TheNewsGuru

Tag: United States

  • India’s pathway to selling only electric cars by 2030

    India’s pathway to selling only electric cars by 2030

    While the United States is walking away from the historic Paris Climate Agreement, India is making a bold vow to start selling only electric cars by 2030.

    India is one of the world’s most polluted countries. Its energy department said in a blog post that it has set the “ambitious” target to stop selling gas-powered vehicles in an attempt to clean up its air.

    As the country’s economy has boomed, new industries and commuters have spewed pollutants in the air at staggering rates. Now, its 1.3 billion residents are suffering. One estimate says India’s air contributes to 1.2 million deaths per year. Doctors have said breathing the air in New Dehli, the nation’s capital, is like smoking 10 cigarettes a day.

    India’s energy minister, Piyush Goyal, said recently that the country will help facilitate the electric car effort by offering subsidies for a couple of years. “After that,” he said, “the cost of electric vehicles will start paying for themselves.”

    The government’s National Electric Mobility Mission Plan wants annual sales of electric and hybrid cars to hit 6 million to 7 million by 2020.

    That’s music to the ears of Elon Musk, CEO of electric car powerhouse Tesla, who touted the decision on Twitter Thursday.

    Tesla hasn’t actually entered the Indian market yet, but Musk has frequently talked about his plans to open up shop there. He said earlier this year that it could happen by summer, but those plans appear to be delayed.

    India is anxiously awaiting Tesla’s arrival. Even the head of Mahindra, India’s leading electric carmaker, told Musk he’ll welcome the competition.

    “The more the merrier — and greener,” Anand Mahindra wrote.

    Plans to aggressively expand the number of electric cars on the road is just one of a number of ways India is trying to go greener. The government is also underway on major pushes to expand its solar energy capacity.

    Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has also doubled down on his commitment to the Paris Climate Agreement after President Trump rebuked the pact on Thursday.

    He was in France on Saturday meeting with French President Emanuel Macron, who also strongly condemned Trump’s decision.

    “Paris Agreement is a shared legacy of the world. It will benefit the future generations as well,” Modi wrote on Twitter.

     

     

    CNN

     

  • Hackers ‘to leak’ emails of UAE ambassador to US

    Hackers ‘to leak’ emails of UAE ambassador to US

    A computer hacking group that calls itself “GlobalLeaks” has reportedly said it plans to release emails taken from the inbox of Yousef al-Otaiba, the ambassador of the United Arab Emirates to the United States.

    The Daily Beast reported on Friday that it had been approached by the hackers, who offered a sample of the emails they said demonstrated “how a small rich country/company used lobbyists to hurt American interests and those of it allies”.

    The group said the leaks “reveal how millions of dollars were used to hurt [the] reputation of American allies and cause policy changes”.

    The leakers said they plan to publish the material themselves on Saturday, the report said.

    According to the Daily Beast, the hackers said the documents had been provided to them by a paid whistle-blower in a Washington, DC lobbying group and contained emails from Otaiba’s Hotmail account.

    It also said the sample provided included several emails between Otaiba and Robert Gates, former US defence secretary in the administrations of George Bush and Barack Obama.

    Otaiba is well-known figure in US national security circles – he has been called “the most charming man in Washington” – and has participated in Pentagon strategy meetings at the invitation of the defence officials.

    Khalil Jahshan, executive director of the Arab Center in Washington, DC, said depending on the substance of the emails, the leak could prove to be “very embarrassing” for the UAE, “particularly if it … reveals any new information pertaining to the source of the hacking that took pace of Qatar News Agency (QNA)”.

    The news of the potential leak comes as the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is believed to be helping Qatar investigate the source of a cyberattack that has led to diplomatic tension among Arab Gulf countries.

    An FBI team has been in Doha for the past week after the Qatari government asked the US for help following a security breach by hackers last month who posted fake remarks on its QNA official media platform.

     

  • Manchester Attack: We accept ‘full responsibility’ for intelligence leaks – United States

    The United States government has accepted full responsibility for leaks of the British police investigation into Monday’s deadly bomb attack in Manchester which killed 22 people and injured over 60.

    This was revealed on Friday by the United States Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson.

    Appearing alongside British foreign secretary Boris Johnson in London, Tillerson said that “all across America, hearts are broken” at news of the attack on people attending a concert by U.S. pop singer Ariana Grande.

    British police briefly suspended intelligence sharing with the United States on Thursday after private details of their investigation repeatedly appeared in American media.

    “We take full responsibility for that and we obviously regret that that happened,” Tillerson said. “With respect to the release of information inappropriately … certainly we condemn that.”

    Tillerson said he expected the close security relationship between the United States and Britain to withstand the leaks.

    NAN reports that Trump vowed on Thursday to bring anyone caught leaking U.S. intelligence to justice after British police stopped sharing information about the Manchester suicide bombing with the United States.

    In a statement released after Trump arrived at the NATO military alliance, the president said he would seek an official review to stop leaks that he said posed a serious security threat.

    “The alleged leaks coming out of government agencies are deeply troubling,” Trump said in the statement.

    “I am asking the Department of Justice and other relevant agencies to launch a complete review of this matter, and if appropriate, the culprit should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

    He said the relationship between the U.S.s and Britain was the most cherished of all U.S. ties.

    British officials reacted with anger on Wednesday after the New York Times published forensic photographs from the crime scene at Manchester Arena thought to have been leaked by U.S. intelligence.

    The photographs, which appear to show a detonator, metal nuts and screws and a blue Karrimor backpack that might have contained the bomb, were published a day after the suicide bomber’s name was leaked to U.S. media against the wishes of police in Manchester.

    “We are furious. This is completely unacceptable,” a British government source said, adding that the matter was being “raised at every relevant level by the British authorities with their U.S. counterparts.”

    Britain’s National Counter Terrorism Policing also issued a rare rebuke, saying the leaks undermined the investigation into Monday night’s attack in which 22 people were killed.

     

     

    Reuters/NAN

  • We’ll support Nigeria in fighting cybercrime, financial fraud – United States

    We’ll support Nigeria in fighting cybercrime, financial fraud – United States

    The United States on Wednesday pledged to support Nigeria in the fight against cybercrime and financial fraud.

    A statement issued by the U.S. Embassy quoted Amb. Stuart Symington, as saying this at the Second Annual Conference on Combatting Financial Fraud, Cybercrime, and Cross-Border Crimes on Tuesday.

    The conference with the theme `U.S.-Nigerian cooperation in combating cybercrime and financial fraud,’ was organised by the Federal Ministry of Justice and the National Information Technology Development Agency.

    Symington said: “there is not a country in the world that is kept secure day and night, year after year by anything other than the people of that country.

    “They are to national security what every user of a computer is to internet security, they are the critical link.”

    The ambassador expressed the need to set up appropriate legal frameworks, deploy computer emergency response teams in critical sectors, and develop national and international tools that will work to combat cybercrime.

    He explained the internet has leveled the playing field for all citizens, because anyone in the world can compete with, influence, and change what the entire world is doing.

    Citing the recent WannaCry worldwide attack, he said “whatever challenges Nigeria is facing, the United States and the global community are confronting those challenges as well”.

    He emphasised the need for an immediate response and robust coordination between nations in answer to frequent cyber-attacks and increasingly sophisticated transnational criminal networks.

    “The U.S. has partnered with the Nigerian government to combat fraud, financial crimes, money laundering, cybercrime, and cross-border crimes including drug, human, and wildlife trafficking.

    `The two countries also continue to work to counter these threats, strengthen information sharing, and develop strategies to work together to protect citizens, resources, and financial networks from dangerous criminal attacks,” he said.

    NAN reports that Mr Abubakar Malami, SAN, Minister of Justice said Nigeria was proactively taking steps to ensure that the Cyber Crime Act of 2015 was implemented.

    Representing Malami, Mrs Juliet Ibekaku-Nwagwu, Special Adviser to the President on Justice Reforms, said the Ministry of Justice was ensuring that cyber crime perpetrators were prosecuted for obstructing national security.

    “Our intention is to ensure that Nigeria is proactively implementing our Cyber Crime Act of 2015 and also to ensure that we are implementing the Advanced Fee Fraud Act of 2007.

    “We want to ensure that we are looking at cross border crimes that can affect the national security of Nigeria and we are taking proactive steps in that direction.

    He said that Nigeria was in a critical situation and if nothing was done to tackle cyber crime issues in the government and across private sector, the country might become subject to gruesome cyber attacks.

     

     

    NAN

  • Buhari’s agenda in line with ours – United States

    Buhari’s agenda in line with ours – United States

    The United States on Tuesday said the agenda being pursued by President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration were in line with its expectations.

    The Deputy Director, Office of West African Affairs, Bureau of African Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, Mr Nathan Holt, made the remarks on Tuesday from Washington, D.C. via teleconference on: ‘Nigeria, a critical U.S. partner’.

    Holt said: “In 2015, Nigeria had a very important election. It elected Muhammadu Buhari as president.

    “This represented the first time in Nigerian history that there was a peaceful, democratic transfer of power from one party to an opposition party.

    “It was a milestone not only for Nigeria, but really for Africa as a whole.

    “President Buhari’s electoral platform was that he wanted to fight insecurity, particularly the depredations of Boko Haram and other forces in the northeast.

    “He wanted to grow the Nigerian economy, create jobs for its growing population, and he wanted to fight corruption.

    “Well, the nice thing about that agenda is that it meshes very well with our own.

    “That is – those are areas of focus that very much are consistent with U.S. interests in Nigeria. We too want to partner with Nigeria and its neighbours to fight terrorism.

    “We too support private-sector-led economic growth. And we are very much in favour of President Buhari’s campaign against corruption,” the U.S. envoy on African Affairs, said.

    Holt also spoke on his country’s decision to cut foreign aid, assistance, and payments to UN programmes but pledged continued robust U.S. assistance to Nigeria and other countries in West Africa.

    According to him, the U.S. remains the leading humanitarian donor in the humanitarian, bilateral development assistance and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).

    “We are very pleased that we are the lead humanitarian donor in the Lake Chad Basin region.

    “We’ve got a vigorous bilateral development assistance programme that’s dominated by health assistance, including the PEPFAR programme.

    “The PEPFAR programme has really helped turn back the tide of HIV/AIDS not just in Nigeria but across the African continent,” he said.

     

     

     

    NAN

     

  • We’ll arrest, prosecute those who commit crimes against humanity – United States

    We’ll arrest, prosecute those who commit crimes against humanity – United States

    The United States Government on Monday said it will stand up against anyone who commits crimes against humanity anywhere in the world.

    This was revealed by Secretary of States, Rex Tillerson. Tillerson made this known less than a week after Washington launched missile strikes in response to an alleged Syrian chemical attack.

    Tillerson said the U.S. would not let such crimes go unchallenged.

    “We rededicate ourselves to holding to account any and all who commit crimes against the innocents anywhere in the world,” he told reporters while commemorating a 1944 German Nazi massacre in Sant’Anna di Stazzema.

    Trump ordered his military to strike Syria in retaliation for what the U. S. said was a chemical weapons attack by President Bashar al-Assad’s forces which killed scores of civilians, including many children.

    European ministers are eager to hear whether Washington is now committed to overthrowing Assad, who is backed by Russia.

    They also want the U. S. to put pressure on Moscow to distance itself from Assad.

    Tillerson, who travels to Russia after the two-day G7 gathering, said at the weekend that the defeat of Islamic State remained the U.S. priority, while the U.S. Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley said that “regime change” in Syria was also a priority for Trump.

    The mixed messages have confused and frustrated European allies, who are eager for full U.S. support for a political solution based on a transfer of power in Damascus.

    “The Americans say they agree, but there’s nothing to show for it behind (the scenes).

    “They are absent from this and are navigating aimlessly in the dark,” said a senior European diplomat, who declined to be named.

    Italy, Germany, France and Britain have invited foreign ministers from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Qatar to sit down with the G7 group on Tuesday morning to discuss Syria. All oppose Assad’s rule.

    The foreign ministers’ discussions in Tuscany will prepare the way for a leaders’ summit in Sicily at the end of May.

    Efforts to reach an agreement on statements ahead of time – a normal part of pre-meeting G7 diplomacy , have moved very slowly, partly because of a difficult transition at the U.S. state department, where many key positions remain unfilled.

    Some issues, such as trade and climate change, are likely to be ducked this week.

    “The more complicated subjects will be left to the leaders,” said an Italian diplomat, who declined to be named because he was not authorized to speak to the press.

    However, the foreign ministers will talk about growing tensions with North Korea, as the United States moves a navy strike group near the Korean peninsula amid concerns over Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions.

    They will also discuss Libya. Italy is hoping for vocal support for a UN-backed government in Tripoli which has struggled to establish its authority even in the city, let alone in the rest of the violence-plagued north African country.

    The Trump administration has not yet defined a clear policy and Rome fears Washington may fall into step with Egypt and Russia, which support general Khalifa Haftar, a powerful figure in eastern Libya.

    The struggle against terrorism, relations with Iran and instability in Ukraine will also come up for discussion, with talks due to kick off at 4.30 p.m. (10.30 a.m. ET) on Monday.

    TheNewsGuru.com reports that the UN said at least 70 people were killed and hundreds more affected in Khan Skeikhoun.

    It added: “The likelihood of exposure to a chemical attack is amplified by an apparent lack of external injuries reported in cases showing a rapid onset of similar symptoms, including acute respiratory distress as the main cause of death.

     

     

    Reuters/NAN