USA

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — The highest rate of coronavirus cases of any county on the U.S. West Coast is in Washington state’s Yakima County.

Health experts point to a large number of essential workers, a large number of cases in long-term care facilities and a large agricultural workforce living and working in close quarters as the causes. The county has about 250,000 residents.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A beleaguered Saudi Arabia is taking modest steps to improve its human rights record as it tries to navigate the coronavirus pandemic and the fallout from plunging oil prices that have rankled the United States and the Trump administration.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the force behind Saudi Arabia’s sweeping changes and risky gambles, is eyeing further steps he hopes will improve the kingdom’s international image, which was badly damaged by the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by government agents in 2018 and by the war in Yemen.

HOUSTON (AP) — A Houston police helicopter crashed early Saturday, killing one of the two officers on board and critically injuring the other, while assisting a call to search for bodies in a nearby bayou, officials said.

A pilot and tactical flight officer were aboard a police helicopter when it crashed at an apartment complex around 2 a.m. They were flown to a hospital where the tactical flight officer died, police Chief Art Acevedo said hours after the crash during a news conference where he was joined by the city’s mayor, Sylvester Turner.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Six months from Election Day, President Donald Trump’s prospects for winning a second term have been jolted by a historic pandemic and a cratering economy, rattling some of his Republican allies and upending the playbook his campaign had hoped to be using by now against Democrat Joe Biden.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Weighing the risks, the Senate will reopen on Monday as the coronavirus crisis rages and the House stays shuttered, an approach that leaves Congress as divided as the nation.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s decision to convene 100 senators at the Capitol during a pandemic gives President Donald Trump the imagery he wants of America getting back to work, despite health worries and a lack of testing.

NEW YORK (AP) — Gorgeous spring weather across the United States and Europe on Saturday drew people cooped up inside for weeks outside to soak in the sun, even as additional coronavirus hot spots in Russia and Pakistan emerged.

UNITED NATIONS, May 02 (APP): A United Nations (UN) spokesman said Friday that he had not seen any new reports from the UN Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) about ceasefire violations along the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir, but reaffirmed that Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ global appeal for a ceasefire also applies to the LoC.

“I have not gotten any updates from our colleagues in UNMOGIP on this,” spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in response to about the recent firing incidents along the LoC.

2 May 2020; MEMO: US President Donald Trump has told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept the deal of the century as one package and recognise the principle of “two states for two nations”.

Washington, May 2 (PTI) The US government has given a grace period of 60 days to H-1B visa holders and Green Card applicants, who have been served notices for submission of various documents, in view of the novel coronavirus outbreak.

WASHINGTON, May 2 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The IMF renewed a nearly $11 billion credit line for Colombia as a backstop amid the growing economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Colombia has had a Flexible Credit Line (FCL) since May 2009, and the IMF board has renewed it every two years, providing the country with money that could be deployed to head off a crisis.

But Bogota has never drawn on the funds, treating it as a precaution.