USA

LOS ANGELES, April 11 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. government is launching a program of 5 billion-plus U.S. dollars to accelerate the development of new coronavirus vaccines and treatments, to better guard against current and future COVID variants.

The program, called "Project Next Gen," would allow the government to partner with private-sector companies to expedite the development of vaccines and therapies.

WASHINGTON, April 10 (Xinhua) -- China and India are "two exceptions to the slowdown" that the global economy is expected to experience this year, World Bank Group President David Malpass has said.

Malpass made the remarks in a media call ahead of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Spring Meetings week, according to a press release posted at the worldbank.org on Monday.

"Global growth is expected to be weak this year, slowing to 2 percent from 3.1 percent in 2022. For the U.S., we're expecting a slowdown to 1.2 percent from 2.1 percent in 2022," said Malpass.

WASHINGTON (AP) — White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan spoke by phone with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Tuesday amid signs that the Saudis and Iran-allied Houthis in Yemen are making “remarkable progress” toward finding a permanent end to their nine-year conflict, according to the Biden administration.

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Attorneys defending Fox in a defamation case related to false claims about the 2020 election withheld critical information about the role company founder Rupert Murdoch played at Fox News, a revelation that angered the judge when it came up at a Tuesday hearing.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Commissioners in Memphis are scheduled to decide Wednesday whether to return a Black Democrat to the Republican-led Tennessee House after he and a Black colleague were kicked out of the Legislature following their support of gun control protesters.

The Shelby County Board of Commissioners set a vote to determine whether Justin Pearson will be sent back to the Legislature in Nashville.

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s top immigration official will face criminal charges in a fire that killed 40 migrants in Ciudad Juarez last month, with federal prosecutors saying he was remiss in not preventing the disaster despite earlier indications of problems at his agency’s detention centers.

The decision to file charges against Francisco Garduño, the head of Mexico’s National Immigration Institute, was announced late Tuesday by the federal Attorney General’s Office.

WASHINGTON (AP) — It’s been less than a week since news of highly classified military documents on the Ukraine war surfaced, sending the Pentagon into full-speed damage control to assure allies and assess the scope of the leak.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Police body camera video released Tuesday showed the chaotic moments when police arrived at the scene of a mass shooting at a bank in downtown Louisville, as the shooter they couldn’t see from the street rained bullets down on them.

Washington, Apr 11 (PTI) The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Tuesday lowered India's economic growth projection for the current fiscal to 5.9 per cent from 6.1 per cent earlier. Yet India will continue to be the fastest-growing economy in the world.

In its annual World Economic Outlook, IMF also lowered the forecast for 2024-25 fiscal (April 2024 to March 2025) to 6.3 per cent from the 6.8 per cent it had predicted in January this year.

11 Apr 2023; MEMO: A spokesman for the Iranian foreign ministry has said that the US must understand the new realities in the region and stop interfering in favour of Israel.