USA

UNITED NATIONS, Dec 18 (APP): China expressed serious concern over the deteriorating situation in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) as it raised the issue in the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday and sought a detailed briefing by the UN Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) on the disturbing developments there, diplomats said.

Deployed in Kashmir in 1949, UNMOGIP monitors the LIne of Control (LoC) in the disputed state.

18 Dec 2019; MEMO: US Congress has rejected an official request from the White House of $175 million, aimed to support President Donald Trump’s ‘deal of the century,’ Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on Tuesday.

Washington/New Delhi, Dec 18 (PTI) Indian IT major Infosys has agreed to pay USD 800,000 (nearly Rs 5.6 crore) to settle allegations of misclassification of foreign workers and tax fraud, officials said on Tuesday.

Infosys will pay California USD 800,000 to resolve allegations that, between 2006 and 2017, approximately 500 Infosys employees were working in the state on Infosys-sponsored B-1 visas rather than H-1B visas, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said.

Washington, Dec 17 (AFP/PTI) The US Senate voted Tuesday to slap sanctions on companies working on Russia's Nord Stream pipeline, sending a bill to President Donald Trump that is sure to antagonize European nations counting on the project's natural gas.

The measure, inserted into a huge annual defense spending bill, passed 86 to eight after easily clearing the House of Representatives last week.

Washington, Dec 18 (PTI) US President Donald Trump in a scathing letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sought to halt impeachment proceedings against him by the lower chamber of the Congress, which is all set to start the process with a debate on Wednesday.

"This impeachment represents an unprecedented and unconstitutional abuse of power by Democrat lawmakers, unequaled in nearly two and a half centuries of the American legislative history," Trump said in a letter to the Pelosi.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Demonstrators rallied in New York on Tuesday night to call for U.S. President Donald Trump’s impeachment and removal from office on the eve of the House of Representatives’ expected vote to impeach him.

Organizers said they were expecting thousands at a rally and march through midtown Manhattan, one of more than 600 events calling for Trump’s impeachment that were scheduled to take place across the country.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday sent a six-page letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, slamming the House Democrats impeachment effort as an "illegal, partisan attempted coup" and an "unprecedented and unconstitutional abuse of power."

"It is time for you and the highly partisan Democrats in Congress to immediately cease this impeachment fantasy and get back to work for the American People," Trump wrote, adding that he has "no expectation" that House Democrats will do so.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday passed a 1.4-trillion-U.S.-dollar spending package that will fund the government through the end of the fiscal year, as lawmakers in both chambers rush to avoid a government shutdown.

The House approved the spending bills to keep the federal government open through Sept. 30, 2020, sending the legislation to the Senate. President Donald Trump has to sign it by this Friday, when current stopgap funding package expires.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday refused Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer's framework on impeachment trial including testimony from four former and current White House senior officials, signaling he wants the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump to mirror that of Bill Clinton.

Speaking from the Senate floor, the top Republican in the Senate said he is not inclined to call in witnesses, at least not before the trial starts. He didn't rule it out either.

GREAT FALLS, Mont. (AP) — An overnight shooting Tuesday at a Montana casino left three people dead and another person injured, and the suspect was later tracked down and killed by police, officials said.

The shooting happened about 2 a.m. at the Emerald City Casino in Great Falls, along one of the city’s main commercial strips, according to a statement from the Great Falls Police Department.