USA

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden told the permanent representatives of the U.N. Security Council on Thursday that the United States will join the international body’s Group of Friends on Climate and Society.

The group was launched in 2018 with a focus on the impact that national security policy has on climate change.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Just two more jurors were needed for the trial of a former Minneapolis police officer charged in George Floyd’s death, as the judge prepared to rule Friday on two major motions — including whether to allow evidence from Floyd’s earlier 2019 arrest.

The 12 jurors seated through Thursday are evenly split by race, with six white jurors, four Black and two multiracial, according to the court. The last two jurors chosen will be alternates.

ATLANTA (AP) — For Asian Americans, 2020 was a year of political success and newfound influence. But it was also a time of vulnerability to racist assaults.

That painful dichotomy will be on display Friday when President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the first person of South Asian descent to hold national office, visit Atlanta just days after a white gunman killed eight people, most of them Asian American women, in three metro-area massage parlors. The killings come after a spike of anti-Asian violence nationally.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Top U.S. and Chinese officials offered sharply different views of each other and the world as the two sides met face-to-face for the first time since President Joe Biden took office.

(AP) --- Asian American Christian leaders said Thursday their congregations are saddened and outraged after a white gunman killed eight people — most of them women of Asian descent — at three Atlanta-area massage parlors. And they’re calling for action beyond prayers.

Asian Americans were already rattled by a wave of racist attacks amid the spread of the coronavirus pandemic across the United States. While the motive behind Tuesday’s rampage remains under investigation, some see it as a wake-up call to stand up against a rise in violence against the community.

McALLEN, Texas (AP) — The U.S. government has stopped taking immigrant teenagers to a converted camp for oil field workers in West Texas as it faces questions about the safety of emergency sites it is quickly setting up to hold children crossing the southern border.

The Associated Press has learned that the converted camp has faced multiple issues in the four days since the Biden administration opened it amid a scramble to find space for immigrant children. More than 10% of the camp’s population has tested positive for COVID-19 and at least one child had to be hospitalized.

WASHINGTON (AP) — With the U.S. closing in on President Joe Biden’s goal of injecting 100 million coronavirus vaccinations weeks ahead of his target date, the White House said the nation is now in position to help supply neighbors Canada and Mexico with millions of lifesaving shots.

The Biden administration on Thursday revealed the outlines of a plan to “loan” a limited number of vaccines to Canada and Mexico as the president announced the U.S. is on the cusp of meeting his 100-day injection goal “way ahead of schedule.”

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 18 (APP): United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has appointed Jean Arnault, a veteran French diplomat, as his personal envoy on Afghanistan and regional issues to help find a solution to the nearly two-decade-old conflict, his spokesman announced Wednesday night.

Arnault, 70, who has over 30 years of experience in international diplomacy, was Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Afghanistan and Head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) from 2004 to 2006, where he was also Deputy in 2002-2003.

WASHINGTON, March 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Regulators have begun legal proceedings that could strip three Chinese state-owned telecommunications companies of their right to operate in the United States, officials said citing national security concerns.

The three firms — China Unicom America, Pacific Networks, and ComNet — had failed to adequately prove their Americas operations were not subject to “undue influence” from Beijing, the Federal Communications Commission said.

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 18 (NNN-XINHUA) – The United Nations is ready to facilitate an agreement between Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan, on the Nile dam, said a spokesman yesterday.

Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, said, the world body has received a letter from the Sudanese Prime Minister, Abdalla Hamdok, on the issue.