Washington — The Biden administration will again allow Iran to run absentee voter stations on U.S. soil for next week’s Iranian presidential election, VOA has learned, prompting the Islamic republic’s critics to denounce the plan as absurd and shameful.

Iranian Foreign Ministry official Alireza Mahmoudi told state media on Sunday that Tehran is planning to set up more than 30 ballot stations across the United States for the June 28 vote to replace Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, who died in a helicopter crash last month.

Mahmoudi said ballot boxes for Iranian absentee voters would be set up at the Iranian Interests Section of the Pakistani embassy in Washington and in New York but did not identify other locations.

Iranian state media say the United States is home to the largest proportion of overseas-based Iranians at 30%. The U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey estimates there are about half a million people born in Iran or of Iranian origin in the U.S., while the Iranian American nonprofit group National Union for Democracy in Iran, or NUFDI, says it has a higher estimate of more than 1 million.

Canada and Turkey follow with 12% shares of the Iranian diaspora, according to Iranian state media. Mahmoudi said Iran is arranging absentee voting in other diaspora locations as well.

In a statement reported exclusively by VOA, the U.S. State Department said on Friday it has no expectation that Iran’s presidential election will be free or fair. The Islamic republic’s ruling clerics permit only loyalists of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to run for offices such as president and parliament, which are subservient to him on key policy issues.

Iran’s last parliamentary and presidential elections, in March and 2021, respectively, drew record-low official turnouts, with the lack of choices leaving much of the electorate disinterested.

Opponents of Iran’s clerical rulers at home and abroad repeatedly have called for boycotts of Iranian elections, which they view as shams, and they have done so again for the June 28 vote. They also have noted that the Islamic republic seeks legitimacy for its 45-year authoritarian rule by trying to boost turnout for such elections.

VOA asked the State Department how authorizing ballot stations in the U.S. for Iran, whose poor human rights record it has strongly criticized, is consistent with the U.S. view of Iranian elections as neither free nor fair.

A spokesperson responded by noting that Iran set up U.S.-based ballot stations for previous presidential elections, in 2021 and 2017, with approval from the Biden administration and its predecessor, the Trump administration, respectively.

“This is nothing new,” the spokesman said, in reference to the planned ballot stations for next week’s vote.

Richard Goldberg, a senior adviser to the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies, countered that permitting Iran to engage in another round of absentee balloting on U.S. soil is a “theater of the absurd.”

In a statement to VOA, Goldberg wrote: “How and why we would facilitate such a charade for a state sponsor of terrorism that is hunting Americans every day is beyond me.” He also questioned who would be operating Iran’s ballot stations in the U.S. and what relationship they have to the Iranian government.

VOA put those questions to Iran’s U.N. mission, which responded by saying it declines to comment because it “believes the issue is not of interest to an American audience.”

A day before Iran’s 2021 presidential election, the Iranian Interests Section in Washington published an online chart showing the addresses of ballot stations in 29 U.S. cities where Iranian citizens could vote. Besides the Interests Section, the other listed venues included 20 properties of U.S. and British hotel companies and eight Islamic centers. There was no indication of who operated the stations.

VOA contacted three hotels that hosted the 2021 ballot stations on Friday to ask if they were planning to host such stations again next week. Staff members who answered the phones at the Marriott Spring Hill Suites in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and at the Hilton Garden Inn Irvine-Orange County Airport in California said they had no record of such events on their schedules. A woman who answered the phone at the Comfort Inn Sandy Springs in Atlanta, Georgia, repeatedly hung up when asked if it is hosting an event next Friday.

Cameron Khansarinia, vice president of the Iranian American group NUFDI, told VOA that diaspora Iranians have a responsibility to protest the Islamic republic’s “shameful” absentee voter stations wherever they are set up.

In reference to those who operate and vote at the planned ballot stations, Khansarinia said, “While we should respect the physical safety of these individuals and U.S. law, they deserve to be publicly shamed for their absolutely amorality.”

VOA also asked the State Department whether U.S. authorities have granted licenses to businesses and nonprofit groups that plan to host the Iranian ballot stations to exempt them from U.S. sanctions that generally prohibit the provision of commercial services to Iran.

The spokesperson replied, “Foreign governments carrying out election-related activities in the U.S. must do so in a manner consistent with U.S. law and regulations.”

The Treasury Department did not respond to similar questions sent by VOA on Tuesday, regarding the granting of licenses for Iranian ballot stations.

Brian O’Toole, a former senior adviser in the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, or OFAC, told VOA it is a gray area.

O’Toole, a nonresident senior fellow at the Washington-based Atlantic Council, identified two U.S. regulations, OFAC’s General License E and the Code of Federal Regulations section 560.545, as potentially permitting election activity and democracy-building in Iran.

“Despite the Iranian government’s issues with elections, the U.S. has a clear interest in promoting democracy,” said O’Toole, who managed OFAC’s sanctions program during former President Barack Obama’s administration.

“What this administration probably would lean toward is the principle that people who are eligible to vote [in Iran’s election] should make the decision as to whether they should or should not,” he said.
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LAS VEGAS, NEW MEXICO — Heavy rain and flash flood warnings in the U.S. state of New Mexico prompted officials to order mandatory evacuations Saturday, with shelters set up for displaced residents.

The National Weather Service announced a flash flood emergency on Friday night through early Saturday. The impacted areas included the city of Las Vegas and communities near Albuquerque.

Up to 5 centimeters (2 inches) of rain had fallen by late Friday, with additional rainfall up to 3.8 centimeters (1.5 inches) expected overnight, the weather service said.

There was flash flooding with multiple road closures on the north and west sides of Las Vegas, the weather service said.

The Las Vegas municipal government announced mandatory evacuations of parts of the city in social media posts, warning residents to prepare for overnight stays. The city said it established shelters for residents on the west and east sides of the city.

The city government asked residents to limit nonessential water use, while also clarifying that online rumors suggesting the city’s dams had broken were false and that the dams “are currently intact.”

New Mexico also suffered devastating wildfires this week that killed at least two people and forced thousands to flee from the flames. The South Fork and Salt fires in south-central New Mexico destroyed or damaged an estimated 1,400 structures. FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell and New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham planned to tour the disaster area Saturday.
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SEOUL, South Korea — A nuclear-powered United States aircraft carrier arrived Saturday in South Korea for a three-way exercise stepping up their military training to cope with North Korean threats that escalated with its alignment with Russia.

The arrival of the USS Theodore Roosevelt strike group in Busan came a day after South Korea summoned the Russian ambassador to protest a pact reached between Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un this week that pledges mutual defense assistance in the event of war. South Korea says the deal poses a threat to its security and warned that it could consider sending arms to Ukraine to help fight off the Russian invasion as a response — a move that would surely ruin its relations with Moscow.

Following a meeting between their defense chiefs in Singapore earlier in June, the United States, South Korea and Japan announced Freedom Edge. The new multidomain exercise is aimed at sharpening the countries’ combined response in various areas of operation, including air, sea and cyberspace.

The Theodore Roosevelt strike group will participate in the exercise that is expected to start within June. South Korea’s military didn’t immediately confirm specific details of the training.

South Korea’s navy said in a statement that the arrival of the Theodore Roosevelt demonstrates the strong defense posture of the allies and “stern willingness to respond to advancing North Korean threats.” The carrier’s visit comes seven months after another U.S. aircraft carrier, the USS Carl Vinson, came to South Korea in a show of strength against the North.

The Theodore Roosevelt strike group also participated in a three-way exercise with South Korean and Japanese naval forces in April in the disputed East China Sea, where worries about China’s territorial claims are rising.

In the face of growing North Korean threats, the United States, South Korea and Japan have expanded their combined training and boosted the visibility of strategic U.S. military assets in the region, seeking to intimidate the North. The United States and South Korea have also been updating their nuclear deterrence strategies, with Seoul seeking stronger assurances that Washington would swiftly and decisively use its nuclear capabilities to defend its ally from a North Korean nuclear attack.
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PITTSBURGH — Last week in Parkland, Florida, wrecking equipment began demolishing the building at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School where a gunman’s rampage in 2018 ended with 17 people dead. As the rumble of destruction echoed, people in the community set to explaining exactly why ripping the building down was so meaningful — and so crucial.

From former student Bryan Lequerique: “It’s something that we all need. It’s time to bring an end to this very hurtful chapter in everyone’s lives.” And Eric Garner, a broadcasting and film teacher, said: “For 6½ years we have been looking at this monument to mass murder that has been on campus every day. … So coming down, that’s the monumental event.”

Parkland. Uvalde. Columbine. Sandy Hook. A supermarket in Buffalo. A church in South Carolina. A synagogue in Pittsburgh. A nightclub in Orlando, Florida. When violence comes to a public place, as it does all too often in our era, a delicate question lingers in the quiet afterward: What should be done with the buildings where blood was shed, where lives were upended, where loved ones were lost forever?

Which is the appropriate choice — the defiance of keeping them standing, or the deep comfort that can come with wiping them off the map? Is it best to keep pain right in front of us, or at a distance?

How different communities have approached the problem

This question has been answered differently over the years.

The most obvious example in recent history is the decision to preserve the concentration camps run by Nazi Germany during World War II where millions of Jews and others died — an approach consistent with the post-Holocaust mantras of “never forget” and “never again.” But that was an event of global significance, with meaning for both the descendants of survivors and the public at large.

For individual American communities, approaches have varied. Parkland and others chose demolition. In Pittsburgh, the Tree of Life synagogue, site of a 2018 shooting, was torn down to make way for a new sanctuary and memorial.

But the Tops Friendly Markets in Buffalo, New York, and the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, where racist mass shootings happened, both reopened. And Columbine High School still stands, though its library, where so much bloodshed occurred, was replaced after much impassioned debate. “Finding a balance between its function as a high school and the need for memorialization has been a long process,” former student Riley Burkhart wrote earlier this year in an essay.

What goes into these decisions? Not only emotion and heartbreak. Sometimes it’s simply a question of resources; not all school districts can afford to demolish and rebuild. Sometimes it’s about not wanting to give those who might support the shooter a place to focus their attention.

“Denying such opportunities for those who celebrate the persecution and deaths of those different from themselves is a perfectly sound reason to tear down buildings where mass killings occurred,” Daniel Fountain, a professor of history at Meredith College in North Carolina, said in a email.

Perhaps the most significant driving force, though, is the increasing discussion in recent years about the role of mental health.

“There are changing norms about things like trauma and closure that are at play that today encourage the notion of demolishing these spaces,” said Timothy Recuber, a sociologist at Smith College in Massachusetts and author of “Consuming Catastrophe: Mass Culture in America’s Decade of Disaster.”

For many years, he said, “the prevailing idea of how to get past a tragedy was to put your head down and push past it. Today, people are more likely to believe that having to return to the scene of the crime, so to speak, is liable to re-inflict harm.”

In Pittsburgh’s Squirrel Hill neighborhood, a fence masks the site where the Tree of Life synagogue stood until it was razed earlier this year, more than five years after a gunman killed 11 people in the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history.

David Michael Slater grew up across the street from the synagogue. He understands the ambivalence that can come with choosing whether to knock down.

“It’s easy to see why decision-makers might have chosen one path or the other. And to me, it seems presumptuous for anyone not part of, or directly affected by, the choice to quibble with it,” said Slater, who retired this month after 30 years of teaching middle and high school English. “That said, the decision to demolish such sites, when seen in the context of our escalating culture of erasure, should raise concern.”

The power of memory cuts both ways

From World War II to 9/11, the politics of American memory are powerful — and nowhere more intricate than in the case of mass shootings. The loss of loved ones, societal disagreements over gun laws and differing approaches to protecting children create a landscape where the smallest of issues can give rise to dozens of passionate and angry opinions.

To some, keeping a building standing is the ultimate defiance: You are not bowing to horror nor capitulating to those who caused it. You are choosing to continue in the face of unimaginable circumstances — a robust thread in the American narrative.

To others, the possibility of being retraumatized is central. Why, the thinking goes, should a building where people met violent ends continue to be a looming — literally — force in the lives of those who must go on?

It stands to reason, then, that a key factor in deciding the fates of such buildings coalesces around one question: Who is the audience?

“It’s not a simple choice of should we knock it down or renovate or let it be,” said Jennifer Talarico, a psychology professor at Lafayette College in Pennsylvania who studies how people form personal memories of public events.

“If we’re interested in the memories of the people who directly experienced the event, that physical space will serve as a specific and powerful reminder. But if we’re talking about remembering or commemorating an event for other people, those who did not experience it, that’s a slightly different calculus,” Talarico said. “Remembering and forgetting are both powerful forces.”

Ultimately, of course, there is a middle ground: eliminating the building itself but erecting a lasting memorial to those who were lost, as Uvalde and other communities have chosen. In that way, the virtues of mental health and memory can both be honored. Life can go on — not obliviously, but not impeded by a daily, visceral reminder of the heartbreak that once visited.

That approach sits well with Slater, who has contemplated such tragedies both from the standpoint of his hometown synagogue and the classrooms where he spent decades teaching and keeping kids safe.

“Like every problem in life that matters, simple answers are hard to come by,” Slater said. “If what replaces the Tree of Life, or Parkland, or the next defiled place of worship or learning or commerce, can be made to serve both as proof of our indomitable spirit and as memorialized evidence of what we strive to overcome, perhaps we can have the best of both worst worlds.”
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Miami, florida — Former President Donald Trump said in an interview posted Thursday he wants to give automatic green cards to foreign students who graduate from U.S. colleges, a sharp departure from the anti-immigrant rhetoric he typically uses on the campaign trail.

Trump was asked about plans for companies to be able to import the “best and brightest” in a podcast taped Wednesday with venture capitalists and tech investors called the “All-In.”

“What I want to do, and what I will do is, you graduate from a college, I think you should get automatically as part of your diploma a green card to be able to stay in this country. And that includes junior colleges, too, anybody graduates from a college. You go there for two years or four years,” he said, vowing to address this concern on day one if he is elected president in November.

Immigration has been Trump’s signature issue during his 2024 bid to return to the White House. His suggestion that he would offer green cards — documents that confer a pathway to U.S. citizenship — to potentially hundreds of thousands of foreign graduates would represent a sweeping expansion of America’s immigration system that sharply diverges from his most common messages on foreigners.

Trump often says during his rallies that immigrants who are in the country illegally endanger public safety and steal jobs and government resources. He once suggested that they are “poisoning the blood of our country.” He has promised to carry out the largest deportation operation in U.S. history if elected.

Trump and his allies often say they distinguish between people entering illegally versus legally. But during his administration, Trump also proposed curbs on legal immigration such as family-based visas and the visa lottery program.

Right after taking office in 2017, he issued his “Buy American and Hire American” executive order, directing Cabinet members to suggest reforms to ensure that business visas were awarded only to the highest-paid or most-skilled applicants to protect American workers.

He has previously said the H1-B program commonly used by companies to hire foreign workers temporarily — a program he has used in the past — was “very bad” and used by tech companies to get foreign workers for lower pay.

During the conversation with “All-In,” Trump blamed the coronavirus pandemic for being unable to implement these measures while he was president. He said he knew of stories of people who graduated from top colleges and want to stay in the U.S. but can’t secure visas to do so, forcing them to return to their native countries, specifically naming India and China. He said they go on and become multibillionaires, employing thousands of workers.

“You need a pool of people to work for your company,” Trump said. “And they have to be smart people. Not everybody can be less than smart. You need brilliant people.”

In a statement released hours after the podcast was posted, campaign press secretary Karoline Leavitt said: “President Trump has outlined the most aggressive vetting process in U.S. history, to exclude all communists, radical Islamists, Hamas supporters, America haters and public charges. He believes, only after such vetting has taken place, we ought to keep the most skilled graduates who can make significant contributions to America. This would only apply to the most thoroughly vetted college graduates who would never undercut American wages or workers.”
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fort pierce, florida — Lawyers for Donald Trump argued Friday that the Justice Department prosecutor who charged the former president with hoarding classified documents at his Florida estate was illegally appointed and that the case should therefore be dismissed.

The challenge to the legality of special counsel Jack Smith’s appointment kicked off a three-day hearing that will further delay a criminal case that had been scheduled for trial last month but has been snarled by unresolved legal disputes. The motion questioning Smith’s selection by the Justice Department is one of multiple challenges to the indictment the defense has raised, so far unsuccessfully, in the year since the charges were brought.

U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon heard hours of arguments Friday from lawyers for both sides, with Trump attorney Emil Bove asserting that the Justice Department risked creating a “shadow government” through the appointment of special counsels to prosecute select criminal cases. Prosecutors say there was nothing improper or unusual about Smith’s appointment, with James Pearce, a member of Smith’s team at one point saying: “We are in compliance. We have complied with all of the department’s policies.” 

Cannon did not immediately rule, but in an apparent sign that she was taking seriously the Trump team motion, she grilled Pearce on what oversight role Attorney General Merrick Garland — who appointed Smith — had in seeking the indictment.

Pearce said he was not in a position to answer the question but noted, “I don’t want to make it seem like I’m hiding something.”

Even as Smith’s team looks to press forward on a prosecution seen by many legal experts as the most straightforward and clear-cut of the four prosecutions against Trump, Friday’s arguments didn’t concern the allegations against the former president. They centered instead on arcane regulations governing the appointment of Justice Department special counsels like Smith, reflecting the judge’s continued willingness to entertain defense arguments that prosecutors say are frivolous and meritless, contributing to the delay of a trial date.

Arbiter’s review ordered

Cannon, a Trump appointee, had exasperated prosecutors even before the June 2023 indictment by granting a Trump request to have an independent arbiter review the classified documents taken from Mar-a-Lago — an order that was overturned by a unanimous federal appeals panel.

Since then, she has been intensely scrutinized over her handling of the case, including for taking months to issue rulings and for scheduling hearings on legally specious claims — all of which have combined to make a trial before the November presidential election a virtual impossibility. She was rebuked in March by prosecutors after she asked both sides to formulate jury instructions and to respond to a premise of the case that Smith’s team called “fundamentally flawed.”

The New York Times, citing two anonymous sources, reported Thursday that two judges — including the chief federal judge in the Southern District of Florida — urged Cannon to step aside from the case shortly after she was assigned to it.

The hearing is unfolding just weeks after Trump was convicted in a separate state case in New York of falsifying business records to cover up a hush money payment to a porn actor who has said she had sex with him. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court is poised to issue within days an opinion on whether Trump is immune from prosecution for acts he took in office or whether he can be prosecuted by Smith’s team on charges that he schemed to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

At issue in Friday’s hearing was a Trump team claim that Smith was illegally appointed in November 2022 by Garland because he was not first approved by Congress and because the special counsel office that he was assigned to lead was not also created by Congress.

Smith’s team has said Garland was fully empowered as the head of the Justice Department to make the appointment and to delegate prosecutorial decisions to him. They note that a similar argument failed in a challenge to the appointment of Robert Mueller, who was tapped as special counsel by the Trump administration Justice Department to investigate potential ties between Russia and Trump’s 2016 campaign.

On Monday, the two sides will again discuss matters related to Smith’s appointment, as well as a limited gag order that prosecutors have requested to bar Trump from comments they fear could endanger the safety of FBI agents and other law enforcement officials involved in the case.

The restrictions were sought after Trump falsely claimed the agents who searched his Mar-a-Lago estate for classified documents in August 2022 were prepared to kill him even though he was citing boilerplate language from standard FBI policy about use of force during the execution of search warrants. The FBI had intentionally selected a day for the search when it knew Trump and his family would be out of town, and the policy he was citing is meant to limit, rather than encourage, the use of force.

Trump’s lawyers have said any speech restrictions would infringe on his free-speech rights. Cannon initially rejected the prosecution’s request on technical grounds, saying Smith’s team had not sufficiently conferred with defense lawyers before seeking the restrictions. Prosecutors subsequently renewed the request.
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HONG KONG — The United States and China resumed semi-official nuclear arms talks in March for the first time in five years, with Beijing’s representatives telling U.S. counterparts that they would not resort to atomic threats over Taiwan, according to two American delegates who attended.

The Chinese representatives offered reassurances after their U.S. interlocutors raised concerns that China might use, or threaten to use, nuclear weapons if it faced defeat in a conflict over Taiwan. Beijing views the democratically governed island as its territory, a claim rejected by the government in Taipei.

“They told the U.S. side that they were absolutely convinced that they are able to prevail in a conventional fight over Taiwan without using nuclear weapons,” said scholar David Santoro, the U.S. organizer of the Track Two talks, the details of which are being reported by Reuters for the first time.

Participants in Track Two talks are generally former officials and academics who can speak with authority on their government’s position, even if they are not directly involved with setting it. Government-to-government negotiations are known as Track One.  

Washington was represented by about half a dozen delegates, including former officials and scholars at the two-day discussions, which took place in a Shanghai hotel conference room.  

Beijing sent a delegation of scholars and analysts, which included several former People’s Liberation Army officers.

A State Department spokesperson said in response to Reuters’ questions that Track Two talks could be “beneficial.” The department did not participate in the March meeting though it was aware of it, the spokesperson said.  

Such discussions cannot replace formal negotiations “that require participants to speak authoritatively on issues that are often highly compartmentalized within (Chinese) government circles,” the spokesperson said.

Members of the Chinese delegation and Beijing’s defense ministry did not respond to requests for comment.  

The informal discussions between the nuclear-armed powers took place with the U.S. and China at odds over major economic and geopolitical issues, with leaders in Washington and Beijing accusing each other of dealing in bad faith.  

The two countries briefly resumed Track One talks over nuclear arms in November but those negotiations have since stalled, with a top U.S. official publicly expressing frustration at China’s responsiveness.

The Pentagon, which estimates that Beijing’s nuclear arsenal increased by more than 20% between 2021 and 2023, said in October that China “would also consider nuclear use to restore deterrence if a conventional military defeat in Taiwan” threatened CCP rule.

China has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control and has over the past four years stepped up military activity around the island.  

The Track Two talks are part of a two-decade nuclear weapons and posture dialog that stalled after the Trump administration pulled funding in 2019.  

After the COVID-19 pandemic, semi-official discussions resumed on broader security and energy issues, but only the Shanghai meeting dealt in detail with nuclear weapons and posture.

Santoro, who runs the Hawaii-based Pacific Forum think-tank, described “frustrations” on both sides during the latest discussions but said the two delegations saw reason to continue talking. More discussions were being planned in 2025, he said.  

Nuclear policy analyst William Alberque of the Henry Stimson Centre think-tank, who was not involved in the March discussions, said the Track Two negotiations were useful at a time of glacial U.S.-Chinese relations.

“It’s important to continue talking with China with absolutely no expectations,” he said, when nuclear arms are at issue.

No first-use?

The U.S. Department of Defense estimated last year that Beijing has 500 operational nuclear warheads and will probably field more than 1,000 by 2030.  

That compares to 1,770 and 1,710 operational warheads deployed by the U.S. and Russia respectively. The Pentagon said that by 2030, much of Beijing’s weapons will likely be held at higher readiness levels.

Since 2020, China has also modernized its arsenal, starting production of its next-generation ballistic missile submarine, testing hypersonic glide vehicle warheads and conducting regular nuclear-armed sea patrols.

Weapons on land, in the air and at sea give China the “nuclear triad” – a hallmark of a major nuclear power.

A key point the U.S. side wanted to discuss, according to Santoro, was whether China still stood by its no-first-use and minimal deterrence policies, which date from the creation of its first nuclear bomb in the early 1960s.

Minimal deterrence refers to having just enough atomic weapons to dissuade adversaries.

China is also one of two nuclear powers – the other being India – to have pledged not to initiate a nuclear exchange. Chinese military analysts have speculated that the no-first-use policy is conditional – and that nuclear arms could be used against Taiwan’s allies – but it remains Beijing’s stated stance.  

Santoro said the Chinese delegates told U.S. representatives that Beijing maintained these policies and that “‘we are not interested in reaching nuclear parity with you, let alone superiority.'”  

“‘Nothing has changed, business as usual, you guys are exaggerating’,” Santoro said in summarizing Beijing’s position.

His description of the discussions was corroborated by fellow U.S. delegate Lyle Morris, a security scholar at the Asia Society Policy Institute.  

A report on the discussions is being prepared for the U.S. government but would not be made public, Santoro said.

‘Risk and Opacity’

Top U.S. arms control official Bonnie Jenkins told Congress in May that China had not responded to nuclear-weapons risk reduction proposals that Washington raised during last year’s formal talks.  

China has yet to agree to further government-to-government meetings.

Bejing’s “refusal to substantively engage” in discussions over its nuclear build-up raises questions around its “already ambiguous stated “no-first-use” policy and its nuclear doctrine more broadly,” the State Department spokesperson told Reuters.  

China’s Track Two delegation did not discuss specifics about Beijing’s modernization effort, Santoro and Morris said.

Alberque of the Henry Stimson Centre said that China relied heavily on “risk and opacity” to mitigate U.S. nuclear superiority and there was “no imperative” for Beijing to have constructive discussions.

China’s expanded arsenal – which includes anti-ship cruise missiles, bombers, intercontinental ballistic missiles and submarines – exceeded the needs of a state with a minimal deterrence and no-first-use policy, Alberque said.  

Chinese talking points revolved around the “survivability” of Beijing’s nuclear weapons if it suffered a first strike, said Morris.

The U.S. delegates said the Chinese described their efforts as a deterrence-based modernization program to cope with developments such as improved U.S. missile defenses, better surveillance capabilities, and strengthened alliances.

The U.S., Britain and Australia last year signed a deal to share nuclear submarine technology and develop a new class of boats, while Washington is now working with Seoul to coordinate responses to a potential atomic attack.

Washington’s policy on nuclear weapons includes the possibility of using them if deterrence fails, though the Pentagon says it would only consider that in extreme circumstances. It did not provide specifics.  

One Chinese delegate “pointed to studies that said Chinese nuclear weapons were still vulnerable to U.S. strikes – their second-strike capability was not enough,” said Morris.

 
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Gaborone, Botswana — Defense chiefs from 30 African countries will gather in Botswana next week for a two-day military conference to discuss the continent’s security and stability challenges. The meeting, organized by the United States Africa Command, or AFRICOM, will be the first to be held in Africa since the inaugural conference in 2017 

“The aim [is] to tackle the pressing security challenges on the African continent and to find ways to work together for a safer, more secure Africa,” said Lt. Commander Bobby Dixon, a spokesman at AFRICOM.  “From counterterrorism efforts to cyber threats and peacekeeping missions, this conference will cover it all. Experts and military leaders will share insights, strategies, and forge partnerships that will strengthen the collective defense capabilities for all of Africa. This is more than just a conference — it’s a significant step towards a unified approach in safeguarding the African continent.”

AFRICOM says the meeting will build on the success of previous conferences. Last year’s meeting held in Rome, Italy, attracted the highest turnout, with 43 countries in attendance.

“It is evident that Africa faces a series of challenges,” said Jakkie Cilliers, a political scientist at the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria. “It is not always clear that the model that the U.S. presents is appropriate for Africa. In recent years, we have seen a variety of coups in Africa, sometimes executed by African forces that have been trained in the U.S., the U.K. and France. And it is also evident that a number of U.N. peacekeeping missions, such as that in the DR Congo and Mali, are withdrawing from Africa.

“On the other hand, the role of Russia and the so-called Africa Group [pls check the audio; it is usually called the Africa Corps] is expanding. So, it’s clear that Africa is facing a security challenge, and partners can and should do as much as possible to help.”

Cilliers added that there is a need for the Gaborone conference to come up with effective solutions to the continent’s security challenges. 

“Are we seeing a new model developing where African governments are considering alternative security arrangements, mostly by other African countries?” he said. “And of course, the role of private companies is also increasing. These events occur at a time of significant shifts in the global balance of power, and Africa again is an area of competition. One hopes all these issues will be discussed at the upcoming conference in Gaborone, and that real solutions will come to the fore.”

In March, following its Peace and Security Council meeting, the African Union expressed “deep concern” over the scourge of conflicts on the continent and their impact on socioeconomic development.
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Washington — U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration on Thursday banned Russia-based cybersecurity firm Kaspersky from providing its popular antivirus products in the United States over national security concerns, the U.S. Commerce Department said.

“Kaspersky will generally no longer be able to, among other activities, sell its software within the United States or provide updates to software already in use,” the agency said in a statement.

The announcement came after a lengthy investigation found Kaspersky’s “continued operations in the United States presented a national security risk due to the Russian Government’s offensive cyber capabilities and capacity to influence or direct Kaspersky’s operations,” it said.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said, “Russia has shown time and again they have the capability and intent to exploit Russian companies, like Kaspersky Lab, to collect and weaponize sensitive U.S. information.”

Kaspersky, in a statement to AFP, said the Commerce Department “made its decision based on the present geopolitical climate and theoretical concerns,” and vowed to “pursue all legally available options to preserve its current operations and relationships.”

“Kaspersky does not engage in activities which threaten U.S. national security and, in fact, has made significant contributions with its reporting and protection from a variety of threat actors that targeted U.S. interests and allies,” the company said.

The move is the first such action taken since an executive order issued under Donald Trump’s presidency gave the Commerce Department the power to investigate whether certain companies pose a national security risk.

Raimondo said the Commerce Department’s actions demonstrated to America’s adversaries that it would not hesitate to act when “their technology poses a risk to the United States and its citizens.”

While Kaspersky is headquartered in Moscow, it has offices in 31 countries around the world, servicing more than 400 million users and 270,000 corporate clients in more than 200 countries, the Commerce Department said.

As well as banning the sale of Kaspersky’s antivirus software, the Commerce Department also added three entities linked to the firm to a list of companies deemed to be a national security concern, “for their cooperation with Russian military and intelligence authorities in support of the Russian government’s cyber intelligence objectives.”

The Commerce Department said it “strongly encouraged” users to switch to new vendors, although its decision does not ban them from using the software should they choose to do so.

Kaspersky is allowed to continue certain operations in the United States, including providing antivirus updates, until September 29, “in order to minimize disruption to US consumers and businesses and to give them time to find suitable alternatives,” it added.  
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washington — A key U.S. lawmaker warned Thursday that Russia is on the verge of ushering in the end of the Space Age with its new, nuclear anti-satellite weaponry.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner, an Ohio Republican, told an audience in Washington that allowing Russia to gain such an advantage would be catastrophic. He called on President Joe Biden to mount an aggressive response.

“This crisis is the Cuban missile crisis in space,” Turner said, comparing the moment to the 1962 confrontation between the U.S. and the former Soviet Union, which took both sides to the brink of nuclear conflict.

But in this case, Turner said, Russia could unilaterally impose high costs on the U.S. simply by detonating a nuclear anti-satellite weapon in orbit.

“This threat would mean that our economic, international security and social systems come to a grinding halt,” he said. “This would be a catastrophic and devastating attack upon Western economic and democratic systems.”

Turner, who accused Biden of “sleepwalking into an irreversible day zero,” called on the White House to immediately declassify all of its intelligence on the Russian program to make the world aware of the full extent of the threat.

The White House on Thursday rejected Turner’s accusations.

“He’s just wrong. He’s just flat-out wrong,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters.

“We have absolutely taken this very seriously,” Kirby said. “We’ve been working this particular problem set from every possible angle, including through intense diplomacy with countries around the world and, obviously, through direct conversations with Russia.”

Russia has repeatedly denied the U.S. accusations, including last month when Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov dismissed concerns as “fake news.”

“The Americans can say whatever they want, but our policy does not change,” Ryabkov told the Interfax news agency, adding that Moscow, “always consistently opposed the deployment of strike weapons in low-Earth orbit.”

Turner first raised concerns about the prospect of a Russian anti-satellite weapons program in February, when he issued a statement warning of “a serious national security threat” and issued his initial call for the White House to declassify the relevant intelligence.

Biden responded by confirming that Russia was developing a space-based, anti-satellite weapons system but added there was no indication that Russia had decided to move ahead with the program and that there was no nuclear threat to anyone on Earth.

Concerns spiked last month when the U.S. accused Russia of using a May 16 space launch to deploy what the U.S. Defense Department described as an anti-satellite weapon “capable of attacking other satellites in low-Earth orbit.”

“Russia deployed this new counterspace weapon into the same orbit as a U.S. government satellite,” Major General Pat Ryder, Pentagon press secretary, said at the time. “So, you know, obviously that’s something that we’ll continue to monitor.”
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The United Nations estimates as many as 6.5 million Ukrainians have fled the country since Russia’s invasion in 2022. VOA’s Kane Farabaugh explores the story of one Ukrainian teenager seeking safety in music in Chicago.
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Voters in this U.S. presidential election are vulnerable to bad actors using artificial intelligence to create disinformation that benefits rival politicians or promotes the interests of foreign governments. VOA’s Ivanna Pidborska looks at the use of AI in Election 2024 in this report narrated by Carolyn Presutti. Camera and edit: Kostiantyn Golubchik, Dmytro Melnyk
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NORTH SOUND, Antigua — South Africa had to work hard to earn an 18-run win over the fast-improving United States in the opening game of the Super Eight at the Twenty20 World Cup on Wednesday.

Co-host the West Indies also lost it first match in the Super Eight stage Wednesday, beaten by eight wickets by defending champion England. Jack Salt scored 87 runs to lead England.

Andries Gous made an unbeaten 80 off 47 balls for the U.S. — against the country of his birth — to move atop the batting charts at the World Cup before South Africa restricted the Americans at 176-6.

Fast bowler Kagiso Rabada claimed 3-18 and spinner Keshav Maharaj got the prized wicket of U.S. captain Aaron Jones for a duck — no runs — to finish with 1-24.

Quinton de Kock had earlier made a rampant 74 off 40 balls and Heinrich Klaasen provided the perfect finish with 36 not out in the South African total of 194-4 after Jones won the toss and elected to field.

“Pretty happy with the performance as a whole,” South Africa captain Aiden Markram said. “A couple of overs here and there we need to tidy up … but the wicket definitely changes and gets a bit slower.”

De Kock and Markram (46 off 32 balls) dominated both spinners and the pacers as they raised a solid 110-run stand after Saurabh Netravalkar (2-21) had provided the early breakthrough by getting the wicket of Reeza Hendricks in his second over.

“We’ve had some tricky wickets so it was nice to spend some time in the middle today,” de Kock said. “The USA put us under pressure towards the end. It was a great game.”

Netravalkar, who bowled a sensational Super Over in the United States’ historic win over heavyweights Pakistan in the group stage, struck immediately in his return spell when Markram was brilliantly caught by diving Ali Khan at deep backward point off a full-pitched ball.

But Klaasen used all his T20 experience in the last five overs and struck three sixes while Tristan Stubbs also hit two fours in his 16-ball unbeaten 20 which lifted the South Africa total.

“Hard to take a defeat after coming so close,” Jones said. “We did lack discipline in the bowling at times, (but) once we play good cricket we can beat any team in the world. We need to be a lot more disciplined.”

England beats the West Indies

At Gros Islet, St Lucia, Salt carried his bat for 87 and Jonny Bairstow made an unbeaten 48 as defending champion England beat the West Indies by eight wickets in a match between two-time World Cup champions.

It was the West Indies’ first loss of the tournament and their first defeat in eight Twenty20 internationals.

The West Indies made 180-4 batting first on the same pitch on which they made 218-5 against Afghanistan in the final match of the group stage on Monday.

The fireworks came at the end and from England as Salt made his 87 runs from 47 balls with seven fours and five sixes and Bairstow added his 48 from 26 deliveries. England reached 181-2 with 15 balls to spare.

Salt provided a solid foundation for the England run chase, initially in a 67-run opening partnership with Jos Buttler.

Salt scored 30 runs — three sixes and three fours — from the 16th over bowled by Romario Shepherd.

“I’m not looking too far ahead at the minute, just glad that I could contribute to a good team win,” Salt said. “It was a little bit tougher in the middle overs with the spin.”

The pitch may have been a little slower than on Monday but England captain Buttler also used his bowlers well and the West Indies innings included 50 dot balls.

A capacity crowd in the first night match of the Super Eight stage was out to party but the match really didn’t come alive until the end.

The West Indies started well but were disrupted in the six-over power play by the loss of Brandon King who retired hurt after 4.3 overs with a side or groin strain. King had just hit the first six of the match, a 103-meter (338-foot) blow that flew over the grandstand and out of the stadium.

He made 23 from 13 balls and was setting the early pace of the innings when he was forced to retire with the West Indies at 40-0. There was no immediate word on the seriousness of King’s injury.

“Credit has to be given to the England bowling unit. You can see they had clear plans and executed them well,” West Indies captain Rovman Powell said.
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Washington — Families of Boeing 737 MAX crash victims on Wednesday asked U.S. authorities to impose a fine of up to $24.8 billion on the aviation giant and proceed with criminal prosecution.

The move comes a day after Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun acknowledged the gravity of the company’s safety problems and assured a U.S. congressional panel that it was making progress on the issue.

Sitting behind him in the audience were relatives of victims of the Boeing 737 MAX 8 crashes in 2018 and 2019, who held up victims’ photos.

“Because Boeing’s crime is the deadliest corporate crime in U.S. history, a maximum fine of more than $24 billion is legally justified and clearly appropriate,” Paul Cassell, a lawyer for the families, wrote in a letter to the U.S. Department of Justice.

The 32-page document explains the calculations behind the amount sought, saying Boeing “should be fined the maximum — $24,780,000,000 — with perhaps $14,000,000,000 to $22,000,0000,000 of the fine suspended on the condition that Boeing devote those suspended funds to an independent corporate monitor and related improvements in compliance and safety programs as identified below.”

It added: “And Boeing’s Board of Directors should be ordered to meet with the families.”

The families also believe the government should promptly “launch criminal prosecutions of the responsible corporate officials at Boeing at the time of the two crashes.”

The case relates to crashes in 2018 and 2019 in Indonesia and Ethiopia that together claimed 346 lives and comes as Boeing faces intensifying scrutiny following recent manufacturing and safety problems.

The aviation giant has again been in the public spotlight since a January 5 incident in which a 737 MAX operated by Alaska Airlines was forced to make an emergency landing after a fuselage panel blew out midflight.
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BATON ROUGE, Louisiana — Louisiana has become the first U.S. state to require that the Ten Commandments be displayed in every public school classroom, the latest move from a Republican-dominated legislature pushing a conservative agenda under a new governor. 

The legislation that Republican Governor Jeff Landry signed into law on Wednesday requires a poster-sized display of the Ten Commandments in “large, easily readable font” in all public classrooms, from kindergarten to state-funded universities. 

Opponents questioned the law’s constitutionality and vowed to challenge it in court. Proponents said the measure is not solely religious, but that it has historical significance. In the language of the law, the Ten Commandments are “foundational documents of our state and national government.” 

The posters, which will be paired with a four-paragraph “context statement” describing how the Ten Commandments “were a prominent part of American public education for almost three centuries,” must be in place in classrooms by the start of 2025. 

Under the law, state funds will not be used to implement the mandate. The posters would be paid for through donations. 

The law also “authorizes” but does not require the display of other items in K-12 public schools, including: The Mayflower Compact, which was signed by religious pilgrims aboard the Mayflower in 1620 and is often referred to as America’s “First Constitution”; the Declaration of Independence; and the Northwest Ordinance, which established a government in the Northwest Territory — in the present day Midwest — and created a pathway for admitting new states to the Union. 

Opponents vow to challenge law

Not long after the governor signed the bill into law at Our Lady of Fatima Catholic School in Lafayette on Wednesday, civil rights groups and organizations that want to keep religion out of government promised to file a lawsuit challenging it. 

The law prevents students from getting an equal education and will keep children who have different beliefs from feeling safe at school, the American Civil Liberties Union, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Freedom from Religion Foundation said in a joint statement Wednesday afternoon. 

“Even among those who may believe in some version of the Ten Commandments, the particular text that they adhere to can differ by religious denomination or tradition. The government should not be taking sides in this theological debate,” the groups said. 

The controversial law, in a state ensconced in the Bible Belt, comes during a new era of conservative leadership in Louisiana under Landry, who replaced two-term Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards in January. Republicans hold a supermajority in the legislature, and Republicans hold every statewide elected position, paving the way for lawmakers to push through a conservative agenda. 

Similar bills requiring the Ten Commandments be displayed in classrooms have been proposed in other states, including Texas, Oklahoma and Utah. However, with threats of legal battles over the constitutionality of such measures, no state besides Louisiana has succeeded in making the bills law. 

Similar law ruled unconstitutional

Legal battles over the display of the Ten Commandments in classrooms are not new. 

In 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a similar Kentucky law was unconstitutional and violated the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says Congress can “make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”  

The high court found that the law had no secular purpose but rather served a plainly religious purpose. 
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MEXICO CITY — Tropical Storm Alberto, the first named storm of 2024 Atlantic hurricane season, has formed over the western Gulf of Mexico, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC), said on Wednesday, bringing  flooding across the southern coast of the United States. 

The storm was located about 300 kilometers (186.4 miles) east of Tampico, Mexico, packing maximum sustained winds of 65 kilometers per hour (40.3 miles per hour), the forecaster said. Alberto is likely to dissipate over Mexico as early as Thursday night. 

The NHC said the storm was very large and that rainfall, coastal flooding and strong winds could occur far from the center along north-eastern Mexico and the south Texas coast.  

Heavy rains also will affect large regions of Central America, the NHC warned, a region that is still facing strong rains that left some 11 people dead in El Salvador over the weekend because of landslides and road accidents. 

“Life-threatening flooding and mudslides are likely in and near higher terrain across the Mexican states of Coahuila, Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas,” the NHC said, including the eastern city of Ciudad Victoria and Monterrey, Mexico’s third-biggest city in Nuevo Leon state. 

Nuevo Leon State Governor Samuel Garcia said on the social media platform X that people should avoid leaving the house or crossing waterways while it is raining and to keep emergency kits on hand. Workers were ready to address the possible impact of strong winds and rain on the electrical grid, water supplies, and sewage, he said. 

Across the Gulf on Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, local media reported strong winds and torrential rains. Some authorities, however, said the storm could help fill the country’s dams, depleted by an extended drought. 

The NHC predicted “moderate coastal flooding” along much of the Texan coast through Thursday as southern areas experience tropical storm conditions.  

Forecasters have warned that this year’s Atlantic hurricane season will likely be highly active because of impacts from the La Nina weather pattern and warmer ocean water. 
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Two years ago this month, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed its 1973 ruling that legalized abortion. Now, abortion looms as a major issue in this year’s elections. VOA’s senior Washington correspondent Carolyn Presutti looks at how the issue is charging the presidential campaign.
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