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WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The US State Department on Thursday approved the potential $14 billion sale to Indonesia of 36 F-15 fighter jets and other assorted military equipment. The proposed sale will improve “the security of an important regional partner that is a force for political stability, and economic progress in the Asia-Pacific region,” said a statement, adding that it “will not alter the basic military balance in the region.” © Agence France-Presse
MEXICO CITY, Mexico (AFP) – US climate envoy John Kerry called Wednesday for an “open and competitive” energy market in Mexico, where planned energy reforms have alarmed foreign investors and environmentalists alike. Washington has stepped up pressure on Mexico over President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s push to boost the state’s role in the energy industry — moves critics say favor fossil fuels over renewable energy. Meeting with Lopez Obrador and other top officials in the […]
by François PICARD Agence France-Presse HOUSTON, United States (AFP) – “You get used to it. The walls shake,” says Sam, a resident of Midland, a town in west Texas where hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas — known as “fracking” — is causing more and more earthquakes. “Then another tremor comes a second later, like a truck passing nearby,” said the 44-year-old, who did not wish to disclose his last name. Echoing his words, three […]
WASHINGTON, D.C., United States (AFP) – US climate scientists accused four of the world’s largest oil companies Tuesday of lying about the harms linked to their industry and trying to delay the switch to cleaner fuel. American multinationals ExxonMobil and Chevron, as well as Britain’s BP and Shell, are being investigated by the US Congress for their role in spreading misinformation about climate change. Michael Mann, an academic, told the House oversight committee the companies […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The husband of US Vice President Kamala Harris was evacuated Tuesday after a reported bomb threat at the Washington high school he was visiting to celebrate African American history, officials said. Douglas Emhoff, whose official title is second gentleman, was pulled away by his security detail during commemorations of Black History Month at Dunbar High School in Washington, DC. Pupils were also told to leave. “It was a bomb threat,” […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Lockheed Martin’s space division has won a NASA contract to build the rocket that will return the first Mars rock samples to Earth in the 2030s, the US space agency said Monday. The “small, lightweight rocket” will be the first to take off from another planet, bringing back “rock, sediment and atmospheric samples from the surface of the Red Planet,” NASA said in a statement. NASA’s Perseverance Rover has […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Democrats introduced a short-term bill on Monday to fund the US government ahead of a potential shutdown next week, when federal agencies run out of previously allocated money. Shutdowns typically lead to hundreds of thousands of government workers being sent home, while parks, museums and other federal properties and services are closed. With funding running out on February 18, President Joe Biden’s Democrats and opposition Republicans had been unable […]
The US death toll from the Covid-19 pandemic surpassed 900,000 on Friday, according to the Johns Hopkins University coronavirus tracker. The toll had hit 800,000 dead in mid-December, just a month and a half ago. New cases linked to the Omicron variant are falling, but daily deaths are still rising, with an average of 2,400 now, according to government figures. “Hospitalizations remain high, stretching our healthcare capacity and workforce to its limits in some areas […]
Ford reported weaker-than-expected fourth-quarter profits Thursday amid supply chain problems, even as higher car prices boosted results in North America. Executives with the US automaker said some of the company’s suppliers had been unable to deliver items due to outbreaks of the Omicron variant of Covid-19. Profit margins in 2021’s final quarter were also pinched by higher commodity costs, as well as elevated expenses tied to fuel and shipping, executives said. Ford, which has also […]
SAN FRANCISCO, United States (AFP) – Athletics giant Nike filed a lawsuit in New York on Thursday against shopping platform StockX for creating and marketing NFTs — the tamper-proof digital property certificates — based on the brand’s products without permission. The company’s lawyers accused US-based StockX of “minting” NFTs using Nike trademarks and trading on the brand’s “goodwill” to market them. StockX is “selling those NFTs at heavily inflated prices to unsuspecting consumers who believe […]
WASHINGTON, D.C., United States (AFP) – Authorities in the US city of Minneapolis, where George Floyd was murdered in 2020, published body-cam video Thursday showing the police shooting of a 22-year-old African American man. According to the police, Amir Locke was shot on Wednesday by officers who were executing a search warrant on the apartment he was in, after Locke pulled a gun from beneath a blanket. The total time between the officers’ entrance and […]
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AFP) – The Dutch port city of Rotterdam has not received a request for a permit to temporarily dismantle an historic bridge to allow a superyacht built for Amazon founder Jeff Bezos to pass, local media reported Thursday. The city’s mayor denied any decision had been made, a day after a municipality spokeswoman told AFP that officials had green-lighted the shipbuilder’s request to remove the central section of the iconic Koningshaven Bridge, […]
