MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump may meet next week at an Asian economic summit amid strains over sanctions against Moscow, the Syria conflict and the investigation into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign. The Kremlin on Friday said talks were under way to set up an encounter at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Danang, Vietnam, from Nov. 8-10. Trump told Fox News in an interview late on Thursday that it was possible he would meet with Putin during the trip.  We may have a meeting with Putin,  he said.  And, again   Putin is very important because they can help us with North Korea. They can help us with Syria. We have to talk about Ukraine.  Representatives for the White House did not immediately reply to a request for comment on Friday.   It (the meeting) is indeed being discussed,  Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.  It s hard to overestimate the importance and significance for all international matters of any contact between the presidents of Russia and the United States.  Putin and Trump first met at a G20 summit in Hamburg in July when they discussed allegations of Russian meddling in the U.S. election last year but agreed to focus on better ties rather than litigating the past. But relations between Moscow and Washington have soured further since then. Trump in August grudgingly signed off on new sanctions against Russia, a move Moscow said ended hopes for better ties. Putin ordered Washington to cut its embassy and consular staff in Russia by more than half. Tensions have also flared over the conflict in Syria. If it the Trump-Putin meeting comes about, it would come as investigations in Washington over alleged Russian meddling in the presidential election and possible collusion by the Trump campaign yielded its first indictments. U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller s office this week unveiled charges against former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, Manafort associate Richard Gates and campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos. Manafort and Gates pleaded not guilty while Papadapoulos pleaded guilty. The Wall Street Journal also has reported that U.S. authorities have enough evidence to charge six members of the Russian government in the hacking of Democratic National Committee computers during the 2016 campaign.

Summary: पुतिन, ट्रम्प अगले सप्ताह एपेक शिखर सम्मेलन में मिल सकते हैं


SAN JUAN (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Democrats, in a letter to Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, on Wednesday called for congressional action on  Puerto Rico, demanding that legislation to resolve the island’s financial crisis include tools to restructure debt. “Restructuring legislation would not cost the federal government a single penny and would instead save U.S. taxpayers from the growing cost of inaction,” said the letter to the Senate’s Republican leader, signed by all 46 Democrats and independents. The letter is a challenge to Republicans who largely oppose letting the U.S. commonwealth restructure debt. Republican Senators Orrin Hatch of Utah, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Chuck Grassley of Iowa last month introduced a bill to bring Puerto Rico’s finances under federal oversight without providing for debt restructuring.  Democrats have argued that federal oversight should be conditional on allowing Puerto Rico to be governed by federal bankruptcy or debt restructuring laws. Hatch, Murkowski and Grassley are cc’d on the letter. “Puerto Rico was included in Chapter 9 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code until 1984, when Congress inexplicably excluded it from the nationwide approach to resolving municipal insolvency,” said the letter, a draft of which was first reported by Reuters last week. The letter’s broad support is key because, with 44 Democrats and two independents on board, Democrats could block bills that do not include a restructuring mechanism. Still, that is no guarantee that Republicans, who control Congress, will draft a bill that includes one. A restructuring option would be a coup for the island’s governor, Alejandro Garcia Padilla, who has long said Puerto Rico needs to cut its $70 billion in debt to grow its economy, a stance that has faced resistance from creditors. Aside from its debt load, Puerto Rico faces widespread economic strain, including a 45 percent poverty rate and a shrinking tax base, as a growing number of citizens jump to the U.S. mainland. Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, speaking on the Senate floor on Wednesday, said Congress must do more than hold hearings or create a task force on Puerto Rico, stressing that the island needs “to be treated as other American citizens and be able to file bankruptcy.” The letter comes weeks after House Speaker Paul Ryan demanded legislation by the end of March to address Puerto Rico.  “We urge you to match his commitment to act ... by the end of the first quarter,” said the letter to McConnell.

Summary: प्यूर्टो रिको के लिए ऋण पुनर्गठन पर सीनेट डेमोक्रेट एकजुटः पत्र


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said on Saturday she has been flooded with “obscene and sick” calls and text messages after a hacker linked to Russia posted personal contact information online for her and hundreds of other Democratic lawmakers and aides. Pelosi sent a letter to colleagues warning them to take precautions and said she was changing her phone number after a hacker identified as “Guccifer 2.0” posted the personal cellphone numbers and email addresses on Friday.  The posted information appeared to have been gained in the electronic breach of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the fundraising and campaign arm of Democrats in the House of Representatives. Other Democratic campaign groups, including the Democratic National Committee, also were targeted by the cyber attack, which was made public late last month. “On a personal note, I was in the air flying from Florida to California when the news broke. Upon landing, I have received scores of mostly obscene and sick calls, voicemails and text messages,” Pelosi told her colleagues, urging them to keep their phones and incoming text messages away from their family members and children. “This is a sad course of events, not only for us, but more importantly for our country,” said Pelosi, who earlier in the week blamed Russia for the cyber attack and called it an “electronic Watergate” akin to the 1972 burglary at Democratic Party headquarters that ultimately brought down Republican President Richard Nixon. John Ramsey, the House’s chief information security officer, sent a memo to lawmakers and aides whose information had been made public urging them to change passwords for all their accounts and to consider changing their non-House email addresses. He said the hacker had uploaded a spreadsheet with a mix of House and personal email addresses and cellphone numbers for “nearly every” House Democrat and “an assorted number of Republicans,” and similar information for hundreds of staffers. “Along with the Excel file, ‘Guccifer 2.0’ uploaded documents that included the account names and passwords for an assortment of subscription services used by the DCCC. Initial analysis identifies some members’ home addresses, along with their spouse’s name, marital status, and religion,” the memo said. U.S. intelligence officials have concluded that Guccifer 2.0 is an individual or group operating with or for the GRU, the Russian military intelligence agency. Russia has denied involvement in the breach. The potential Russian involvement in the cyber attack has ignited a fierce campaign debate, with Democrats accusing the Russians of trying to aid Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. But U.S. officials suspect the operation and others directed at the DNC and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s campaign were more likely an attempt to pursue email chains into classified networks or in search of national security policy information than to influence the Nov. 8 U.S. election. “The Russian assumption probably is that it doesn’t matter much who wins the election, because Wall Street and other powerful lobbies really run the country,” one of the officials said on Saturday, speaking like the others on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence assessments. “The old Soviet belief hasn’t faded completely when it comes to foreign policy,” the official said.

Summary: अमेरिकी डेमोक्रेट पेलोसी को हैक के बाद 'अश्लील और बीमार' कॉल आते हैं


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Here are highlights of the Reuters Oval Office interview with U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday. ON WHETHER HE WAS AWARE HIS SON DONALD TRUMP JR. WAS MEETING WITH A RUSSIAN LAWYER “No. That I didn’t know. Until a couple of days ago, when I heard about this. No I didn’t know about that.” ON WHETHER HE WISHED HE HAD KNOWN HIS SON WAS HAVING THE MEETING “Look - that campaign ... I actually always thought I’d win, to be honest with you, because I’ve been winning my whole life, to be honest with you, but we started a campaign as a non-politician, and many people were skeptical. Some weren’t, some people who know me weren’t ... but many were skeptical. And it was a wild time. And we would meet with many people.” “That same meeting: a person comes in, sits, leaves, quickly. It was a 20-minute meeting, I guess, from what I’m hearing. Many people, and many political pros, said everybody would do that. If you got a call and said, ‘Listen I have information on Hillary and the DNC,’ or whatever it was they said, most people are going to take that meeting, I think.” “I think many people would have held that meeting.” “And you have to understand, when that took place, this was before Russia fever. There was no Russia fever back then, that was at the beginning of the campaign, more or less. There was no Russia fever.” “Most of the phony politicians who are Democrats who I watched over the last couple of days – most of those phonies that act holier-than-thou, if the same thing happened to them, they would have taken that meeting in a heartbeat.” “First question - first 20, 25 minutes - I said, ‘Did you do it?’ He said, ‘No, I did not, absolutely not.’ I then asked him a second time, in a totally different way. He said, ‘Absolutely not.’” “Somebody did say if he did do it, you wouldn’t have found out about it. Which is a very interesting point.” “Look: Something happened and we have to find out what it is, because we can’t allow a thing like that to happen to our election process. So something happened, and we have to find out what it is.” “We have to find out and get to the bottom of what’s going on, because we can’t have even the slightest suspicion about our election process.” “Now, everybody agrees that there was no impact on the votes in this election, which is very important to say, but we have to make sure that nothing could ever happen to our election process.” “Do I feel I can trust anybody, OK? I’m a very suspicious person. I am not a person that goes around trusting lots of people. But he’s the leader of Russia. It is the second most powerful nuclear power on earth. I am the leader of the United States. I love my country. He loves his country. He’s for Russia. President Xi – I had a long meeting with him too, 2-1/2 hours, great relationship. He’s for China, I’m for the United States. They’re for their countries. But I do things the way I do things, and it’s just worked out.” “But we had a very productive meeting. Including the fact that I think we have a good shot at piece by piece getting Syria to stop fighting. Ultimately Ukraine. And other things, including the destruction of terrorists as we know them.” “So I’m sitting with Putin, and we had a very good - we were there two hours and 15 minutes - we had a very good meeting. One of the things brought up was a ceasefire. I said, ‘We’ve got to solve this problem in Syria. And Ukraine by the way.’ And what happened is we sat down and we worked out a ceasefire, which is by the way, as of 20 minutes ago, totally holding, and that’s four days. Four days doesn’t sound like a lot, but they’ve never had a ceasefire that lasted at all. That’s because Putin told them, as opposed to somebody that nobody ever heard of. Putin and I agreed to it, and we have a four-day ceasefire. That means many lives have already been saved because of four days. But it’s going to go on for a while, and things are going to go better.” “I was very tough with President Putin. We have a very important relationship. It’s going to be a relationship where lots of lives could be saved, like as an example with the ceasefire, which nobody else could have gotten but me.” “I campaigned on strong military, strong borders, and low oil prices.” “Look what I’ve done – oil prices have been driven down. We’re sending LNG to Poland, massive shipments to Poland. That’s not what Putin wants. And for the military, we’ve got $56 billion more of equipment than anybody ever thought of, in the last budget. Putin doesn’t want that – so why would Putin want me?” “It’s really the one question I wish I would have asked Putin: Were you actually supporting me?” “I’m very big on energy, and that’s not good for Russia, because Russia makes its money with energy. That drives the price of energy down. I also am very strong on the military, very, very strong on the military. I’m also very strong on cyber.” “I would bet that inwardly Putin would have been against me.” “The mood in the White House is fantastic.” “We have done more in five months than practically any president in history.” “If you look at Iraq and if you look at Syria and you see the progress we’ve made with ISIS, it’s been almost complete.” “The White House is functioning beautifully. The stock market has hit a new high. Job numbers are the best they’ve been in 16 years. We have a Supreme Court judge already confirmed. Energy is doing levels that we’ve never done before. Our military is doing well. We’re knocking the hell out of ISIS, which Obama wasn’t. There’s not a thing that we’re not doing well in. The White House is functioning beautifully, despite the hoax made up by the Democrats.” “The problem is, I didn’t do anything. I didn’t do anything. This isn’t a question of defense. I didn’t do anything. I had no relationship to Russia. So I said, what can the legal team do?” “The only frustration is that this Russia story is a hoax made up by the Democrats as an excuse for losing an election that they should have won because it’s almost impossible for a Republican to win the Electoral College.” “There was zero coordination. It’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. There’s no coordination, this was a hoax, this was made up by the Democrats.” “This is the greatest con job in history, where a party sits down the day after they got their ass kicked, and they say, ‘Huh, what’s our excuse?’” “It just continues and continues, and honestly it’s a disgrace, and it’s very bad for our country. And the Russians must be laughing, because this narrative is so bad for us as a country.”

Summary: ट्रम्प के साथ रॉयटर्स के साक्षात्कार की मुख्य बातें


BERLIN (Reuters) - Alice Weidel, a leader of Germany s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, said the late British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is her political role model, saying Thatcher got Britain back on its feet when it was facing economic ruin. Weidel told the German newspaper Bild am Sonntag newspaper that her party, which stormed into parliament for the first time after capturing nearly 13 percent of the vote, aimed to be ready to join a coalition government by 2021. That could be a long shot since all mainstream parties have rejected working with the AfD. Weidel said the party was content serving in opposition now, but its long-term goal was to shape policy, and Thatcher s experience in Britain was a helpful guide.  Margaret Thatcher is my political role model,  Weidel told the newspaper, lauding the U.K. leader s willingness to swim against the current when necessary.  Thatcher took over Great Britain when the country was economically in the dumps and built it up again.  Weidel, a lesbian, said her partner and two adopted sons would move to Berlin from Switzerland when the partner s current film project was completed.  She said only 18 percent of the AfD s voters were women which was  way too few  and the party needed to attract more women voters. She said she favoured free child care and kindergartens because that would help families. Weidel also urged former AfD leader Frauke Petry to give up her seat in parliament after quitting the party the day after the election and vowing to sit as an independent.   I don t have any animosity,  Weidel said.  I think it s a shame that she left the AfD. I consider it the wrong decision.  Petry this month kicked off a new  Blue Party , promising a  reasonable conservative  agenda and berating AfD leaders for holding views too far outside the mainstream.

Summary: 'मार्गरेट थैचर मेरे आदर्श हैं': जर्मन धुर दक्षिणपंथी ए. एफ. डी. नेता


DUBAI (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia said on Tuesday it foiled an Islamic State plot to bomb its defense ministry headquarters and also said it had arrested several people suspected of carrying out espionage in the kingdom on behalf of foreign powers. It was not immediately clear whether the two announcements, made separately by a security official to state news agency SPA and a security source speaking to Reuters, were related. The would-be bombers were identified as two Yemeni nationals living under aliases in the kingdom who were detained along with two Saudi citizens also suspected of involvement in the attack planned for the capital Riyadh, the official from the Presidency of State Security added. Saudi Arabia has previously been hit by deadly bombing and shooting attacks by Islamic State militants targeting security forces and Shi ite Muslims. The assailants were training in the use of explosive belts, the security source added, while authorities said they seized grenades and firearms during the operation to foil the attack. Islamic State has for years criticized the leadership of Western-allied Saudi Arabia, the world s top oil exporter, accusing it of deviating from their strict interpretation of Islam and advancing the interests of their U.S. enemies. In a separate news item, SPA quoted a security source saying  authorities uncovered  intelligence activities for the benefit of foreign parties  by a group of people it did not name. A Saudi security source, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter, told Reuters that the suspects were accused of  espionage activities and having contacts with external entities including the Muslim Brotherhood , which Riyadh has classified as a terrorist organization.  The group is also accused of having contacts with and receiving financial and other forms of support from two other countries to harm the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and with the aim of destabilizing the security and national unity in preparation to overthrow the Saudi regime in favor of the Muslim Brotherhood,  the source said. Citing an ongoing investigation, the source declined to name the countries or the members of the group. The source said one of the detainees is a member of the armed Houthi movement, which is locked in 2 1/2 years of war with a Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, and is in direct contact with the group. The suspects are in custody and will be granted legal rights and due process, the source added.

Summary: सऊदी अरब का कहना है कि उसने इस्लामिक स्टेट के बम, विदेशी जासूसी की साजिश को विफल कर दिया


GENEVA (Reuters) - Deadly ethnic fighting in Central African Republic could descend into a much larger-scale conflict if nothing is done to disarm combatants and defuse tensions, a U.N. report said on Friday. With a fifth of the population displaced since the mainly Muslim Seleka rebels ousted the president in 2013, provoking a backlash from Christian anti-balaka militias, U.N. peacekeepers are struggling to contain simmering violence. The U.N. human rights working group on mercenaries and foreign fighters said it  strongly senses that the possibility of another armed conflict is likely, if foreign armed actors, along with local armed groups, are not effectively dismantled and suppressed.  National security forces are too weak to tackle armed groups and counter the spillover from conflicts in neighboring countries, and U.N. military personnel, who number just over 10,000, have failed to convince locals that they can protect them, the report said. Ugandan and U.S. forces pulled out earlier this year,  declaring  success  against the Lord s Resistance Army, a regional militia notorious for two decades of abducting children to use as fighters and sex slaves. On Thursday, Amnesty International issued its own report detailing what it said was the systematic rape and murder of civilians in ethnic fighting.       If the U.N. s mandate in the Central African Republic is to mean anything, civilians must be better protected,  the rights group s Joanne Mariner said. U.N. peacekeeping chief Jean-Pierre Lacroix said the U.N. mission in Central African Republic (MINUSCA) had to make changes and was  slightly  short of the necessary personnel.  We have currently a troop ceiling which we think is slightly under what we would need,  he said on Friday. MINUSCA s mandate authorizes it to have 10,750 military personnel, a recent U.N. report said there were 10,098 on the ground.      We are seeing a surge in ... very negative and antagonistic messages to the effect that  foreigners  should be eliminated, putting one ethnic or religious component of this country against the other,  Lacroix told reporters in Geneva.  The working group report said the word  foreigners  was constantly used to label Muslims.

Summary: मध्य अफ्रीकी गणराज्य में बड़े संघर्ष की वापसी का खतराः संयुक्त राष्ट्र की रिपोर्ट


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama asked Republican congressional leaders for suggestions on a Supreme Court nominee during a meeting on Tuesday, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. Obama met with Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, both Republicans, in the Oval Office to discuss a replacement for the late Justice Antonin Scalia. “The president ... gave everyone in the room, Democrats and Republicans, the opportunity to put forward their own suggestions for potential Supreme Court nominees,” Earnest said at a news briefing. “The president didn’t guarantee that he would choose that person, but the president did indicate that he would take seriously any recommendations that either Democrats or Republicans had to put forward.”  Earnest declined to say whether any Republican congressional leaders, who have said the top court seat should remain vacant until Obama’s successor takes office next year, offered any names. Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, the top Democrat on the judiciary panel, also attended the meeting.

Summary: ओबामा ने रिपब्लिकन नेताओं से शीर्ष अदालत के उम्मीदवार की पेशकश करने को कहाः व्हाइट हाउस


ATLANTA (Reuters) - Things were not looking too good a year ago for Georgia’s top elections officer as he tried to stitch together a mega-presidential primary in the U.S. South. Efforts to bring Alabama and Arkansas online had stalled. Tennessee was threatening to defect.  But Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp kept working the phones, arguing that a bloc of Southern states all voting on March 1 was the only way to make U.S. presidential candidates pay attention to the region.  Eventually key state leaders came around and their effort seems to have paid off.  Candidates have campaigned more in the South this election year in an effort to woo a group of states voting early on so-called Super Tuesday than Kemp can recall seeing in any contemporary primary. And the seven states holding contests in the region appear poised to play a pivotal role in selecting the Republican and Democratic nominees for the Nov. 8 race. “In years past, we’ve been an afterthought,” Kemp said at the Georgia State Capitol in Atlanta last week. “That’s certainly not the case this year.” Elections officials nationally are watching how the concurrent races in the South play out on Tuesday, and are talking about possibly replicating the strategy in other parts of the country to win a greater say in the primaries. Kemp has dubbed the coordinated Southern races that he’s orchestrated the “SEC primary” - or Southeastern Conference primary - after a regional college athletic conference. “This represents an attempt to introduce primary reform,” said Kay Stimson, spokeswoman for the National Association of Secretaries of State, which for years has urged holding regional primaries that would rotate around the nation. “Brian Kemp took the ball and ran with it,” she added. It was not easy.  A year ago, Kemp stood in his statehouse office fretting that bills to set the primary date in Alabama and Arkansas were not going to pass. An Alabama state party chair was worried her state would get lost in a big group, he said, but Kemp argued that Alabama would still be better off by voting when it was early enough to matter. In Arkansas, the bill to change the primary date did not pass until it was included in a special legislative session. Kemp even feared trouble in Tennessee after his counterpart there said there was a rumor circulating that the “SEC Primary” states were thinking about moving back by a week.  “No,” Kemp replied. “Our coalition is holding together.” “WAFFLE HOUSE” v. “SEC” PRIMARY     Kemp, 52, a boots-wearing small business owner who drives a Chevrolet Suburban with more than 430,000 miles on it, jokes he could have dubbed his effort the “Waffle House primary,” for a restaurant chain prevalent in the region.  But athletics jumped out as a common passion for the Southern states he helped to bring together: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia. Four other states, from Alaska to Vermont, also hold contests to award delegates on Super Tuesday. Kemp’s plan to concentrate attention on the South did not initially excite Alabama’s John Merrill, who had other priorities as that state’s newly elected elections chief. But after hearing the then secretary of state from Iowa - which holds the country’s first nominating contest - talk about how voters there would never back a candidate they had not met eight times, he rallied bipartisan support.  “Do you know just how few times anybody in Alabama has ever had the privilege to interact with a presidential candidate on a personal basis, let alone do it more than once?” Merrill said. Candidates began showing up once the regional primary was in place. A rally for Republican billionaire businessman Donald Trump drew as many as 30,000 people to a football stadium in Mobile, Alabama in August, for example. The primaries in the politically conservative South got a boost in significance this year from the size and unpredictability of the Republican presidential field. On the Democratic side, the region’s large concentrations of African-American voters are seen as a test of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s and U.S. Senator from Vermont Bernie Sanders’ appeal with a key Democratic voting bloc. While the South has not seen such a coordinated effort in decades, it is not the first time the states have tried to gang up.  Yet in 1988, when the region almost entirely held primaries on March 8, votes were split among Democratic candidates and the contest left the South to be settled elsewhere. A number of states eventually walked away from the plan. “The experience in 1988 was not one that the powers-that-be at the time really wanted,” said Josh Putnam, a lecturer in political science at the University of Georgia. Nonetheless, other regions are eyeing the Southern model. Washington state Secretary of State Kim Wyman failed last year to persuade several neighboring states to coordinate their primaries but plans another push in the next cycle.  “We could have a Pac-12,” she joked, referring to a Pacific Coast-oriented college athletic conference. “Or at least get some of the Western states to go on the same day, so candidates might actually come and visit us and campaign.”

Summary: सुपर मंगलवार प्रदर्शनः कैसे दक्षिण ने सुर्खियां बटोरी


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Urged on by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, Republican lawmakers rushing to scrap Obamacare said this week they hoped to make some changes intended to stabilize the insurance market while they work at repealing and replacing the law. The beginnings of a framework outlining what a post-Obamacare world could look like came in the same week that  Congress approved a resolution instructing key committees of both the House of Representatives and the Senate to draft Obamacare repeal legislation by a target date of Jan. 27. The fate of the Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare, is a high-stakes political showdown between Republicans and Democrats that potentially jeopardizes medical coverage for millions of Americans and risks causing chaos in the health insurance marketplace. The seven-year-old law has enabled up to 20 million previously uninsured Americans to obtain health coverage and helped slow the rise in healthcare spending. But Republicans have called it federal government overreach. “If our general goal is to move decisions out of Washington back to the states, we should be able to make those decisions in the next several months,” a key Republican senator working on the repeal, Lamar Alexander, told reporters outside the Senate this week. In a speech on the Senate floor, Alexander indicated Republicans are eyeing some moves insurers have said would help shore up the insurance plans offered on the Obamacare exchanges. The changes could be done by law or by regulation, Alexander said. Alexander said he favors continuing, at least temporarily, the cost-sharing subsidies that millions of Americans receive with their Obamacare exchange-based plans - a kind of financial assistance that helps keep down the cost of deductibles and co-pays. He advocates adjusting the special enrollment periods that insurers say are sometimes abused by people who wait until they are sick to sign up for insurance. Insurers have long sought changes that would fix this facet of Obamacare to weed out misuse. It would also help the transition to a new system, Alexander said, if individuals could use government premium subsidies to buy plans outside of the Obamacare marketplace. Alexander is chairman of the Senate health committee, one of the committees drafting the repeal legislation. He told reporters he had discussed his ideas with a number of senators and the process was evolving, but stressed it should be gradual, with some changes made by lawmakers and some by the secretary of Health and Human Services after he is confirmed.  Trump has nominated Republican Representative Tom Price for the job. “Certainty is something the insurance industry needs so they don’t abandon coverage,” said Senator Johnny Isakson of Georgia, another Republican lawmaker who has been working on how to stabilize  insurance markets. It was unclear whether lawmakers will reach the ambitious target date of Jan. 27 for drafting repeal legislation. But House Speaker Paul Ryan said on CNN on Thursday that Republicans are moving “as quickly as they can”. The 2010 law, Democratic President Barack Obama’s signature piece of domestic policy, touches almost all parts of the U.S. healthcare system, making its replacement likely to take effect over a number of years, even if lawmakers are trying to draft changes in weeks or months.

Summary: अमेरिकी रिपब्लिकन ने ओबामाकेयर प्रतिस्थापन के लिए रूपरेखा शुरू की


ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Ivory Coast authorities arrested a senior aide to parliament speaker Guillaume Soro on Monday, a prosecutor said, accusing him of possessing and distributing weapons to destabilize the state during an army mutiny earlier this year. The arrest of Soro s protocol chief Souleymane Kamarate Kone and other associates could deepen a rift between the powerful former rebel leader and President Alassane Ouattara. Renegade soldiers in the second city Bouake used weapons taken from Kone s home to halt the advance of loyalist troops sent to put down their four-day uprising in May.  Soon after the mutiny, prosecutors opened an investigation into the arms cache, which State Prosecutor Christophe Adou said contained six tonnes of weapons and ammunition.   The possession and concealment of these weapons in an illegal manner and then their distribution aimed to destabilize the state,  Adou told reporters in the commercial capital Abidjan.  An inquest with an arrest warrant was opened against him and all persons involved,  he added.  Around 15 people were questioned during the investigation, including Soro s head of security and his deputy. It was unclear, however, who in addition to Kone was being targeted for arrest.  Kone was taken into custody after questioning on Monday and could not be reached for comment. Allies of Soro say the investigation is politically motivated.  Kone ... has already served in prison in 2000 for the cause of President Alassane Ouattara. He is a strong man who will remain dignified,  a spokesman for Soro, who is out of the country, wrote in a statement. The statement also called for supporters to remain calm and for the judicial process to remain independent.  Soro headed a northern rebellion between 2002 and 2011 that helped Ouattara to power after his predecessor Laurent Gbagbo refused to accept defeat in a 2010 election.  However, a split has opened between the president and his former ally this year. Soro is considered one of the main contenders to take over from Ouattara, who cannot run for re-election in 2020, but he faces stiff opposition with the ruling RDR party.  Diplomats and analysts worry that a series of army mutinies beginning in January may be a symptom of jockeying for position by political figures ahead of the 2020 vote. The arrest of Kone and other Soro associates is likely to increase tensions, including within the army where the parliament speaker still commands the loyalty of many of the thousands of his former fighters now serving as soldiers.

Summary: आइवरी कोस्ट संसद के अध्यक्ष के सहायक को हथियारों के जखीरे के मामले में गिरफ्तार किया गया


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon said on Tuesday that it had detected a  probable  missile launch from North Korea.  We detected a probable missile launch from North Korea. We are in the process of assessing the situation and will provide additional details when available,  Pentagon spokesman Colonel Robert Manning told reporters.  He said the probable launch was detected at 1:30 p.m. EST (1830 GMT).

Summary: पेंटागन ने 'संभावित' उत्तर कोरियाई मिसाइल प्रक्षेपण की पुष्टि की


BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi federal and Kurdish regional judiciaries are violating the  rights of Islamic State suspects with flawed trials, arbitrary detentions under harsh conditions and broad prosecutions, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Tuesday. As the Sunni Muslim militant group s self-proclaimed caliphate crumbles following defeats in Iraq and Syria, thousands suspected of joining it have been captured, detained, and put on trial. At least 200 have been sentenced and at least 92 executed, an HRW report said.  Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, at a weekly news conference on Tuesday, denied that Iraq puts Islamic State suspects on trial without evidence but did not address other parts of the HRW report. His government faces the task of exacting justice on Islamic State members while preventing revenge attacks on people associated with the group that could only undermine efforts to create long-term stability. New York-based HRW said that an 80-page report it released early on Tuesday  finds serious legal shortcomings that undermine efforts to bring (Islamic State) fighters, members, and affiliates to justice.  A spokesman for Iraq s Supreme Judicial Council, which supervises the federal judiciary, declined to comment on the contents of the report ahead of its release.  Issues highlighted by the HRW report: - It is too easy to accuse someone of belonging to Islamic State and have them detained. Wanted lists or community accusations without evidence can result in the detention of  suspects for months even if wrongly accused. - Detention centers are overcrowded and authorities fail to separate children from adult detainees. Iraqi law states detainees should be brought to a judge within 24 hours of capture but this does not happen.  - Detainees are often subject to torture, not granted access to lawyers, and their families are not informed of their whereabouts. Iraqi authorities say they have investigated these allegations but have not released any findings. - The reliance of Iraqi and Kurdish courts on counter terrorism laws to prosecute suspects rather than on laws in the criminal code means crimes are not prioritized by gravity and victims are not included in the process as suspects are not tried for individual acts of murder, rape, torture or slavery. - Proving guilt under counter-terrorism laws is easier as a judge only needs proof that a defendant was a member of Islamic State to find them guilty. This means that anyone from cooks and doctors serving under the group to actual fighters is subject to the same sentences, which range from life in prison to death. This stretches Iraq s resources thin as casting such a wide net means the courts lack the time or manpower to go through all cases, the HRW report says, which prevents victims from getting personal justice. HRW said that when it raised concerns about prosecutors not charging suspects with crimes under the criminal code, Iraqi judicial authorities said there was no need.  Genocide and terrorism are the same crime, why would we need a separate charge for genocide?  the report quoted one counter-terrorism judge as saying.

Summary: इराक पर इस्लामिक स्टेट के संदिग्धों के लिए उचित प्रक्रिया का उल्लंघन करने का आरोप


BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq won’t take part in any regional or international conflicts, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi told state TV on Saturday. The comment came after Abadi had spoke in a phone call with U.S. President Donald Trump during which tensions with Iran were mentioned. The call was the first between the two leaders.  A political commentator close to Abadi, Ihsan al-Shammari, said Abadi’s comment addressed the U.S.-Iranian tensions.   Iran has close ties with the Shi’ite political elite ruling Iraq while Washington is providing critical military support to Iraqi forces battling Islamic State.   “Iraq is very keen to preserve its national interests (..)and does not wish to be part of any regional or international conflict which would lead to disasters for the region and for Iraq,” Abadi said, according to state TV. Trump said on Friday that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani “better be careful” after the latter was quoted as saying that anyone who speaks to Iranians with threats would ‘’regret it.’’ The White House on Friday said Trump and Abadi “spoke to the threat Iran presents across the entire region,” in their first phone call since the inauguration of the U.S. president. Abadi’s office on Friday also gave a readout of the phone call that took place overnight Thursday, without specifically mentioning Iran.  Both readouts stressed the importance of their continued cooperation against Islamic State, as the militants are being pushed back in Iraq and losing control over Mosul, the last major city stronghold under their control in the country. The United States has more than 5,000 troops deployed in Iraq and is providing air and ground support in the battle of Mosul. Iran has also played a major role in the fight against Islamic State by arming and training Iraqi Shi’ite groups collectively known as Popular Mobilization.    “The Iraqi prime minister Dr Abadi is stressing once again the policy of neutrality and to steer clear from conflicts,’’ political commentator Shammari told state TV. The Iraqi readout said Abadi asked Trump to lift the ban on people from his country traveling to the United States.  U.S. courts suspended the restrictions announced end January on entries from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Trump has said he will keep trying to reinstate them. Abadi resisted calls from influential pro-Iranian Shi’ite politicians to retaliate against the ban, at a meeting held on Jan. 29, citing Iraq’s need for U.S. military support. Washington last week ratcheted up pressure on Iran, putting sanctions on 13 individuals and 12 entities days after the White House put Tehran “on notice” over a ballistic missile test. Iran’s dominant influence in Iraqi politics was eroded after Islamic State routed the Iraqi army commanded then by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, a close ally of Tehran, in 2014.

Summary: इराक का कहना है कि वह U.S.-Iran तनाव से दूर रहेगा


TOKYO (Reuters) - Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe s coalition is on track for a roughly two-thirds majority in Sunday s general election, a survey by Kyodo news agency showed, as its conservative rival led by Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike appeared to lose momentum. Japanese go to the polls on Sunday to elect representatives for the country s 465-member lower house, the more powerful of Japan s two-chamber parliament. The Kyodo poll, conducted by telephone between Oct. 15-17, showed Abe s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) poised to win about 280 seats in the 465-member lower house. Combined with its junior coalition partner Komeito, it is likely to retain about two-thirds of the seats, Kyodo said. The ruling bloc held a two-thirds  super majority  before the chamber was dissolved for the snap election. About two-fifth of voters polled were still undecided, suggesting they could still sway the results, it said. The Party of Hope, which Tokyo Governor Koike launched last month as a  reformist, conservative  alternative to the LDP, has lost momentum since the previous survey, Kyodo said. The Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDPJ), formed this month by liberal members of the Democratic Party, is set to beat out the Party of Hope to become the leading opposition party, at least doubling its representation, Kyodo added. A Reuters corporate survey published on Wednesday showed Japanese companies overwhelmingly want Abe s coalition to stay in power but also want it to lose seats, suggesting they want political stability but don t want to hand him a landslide victory.

Summary: जापान के सत्तारूढ़ गठबंधन को लगभग दो-तिहाई बहुमत मिलाः क्योडो


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Although the Nov. 8 U.S. presidential election is more than two months away, the first ballots will be cast in just a few weeks when several states begin early voting. Thirty-eight of the 50 U.S. states have some form of early voting in this year’s race between Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump. Pushing supporters to vote early has become a large organizational effort by both major U.S. parties. Below are the dates for early voting in the states that allow it. State rankings, such as "most competitive states," are based on the Reuters States of the Nation poll. (here) * Florida: Oct. 24 to Nov. 6 * Iowa: Sept. 29 to Nov. 7 * Nevada: Oct. 22 to Nov. 4 * North Carolina: Varies by county * Ohio: Oct. 12 to Nov. 7 * Virginia: Sept. 23 to Nov. 5 * Arizona: Oct. 12 to Nov. 4 * Colorado: Oct. 24 to Nov. 7 * Georgia: Oct. 17 to Nov. 4 * New Mexico: Oct. 11 to Nov. 5 * Wisconsin: Varies by municipalities * Alaska: Oct. 24 to Nov. 7 * Arkansas: Oct. 24 to Nov. 7 * Idaho: Oct. 24 to Nov. 4 * Indiana: Oct. 12 to Nov. 7 * Kansas: Nov. 1 to Nov. 7 * Kentucky: Oct. 21 to Nov. 7 * Louisiana: Oct. 25 to Nov. 1 * Mississippi: Sept. 26 to Nov. 5 * Montana: Oct. 11 to Nov. 7 * Nebraska: Oct. 10 to Nov. 7 * Oklahoma: Nov. 3 to Nov. 5 * South Dakota: Sept. 23 to Nov. 7 * Tennessee: Oct. 19 to Nov. 3 * Texas: Oct. 24 to Nov. 4 * Utah: Oct. 25 to Nov. 4 * West Virginia: Oct. 26 to Nov. 5 * Wyoming: Sept. 29 to Nov. 7 * California: Varies by county * Hawaii: Oct. 25 to Nov. 5 * Illinois: Sept. 29 to Nov. 7 * Maine: Oct. 9 to Nov. 7 * Maryland: Oct. 27 to Nov. 3 * Massachusetts: Oct. 24 to Nov. 4 * Minnesota: Sept. 23 to Nov. 7 * Vermont: Sept. 23 to Nov. 7 * Washington state: Oct. 21 to Nov. 7 * Washington, D.C.: Oct. 29 to Nov. 5

Summary: फैक्टबॉक्सः अमेरिकी चुनाव में अगले महीने जल्दी मतदान शुरू


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives voted nearly unanimously on Tuesday to reaffirm the NATO alliance’s guarantee that all members defend each other, weeks after President Donald Trump raised doubts about Washington’s support for the agreement. The vote was 423-4 in the House, where Trump’s fellow Republicans hold a 48-seat majority, for a resolution “solemnly reaffirming” the U.S. commitment to Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. It also supports calls for every NATO member to spend at least 2 percent of its gross domestic product on defense by 2024.  During a visit to NATO headquarters in Brussels in May that was part of his first overseas trip, Trump pointedly did not mention U.S. support for that critical portion of the NATO charter, rattling allies. Instead, he used a speech there to demand that member states pay more for the alliance’s defense. Trump later said he backed the mutual defense agreement, and other senior officials rushed to express U.S. support. “With all the threats we and our partners face around the globe, a strong and secure NATO is more important than ever before,” Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan said in a statement. The resolution was co-sponsored by Ryan and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, as well as the number two Republican and Democrat in the chamber, and the Republican chairman and the ranking Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Summary: सदन ने नाटो की आपसी रक्षा का भारी समर्थन किया


LONDON (Reuters) - Russian President Putin and his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani discussed the Iraqi Kurdish independence referendum and the Syrian civil war in a telephone call, a senior Iranian official was quoted as saying by Tasnim news agency.  Assessing the current situation in the region, especially in Iraq and Syria, was the main focus of the two leaders,  Hamid Aboutalebi, Rouhani s deputy chief of staff of for political affairs, said.  They stressed on the necessity of maintaining the unity of Iraq and security and stability in the region,  he added.

Summary: रूसी, ईरानी राष्ट्रपतियों ने इराकी कुर्दिश वोट पर चर्चा की-रूहानी का कार्यालय


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Democrat Hillary Clinton as president will have no policy mandate, even if elected by a wide margin, and would be wise to court Congress for an easy win on a big-dollar infrastructure bill, an economic aide to former Republican President George W. Bush said. Keith Hennessey, a former director of the White House National Economic Council and now professor at the Stanford Graduate Business School, joined the Global Markets Forum on Tuesday as Americans voted on a new president for the next four years. Clinton led Republican candidate Donald Trump, 44 percent to 39 percent, in the last Reuters/Ipsos national tracking poll before Election Day. Here are excerpts from the conversation with Hennessey. Question: You see Hillary Clinton possibly scoring an outsized victory over Donald Trump in Electoral College votes. So why wouldn’t that be a mandate for her policies? Answer: I’m sure her team will want to claim a mandate, especially if the (Electoral College vote) is high. But this has been a near-zero policy election, so it’s super hard to make that case with a straight face. Q: There is wide agreement America needs to spend much more on highways, transport, airports and other fundamentals of modern society. How should a President Clinton go about securing that? A: She makes phone calls to (Congressional Republican leaders Paul) Ryan and (Mitch) McConnell. She invites our members to the White House to meet her. She engages with them, asks them what’s important to them, and listens. She could do an infrastructure bill first. That has potential to be an easy bipartisan win. Q: What do you expect Clinton’s economic agenda to look like? A: She has taken an Obama-like position on debt: I’m not prioritizing decreasing it, I’m not prioritizing slowing the growth of it. But I’m going to “pay for” all my new spending so my new proposals won’t make the current policy path worse. If Clinton wins the White House, I expect at most only relative modest moves on fiscal policy (probably +/- <= 1% of GDP in the short run). Nothing like the 2009 initial Obama fiscal stimulus. If that’s right, I assume the Fed stays on its current track on monetary policy.

Summary: बुनियादी ढांचा क्लिंटन के लिए लोकप्रिय द्विदलीय कदम होगाः हेनेसी


(Reuters) - Financial markets are fretting about the fiscal situation in Washington, with deadlines looming in late September and early October on the U.S. budget and the federal debt ceiling. Republican President Donald Trump stoked anxieties by threatening on Aug. 22 to shut down the government if Congress does not fund his U.S.-Mexico border wall. Here is what you need to know about the budget and the debt ceiling, separate issues but ones that are politically connected: Congress is supposed to pass annual spending bills around the end of the federal fiscal year on Sept. 30 to fund most of the U.S. government, but disagreements often prevent this. When that happens, lawmakers usually pass a temporary bill extending current spending levels with no changes for days, weeks or months, while they work on a long-term agreement. When even a short-term budget patch cannot be agreed in Congress, or if the president decides to veto either a long-term or short-term budget measure, the government shuts down.  This year, when Congress returns on Sept. 5 from its long summer recess, lawmakers will have only about 12 working days to pass a budget measure, probably a short-term patch, known as a continuing resolution, to keep the government open. If a budget measure is not passed before Oct. 1, or if Trump vetoes a budget deal over his Mexican border wall demand, portions of the government will begin to shut down and non-essential employees will go without pay until an agreement is reached. The last time the government shut down, in October 2013 for about two weeks, was because of a dispute over funding for former Democratic President Barack Obama’s healthcare law. There were three shutdowns in the 1990s, the longest lasting 21 days. In the 1970s and 1980s there were 14 shutdowns, most brief and some only partial. Shutdowns hurt federal workers, rattle financial markets and shake confidence in the U.S. government abroad, but to date they have done little lasting economic damage, according to analysts. The “debt ceiling” is a legal cap on how much money the U.S. government can borrow through bonds and other debt issued by the U.S. Treasury. It now stands at about $19.8 trillion, very close to the actual national debt.  Since March, the Treasury has been using financial “extraordinary measures” to stave off hitting the ceiling. Once the ceiling is hit, Congress must raise it. If it does not, the government cannot keep borrowing. This matters because the government spends more than it collects in taxes. That accounts for the federal budget deficit. So Washington continually borrows money to cover its bills. The Treasury has said that Congress must increase the debt ceiling by Sept. 29. However, default likely could be staved off a few more weeks by extraordinary measures, analysts said.  In any case, legislation to raise the debt limit will need to be adopted, at the very latest, by mid-October, they said. If the debt ceiling is not raised and the government can no longer pay its bills, default results, along with a likely downgrade in the U.S. credit rating. Political gridlock has never led to the United States’ reaching its debt ceiling and its bills going unpaid, but there have been some close calls. A standoff in August 2011 cost the country its top-notch bond rating from the credit ratings agency Standard & Poor’s and caused the most jarring two weeks in financial markets since the 2007-2009 global financial crisis. The two move on separate tracks, but are likely to get tangled, with Republican opponents of increasing the debt ceiling probably demanding federal spending cuts. Some analysts said Congress may try to tackle both issues at the same time, perhaps in a single piece of legislation. Both the spending and debt ceiling bills can pass the Republican-led House of Representatives by a simple majority vote. But in the Senate, where Republicans hold 52 of 100 seats, 60 votes are needed to pass, meaning the bills will need some Democratic support.  Trump made his U.S.-Mexico border wall a central promise of his 2016 presidential campaign. He also promised that Mexico would pay for it, but Mexico has steadfastly refused to do so and Trump has largely stopped talking about that pledge. Conservative House Republicans agree with the president on the need for a wall and say border-wall funding should be a priority in any spending legislation. Some have already indicated they are willing to shut down the government to get it. Moderate Republicans have called a shutdown unwise, and Republican leaders are determined to prevent one, fearing it would worsen doubts about the party’s ability to govern. Democrats are uniformly opposed to Trump’s wall and say any blame for a shutdown would rest solely with Republicans. The Trump administration reversed course earlier this month and said it would back a “clean” raising of the debt ceiling, meaning it would not be tied to other policy measures. Democrats and moderate Republicans also support a clean debt-ceiling increase. But conservative Republicans, especially in the House, often use debt-ceiling legislation to insist on changes to spending, making them opposed to a clean bill.

Summary: फैक्टबॉक्सः अमेरिकी बजट, ऋण सीमा के मुद्दे क्या हैं जो बाजारों को डरा रहे हैं?


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Wednesday voiced concern about Malaysia’s media crackdown and suggested that the extent of press and Internet freedom in the Asian country could affect prospects for expanded bilateral cooperation. U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said Washington was “very concerned” by Malaysia’s recent restrictions of access to reporting on its domestic current affairs, including last week’s blocking of access to The Malaysian Insider, a news portal. The Malaysian Insider has published reports on the scandal around 1Malaysia Development Berhad and investigations into $681 million deposited into Prime Minister Najib’s personal accounts. The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission said the news portal had breached laws under the Communications and Multimedia Act, a 1998 law that bars using a website to publish “any comment, request, suggestion or other communication which is obscene, indecent, false, menacing or offensive in character with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten or harass another person.” Najib has denied any wrongdoing over the money transferred into his account, saying that the funds were a political donation and that nothing was taken for his personal gain. The United States is also troubled that the government has failed to provide due process to targeted media groups before blocking access and has begun criminal investigations of  reporters, editors and publishers, Kirby said. “Of equal concern, many Malaysian social media users face charges for postings critical of the government and national leaders,” he added, saying Malaysian officials have spoken about legal amendments “that would further restrict online space.” He said the United States hoped “to expand our cooperation” with Malaysia on shared challenges, adding “in that context, we urge the Government of Malaysia to ensure that all its laws, existing and future, fully respect freedom of expression, including the free flow of ideas on the internet.”

Summary: मलेशिया में मीडिया की कार्रवाई से अमेरिका 'बहुत चिंतित'


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a move to bolster support among veterans, Republican Donald Trump joined a leather-jacket-wearing, motorcycle-riding crowd in Washington on Sunday to honor fighters who served in foreign wars and advocate for those still missing in action. Riders from across the country converged on the National Mall near the Lincoln Memorial for the annual “Rolling Thunder” rally and to listen to the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, who hopes to be commander in chief next year. “We’re going to rebuild our military and we’re going to take care of our veterans,” Trump told the crowd of thousands, many of whom wore leather vests, veterans’ hats and biker insignia. Trump, the billionaire businessman who has promised to build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico if he becomes president, said illegal immigrants in many cases got better care in the United States than military veterans. “We’re not going to allow that to happen any longer,” he said. Trump, 69, who did not serve in the military, upset veterans last year when he said Senator John McCain of Arizona was not a war hero.  McCain, a Navy fighter pilot who went on to become the 2008 Republican presidential nominee, was imprisoned and tortured after being shot down during the Vietnam War. Trump made no mention of McCain during his remarks on Sunday, and the crowd cheered him enthusiastically, with some waving signs including “Bikers for Trump” and “Make America Great Again.” Supporters cheered when Trump mentioned veterans and booed at the mention of Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. “I don’t know if he can fix (veterans’ issues), but he’s the only one I think will try,” said Leonard Westberry, 68, of Richmond, Virginia, a U.S. Army veteran who served in Vietnam in 1967. Westberry said he planned to support Trump in the Nov. 8 election. “It’s awesome that Trump is here. ... That’s a good thing,” said Ralph Giannola, 65, who said he had not decided whether to support Trump in November. “I just don’t want to see any rioting. I mean, protests are OK. I don’t want to see anybody get hurt,” he said. There were no protest interruptions during Trump’s nearly 20-minute address on Sunday, a rarity for similar events. “I know one thing, you’re going to all behave yourselves, right?” Trump said to positive affirmations from the crowd. “And I know another thing - there won’t be any paid agitators in this group,” he added to cheers.

Summary: मोटरसाइकिलों की पृष्ठभूमि में, ट्रम्प ने दिग्गजों की मदद करने का संकल्प लिया


MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia has detained a Norwegian citizen it suspects of spying, the RIA news agency reported on Tuesday, citing a Moscow court which sanctioned the individual s detention. Media reports said Russia s FSB security service had caught the Norwegian taking secret documents about the Russian Navy from a Russian citizen.

Summary: रूस ने जासूसी के संदेह में नॉर्वे के नागरिक को हिरासत में लियाः आर. आई. ए.


YANGON (Reuters) - Muslim Rohingya insurgents said on Saturday they are ready to respond to any peace move by the Myanmar government but a one-month ceasefire they declared to enable the delivery of aid in violence-racked Rakhine State is about to end. The Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) did not say what action it would take after the ceasefire ends at midnight on Monday but it was  determined to stop the tyranny and oppression  waged against the Rohingya people.  If at any stage, the Burmese government is inclined to peace, then ARSA will welcome that inclination and reciprocate,  the group said in a statement. Government spokesmen were not immediately available for comment. When the ARSA announced its one-month ceasefire from Sept. 10, a government spokesman said:  We have no policy to negotiate with terrorists.  The rebels launched coordinated attacks on about 30 security posts and an army camp on Aug. 25 with the help of hundreds of disaffected Rohingya villagers, many wielding sticks or machetes, killing about a dozen people. In response, the military unleashed a sweeping offensive across the north of Rakhine State, driving more than half a million Rohingya villagers into Bangladesh in what the United Nations branded a textbook example of  ethnic cleansing . Myanmar rejects that. It says more than 500 people have been killed in the fighting, most of them  terrorists  who have been attacking civilians and torching villages. The ability of the ARSA, which only surfaced in October last year, to mount any sort of challenge to the Myanmar army is not known but it does not appear to have been able to put up resistance to the military offensive unleashed in August. Inevitably, there are doubts about how the insurgents can operate in areas where the military has driven out the civilian population, cutting the insurgents off from recruits, food, funds and information. The ARSA accused the government of using murder, arson and rape as  tools of depopulation . The ARSA denies links to foreign Islamists. In an interview with Reuters in March, ARSA leader Ata Ullah linked the creation of the group to communal violence between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine in 2012, when nearly 200 people were killed and 140,000, mostly Rohingya, displaced. The group says it is fighting for the rights of the Rohingya, who have never been regarded as an indigenous minority in Myanmar and so have been denied citizenship under a law that links nationality to ethnicity. The group repeated their demand that Rohingya be recognized as a  native indigenous  ethnic group, adding that all Rohingya people should be allowed  to return home safely with dignity ... to freely determine their political status and pursue their economic, social and cultural development . The Rohingya have long faced discrimination and repression in Rakhine State where bad blood between them and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists, stemming from violence by both sides, goes back generations. The ARSA condemned the government for blocking humanitarian assistance in Rakhine and said it was willing to discuss ceasefires with international organizations so aid could be delivered. Some 515,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh but thousands remain in Rakhine. Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has faced scathing criticism for not doing more to stop the violence, although a military-drafted constitution gives her no power over the security forces. Suu Kyi has condemned rights abuses and said Myanmar was ready to start a process agreed with Bangladesh in 1993 by which anyone verified as a refugee would be accepted back. Many refugees fear they will not have the paperwork they believe Myanmar will demand to allow them back.

Summary: रोहिंग्या विद्रोही शांति के लिए खुले हैं लेकिन म्यांमार में संघर्ष विराम समाप्त


NEW YORK (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Friday rejected an effort by Joaquin Guzman, the accused Mexican drug lord known as  El Chapo,  to dismiss a massive international narcotics conspiracy indictment on the ground he was extradited improperly to Brooklyn. While not challenging the merits of the case, Guzman s lawyers claimed that the indictment violated the extradition treaty between the United States and Mexico because Mexican authorities initially agreed to extradite their client only to southern California or western Texas. The lawyers questioned how Mexico could have suddenly consented to have U.S. authorities hurry Guzman to Brooklyn in New York City to face charges other than those for which his extradition had been sought, violating the so-called Rule of Specialty. But in a brief order, U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan said Guzman had no legal right to challenge the Brooklyn indictment because Mexico had not objected to it. Cogan also said the federal appeals court in Manhattan, whose jurisdiction includes the Brooklyn courthouse, upheld this principle in late July in an unrelated case.  Here, there is no protest or objection by Mexico, nor is there an express provision in the extradition treaty between the United States and Mexico,  Cogan wrote.  Therefore, defendant s motion to dismiss the indictment based on an alleged Rule of Specialty violation is denied.  Michelle Gelernt, a federal public defender representing Guzman, in an email said her office was  disappointed, but not surprised  with the order.  We still believe Mr. Guzman s rights under the treaty were violated, and given that other circuit courts give the defendant the right to object to violations of extradition treaties, hope that the Supreme Court will decide this issue favorably to Mr. Guzman,  she said. Prosecutors accused Guzman, 60, of running a global cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine smuggling operation as the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, and playing a major role in a decade-long Mexican drug war where more than 100,000 people have died. Guzman faces life in prison if convicted. He is being held without bail.

Summary: अमेरिकी न्यायाधीश मैक्सिकन ड्रग लॉर्ड एल चैपो के अभियोग को खारिज नहीं करेंगे


(Reuters) - Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump has effectively split the conservative Tea Party movement, as his fiery campaign draws in followers of the group who had been expected to line up behind Ted Cruz, a more consistent champion of small government. As the Republican race moves to the crucial battlegrounds of Ohio and Florida among three other states on Tuesday, Tea Party support promises to help Trump’s campaign offset its relative lack of on-the-ground organization compared to Texas Senator Cruz, his closest rival nationally. Having loyal Tea Party supporters could also help him fend off moves to block his nomination at the Republican National Convention in July if he falls short of the threshold of 1,237 delegates that would guarantee him the party’s candidacy.  A Reuters review of Trump’s list of 66 Ohio delegates — who would represent him at the nominating convention if he wins the primary and provide crucial support in the event of a contested convention — found that 28 are Tea Party leaders, members or are otherwise linked to the movement, including officials who have been featured speakers at Tea Party events.  Using the same benchmark, 27 of Cruz’s delegates have links with the grassroots group, which sprang to national prominence in 2009 on anger over government bailouts, and demands for tax cuts and less “intrusive” government. Despite Trump’s mixed record as a conservative, the real estate mogul’s promises to shake up Washington, throw out illegal immigrants and tear up “unfair” trade deals have won over many influential Tea Party followers, according to interviews with activists across more than a dozen states. “Trump has never asked me for a dime and being self funded he’s the only one that can blow up the Republican Party establishment,” said Ralph King, a Trump delegate and member of the Cleveland Tea Party.  “If the primaries result in a contested convention, I’m in his corner all the way.” (Graphic showing Trump Ohio delegates with Tea Party links:tmsnrt.rs/1Xr3aZw) Recent polls have shown Trump performing well among voters who identified as Tea Party supporters.  A Feb. 29 CNN poll had 56 percent of Tea Partiers favoring Trump compared to 16 percent for Cruz. A March 9 Quinnipiac University poll had Trump leading Cruz 48 percent to 40 percent among Tea Party voters in Florida, while Cruz led Trump with 38 percent to Trump’s 33 percent in Ohio. “Trump has tapped into Tea Party emotions, gaining the support of many of the most hacked off and motivated voters out there,” said Republican strategist Ford O’Connell. “It was a brilliant move.”  The influence of the amorphous Tea Party has waned nationally, but it remains a potent force in many states through its thousands of committed grassroots activists. For conservative purists, Cruz checks all the right ideological boxes of limited government and lower taxes.  Trump, on the other hand, says he would maintain government programs such as Social Security and has called for higher taxes on the most wealthy Americans. In 2008, he voiced support for the government’s rescue package for major banks. After Trump’s strong showing in a string of states on “Super Tuesday” last month, Jenny Beth Martin — co-founder of a national umbrella group called Tea Party Patriots - lambasted him as a conservative of convenience. “Trump is about love of himself. But the Tea Party is about love of country and the love of our Constitution,” she said at this month’s Conservative Political Action Conference.  Ned Ryun, founder of American Majority, a group that trains conservative grassroots activists, said Trump’s outsider persona is key to his appeal to Tea Party activists.  “Cruz people feel they can work within the status quo,” said Ryun. “Trump people say screw the status quo, we’re sick of it.” The billionaire has quietly maintained contacts with the movement since at least 2011, when he was flirting with a presidential run in the 2012 election. More recently he has courted activists, focusing on prospective delegates. Trump broadened his appeal among Tea Party members in January when he secured the endorsement of former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, who commands strong loyalty among many in the movement. At the South Carolina Tea Party convention in January 2015 in Myrtle Beach, Trump spent 45 minutes with eight Tea Party activists, test-marketing themes like immigration, according to attendees.  The effort brought converts. One of those present, Gerri McDaniel, ran Trump’s grassroots efforts in South Carolina. Another, Jeanne Seaver, did the same in Georgia. He won both states’ primaries. Atlanta Tea Party co-founder Debbie Dooley also attended that meeting and aims to be a Trump delegate.  On the first ballot of the Republican convention in July she would be obliged to back him, but says she would continue to back him if voting goes to a second round when delegates become free to vote for whichever candidate they choose. “I’ll back Trump to hell and back,” Dooley said. In Michigan, New Hampshire and Nevada, Trump’s successful efforts were helped by state directors formerly employed by Americans for Prosperity, a group backed by the billionaire Koch brothers that has courted Tea Party groups for years. His Florida field director Ken Mayo held the same post at Americans for Prosperity. Trump tapped a local Tea Party leader — Rob Scott — to run his campaign in Ohio. Of Trump’s 21 delegates from New Hampshire — the first primary he won — 13 have Tea Party links or affiliations. Delegate lists for Florida and Michigan — another state that votes on Tuesday — are not yet available because those states pick delegates at conventions after their primaries. In Ohio, candidates submit delegate lists in advance. Trump still trails Cruz on get-out-the-vote efforts, strategists and activists say. June Pitts, a Tea Party activist in Illinois, said in previous elections she has worked at campaign offices. But Trump doesn’t have one in Chicago, so Pitts is making calls herself ahead of the state’s March 15 vote.      In Tiffin, Ohio, Trump delegate Jim Green said he spent $700 of his own money on yard signs before the campaign began sending him paraphernalia for free.     Glenn Newman, a Trump delegate and activist in southeastern Ohio, has also been left to his own devices.     Trump’s campaign “is being put together like a puppy chasing a pickup truck,” Newman said. “They’re just playing catch-up.”

Summary: ट्रम्प की अपील महत्वपूर्ण राज्यों में टी पार्टी की वफादारी को विभाजित करती है


ADEN (Reuters) - The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen said on Wednesday it would keep the Houthi-controlled Hodeidah port, vital for aid, open for a month despite a fresh missile attack against Riyadh, but it kept up air raids that killed at least nine people. The Western-backed coalition, which controls Yemen s airspace and port access, said last month it would allow humanitarian relief through Hodeidah following a nearly three-week blockade imposed because of a missile attack toward the Saudi capital s international airport. The Saudis say the Red Sea port, which is Yemen s main entry point for food and humanitarian supplies, is also a hub used by the Houthis to bring in weapons, which it accuses Iran of supplying. Tehran denies the charges. On Wednesday, the coalition confirmed it would keep access open to the port despite another missile attack at Riyadh on Tuesday by the Houthis which Saudi forces also intercepted.   Keen to maintain humanitarian aid to the brotherly Yemeni people and as a result of intensified inspection measures, the coalition command announces that Hodeidah port will remain open for humanitarian and relief supplies,  the coalition said in a statement carried by Saudi state news agency SPA on Wednesday. The Saudi ambassador to Sanaa said the coalition would also allow the provision of four cranes to the port to boost aid deliveries to the war-damaged country. The ambassador, Mohammed al-Jaber, who was speaking in a televised news conference, did not give details on how the cranes would be delivered.  Earlier this year, the United Nations said the coalition turned back four cranes the United States donated to the World Food Programme to boost aid operations at Hodeidah.  The cranes would have replaced parts of the port s infrastructure destroyed by coalition air strikes in August 2015, damage that forced ships to line up offshore because they could not be unloaded. The coalition said ships bringing in fuel and food would also be allowed to enter for another 30 days while proposals made by the United Nations envoy to Yemen were implemented, it added. The agency did not elaborate on the proposals. But the coalition has been demanding that a U.N. inspection regime agreed in 2015 be further tightened to prevent weapons from reaching the Houthis. SALMAN-TRUMP CALL Saudi state news agency SPA said King Salman discussed in a telephone call with U.S. President Donald Trump ways  to hold the Iranian regime accountable for its hostile acts and its involvement in supplying the Houthi militia with missiles to threaten the security of the kingdom and the region . The White House later confirmed the call and said the two leaders  agreed on the importance of reinvigorating a political process to end the war in Yemen  and that the king briefed Trump on a Saudi plan  to alleviate the humanitarian crisis  caused by the conflict. Tuesday s missile attack took place as the Houthis marked 1,000 days since the coalition intervened in the Yemen war in March 2015 to try to restore President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi after a Houthi advance on his base in Aden forced him to flee. Saudi Arabia said that since the war began the Houthis had fired 83 ballistic missiles toward the kingdom. More than 10,000 people have been killed and a humanitarian crisis unleashed in a conflict which has intensified since former President Ali Abdullah Saleh was killed on Dec. 4. Coalition forces, which are supported by the United States and Britain, meanwhile launched fresh air strikes overnight.  Residents said at least nine members of the same family, including at least five children, were killed in one air strike which hit their home in Wadi Khair in southern Yemen s Shabwa province. Coalition aircraft have been providing air support for southern fighters and pro-government troops as part of a push to clear the Houthis from Shabwa and the family were killed in an apparently mistaken attack. Residents also reported that coalition aircraft bombed a new parliament chamber, part of a government compound being built in Sanaa, causing damage but no casualties. The coalition had no immediate comment on the report but says it does not target civilians. Similar air strikes in which civilian homes, markets and hospitals were hit are recurrent in Yemen. On Monday, eight women and two children from the same family died when war planes struck a vehicle returning from a wedding party in Marib, east of Sanaa.

Summary: अरब गठबंधन का कहना है कि यमन का बंदरगाह खुला रहेगा; हवाई हमलों में कम से कम नौ लोगों की मौत


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan welcomed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s choice of Mike Pence as a running mate on Friday, saying the Indiana governor comes from “the heart of the conservative movement.” “I can think of no better choice for our vice-presidential candidate. We need someone who is steady and secure in his principles, someone who can cut through the noise and make a compelling case for conservatism. Mike Pence is that man,” Ryan said in a statement.

Summary: पेंस पर सदन के अध्यक्ष रयानः 'कोई बेहतर विकल्प नहीं'


ADEN (Reuters) - Security forces in the southern Yemeni city of Aden arrested 10 members of an Islamist partner in the internationally-recognized government, the Islah party said on Wednesday. Aden is dominated by local forces backed by the United Arab Emirates, a key member of the Saudi-led coalition that intervened in Yemen s civil war in 2015 to restore President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi to power but is hostile toward Islamists. The arrests could raise tension within the coalition fighting the Iran-aligned Houthi movement and forces loyal to ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh who seized much of northern Yemen, including the capital Sanaa, and drove Hadi into exile. Islah said security forces raided the home of its number two man in Aden, Mohammed Abdel-Malek, and arrested him, along with a member of the party s local Shura Council as well as a local militia commander. Security forces also closed down the party s office in the al-Qaloua district of Aden, Islah said in a statement. A security source in Aden confirmed four people were arrested and said the move was related to the assassination of a Salafist imam in Aden on Tuesday by a bomb planted in his car. While both in the Islamist camp, Salafists and Islah are at odds as some of the former back a secession of south Yemen while the latter wants the Arabian Peninsula state to remain intact. It was unclear if the arrested Islah members had been formally charged.  (Islah) directs a call to public opinion, the government and the coalition demanding they shoulder their responsibility to swiftly release brother Abdel-Malek and his colleagues and to stop these arbitrary measures,  Islah s statement said. With thousands of fighters deployed on battlefronts against the Houthis, Islah has been an important ally of Hadi and the Saudi-led coalition trying to reinstate his government. But Islah, seen as linked with the Muslim Brotherhood, has come under pressure since a rift erupted between Qatar and some Arab states, including the UAE and Saudi Arabia, in June over allegations Qatar backs Islamist militants. Qatar denies this. Since the coalition intervened in Yemen, Islah has tried to distance itself from the Brotherhood in an effort to ease Gulf rulers  anxiety about its Islamist ideology.  The Brotherhood denies accusations from conservative Arab governments of involvement in terrorism, saying it seeks change only by peaceful means.

Summary: यमन इस्लामिक पार्टी के सदस्य गिरफ्तार, तनाव बढ़ा


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump has signed off on sending 4,000 more troops to Afghanistan, Fox News reported on Monday, citing a senior U.S. official. The report comes before Trump addresses the nation on his strategy for Afghanistan at 9:00 p.m. EDT Monday (0100 GMT on Tuesday).

Summary: अफगानिस्तान में 4,000 और सैनिक भेजने को ट्रंप की मंजूरीः फॉक्स न्यूज


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A  handful  of private U.S. citizens who traveled to Cuba say they have experienced symptoms similar to those suffered by American diplomats in mysterious health  attacks  in Havana, the U.S. State Department said on Friday. A State Department spokesperson, who declined to be named, said the agency could not verify the claims but said travelers should heed its travel warning issued last Friday. The warning urged Americans to stay away from Cuba because of unexplained health  attacks  it says have caused hearing loss, dizziness, fatigue and cognitive issues among at least 22 diplomatic personnel. The Trump administration on Tuesday expelled 15 Cuban diplomats to protest Cuba s failure to protect staff at the U.S. embassy in the communist country, just days after Washington recalled more than half the U.S. diplomatic personnel from Havana. Cuba has denied involvement, and Washington has not directly blamed the government in Havana. So far, no probes have yielded any answers about how the alleged attacks were carried out or who was responsible. The warning said the attacks had occurred in  diplomatic residences and hotels frequented by U.S. citizens.  CBS News first reported that some private citizens had complained of symptoms after visiting Cuba. On Friday, the U.S. embassy in Havana identified the Hotel Nacional and Hotel Capri as the two places where it said embassy personnel had been targeted over the past few months, and said the U.S. government had  imposed limitations on lodging  there. Receptionists at both hotels, when contacted by Reuters, said they had not heard of any restrictions. Both said they had Americans registered there and their managers were not immediately available for comment. U.S. intelligence operatives working undercover were among the embassy personnel affected by the attacks, but it was unclear if they were specifically targeted since the symptoms hit staff across a range of job categories, U.S. officials have told Reuters. The steps taken by Republican President Donald Trump s administration deliver another blow to his Democratic predecessor Barack Obama s policy of rapprochement, including actions likely to erode the normalization of a relationship dominated for decades by Cold War hostility and suspicion. Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez denounced the expulsion of Cuban diplomats as  unjustified,  accused the United States of insufficient cooperation with Cuba s investigation and urged Washington to stop politicizing the matter. Theories about the attacks abound, from surveillance technology gone awry to a sophisticated acoustic weapon in the hands of Cuban-American exiles or third-party state actors such as Russia, Iran or North Korea. But no clear explanation has emerged.

Summary: क्यूबा में कुछ अमेरिकी आगंतुकों ने दूतावास 'हमलों' के समान लक्षणों की शिकायत कीः यू. एस.


(Reuters) - A New York comedian has been compelled to appear before a House Intelligence Committee investigating suspected Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election where he will likely face questions about acting as a go-between for Wikileaks and an ally of President Donald Trump.  Randy Credico, a political activist who hosted a radio show on New York radio, is scheduled to appear in front of the committee on Dec. 15, according to a photo of the subpoena posted on his Twitter account.  On several occasions over the last few years, Credico interviewed and met with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, a man believed by some U.S. officials and lawmakers to be an untrustworthy pawn of Russian President Vladimir Putin.  Assange’s group released Democratic emails during the 2016 presidential campaign that U.S. intelligence agencies say were hacked by Russia to try to tilt the election against Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. He is regarded with distaste by many in Washington, although Trump, then the Republican candidate, supported the group’s email releases last year. Credico has also interviewed Republican political consultant Roger Stone, a longtime Trump ally, who he worked with in the past to reform New York’s drug laws, according to the New York Times.  Stone flatly denied allegations of collusion between the president’s associates and Russia during the 2016 U.S. election in a meeting with House of Representatives Intelligence Committee in September.  During his appearance in front of the committee, Stone refused to identify an “opinion journalist” who had acted as a go-between between Stone and Assange. According to Stone’s own account to Reuters, he “reluctantly” identified the journalist as Credico in written communication to the committee.  The committee has been interested in predictions that Stone made about damage the email release would have on Clinton’s campaign, the Times reported.

Summary: अमेरिकी खुफिया समिति ने रूस के चुनाव में हस्तक्षेप की जांच में कॉमेडियन को सम्मन भेजा


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Wednesday he had never considered resigning and was committed to President Donald Trump’s agenda, but failed to address whether he had referred to the president as a “moron,” as NBC reported. The State Department later denied he had even used the word, an issue Tillerson earlier declined to specifically address. “The Secretary .... does not use that language to speak about anyone. He did not say that,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said at a briefing. The top U.S. diplomat, whose tenure has been dogged with rumors about unhappiness with Trump’s policies and rhetoric, said he was as committed to Trump’s agenda today as he was when he accepted the offer to serve as secretary of state. The episode is the latest controversy to embroil Trump’s administration which has witnessed a string of high-profile departures and firings in recent months, including his chief of staff, national security advisor and the former FBI director. NBC reported that in a session with Trump’s national security team and Cabinet officials at the Pentagon, Tillerson had openly criticized the president and referred to him as a “moron,” citing three officials familiar with the incident. Tillerson sidestepped the issue when taking questions after making a statement at a hastily organized news conference. “I’m not going to deal with petty stuff like that,” he said, adding, “I’m not from this place (Washington), but the places I come from we don’t deal with that kind of petty nonsense.” Tillerson spoke after NBC reported that Vice President Mike Pence and other top officials had intervened to persuade him not to resign this summer as tensions rose between him and Trump. “The vice president has never had to persuade me to remain as secretary of state because I have never considered leaving this post,” Tillerson said. “My commitment to the success of our president and our country is as strong as it was the day I accepted his offer to serve as secretary of state,” Tillerson said. Nauert said Tillerson and Trump had spoken later on Wednesday and that it was a “good conversation”. Tillerson did not offer an apology to Trump because “one was not needed”. Tillerson, the former CEO of Exxon and former president of the Boy Scouts, said of Trump: “He’s smart. He demands results.” Trump later told reporters in Las Vegas: “I’m very honored by his comments. It was fake news, it was a totally phony story. ... It was made up by NBC. They just made it up. ... Total confidence in Rex. I have total confidence.” Trump had appeared to undercut Tillerson over the weekend when the president tweeted that he told him that he was “wasting his time” trying to negotiate with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un over Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs. Tillerson offered a vigorous defense of both the U.S. president and his foreign policy even though the White House and State Department have at times appeared to differ on policy. “President Trump’s foreign policy goals break the mold of what people traditionally think is achievable on behalf of our country,” Tillerson said. The embarrassing episode underscored the sense of disarray that U.S. friends and foes alike have detected in their dealings with Trump’s foreign policy apparatus and could further undermine U.S. credibility in world affairs. Pence, in a statement, said he never discussed with Tillerson the prospect of the secretary of state’s resignation. In a tweet, Trump earlier urged NBC to apologize for its story, but NBC News anchor Hallie Jackson said on air: “NBC will not be issuing an apology to America as the president is calling for because again ... the secretary did not refute directly some of the key points” in the story. Several NBC journalists who reported the story also stood by their piece, saying on MSNBC that their reporting was true.  Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has played down any tensions between Trump and Tillerson over their apparent split, most recently over North Korea. Some administration officials have privately described Tillerson as chafing against some of the president’s pronouncements and off-the-cuff decisions, sometimes contrary to advice from senior advisers. One U.S. official said the view of many within the administration was that despite Tillerson’s denial of having contemplated resignation, “it’s only a matter of time” before he does consider it. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there was no reason to believe that Trump would give up his habit of publicly contradicting Tillerson and that each time speculation on his future would resurface. Tillerson has often found himself at odds with the president on a range of issues, according to current and former U.S. officials and media reports. He has taken a more hawkish view on Russia and tried to mediate a dispute among key U.S. Mideast allies after four Arab nations boycotted Qatar over its alleged extremist ties. Tillerson also appeared to distance himself from Trump’s response to violence in Charlottesville, Virginia this summer, saying at the time “the president speaks for himself” when asked about Trump’s values. Senator Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican, said Tillerson was working under difficult circumstances because some in the administration are undermining his authority by trying to act as secretary of state on a daily basis. He declined to name names. Corker, who is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee, was asked whether he supported Tillerson, and said: “As a team, Tillerson, Mattis and (White House Chief of Staff John) Kelly help separate us from chaos, so I absolutely support ‘em. Absolutely.” Tillerson was confirmed by only 56-43 at his Senate confirmation hearing in January, an unusually low confirmation for a secretary of state. Many members of Congress, including Republicans, strongly object to his plans to slash the State Department and foreign aid budgets.

Summary: टिलरसन ने कहा, कभी इस्तीफा देने के बारे में नहीं सोचा था


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley, head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, proposed a bill on Tuesday to overhaul disclosure rules regarding anyone working on behalf of a foreign government, a law that has received renewed attention after Paul Manafort was indicted for violating it.  The proposed legislation, called the Disclosing Foreign Influence Act, would close loopholes in the Foreign Agents Registration Act and require the Department of Justice to develop a strategy for enforcing the law, the Republican senator said in a statement.  Manafort, a longtime Republican operative who briefly served as Donald Trump’s campaign manager in 2016, and his business associate Rick Gates, pleaded not guilty on Monday to a 12-count indictment that contained charges ranging from money laundering to acting as unregistered agents of Ukraine’s former pro-Russian government. The current law, known as FARA, requires persons acting on behalf of a foreign government or political party to disclose to the Department of Justice their work as well as public communications taken on behalf of that client.  Critics have argued the reporting requirements for FARA are unclear and contains loopholes that allow American lobbyists to avoid disclosure of their foreign clients. “Congress passed the Foreign Agents Registration Act to prevent inappropriate influence in domestic policy, but my oversight work has uncovered rampant disregard by foreign agents and lackluster enforcement by federal authorities,” Grassley said in a statement.   The proposed law would clarify who is required to register, improve investigative tools, including granting authority for the Justice Department to pursue civil charges, and create new reporting requirements. FARA was first passed in 1938 in the lead up to World War II in an effort to combat German propaganda efforts and was later amended in 1966 to include lobbyists, according to the Department of Justice. As the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Grassley is empowered to see that the bill quickly receives a hearing and a vote.

Summary: वरिष्ठ रिपब्लिकन ने विदेशी लॉबिंग की अधिक निगरानी का प्रस्ताव रखा


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The departure on Friday of Steve Bannon, the White House’s top economic nationalist, will likely tip the trade policy scales in favor of the Trump administration’s “globalist” faction, which could soften the stance toward two of Trump’s favorite targets: China and the North American Free Trade Agreement. But after news that Trump had fired Bannon from his post as chief strategist, trade experts said it may take some time for National Economic Council Chairman Gary Cohn, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue to start winning more debates on trade policy. Bannon and White House Trade and Manufacturing Office director Peter Navarro were often allied in taking hardline anti-China stances over currency manipulation, steel tariffs and other trade issues, often opposed to Cohn, Mnuchin and Perdue, according to lobbyists who been involved in the debates. The Cohn-led group proved more influential in the administration’s decisions in April not to label China a currency manipulator and to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement instead of terminating it.  More recently, they have pushed for a delay in a decision on the imposition of broad steel tariffs.     With Bannon gone, “there’s not a replacement for that voice in internal debates,” said a senior administration official who was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue. “Without Steve constantly pushing back on every policy idea coming from the so called “globalists,” it’s easy to see how they could have a chance to start winning more policy battles,” the official said. In the short term, the trade policy trajectory won’t change much, said Derek Scissors, a China trade expert at the American Enterprise Institute, a pro-business conservative think tank in Washington. Many of Trump’s views on trade pre-dated Bannon’s arrival on his campaign in any case. The U.S. Trade Representative’s office announced on Friday that it will proceed with a planned investigation into whether China is misappropriating U.S. technology and intellectual property through unreasonable investment rules. Scissors said Bannon’s departure will show in what decisions the administration makes following a year-long study of the issue.   “It’s about the final choices on do we go forward with these very difficult sanctions on the Chinese or do we look to make a tradeoff on a security issue, and Bannon would have been in the first camp,” Scissors said. The struggle for influence in Trump’s White House “has been something of a battle between the finance guys and the economic nationalists, and the most important economic nationalist just left,” Scissors added. The offices of USTR Robert Lighthizer and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who have been pushing for stronger trade policies to reduce U.S. trade deficits with China, Mexico and other countries, declined to comment on Bannon’s departure, referring policy questions to the White House. But industry lobbyists, who have been whipsawed by economic policy twists over trade and an ill-fated border tax proposal, were skeptical that much would change.  Two lobbyists on the sidelines of NAFTA talks in Washington said that even without Bannon, they will assume the status quo on trade policy as long as fierce China critic Navarro is in the White House. Bonnie Glaser, senior adviser for Asia at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the administration’s efforts to develop an effective strategy to retaliate against China’s unfair trade practices will survive, largely because there is a widely held view in the administration and the corporate sector that China’s trade practices are a problem. “I doubt this effort will evaporate, though it may evolve,” she said.

Summary: बैनन के प्रस्थान ने व्हाइट हाउस के 'वैश्विकतावादियों' के पक्ष में व्यापार पैमाने की सलाह दी