USA

Washington, Sep 16 (PTI) US President Donald Trump has made inroads into the Indian-American vote bank, the biggest ever by a Republican president, according to a survey which has sent worrying signals to the Democrats that the support of this influential ethnic community can no longer be taken for granted.

The survey by Indiaspora and Asian Americans & Pacific Islanders (AAPI) Data on Tuesday showed that a majority of Indian-Americans still favour former vice president Biden, the Democratic Party's nominee in the November 3 US presidential election.

16 Sep 2020; MEMO: The UN Security Council on Tuesday asked Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to appoint a special envoy to broker peace in Libya, although Russia and China abstained from voting on the resolution that also extended the UN mission in the country.

16 Sep 2020; MEMO: Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN Secretary-General, said on Monday that the status of the city of Jerusalem should be “decided” by Israel and the Palestinians.

Answering a question during his daily briefing, Dujarric said:  “What is clear for us and for the Secretary‑General is that the status of Jerusalem is one that should be negotiated between the parties [Israel and Palestinians].”

LOUISVILLE (Kentucky, US), Sept 16 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Officials in Louisville, Kentucky have agreed to pay $12m to the family of Breonna Taylor, a black woman who was killed in her home by police.

Taylor was 26 when she was shot at least five times and killed on March 13 during a mistaken drugs raid.

Her name has featured prominently in anti-racism protests in recent months.

Lonita Baker, a lawyer for Taylor’s family, called the settlement just one “layer” in the effort to seek justice, and praised new police reforms.

WASHINGTON, Sept 16 (NNN-Xinhua) — Nearly 550,000 children in the United States have been diagnosed with COVID-19 since the onset of the pandemic, according to a new report of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association.

A total of 72,993 new child cases were reported from Aug 27 through Sept 10, which is a 15 percent increase in child cases over two weeks, according to the report.

Altogether 549,432 total child COVID-19 cases have been reported in the United States so far, and children represented 10 percent of all cases, said the report.

WASHINGTON, Sept 16 (NNN-AGENCIES) — US President Donald Trump said he wanted to assassinate Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad in 2017, but that his then-secretary of defense Jim Mattis opposed the operation.

“I would have rather taken him out. I had him all set,” Trump told the morning show Fox & Friends.

“Mattis didn’t want to do it. Mattis was a highly overrated general, and I let him go.”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An 18-month investigation by a U.S. House panel blasted Boeing Co BA.N and the Federal Aviation Administration over the 737 MAX which has been grounded since March 2019 after two fatal crashes killed 346 people.

The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s Democratic majority found numerous missteps in a nearly 250-page final report released Wednesday into the troubled plane’s development.

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he had heard Oracle Corp ORCL.N was very close to a deal over ByteDance's TikTok, even as sources said the Chinese company was seeking to keep majority ownership of the popular short video app.

Trump has ordered ByteDance to divest TikTok amid U.S. concerns user data could be passed to China’s Communist Party government. He has threatened to ban TikTok in the United States as early as Sunday if ByteDance does not comply.

UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 15 (Xinhua) -- The 75th session of the UN General Assembly was on Tuesday declared open by new General Assembly President Volkan Bozkir.

In his opening remarks, Bozkir asked UN member states to uphold multilateralism.

"The context in which we are working serves to remind us of the necessity of the multilateral system and inspires us all to make use of the UN Charter to address our collective challenges," he said, referring to the COVID-19 pandemic.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Tuesday the House will remain in session until lawmakers deliver another round of COVID-19 relief, a move that came as Democrats from swing districts signaled discontent with a standoff that could force them to face voters without delivering more aid.

“We are committed to staying here until we have an agreement, an agreement that meets the needs of the American people,” Pelosi said on CNBC.