North America

NEW YORK, Aug 20 (APP): Hundreds of Pakistani-Americans gathered in Edison in the neighbouring US state of New Jersey on Sunday for the Pakistan Independence Day Parade marking 72nd anniversary of the establishment of their homeland.

Men, women and children — mostly clad in national dresses — chanted slogans in support of Kashmiri people’s struggle for freedom from India’s yoke and an end to their sufferings. They also raised vociferous slogans of “Pakistan Zinda Bad” and “Quaid-e-Azam Zinda Bad” slogans.

20 August 2019; AFP: American tech giants Amazon, Facebook and Google joined forces on Monday to decry the French digital tax as retroactive and discriminatory.

President Donald Trump is considering retaliating against the tax -- approved July 11 -- with punitive tariffs on French wine imports, prompting an investigation by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR).

CIUDAD DELGADO, El Salvador (Reuters) - A Salvadoran court on Monday acquitted a woman accused of homicide after giving birth to a stillborn baby in a case that drew international attention to the socially conservative nation’s strict abortion ban.

Evelyn Hernandez, 21, was previously convicted of intentionally inducing an abortion and had already served three years of a 30-year prison sentence.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 19 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Monday called the release of the Iranian oil tanker "unfortunate," as the tanker seized by Britain for several weeks now has left Gibraltar.

"It's very unfortunate that that ship was released," said the top U.S. diplomat in an interview with U.S. Fox News.

Data from ship-tracking service MarineTraffic showed that the oil tanker set sail shortly before midnight on Sunday towards international waters and is heading for the Greek port of Kalamata, according to media reports.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug. 19 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations held a wreath-laying ceremony Monday to commemorate its 22 staffers killed in the 2003 attack in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad.

The ceremony took place at Memorial Wall inside the UN General Assembly Visitors Lobby, where a flag retrieved from the bombing site is framed and preserved.

UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed led a minute of silence in honor of all the UN personnel who sacrificed their lives in the service of the world body.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Immigrants held in U.S. detention facilities filed a lawsuit Monday decrying what they called shoddy medical care and a failure by authorities to provide accommodations for disabilities.

In the suit filed by disability and civil rights advocates in U.S. District Court, immigrants said they’re placed in isolation as punishment and denied recommended medical treatment and surgery. Some said they’ve been denied wheelchairs and a deaf detainee who communicates in American Sign Language said he has not been provided an interpreter.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General William Barr removed the acting director of the Bureau of Prisons from his position Monday, more than a week after millionaire financier Jeffrey Epstein took his own life while in federal custody.

SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) — Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren offered a public apology Monday to Native Americans over her past claim to tribal heritage, directly tackling an area that’s proved to be a big political liability.

“Like anyone who has been honest with themselves, I know I have made mistakes,” the Massachusetts senator said at a forum on Native American issues in this pivotal early voting state. “I am sorry for the harm I have caused.”

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Democratic Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib sharply criticized Israel on Monday for denying them entry to the Jewish state and called on fellow members of Congress to visit while they cannot.

Omar, of Minnesota, suggested President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were suppressing the lawmakers’ ability to carry out their oversight role.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Twitter said Monday it has suspended more than 200,000 accounts that it believes were part of a Chinese government influence campaign targeting the protest movement in Hong Kong.

The company also said it will ban ads from state-backed media companies, expanding a prohibition it first applied in 2017 to two Russian entities.