USA

WASHINGTON, Sept 20 (NNN-XINHUA) – A new ensemble forecast, published by the U.S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), projects up to 218,000 COVID-19 deaths in the United States by Oct 10.

The new national ensemble forecast predicts that 3,000 to 7,100 new COVID-19 deaths will likely be reported during the week ending Oct 10, and a total of 207,000 to 218,000 COVID-19 deaths will be reported by that date.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. judge early Sunday blocked the Commerce Department from requiring Apple Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google to remove Chinese-owned messaging app WeChat for downloads by late Sunday.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler in San Francisco said in an order that WeChat users who filed a lawsuit “have shown serious questions going to the merits of the First Amendment claim, the balance of hardships tips in the plaintiffs’ favor.”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden will speak in Philadelphia on Sunday about his rival President Donald Trump’s plan to name a third justice to the Supreme Court, a move that would cement a 6-3 conservative majority.

Trump on Saturday said he will make his nomination this week and named Amy Coney Barrett of the Chicago-based 7th Circuit and Barbara Lagoa of the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit as possible candidates to fill the vacancy created by Friday’s death of liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) -- The United States claimed on Saturday that all pre-2015 UN sanctions against Iran had been restored, a unilateral effort ignored by the international community.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement that the sanctions are being re-imposed according to the "snapback" mechanism under UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which endorsed the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 20 (Xinhua) -- Video-sharing social networking platform TikTok on Saturday voiced hope that an agreement reached by its Chinese parent company ByteDance with Oracle and Walmart will "resolve the security concerns of the U.S. administration and settle questions around TikTok's future in the U.S.."

The Los Angeles-based company issued a statement Saturday afternoon, hours after U.S. President Donald Trump said he had approved a deal between the three parties.

Tehran, Sept 20, IRNA - Coinciding with Trump administration’s claim that UN sanctions against Iran will be restored, Bloomberg wrote in a report: "allies and adversaries argue the U.S. effort to restore sanctions is groundless and a diplomatic crisis is set to explode."

According to Bloomberg on Sunday, The Trump administration’s push to kill off what’s left of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran comes to a head this weekend at the United Nations, where allies and adversaries argue the US effort to restore sanctions is groundless and a diplomatic crisis is set to explode.

Richmond (US), Sep 20 (AP/PTI) A university in the former capital of the Confederacy will remove building names, plaques and other symbols that honour several Confederate supporters.

The board of visitors at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond voted unanimously on Friday to remove 16 different references on campus. While the decision marks the latest action this year in Richmond and elsewhere to take down remembrances of the Confederacy, VCU's action was nearly three years in the making, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The trial of four former Minneapolis police officers charged in George Floyd’s death will generate massive public interest when it begins in March, but as it stands, most people who want to watch the proceedings will be out of luck.

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — An exceptionally busy Atlantic hurricane season was churning along Saturday as the Texas coast prepared for a tropical storm that could strengthen into a hurricane before breaching its shores in the week ahead.

Both the city of Galveston and Galveston County on Saturday issued voluntary evacuation orders ahead of Tropical Storm Beta, as did the city of Seabrook to the north of Galveston.

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) — Already roiled by this month’s revelation of Daniel Prude’s police suffocation death, the city of Rochester, New York, was further traumatized Saturday when gunfire at a backyard party killed two teenagers and wounded 14 others.

“Our community has been hurting enough already,” Rochester City Council Vice President Willie Lightfoot said. “This is just another thing on top of all the things that we’ve been going through.”