USA

BOSTON (AP) — The U.S. government imposed new restrictions on Chinese tech giant Huawei on Friday, severely limiting its ability to use American technology to design and manufacture semiconductors produced for it abroad.

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said Friday that the move aims to prevent Huawei from making a run around existing U.S. sanctions.

“There has been a very highly technical loophole through which Huawei has been able to in effect use U.S. technology,” Ross told Fox Business. “We never intended that loophole to be there.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr on Friday submitted the final report in the panel’s three-year Russia investigation to the intelligence community for a declassification review. The move came hours before he was to temporarily step aside as chairman of the panel.

WASHINGTON (AP) — As businesses reopened Friday in more of the U.S., an overwhelming majority of states still fall short of the COVID-19 testing levels that public health experts say are necessary to safely ease lockdowns and avoid another deadly wave of outbreaks, according to an Associated Press analysis.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats powered a massive $3 trillion coronavirus relief bill through the House on Friday, an election-year measure designed to brace a U.S. economy in free fall and a health care system struggling to contain a pandemic still pummeling the country.

15 May 2020; MEMO: Boeing has won two contracts worth $2.6 billion to deliver more than 1,000 air-to-surface and anti-ship missiles to Saudi Arabia, the US’ defence department announced yesterday.

In an official statement, the Pentagon explained that the first contract was worth $1.97 billion, adding that it would include “modernizing SLAM ER cruise missiles and delivering 650 new missiles in support of the government of Saudi Arabia.”

Washington, May 15 (AP) Nearly 3 million laid-off workers applied for US unemployment benefits last week as the viral outbreak forced more companies to slash jobs even though most states have begun to let some businesses reopen.

Roughly 36 million people have now sought jobless aid in just the two months since the coronavirus first forced businesses to close down and shrink their workforces, the government said Thursday.

Washington, May 15 (AP) Long-term US mortgage rates were mostly steady this week, hovering near all-time lows.

Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac reported Thursday that the average rate on the benchmark 30-year home loan edged up to 3.28 per cent from 3.26 per cent last week. A year ago, the rate stood at 4.07 per cent.

The average rate on the 15-year fixed-rate mortgage eased to 2.72 per cent from 2.73 per cent last week.

Washington, May 15 (PTI) The United States has urged China to release Tibetan Buddhism's 11th Panchen Lama, who was taken into captivity at the age of six by Chinese authorities.

In 1995, a young Tibetan boy Gedhun Choekyi Nyima was recognised as the 11th Panchen Lama, the second highest spiritual authority in Tibetan Buddhism after Dalai Lama. Days later Nyima had disappeared, becoming the world's youngest political prisoner.

Washington, May 15 (PTI) The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the importance of strong India-US collaboration, India's Ambassador to the US, Taranjit Singh Sandhu has said.

Noting that India's partnership with the US in health sciences and technologies is longstanding, the senior diplomat said research and innovation institutions of both the countries have been engaged in understanding important chronic and infectious diseases and in developing therapeutics and diagnostics.

UNITED NATIONS, May 15 (APP): The UN Human Rights High Commissioner, Michelle Bachelet, has warned of potential risks as more countries move to lift lockdown measures put in place to contain the spread of coronavirus.

Michelle Bachelet — a former doctor, health minister and Head of State — acknowledged the challenge facing governments as they grapple with the medical crisis, while also trying to save their economies from collapsing.