no role in this coverage.

Summary: क्रूज़ कर योजना अमेरिकी राजस्व में कटौती करेगी, अमीरों का पक्ष लेगीः विश्लेषण


ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan called on world powers to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine on Wednesday and said the United States should reverse a decision recognizing the city as Israel s capital. Addressing a summit of Muslim leaders in Istanbul, Erdogan described Washington s decision last week as a reward for Israeli  terror acts  and said the city was a red line for Muslims.

Summary: तुर्की के एर्दोगन ने मुस्लिम शिखर सम्मेलन में कहा कि जेरूसलम फिलिस्तीन की राजधानी है


MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Kremlin said on Friday that a U.S. decision to close Russia’s San Francisco consulate and buildings in Washington and New York pushed bilateral ties further into a blind alley and fueled a spiral of tit-for-tat retaliatory measures. The United States on Thursday ordered Russia to close the facilities by Sept. 2 in retaliation for Moscow cutting the U.S. diplomatic presence in Russia. “The new steps push our bilateral relations even further into a dead end and contradict other high level announcements ,” Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov told a news briefing when asked about the closures. “There have been words, but there’s no readiness to cooperate yet. This is about further escalating tensions. We regret this and will calmly think about how we might respond.” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier on Friday that Moscow would respond harshly to U.S. measures it deemed damaging. Moscow last month ordered the United States to cut its diplomatic and technical staff in Russia by more than half, to 455 people to match the number of Russian diplomats in the United States, after Congress overwhelmingly approved new sanctions against Russia.

Summary: क्रेमलिन का कहना है कि अमेरिकी वाणिज्य दूतावास ईंधन U.S.-Russia तनाव को बंद कर रहा है


BEIRUT (Reuters) - The United States, which wants to prevent violence spilling over from Syria into Lebanon, will give the Lebanese army $120 million more in aid to boost border security and counter-terrorism work, the U.S. ambassador to Lebanon said on Wednesday. Lebanon will get six MD 530G light attack helicopters, six Scan Eagle drones, and communication and night vision equipment under the new programs, Ambassador Elizabeth Richard said  after she met Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri.   The United States has given the Lebanese Armed Forces more than $1.5 billion in assistance over the past ten years, the Embassy has said previously.   The United States hopes to strengthen the Lebanese army to stop the spread of violence over the border from neighboring Syria and help it become the sole military force defending the country. Lebanon s Iran-backed Hezbollah group, which Washington regards as a terrorist organization, is a powerful military force in the country and also fights in Syria for President Bashar al-Assad.  Lebanon hosts around 1.5 million Syrian refugees.

Summary: लेबनान की सेना को अमेरिकी सहायता में 12 करोड़ डॉलर मिलेंगे


NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Trump administration will be persistent in prosecuting white collar crimes despite giving a higher profile to tackling violent crime, a senior Justice Department official said on Thursday. Since taking office, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has repeatedly said federal law enforcement agencies would focus on aggressively targeting violent criminals, especially drug-trafficking gangs. That focus led some legal observers to believe the government “no longer is interested in prosecuting white collar crime,” Trevor McFadden, a deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department, told a conference of anti-corruption lawyers in New York on Thursday. “I intend to dispel that myth,” McFadden said.      He said it makes “perfect sense” to devote more resources to the fight against violent crime given an increase in murder rates in some areas of the country, but that the Justice Department would not neglect prosecuting corporate criminals. He also said enforcement of laws against U.S. companies bribing overseas officials is “alive as ever”, although he added that federal prosecutors are not trying to “break our own records for the largest fines or longest prison sentences.”  “Our aim is to motivate companies and individuals voluntarily to comply with the law.” Violent crime rose around 5 percent in the United States last year, but remained near the lowest levels in decades, according to data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Summary: व्हाइट कॉलर अपराध को नजरअंदाज नहीं करेगा ट्रंप प्रशासनः न्याय अधिकारी


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration’s search for a new FBI director hit roadblocks on Tuesday when two high-profile potential candidates, a moderate judge and a conservative senator, signaled they did not want the job. Advisers to Judge Merrick Garland and U.S. Senator John Cornyn of Texas told Reuters they discouraged them from leading the Federal Bureau of Investigation, cautioning that they would be leaving important, secure jobs for one fraught with politics and controversy.  The advisers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the new FBI director would have little job security and heightened scrutiny by political observers following President Donald Trump’s abrupt firing of James Comey on May 9.  Garland and Cornyn distancing themselves from the selection process just three days before Trump has said he may make a decision, points to the difficulties the White House has in filling the FBI post amid turmoil in the administration.     Trump’s firing of Comey, the man in charge of an investigation into possible collusion between 2016 election campaign associates and the Russian government, outraged many lawmakers, including some Republicans. Garland, the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, “loves his job and is not interested in leaving the judiciary,” said one source familiar with the judge’s thinking. Cornyn said in a statement that he had informed the White House that “the best way I can serve is continuing to fight for a conservative agenda in the U.S. Senate.” White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters on Tuesday that an announcement on FBI director was still possible before  Trump leaves on his first foreign trip on Friday. He said the U.S. Department of Justice was still interviewing candidates. Several Republican senators had promoted Garland even though they had refused to give him a hearing when Republican Trump’s predecessor President Barack Obama, a Democrat, nominated Garland last year for a then-vacant seat on the U.S. Supreme Court. The Republicans’ reasoning appeared to be that Garland would be accepted by Democrats and help restore faith in the FBI as a nonpartisan agency. In an interview on Bloomberg Television, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell referred to Garland, a former federal prosecutor, as “an apolitical professional.” A second Garland acquaintance who spoke on the condition of anonymity said Garland sought advice from those who told him he would be leaving his life-long position on the federal bench to take a job that could be terminated by Trump overnight. A Republican Senate aide said Cornyn’s staff also worried that the third-term Texas Senator could cut his- and their own- careers short by going to the FBI.  An adviser to another candidate on the White House short-list, former New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, 75, said Kelly is also being persuaded to step out of the running.  Kelly has not said that he would not consider the job, but so far he has not been interviewed. Republican Representative Trey Gowdy, a former federal prosecutor whose name had been floated, said on Monday he was not interested in the director position.  The difficulty in filling key administration jobs is not just limited to the FBI director post. Trump’s habits of contradicting his top aides, demanding personal loyalty and punishing officials who contradict him in public has discouraged a number of experienced people from pursuing jobs, said three people who declined to discuss possible positions with administration officials. “It’s becoming increasingly difficult to attract good people to work in this administration,” said one senior official. “In other cases, veteran people with expertise are leaving or seeking posts overseas and away from this White House.”

Summary: सलाह के बाद, संभावित एफ. बी. आई. प्रमुखों ने ट्रम्प के तहत नौकरी छोड़ दी


BARCELONA (Reuters) - Barcelona s mayor has asked for reassurances that municipal staff would not face legal action or lose their jobs if they helped to organize an Oct. 1 referendum on Catalonia seceding from Spain. However, some of the region s nearly 1,000 mayors have already said they would go ahead with the vote, despite it being declared illegal by Madrid. Having originally offered to allow premises across the city to be used as polling stations, Barcelona mayor Ada Colau has asked the Catalan government for further reassurances that civil servants involved would be protected, her office said.  We support the right to participate and protest completely but we will repeat what we have said many times before: we will not put at risk institutions or civil servants,  Barcelona s deputy mayor, Gerardo Pisarello, said on Friday. Catalonia s parliament voted on Wednesday to hold an independence referendum on Oct. 1, setting up a clash with the Spanish government that has vowed to stop what it says would be an illegal vote. Polls in the northeastern region show support for self-rule waning as Spain s economy improves. But the majority of Catalans do want the opportunity to vote on whether to split from Spain. As of Friday night, 674 of Catalonia s 948 municipal districts had informed the government of their intention to allow city spaces to be used for the vote, according to the Municipal Association for Independence (AMI). In a video posted on Twitter, the mayor of the Cerdanyola municipality tore in half a letter from the Constitutional Court warning of the legal repercussions of participating in the referendum to applause from the crowd watching. Pro-independence groups protested on Friday outside the offices of several mayors across Catalonia who announced they would not allow municipal spaces to be used for the vote. On Saturday, Spanish police searched the offices of a weekly newspaper in the town of Valls in search of ballot papers, according to newspaper La Vanguardia. On Friday, the Civil Guard police searched a printing company near Tarragona, reportedly in search of materials to be used in the independence vote. Spain s Civil Guard police was unavailable for comment but a court statement said the searches were related to charges brought by the public prosecutor in relation to the referendum.

Summary: कैटेलोनिया की स्वतंत्रता के लिए हुए मतदान ने क्षेत्र के महापौरों को विभाजित कर दिया


GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp Chief Executive Officer Rex Tillerson emerged on Friday as President-elect Donald Trump’s leading candidate for U.S. secretary of state, a senior transition official said. Trump met Tillerson on Tuesday and may talk to him again over the weekend, the official said. Trump appears to be in the final days of deliberations over his top diplomat with an announcement possible next week. Tillerson’s favored status was revealed as former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani formally withdrew from consideration for secretary of state. The transition official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Tillerson, 64, had moved ahead in Trump’s deliberations over 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, who has met Trump twice, including at a dinner in New York. But the official said Romney was still under consideration for the job, along with John Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations; U.S. Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, and retired Navy Admiral James Stavridis. Giuliani’s withdrawal came after he was fully vetted by the Trump transition team for his overseas business ties in what was described by the Trump official as an “intense” effort by lawyers and accountants.  Giuliani, who runs a global consulting firm, was given a clean bill of health, with Trump’s aides concluding his business interests would not pose a risk to his confirmation. Should Tillerson be nominated, his business ties, too, will come under scrutiny. Exxon Mobil has operations in more than 50 countries and boasts that it explores for oil and natural gas on six continents. In 2011, Exxon Mobil signed a deal with Rosneft, Russia’s largest state-owned oil company, for joint oil exploration and production. Since then, the companies have formed 10 joint ventures for projects in Russia.  In 2013, Russian President Vladimir Putin awarded Tillerson his nation’s Order of Friendship. But U.S. sanctions against Russia for its incursion into Crimea cost Exxon Mobil dearly, forcing it to scrap some projects and costing it at least $1 billion in losses. Tillerson has been a vocal critic of the sanctions.  Trump has spoken of wanting warmer relations with Moscow, which has sparked concerns in Congress that he could lift or loosen some of the sanctions on Russia.  Tillerson has been chairman and CEO of Exxon Mobil since 2006. He is expected to retire from the company next year.  Should Tillerson be nominated, climate change could be another divisive issue. The company is under investigation by the New York Attorney General’s Office for allegedly misleading investors, regulators and the public on what it knew about global warming.

Summary: एक्सॉन के सी. ई. ओ. अब ट्रम्प के पसंदीदा विदेश मंत्री हैं-संक्रमण अधिकारी


XIAMEN, China (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that imposing tougher sanctions on North Korea over its nuclear missile programme would be counter-productive and said threats of military action could trigger  a global catastrophe . Putin, speaking after a BRICs summit in China, criticised U.S. diplomacy in the crisis and renewed his call for talks, saying Pyongyang would not halt its missile testing programme until it felt secure.  Russia condemns North Korea s exercises, we consider that they are a provocation ... (But) ramping up military hysteria will lead to nothing good. It could lead to a global catastrophe,  he told reporters.  There s no other path apart from a peaceful one.  Putin was speaking after South Korea said an agreement with the United States to scrap a weight limit on its warheads would help it respond to the North Korea threat after Pyongyang conducted its sixth and largest nuclear test two days ago. Russia, which shares a border with North Korea, has repeatedly joined China in calling for negotiations with Pyongyang, suggesting that the United States and South Korea halt all major war games in exchange for North Korea halting its testing programme. While describing additional sanctions as  the road to nowhere , Putin said Russia was prepared to discuss  some details  around the issue, without elaborating. The Russian leader also lashed out at the United States, saying it was preposterous for Washington to ask for Moscow s help with North Korea after sanctioning Russian companies whom U.S officials accused of violating North Korea sanctions.  It s ridiculous to put us on the same (sanctions) list as North Korea and then ask for our help in imposing sanctions on North Korea,  said Putin.  This is being done by people who mix up Australia with Austria,  he added. The United States has floated the idea of requiring all countries to cut economic links with North Korea to try to strong-arm Pyongyang into changing its behaviour.  In Moscow s case, that would mean stopping using North Korean labourers, tens of thousands of whom work in Russia, and halting fuel supplies to Pyongyang. Russia has so far refused to contemplate doing either.

Summary: पुतिन ने उत्तर कोरिया पर सख्त प्रतिबंधों को मूर्खतापूर्ण बताया, 'वैश्विक तबाही' की चेतावनी दी


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama will meet the Dalai Lama at the White House on Wednesday, a move certain to anger China which considers the exiled Tibetan Buddhist spiritual leader a dangerous separatist. Obama and the Dalai Lama will meet privately at 10:15 a.m. (1415 GMT), a White House statement said. Earlier on Tuesday, China warned the United States to stick by its promises not to support any separatist activities. In an interview with Reuters on Monday, the Dalai Lama had said it was possible he would meet Obama and on Tuesday Taiwan announced that its new president would make a transit stop in the United States next week. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said both issues touched on the “one China” policy, a basic diplomatic tenet referring to both Taiwan and Tibet being part of China that Beijing insists foreign governments recognize. Lu said the United States had said it opposed Taiwan’s independence and recognized that Tibet was an inseparable part of China. “We demand the U.S. government earnestly stands by its promises, conscientiously handle the relevant issue in accordance with the one China principle and not give any space to any individual or behavior which tries to create two Chinas, one China one Taiwan, or to split China,” he said. Obama met the Dalai Lama when the latter visited Washington in 2014 and angered China then when he vowed “strong support” for Tibetans’ human rights. The Dalai Lama says he wants genuine autonomy for Tibet rather than independence. He told Reuters Obama was a “a long-time friend” whom he admired for his work to normalize relations with Cuba, on Iran and for his recent visits to former U.S. foe Vietnam and the site of the Hiroshima atomic bombing in Japan.  Asked how Beijing (Peking) might respond to a meeting, the Dalai Lama said: “I don’t know - you should ask them. I think in Peking, we cannot as of now ... generalize. In Peking there are different views. Some people there have a more realistic view. Some are more hardline, which is more narrow-minded.”  Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen will transit in Miami on her way to Panama, one of the island’s few diplomatic allies, and stop over in Los Angeles on her return, Taiwan’s deputy foreign minister, Javier Ching-shan Hou, said. China is suspicious of Tsai, who assumed office last month, as she is also head of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party. Travel abroad is sensitive for Taiwanese leaders who have angered China as it is seen as exerting sovereignty. Tsai’s trip will run from June 24 to July 2 and include Paraguay.

Summary: ओबामा बुधवार को व्हाइट हाउस में दलाई लामा से मिलेंगे