Tag: United States

Posted on by — Leave a comment

UK, France pledge ‘reassurance force’ for Ukraine after Russia ceasefire

Key European allies pledged to send a “reassurance force” to Ukraine in a move described as a significant step in the effort to end Russia’s nearly four-year invasion.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, French President Emmanuel Macron, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer signed a declaration of intent on Tuesday for the deployment of multinational forces to support Kyiv’s defence and reconstruction – if a ceasefire with Russia is agreed on.

The announcement follows a meeting of more than two dozen countries in Paris. The nations dubbed the “coalition of the willing” have explored for months how to deter any future Russian aggression should it agree to stop fighting Ukraine.

There was no immediate response from Russia, however. President Vladimir Putin has ruled out any deployment of troops from NATO countries on Ukrainian soil.

Kyiv has long said it cannot be safe without guarantees that are comparable to the NATO alliance’s ‍mutual defence agreement Article 5 to deter Russia from attacking again.

Zelenskyy welcomed the promised security guarantees for Ukraine.

“It’s important that today the coalition has substantive documents. These are not just words. There is concrete content: a joint declaration by all the coalition countries and a trilateral declaration by France, Britain, and Ukraine,” he said.

“It has been defined how those forces will be managed and at what levels command will be exercised,” Zelensky added.

Macron said “several thousand” French soldiers could be deployed to Ukraine to maintain peace.

“These are not forces that will be engaged in combat,” Macron told France 2 television on the sidelines of the summit, calling such a deployment “a force of reassurance”.

Starmer said allies will participate in US-led monitoring and verification of any ceasefire, support the long-term provision of armaments for Ukraine’s defence.

The UK and France will “establish military hubs across Ukraine and build protected facilities for weapons and military equipment to support Ukraine’s defensive needs” – in the event of a peace deal with Russia, he added.

Starmer said peace in Ukraine ⁠is closer than ever though ​the “hardest yards” still ‍lay ahead.

US ‍envoy ‍Steve Witkoff said there was significant progress made on ​several critical issues facing ‍Ukraine including security guarantees and a “prosperity plan”. Security ‍protocols for Ukraine are “largely ⁠finished”, he added.

“We agree ‍with ⁠the coalition that durable security guarantees and robust prosperity commitments are essential to ​a lasting peace ‌in the Ukraine, and we will continue to ‌work together on this effort,” ‌Witkoff said ⁠in a post on X after talks in ‌Paris.

Ukraine’s ‍reconstruction ‍is inextricably linked to security guarantees, German ⁠Chancellor Friedrich Merz ​said.

“Economic strength will ‍be indispensable ⁠to guarantee that Ukraine will continue to credibly block ​Russia ‌in the future,” Merz said.

However, he noted Ukraine and its European allies will have to accept “compromises” to achieve a peace deal.

“We will certainly have to make compromises” to end the nearly four-year-old war. “We will not achieve textbook diplomatic solutions,” said Merz.

Moscow has revealed few details of its stance in the US-led peace negotiations. Officials have reaffirmed Russia’s demands and insisted there can be no ceasefire until a comprehensive settlement is agreed. (AlJazeera)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Trump threatens Iran over protest crackdown as deadly unrest flares

U.S. President Donald Trump threatened on Friday to come to the aid of protesters in Iran if security forces fired on them, days into unrest that has left several dead and posed the biggest internal threat to Iranian authorities in years.

“We are locked and loaded ‌and ready to go,” he said in a social media post. The United States bombed Iranian nuclear facilities in June, joining an Israeli air campaign that targeted Tehran’s atomic programme and military leadership.

Responding to Trump’s comments, top Iranian official Ali Larijani warned that U.S. interference in domestic Iranian issues would amount to a destabilization of the entire Middle East. Iran backs proxy ⁠forces in Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen.

The comments came as a local official in western Iran, where several deaths were ‍reported, was cited by state media as warning that any unrest or illegal gatherings would be met “decisively and without leniency”.

This week’s protests over soaring inflation ‍are so far smaller than some previous bouts of unrest in Iran, but have spread across the country, with deadly confrontations between demonstrators and security forces ⁠focused in western provinces.

State-affiliated media and rights groups have reported at least 10 deaths since Wednesday, including one man who authorities said was a member of the Basij paramilitary force affiliated with the elite Revolutionary Guards.

The Islamic Republic’s clerical leadership has ​seen off repeated eruptions of unrest in recent decades, often quelling protests with heavy security measures and mass arrests. But economic problems may leave authorities more vulnerable now.

This week’s protests are the biggest since nationwide demonstrations triggered by the death of a young woman in custody in 2022 paralyzed Iran for weeks, with rights groups reporting hundreds killed.

Trump did not specify what sort of action the U.S. could take in support of the protests.

Washington has long imposed broad financial sanctions on Tehran, in particular since Trump’s first term when, in 2018, he pulled the U.S. out of ⁠Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers and declared a “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran.

Video verified by Reuters showed dozens of people gathered in front of a burning police station overnight, as gunshots sporadically rang out and people shouted “shameless, shameless” at the authorities.

In the southern city of Zahedan, where Iran’s Baluch minority predominates, the human rights news group Hengaw reported that protesters had chanted slogans including “Death to the dictator”.

Hengaw has reported at least 80 arrests so far over the unrest, mostly in the west, and including 14 members of Iran’s Kurdish minority.

State television also reported the arrest of an unspecified number of people in another western city, Kermanshah, accused of manufacturing petrol bombs and homemade pistols. Iranian media also said two heavily armed individuals were arrested in central and western Iran before they could carry out attacks.

The deaths acknowledged by official or semi-official Iranian media have been in the small western cities of Lordegan and Kuhdasht. Hengaw also reported that a man was killed in Fars province in central Iran, though state news sites denied this.

Rights groups and social media posts reported protests in a number of cities late on Friday.

Reuters could not verify all the reports of unrest, arrests or deaths.

Trump spoke a few days after he met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a longtime advocate of military action against Iran, and warned of ​fresh strikes if Tehran resumed nuclear or ballistic work.

The Israeli and U.S. strikes in June last year have cranked up the pressure on Iranian authorities, as have the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, a close Tehran ally, and the Israeli pounding of its main regional partner, Lebanon’s Hezbollah.

Iran continues to ⁠support groups in Iraq that have previously fired rockets at U.S. forces in the country, as well as the Houthi group that controls much of northern Yemen.

“American people should know that Trump started the adventurism. They ought to watch over their soldiers,” said Larijani, the head of Iran’s National Security Council and a top adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

During the latest unrest, Iran’s elected President Masoud Pezeshkian has struck a conciliatory tone, pledging dialogue with protest leaders over the cost-of-living crisis, even as rights ‌groups said security forces had fired on demonstrators.

Speaking on ‌Thursday, before Trump threatened U.S. action, Pezeshkian acknowledged that failings by the authorities ‍were behind the crisis.

“We are to blame… Do not look for America or anyone else to blame. We must serve properly so that people are satisfied with us…. It is us who ‌have to find a solution to these problems,” he said.

Pezeshkian’s government is trying a program of economic liberalization, but ‍one of its measures, deregulating some currency exchange, has contributed to a sharp decline in the value of Iran’s rial on the unofficial market.

The sliding currency has compounded inflation, which has hovered above 36% since March even by official estimates, in an economy battered by Western sanctions. (JapanToday)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Trump says U.S. has captured Venezuela President Maduro

The United States hit Venezuela with a “large-scale strike” early Saturday and said its president, Nicolás Maduro, had been captured and flown out of the country after months of stepped-up pressure by Washington — an extraordinary nighttime operation announced by President Donald Trump on social media hours after the attack.

Multiple explosions rang out and low-flying aircraft swept through Caracas, the capital, as Maduro’s government immediately accused the United States of attacking civilian and military installations. The Venezuelan government called it an “imperialist attack” and urged citizens to take to the streets.

It was not immediately clear who was running the country, and Maduro’s whereabouts were not immediately known. Trump announced the developments on Truth Social shortly after 4:30 a.m. Under Venezuelan law the vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, would take power. There was no confirmation that had happened, though she did issue a statement after the strike.

“We do not know the whereabouts of President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores,” Rodriguez said. “We demand proof of life.”

Maduro, Trump said, “has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the Country. This operation was done in conjunction with U.S. Law Enforcement. Details to follow.” He set a news conference for later Saturday morning.

The legal implications of the strike under U.S. law were not immediately clear. Sen Mike Lee, R-Utah, posted on X that he had spoken with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who briefed him on the strike. Rubio told Lee that Maduro “has been arrested by U.S. personnel to stand trial on criminal charges in the United States.”

The White House did not immediately respond to queries on where Maduro and his wife were being flown to. Maduro was indicted in March 2020 on “narco-terrorism” conspiracy charges in the Southern District of New York.

Maduro last appeared on state television Friday while meeting with a delegation of Chinese officials in Caracas.

The explosions in Caracas, Venezuela’s capital, early on the third day of 2026 — at least seven blasts — sent people rushing into the streets, while others took to social media to report hearing and seeing the explosions. It was not immediately clear if there were casualties on either side. The attack itself lasted less than 30 minutes and it was unclear if more actions lay ahead, though Trump said in his post that the strikes were carried out “successfully.”

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a ban on U.S. commercial flights in Venezuelan airspace because of “ongoing military activity” ahead of the explosions.

The strike came after the Trump administration spent months escalating pressure on Maduro. The CIA was behind a drone strike last week at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels — the first known direct operation on Venezuelan soil since the U.S. began strikes in September.

For months, Trump had threatened that he could soon order strikes on targets on Venezuelan land following months of attacks on boats accused of carrying drugs. Maduro has decried the U.S. military operations as a thinly veiled effort to oust him from power.

Some streets in Caracas fill up

Armed individuals and uniformed members of a civilian militia took to the streets of a Caracas neighborhood long considered a stronghold of the ruling party. But in other areas of the city, the streets remained empty hours after the attack. Parts of the city remained without power, but vehicles moved freely.

Video obtained from Caracas and an unidentified coastal city showed tracers and smoke clouding the landscape sky as repeated muted explosions illuminated the night sky. Other footage showed an urban landscape with cars passing on a highway as blasts illuminated the hills behind them. Unintelligible conversation could be heard in the background. The videos were verified by The Associated Press.

Smoke was seen rising from the hangar of a military base in Caracas, while another military installation in the capital was without power.

“The whole ground shook. This is horrible. We heard explosions and planes,” said Carmen Hidalgo, a 21-year-old office worker, her voice trembling. She was walking briskly with two relatives, returning from a birthday party. “We felt like the air was hitting us.”

Venezuela’s government responded to the attack with a call to action. “People to the streets!” it said in a statement. “The Bolivarian Government calls on all social and political forces in the country to activate mobilization plans and repudiate this imperialist attack.”

The statement added that Maduro had “ordered all national defense plans to be implemented” and declared “a state of external disturbance.” That state of emergency gives him the power to suspend people’s rights and expand the role of the armed forces.

The website of the U.S. Embassy in Venezuela, a post that has been closed since 2019, issued a warning to American citizens in the country, saying it was “aware of reports of explosions in and around Caracas.”

“U.S. citizens in Venezuela should shelter in place,” the warning said. (JapanToday)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Peace hopes dented as Russia says Ukraine tried to attack Putin residence

Russia accused Ukraine on Monday of trying to attack President Vladimir Putin’s residence in northern Russia, although it provided no evidence to back up an assertion that Kyiv dismissed as baseless and designed to undermine peace negotiations.

The angry exchanges – including a statement by Russia that it was reviewing its stance ‌in negotiations in response to the attack – dealt a new blow to prospects for peace in Ukraine.

U.S. President Donald Trump said Putin had told him about the alleged attack in a phone call on Monday morning, which had angered him. Still, Trump repeated his belief that a peace deal may be near.

“It’s one thing to be offensive,” Trump told reporters. “It’s another thing to attack his house. It’s not the ⁠right time to do any of that. And I learned about it from President Putin today. I was very angry about ‍it.”

On Sunday, Trump met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Florida and the U.S. president said they were “getting a lot closer, maybe very ‍close” to an agreement to end the ‍war, although “thorny” territorial issues remained.

On Monday, Putin struck a defiant tone, telling his army to press on with a campaign to take full control of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region. ⁠The Kremlin repeated demands for Kyiv to pull its forces out of the last part of the Donbas area that they still hold in eastern Ukraine.

Putin told Trump in Monday’s phone call that Russia, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022, was reviewing its stance following the ​reported drone attack, an aide said.

After the call with Putin, Trump told reporters outside his home in Palm Beach, Florida, that he had no further information about the alleged attack.

“I don’t like it, it’s not good,” Trump said. Asked if U.S. intelligence agencies had evidence of such an attack, Trump said: “We’ll find out.”

Trump said the conversation with Putin was productive.

“We have a couple of issues that we’re going to get resolved, hopefully, and if we get them resolved, you’re going to have peace,” Trump said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Ukraine had tried to attack Putin’s residence in the Novgorod region west ⁠of Moscow on December 28-29 with 91 long-range drones which were all destroyed by Russian air defenses. No one was injured and there was no damage, he said in comments reported by Russian media.

“Such reckless actions will not go unanswered,” Lavrov said in a statement, describing the attack as “state terrorism” and adding that targets had already been selected for retaliatory strikes by Russia’s armed forces.

Lavrov did not offer any evidence for his assertions in his statement. It was not clear where Putin was at the time.

Lavrov said the attack took place during negotiations about a possible peace deal, and said Russia would review its negotiating stance but not quit the negotiations.

Denying Ukraine had planned such an attack, Zelenskyy accused Russia of preparing the ground to strike government buildings in Kyiv, saying Russia wanted to undermine progress at U.S.-Ukrainian talks on ending the war.

“Another round of lies from the Russian Federation,” Zelenskyy told reporters via WhatsApp. “It is clear that we had a meeting with Trump yesterday, and it is clear that for the Russians, if there is no scandal between us and America, and we are making progress – for them it is a failure, because they do not want to end this war.”

He added: “I am sure they are simply preparing the ground for strikes, probably on the capital, probably on government buildings.”

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said on social media the attack was a fabrication intended to create a pretext for more Russian attacks on Ukraine and to undermine the peace ​process. He urged world leaders to condemn Russia over its accusations. (JapanToday)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

George Clooney, his wife Amal and children become French citizens

Hollywood star George Clooney has become French, along with his wife Amal Alamuddin Clooney and their two children, an official decree seen by AFP on Monday showed.

The publication, in France’s government gazette, confirms an ambition Clooney alluded to early in December when he hailed French privacy laws that keep his family shielded from paparazzi.

“I love the French culture, your language, even if I’m still bad at it after 400 days of courses,” the 64-year-old actor told RTL radio at the time — in English.

“Here, they don’t take photos of kids. There aren’t any paparazzi hidden at the school gates. That’s number one for us,” he said.

The now-dual U.S.-French citizen has a long attachment to Europe, which even pre-dates his 2014 marriage to Amal, a British-Lebanese human rights lawyer who speaks fluent French.

Clooney owns an estate in Italy’s picturesque Lake Como region, purchased in 2002, and he and Amal bought a historic manor in England.

Their property in southern France — a former wine estate called the Domaine du Canadel, near the village of Brignoles — was purchased in 2021.

They also own a New York apartment and a property in Kentucky, but reportedly sold homes in Los Angeles and Mexico over the past decade.

The glamorous couple are parents to eight-year-old twins.

Clooney told RTL that although the family jet-sets around, their French home “is where we’re happiest”.

Clooney is also a director and producer, and has two Oscars to put on whichever mantlepiece suits: one for best supporting actor in 2006’s “Syriana” and as a producer on 2012’s “Argo”.

On top of his cinema pay checks, he has raked in millions for celebrity endorsements, including for Nespresso, and got a windfall pay-out for selling his stake in a tequila brand.

Clooney is not the only Hollywood luminary to want to go French: U.S. director Jim Jarmusch on Friday told France Inter radio that he plans to apply for French nationality.

“I would like a place that will allow me to escape from the United States,” he said, also saying he was attracted to French culture. (JapanToday)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Trump says comedian Colbert should be ‘put to sleep’

On the eve of Christmas, President Donald Trump has unleashed a fresh blast of vitriol at late-night comedy talk shows, saying comedian Stephen Colbert is a “pathetic train wreck” who should be “put to sleep.”

Colbert’s “The Late Show” is scheduled to end in May 2026, a decision his fans say smacks of censorship.

In a late night Truth Social post, Trump wrote that Colbert “has actually gotten worse” since being “terminated by CBS, but left out to dry.”

“Stephen is running on hatred and fumes ~ A dead man walking! CBS should, ‘put him to sleep,’ NOW,” Trump wrote.

Colbert has hosted the “The Late Show” since 2015 and it has been the highest-rated late night talk show on U.S. television. His opening monologues often take aim at the Republican president.

There was no immediate public response from Colbert or CBS to Trump’s post.

CBS announced the sunsetting of Colbert’s show after one more season in July, the same month its parent company reached a $16 million settlement with Trump. CBS called the cancellation “a purely financial decision.”

Trump had sued Paramount, alleging that CBS News’ “60 Minutes” program deceptively edited an interview with his 2024 election rival, Kamala Harris, in her favor.

In another overnight post, Trump repeated threats to yank the broadcast licenses of networks whose content he deemed overly critical.

“If Network NEWSCASTS, and their Late Night Shows, are almost 100% Negative to President Donald J. Trump, MAGA, and the Republican Party, shouldn’t their very valuable Broadcast Licenses be terminated? I say, YES!”

On Sunday, CBS’s new editor-in-chief, Bari Weiss, pulled a “60 Minutes” segment on alleged torture at El Salvador’s CECOT prison — where Trump sent hundreds of deported Venezuelans — saying it needed more reporting.

In August, Disney-owned ABC briefly suspended its late-night star, Jimmy Kimmel, before bringing him back on a one-year contract.

Kimmel had annoyed conservatives with comments in the wake of the murder of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk.

Trump appears to be aiming to reshape the U.S. media landscape, which he says is biased against conservatives.

His appointee to head the Federal Communications Commission, Brendan Carr, turned heads when he told a Congressional hearing that “the FCC is not formally an independent agency,” implying that his actions could justifiably be aligned with the political priorities of the White House. (JapanToday)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Trump says US launched strike against ISIL in northwest Nigeria

The United ‍States ‍says that it has carried out an air strike against ISIL (ISIS) fighters in northwest Nigeria that residents say caused buildings to shake and the sky to glow red.

“Tonight, ⁠at my direction as Commander in Chief, the United States launched a powerful and ​deadly strike ‌against ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria,” ‌President Donald Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform on Thursday evening.

Trump, who has previously threatened greater US intervention in Nigeria over dubious claims that a “genocide” of Christians is taking place there, said ISIL fighters had been “viciously” killing and targeting Christians at levels unseen for “centuries”.

“I have previously warned these Terrorists that if they did not stop the slaughtering of Christians, there would be hell to pay, and tonight, there was,” Trump said.

The US military’s Africa Command (AFRICOM), which is responsible for operations in Africa, said in a post on X that the air strike was carried out “at the request of Nigerian authorities” and had killed “multiple ISIS terrorists”.

Residents of Jabo have said that the strikes caused alarm and that their village has never experienced an attack by ISIL.

“As it approached our area, the heat became intense,” Abubakar Sani, who lives just a few houses from the scene of the explosion, told the news service Associated Press.

“Our rooms began to shake, and then fire broke out,” he said. “The Nigerian government should take appropriate measures to protect us as citizens. We have never experienced anything like this before.”

Another resident, 40-year-old farmer Sanusi Madabo, said that the attacks made the night sky glow red and appear “almost like daytime”.

“Grateful for Nigerian government support and cooperation,” US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wrote on social media, warning also of “more to come”, without providing details.

In a statement, AFRICOM said the strike occurred in “Soboto state,” an apparent reference to Nigeria’s Sokoto State.

Nigerian Foreign Minister Yussuf Tuggar confirmed on Friday that the strike had been carried out in coordination with the country’s authorities, but said it was not aimed at targeting members of any particular religious community.

“Nigeria is a multi-religious country, and we’re working with partners like the US to fight terrorism and protect lives and property,” Tuggar told Nigeria’s Channels Television.

The US military action comes weeks after Trump said he had ordered the Pentagon to begin planning for potential military action in Nigeria following claims of Christian persecution in the country.

Nigeria’s government had dismissed Trump’s assertions, saying armed groups target both Muslim and Christian communities in the country, and US claims that Christians face persecution ‌do not represent a complex security situation and ignore efforts by Nigerian authorities to safeguard religious freedom.

Nigeria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement shortly after Trump announced the US strike, confirming early on Friday that Nigerian authorities were “engaged in structured security cooperation with international partners, including the United States of America, in addressing the persistent threat of terrorism and violent extremism”. (AlJazeera)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Supreme Court rejects Trump’s military deployment in Chicago area, for now

The U.S. Supreme Court refused on Tuesday to let Donald Trump send National Guard troops to the Chicago area as the Republican president expands the use of the military for domestic purposes in a growing number of Democratic-led jurisdictions, a ‌policy critics call an effort to punish adversaries and stifle dissent.

The justices denied the Justice Department’s request to lift a judge’s order that has blocked the deployment of hundreds of National Guard personnel in a legal challenge brought by Illinois state officials and local leaders. The department had asked to allow the deployment while the litigation plays out.

The ⁠National Guard serves as state-based militia forces that answer to state governors except when called into federal service ‍by the president.

Trump ordered troops to Chicago, the third-largest U.S. city, and to Portland, Oregon, following his earlier ‍deployments to Los Angeles, Memphis and ‍Washington, DC.

The case has been characterized by starkly different portrayals of the protests against Trump’s aggressive immigration enforcement in and around Chicago.

Trump and his ⁠allies have described Democratic-led cities as lawless, crime-ravaged and plagued with vast, violent protests. His administration has said troops are needed to protect federal property and personnel.

Democratic mayors and governors, along with other Trump critics, have said these claims ​are a false account of the situation and a pretext for sending troops, accusing Trump of abusing his power.

Federal judges have expressed skepticism over the administration’s dire view of protests that local law enforcement officials have called limited in size, largely peaceful and manageable by their own forces – far from the “war zone” conditions described by Trump.

Trump has relied on a law that lets a president deploy state National Guard troops to suppress a rebellion, repel an invasion or if he is “unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the ⁠United States.”

Illinois and Chicago sued after the administration federalized 300 Illinois National Guard troops and also ordered Texas National Guard troops into the state, calling the actions unlawful. Officials have since announced the administration was sending home hundreds of National Guard troops who were dispatched to Portland from California, and to Chicago from Texas.

Chicago-based U.S. District Judge April Perry temporarily blocked the move on October 9, finding that the claims of violence during protests at an immigration facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Illinois, where a small group of demonstrators had gathered daily for weeks, were unreliable.

Perry, an appointee of Democratic former President Joe Biden, found that there was no evidence of rebellion or that the law was not being enforced, faulting officials for “equating protests with riots and a lack of appreciation for the wide spectrum that exists between citizens who are observing, questioning and criticizing their government, and those who are obstructing, assaulting or doing violence.”

A National Guard deployment would “only add fuel to the fire,” Perry said.

A three-judge panel of the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declined to lift Perry’s order blocking the deployment, concluding that “the facts do not justify the president’s actions in Illinois.” Two of the three judges were appointed by Republican presidents, including one by ​Trump.

The Justice Department told the Supreme Court that the assessment by local officials of the protests was “implausibly rosy,” and that federal agents “have been forced to operate under the constant threat of mob violence.”

Lawyers for Illinois and Chicago told the justices that the local protests have “never hindered ⁠the continued operation” of the Broadview facility, and that state and local authorities have responded to every request for assistance and contained any sporadic disruption.

Officials from Portland and Oregon are pursuing a separate legal challenge to Trump’s planned deployment to that city. U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut, a Trump appointee, permanently blocked that deployment in a November 7 ruling. The ‍administration has appealed that ruling.

The Supreme Court in October asked the administration as well as Illinois and Chicago to provide written arguments over ‌how to interpret the words “regular forces” in the law ‌at issue in the case.

In an October 10 written ruling, Perry said ‍that historical sources indicate that “regular forces” means only members regularly enlisted in the military, including the Army and Navy, as opposed to the National Guard.

Trump’s administration “made no attempt to rely ‌on the regular forces before resorting to federalization of the National Guard,” Perry said, adding that there are ‍other limits on the use of the military for domestic law enforcement purposes.

The administration repeatedly has sought the Supreme Court’s intervention to allow implementation of Trump policies impeded by lower courts. The Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, has sided with the administration in almost every case that it has been called upon to review since Trump returned to the presidency in January. (JapanToday)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

US signs health deal to aid Christians in Nigeria

The United States has signed a five-year health cooperation agreement with Nigeria aimed at strengthening the country’s health system, with a specific focus on supporting Christian faith-based healthcare providers, Washington announced on Saturday.

Under the bilateral agreement, the United States will contribute nearly $2.1 billion to programmes targeting HIV, tuberculosis, malaria and polio, as well as initiatives to improve maternal and child health, a US State Department spokesperson said.

Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, has committed to increasing its national health spending by almost $3 billion over the same five-year period, according to the spokesperson.

The agreement includes what the State Department described as “a strong emphasis on promoting Christian faith-based health care providers”.

The announcement comes amid heightened attention from Washington to the security situation facing Christian communities in Nigeria.

Last month, President Donald Trump said the United States was prepared to take military action in Nigeria in response to attacks on Christians, comments that drew international attention.

Trump has repeatedly said Christianity faces what he described as an “existential threat” in Nigeria and other countries, framing the issue as part of a broader concern about the global persecution of Christians.

His administration has placed Nigeria back on the US list of countries of “particular concern” over religious freedom and has imposed restrictions on the issuance of visas to Nigerian nationals.

According to the State Department, the health agreement signed on Saturday was negotiated in connection with reforms undertaken by the Nigerian government to prioritise the protection of Christian populations from violence.

Nigeria is roughly divided between a predominantly Christian south and a largely Muslim north. (ThisDay)

Posted on by — Leave a comment

TikTok owner signs deal to avoid US ban

TikTok’s Chinese owner ByteDance has signed binding agreements with US and global investors to operate its business in America, TikTok’s boss told employees on Thursday.

Half of the joint venture will be owned by a group of investors, including Oracle, Silver Lake and the Emirati investment firm MGX, according to a memo sent by chief executive Shou Zi Chew.

The deal, which is set to close on 22 January, would end years of efforts by Washington to force ByteDance to sell its US operations over national security concerns.

It is in ​line with a deal unveiled in September, when US President Donald Trump delayed the enforcement of a law that would ban the app unless it was sold.

In the memo, TikTok said the deal will enable “over 170 million Americans to continue discovering a world of endless possibilities as part of a vital global community”.

Under the agreement, ByteDance will retain 19.9% of the business, while Oracle, Silver Lake and Abu Dhabi-based MGX will hold 15% each.

Another 30.1% will be held by affiliates of existing ByteDance investors, according to the memo.

The White House previously said that Oracle, which was co-founded by Trump supporter Larry Ellison, will license TikTok’s recommendation algorithm as part of the deal.

The deal comes after a series of delays.

In April 2024, during President Joe Biden’s administration, the US Congress passed a law to ban the app over national security concerns, unless it was sold.

The law was set to go into effect on 20 January 2025 but was pushed back multiple times by Trump, while his administration worked out a deal to transfer ownership.

Trump said in September that he had spoken on the phone to China’s President Xi Jinping, who he said had given the deal the go ahead.

The platform’s future remained unclear after the leaders met face to face in October.

The app’s fate was clouded by ongoing tensions between the two nations on trade and other matters.

“TikTok has become a bargaining chip in the wider US-China relationship,” said Alvin Graylin, a lecturer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

“With recent softening tensions, Beijing’s sign off on the structure and algorithm licensing now looks less like capitulation and more like calibrated de-escalation, letting both capitals claim a win at home.”

he White House referred the BBC to TikTok when contacted for comment.

Oracle and Silver Lake declined to comment. The BBC has contacted MGX for comment.

The deal drew critiques from Senate Democrat Ron Wyden of Oregon, who said it wouldn’t do “a thing to protect the privacy of American user”.

Under the terms, TikTok’s recommendation algorithm is set to be retrained on American user data to ensure feeds are free from outside manipulation.

“It’s unclear that it will even put TikTok’s algorithm in safer hands,” said Sen Wyden.

He opposed the 2024 law, and was among the US lawmakers who lobbied to extend the TikTok deadline in January in a bid to give Congress more time to mitigate threats from China. (BBC)