U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said Friday that President Donald Trump is still weighing options in response to a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria that Washington believes President Bashar al-Assad carried out.

“Our president has not yet made a decision about possible actions in Syria,” Haley told a meeting of the U.N. Security Council. “But should the United States and our allies decide to act in Syria, it will be in defense of a principle on which we all agree. It will be in defense of a bedrock international norm that benefits all nations.”

Haley told reporters on her way into the council session that she would be returning to Washington on Friday for more meetings on a potential response.

“I am unbelievably proud of how President Trump has looked at the information, analyzed, not let anyone rush him into this, because he has said from the beginning — we have to know when we’re right, we have to know all the information, we have to know that there’s proof and we have to know that we’re taking every precaution necessary should we take action,” she told reporters.

At least 40 people were killed and hundreds sickened in last week’s attack in Douma, in eastern Ghouta on the outskirts of Damascus.

“At some point, you have to do something,” Haley said. “At some point, you have to say enough.”

Syria has denied using chemical weapons, but Haley criticized the Syrian president for the repeated use of chlorine and sarin gas on civilians.

“Let’s be clear: Assad’s most recent use of poison gas against the people of Douma was not his first, second, third, or even 49th use of chemical weapons,” the U.N. ambassador said. “The United States estimates that Assad has used chemical weapons in the Syrian war at least 50 times. Public estimates are as high as 200.”

Russia

She chastised Russia for steadfastly protecting Assad from accountability with its Security Council veto and for not living up to its obligations in making sure Syria gave up all of its chemical weapons under a 2013 deal.

“Russia can complain all it wants about fake news, but no one is buying its lies and its cover-ups,” Haley said.

Russia called Friday’s Security Council meeting, the fourth day this week it has discussed Syria. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said his government has worked “robustly and fully” to de-escalate tensions in international relations. He said Moscow sponsored and supported the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) sending a fact-finding mission to Douma to investigate, but the U.S., Britain and France had rejected it.

“Thereby, these countries have demonstrated they have no interest in an investigation,” Nebenzia said. “The sole thing they have an interest in is to oust the Syrian government and, more broadly, to deter and contain the Russian Federation.”

A measure put forward by Moscow supporting an OPCW investigation, but not a mechanism to attribute blame for chemical attacks, failed to pass the Security Council on Tuesday, garnering support from six of the 15 council members.

OPCW inspectors have arrived in Syria and are scheduled to begin collecting samples Saturday in Douma.

Britain, France

The United States has been in close consultations with allies Britain and France on what response it should take.

French envoy Francois Delattre said Assad’s government had “reached a point of no return” with its most recent chemical weapons attack.

“This is a situation to which the world must provide robust, united and steadfast response and this is our responsibility,” Delattre told the council Friday.

He said France would “shoulder its responsibility to end an intolerable threat to our collective security,” and ensure respect for international law and Security Council resolutions.

“The use of chemical weapons cannot be allowed to go unchallenged,” said British Ambassador Karen Pierce. “The British Cabinet has agreed on the need to take action to alleviate humanitarian distress and to deter the further use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime, and we will continue to work with our friends and allies to coordinate an international response to that end.”

As the international community waits to see if there will be a military response, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned of the dangers of escalation.

“Increasing tensions and the inability to reach a compromise in the establishment of an accountability mechanism threaten to lead to a full-blown military escalation,” he said. “In my contacts with you — especially with the Permanent Members of the Security Council — I have been reiterating my deep concerns about the risks of the current impasse and stressed the need to avoid the situation spiraling out of control.”

Guterres added that the situation in Syria is now the “most serious threat to international peace and security.”
…

Trade and North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs will be the key topics for Japan during U.S. President Donald Trump’s meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe next week.

Earlier this month, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga spoke on Japan’s priorities for the upcoming meeting. He said addressing how to handle the North Korean missile situation is high on the agenda, as is trade.

“We anticipate discussions on the importance of free trade — since that is of interest to us,” he said.

Trump hit Japan and many other countries with aluminum and steel trade restrictions last month. Japan has been asking that the restrictions to be lifted.

“The U.S. wants Japan to complain about the tariff and then wants to talk about a bilateral treaty,” said Hajime Izumi, professor of international relations at Tokyo International University. “From the Japan side, they aren’t interested in doing a bilateral FTA [Free Trade Agreement]. This is not going to be easy.”

That’s because Japan has just signed on to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) with 10 other countries. Critics say Abe is unlikely to coax Trump to reconsider joining the trade pact, and Trump may see similar results on a bilateral proposal.

Another key topic: the North Korea missile situation. Critics say Japan will remind Trump to negotiate on all types of missiles, and not just long-range missiles that would reach American soil.

“While the U.S. is trying to address the issue of intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the United States, from the Japanese perspective, what is more important is the medium-range ballistic missiles with a range of 1,300 kilometers, capable of reaching most parts of Japan, including Tokyo,” said Narushige Michishita, professor of securities and international studies, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies.

Meanwhile, some Japanese analysts observed that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping last month indicated North Korea’s nervousness about the upcoming talks with Washington.

“Eventually, [the U.S. and North Korea] may conclude that all the diplomatic efforts have been exhausted,” said Kunihiko Miyake, president of the Foreign Policy Institute in Tokyo. “That’s when the Americans might or could contemplate a possibly harsher, more physical measure against North Korea. That’s what North Koreans are most concerned about.”

Miyake raises the possibility of a meeting between Kim and Russian President Vladimir Putin, as indicated in an envoy meeting with top Russian diplomats April 10.

“[North Korea is] fully aware of the military disadvantages vis-à-vis against the Americans,” said Miyake. “That’s why [North Korea needs] to talk to the Russians and Chinese to prevent that kind of worst-case scenario from happening.”

Miyake said North Koreans had nothing to offer to Russia or China but “their existence, as a buffer against the U.S. control over the Korean peninsula.”

Abduction issue

Many critics say a sure topic will be the Japan abduction issue, a domestic priority rivaling the North Korean missiles in importance.

Former North Korean leader Kim Jong Il admitted in 2002 that its agents had abducted Japanese citizens in the 1970 and ’80s. Several were returned, but Tokyo has since demanded more information.

“There is a possibility some of [the abductees are] still there, living in North Korea,” said Michishita. “So we have to take them back. It’s a real issue.”

Another point critics are betting on is that true denuclearization of North Korea will be a long way away, even if a Trump-Kim meeting happens and even if North Korea says it will denuclearize.

“Trump must have been informed or convinced by now that the word ‘denuclearization’ has many meanings,” Miyake said. “Denuclearization of the North means dismantling North Korean missiles, but denuclearization of the Korean peninsula — which was agreed upon with China — means they want to basically kick the U.S. out of the Korean peninsula.”

Trump and Abe are expected to agree to continue applying maximum pressure against North Korea until talks produce meaningful progress.
…

Lawyers for President Donald Trump and his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, told a federal judge in New York on Friday that they believe some of the documents and devices seized from Cohen during an FBI raid are protected by attorney-client privilege, and they want a chance to review the items before prosecutors get to examine them.

In the hour-long court hearing, U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood said Cohen’s lawyers have asked to “take the first cut at identifying documents that are relevant or not relevant to the investigation.”

An attorney for the president, Joanna Hendon, appeared as well, telling the judge Trump has “an acute interest in this matter.”

“This is of most concern to him. I think the public is a close second. And anyone who has ever hired a lawyer a close third,” she said.

Federal agents seized records on a variety of subjects in raids Monday on Cohen’s Manhattan office, apartment and hotel room, including payments that were made in 2016 to women who might have damaging information about Trump.

The court hearing Friday didn’t provide new insight into why agents seized the items, but the judge, prosecutors and the attorneys all spoke openly about an investigation that previously has been shrouded in secrecy.

Wood adjourned the hearing until 2 p.m. It was unclear whether that session will be open or closed to the public. The judge said sealing the proceedings might be needed to protect “the privacy interests of potentially innocent people.”

FBI and Justice Department officials have refused to say what crimes they are investigating, but people familiar with the investigation have told The Associated Press the search warrant used in the raids sought bank records, business records on Cohen’s dealing in the taxi industry, Cohen’s communications with the Trump campaign and information on payments made to a former Playboy model, Karen McDougal, and a porn actress, Stephanie Clifford, who performs under the name Stormy Daniels. Both women say they had affairs with Trump.

Clifford’s lawyer, Michael Avenatti, was in the audience for the court session and asked the judge to be heard at 2 p.m.

“We have every reason to believe that some of the documents seized relate to my client,” he said.

Cohen has denied wrongdoing.

Trump has called the raids a “witch hunt,” “an attack on our country,” and a violation of rules that ordinarily make attorney client communications confidential.

Those confidentiality rules can be set aside under certain circumstances if investigators have evidence that a crime has been committed.

Public corruption prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan are trying to determine, according to one person familiar with the investigation, if there was any fraud related to payments to McDougal and Clifford.

McDougal was paid $150,000 in the summer of 2016 by the parent company of the National Enquirer under an agreement that gave it the exclusive rights to her story, which it never published.Cohen said he paid Daniels $130,000 in exchange for her silence about her claim to have had a one-night-stand with Trump.

The White House has consistently said Trump denies either affair.
…

A six-month budget truce stitched together by Congress in March could unravel if Republican leaders vying to replace U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan indulge party conservatives who want to renege on critical parts of the pact.

At issue is a resurgent move by conservative Republicans to rescind, or cut, about $60 billion in non-defense domestic spending increases that were key to winning Democratic votes.

That deal also significantly raised U.S. military spending this year as demanded by Republicans.

Provocative cuts

Those seeking the cuts would need the support of Republican House leaders, such as Kevin McCarthy and Steve Scalise, both seen as potential rivals to replace Ryan as the No. 1 House Republican and, if the party retains its majority in November elections, as speaker.

McCarthy, the House majority leader, talked up the provocative spending cuts Thursday. In a statement, he said Republicans were “looking at other tools to cut spending” and added: “We have nothing to lose by making big changes.”

One of several Republicans who will have a say in the budding battle, McCarthy explicitly mentioned using a procedural tool known as rescissions in which President Donald Trump could team up with Republicans to kill off the non-military spending increases.

Allowing that to happen could rekindle the budget battles that consumed Congress for much of 2017 and early 2018, a scenario lawmakers had hoped the $1.3 trillion March spending bill had averted through November’s congressional elections.

‘Chilling effect’

Both Democrats and moderate Republicans warned against such an outcome. 

“Bad idea,” said Republican Representative Charlie Dent. “If they want to go down this path, which won’t be successful … we wouldn’t be able to pass an appropriations bill” for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, he said.

More broadly, he added, trashing the spending deal would “have a chilling effect” on all sorts of future legislation.

Ryan and enough rank-and-file Republicans could link arms with Democrats to defend the spending deal enacted into law March 23 and prevent a resumption of hostilities over the budget.

Doing so, however, could risk alienating Republican conservatives such as Representative Jim Jordan, a leading member of the right-wing House Freedom Caucus, at a politically delicate time given the looming leadership shake-up in the House and November’s elections that have Republicans struggling to persuade voters of their fiscal conservatism.

“Let’s get aggressive,” Jordan told reporters just hours after Ryan said Wednesday that he would quit Congress at the end of 2018, setting up an internal struggle to replace him.

FBI oversight

Jordan urged pushing for the cuts to Democrats’ domestic priorities, along with welfare changes and tougher oversight of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which has investigated Russia’s role in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Any ambitious House leader could help his or her cause by agreeing to the conservatives’ demands, in part a response to the huge deficit expansion created by the spending deal and December’s Republican tax overhaul package.
…

The U.S. Interior Department will hike fees at the most popular national parks to $35 a vehicle, backing off a plan that would have cost visitors $70 a vehicle to visit Yellowstone and other well-known parks, the agency said Thursday.

The new plan boosts fees at 117 parks by $5, up from the current $30 but half the figure the Interior Department proposed in October for peak-season visitors at 17 heavily visited parks, it said in a statement.

The fee increase would help finance a $11.6 billion backlog of maintenance and improvements. The proposal generated a wave of protests, and the Interior Department had to extend its comment period by 30 days to accommodate the more than 100,000 responses it received.

“This new fee structure addresses many of the concerns and ideas provided by the public regarding how to best address fee revenue for parks,” the department’s statement said.

The new charges go into effect June 1, and more than two-thirds of national parks will remain free to enter, it said.

Federal law requires that 80 percent of revenue generated at a national park remains where it is collected. The remaining funds can be funneled to other projects within the system.
…

A federal jury in Washington on Thursday convicted former Texas Republican Congressman Stephen Stockman of numerous counts of fraud, including stealing charitable contributions for campaign and personal expenses.

U.S. attorneys said Stockman used his position as a public servant to defraud donors and break federal law.

They say his conviction shows no one is above the law.

Stockman was charged with 23 counts, including money laundering, mail and wire fraud, and lying to federal election officials.

Among the charges, Stockman solicited more than $1 million in charitable contributions on false pretenses and used much of the money to pay for his election campaign and other personal expenses.

He also spent some of the funds to illegally spy on a political opponent in his failed 2014 campaign for the U.S. Senate.

Two former Stockman aides already had pleaded guilty in their roles in the scheme.

Stockman, a Republican, served two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives from Texas, from 1995 to 1997 and again from 2013 to 2015.

He is to be sentenced August 17.
…

A data leak that enabled political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica to access personal information from about 87 million Facebook users has generated an uproar and concerns over online privacy and the power of the major internet platforms. On VOA’s Plugged In with Greta Van Susteren experts explore the issue and next steps to better protect user privacy while also preserving internet openness. VOA’s Jesusemen Oni has more.
…

U.S. lawmakers are about to get a glimpse into the world view of the man tapped by President Donald Trump to shape U.S. foreign policy. Trump’s nominee for Secretary of State, CIA Director Mike Pompeo, will be on Capitol Hill Thursday for confirmation hearings. Pompeo’s attitudes on perceived global threats posed by North Korea, Iran and Russia are certain to topics of discussion, as VOA’s Robert Raffaele explains.
…

A decision by U.S. President Donald Trump not to renew sanctions relief for Iran on May 12 would not necessarily mean the United States had withdrawn from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Wednesday.

It was not immediately clear what Mnuchin meant by his comment, but it appeared to signal the Trump administration believes the agreement will not necessarily collapse if Trump chooses not to extend U.S. sanctions relief to Iran.

The crux of the 2015 agreement between Iran and six major powers — Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States — was that Iran would restrict its nuclear program in return for relief from sanctions that have crippled its economy.

On January 12, Trump delivered an ultimatum to Britain, France and Germany, saying they must agree to “fix the terrible flaws of the Iran nuclear deal” or he would refuse to extend the U.S. sanctions relief on Iran that it calls for.

U.S. sanctions will resume unless Trump issues new “waivers” to suspend them May 12, although it is not clear how quickly they would go into effect.

Negotiations underway

European officials saw Trump’s January 12 comments as a threat to kill the deal. They have since been in negotiations with the Trump administration to see if there is a way to salvage it.

Speaking at a congressional hearing, Mnuchin said the Trump administration was in talks with allies and would “not do anything abruptly.”

“If the president decides not to sign that (waiver), it doesn’t mean we’re necessarily pulling out of the deal. What it means is that the primary and secondary sanctions will go back in place,” he told the U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Committee.

The political directors of Britain, France and Germany met Brian Hook, the State Department’s director of policy planning, in Washington on Wednesday to discuss the future of the pact, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, two sources familiar with the matter said.

It is not immediately clear how Iran might respond to a Trump decision not to renew the sanctions waivers, but Tehran would be within its rights to argue the United States violated its commitments to ease sanctions even as Iran, as verified by international inspectors, had kept its nuclear commitments.

U.S. nuclear experts say if Trump does not waive the sanctions in May, it effectively kills the nuclear deal.

European diplomats have said that even if U.S. allies decide to remain in the agreement, Western companies would withdraw from Iran because of the threat of U.S. sanctions.

‘All about lifting the sanctions’

Democratic Representative David Price pressed Mnuchin on the issue, saying: “Are you saying that failing to waive the sanctions would not constitute pulling out of the deal? The deal is all about lifting the sanctions.”

Mnuchin did not answer the question directly.

The secretary declined to speculate on what Trump might do, repeatedly emphasizing he could not discuss the issue publicly.

Trump has voiced frustration at having to waive the sanctions again, believing his predecessor, Democratic President Barack Obama, negotiated a bad deal for the United States in agreeing to the accord.

Iran says its nuclear program is only for peaceful purposes. It has said it will stick to the accord as long as the other signatories respect it but will “shred” the deal if Washington pulls out.
…

U.S. media reports say House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan will not run for re-election this November.

Ryan, a Republican from Wisconsin, has been House speaker since 2015.

He has served in the House since 1999.
…

As thousands of National Guard troops deploy to the Mexico border, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions plans to bring his firm stance on immigration enforcement to New Mexico where a group of Southwest border sheriffs are meeting Wednesday.

Sessions will speak in Las Cruces at the Texas Border Sheriff’s Coalition Annual Spring Meeting with the Southwestern Border Sheriff’s Coalition, which is made up of 31 sheriff’s departments from Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California. 

Their counties are located within 25 miles (40 kilometers) of the U.S.-Mexico border.

Immigrant rights activists promised to protest Sessions’ visit on Wednesday, as they rejected his past characterization of the border region during a 2017 visit to El Paso, Texas, as “ground zero” in the Trump administration’s fight against cartels, and human traffickers. 

“He treated our home like a war zone, referring to it as ‘ground zero,”’ said Fernando Garcia, executive director of the Border Network for Human Rights in El Paso. “He was wrong then, and he is wrong now.” 

El Paso is some 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Las Cruces.

Sessions’ trip to Las Cruces, a city about an hour north of the border, comes as construction begins nearby on 20-miles (32-kilometers) of steel fencing that officials say is a part of President Donald Trump’s promised wall. 

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials have described the new, heightened barrier as a structure that will be harder to get over, under and through than the old post and rail barriers that has lined the stretch of the border’s El Paso sector. 

Sessions has issued an order directing federal prosecutors to put more emphasis on charging people with illegal entry, citing a “crisis” on the border. 

A 37 percent increase in illegal border crossings in March brought more than 50,000 immigrants into the United States, which was triple the number of reported illegal border crossings in the same period last year. It was still far lower, however, than the surges during the last years of the Obama administration and prior decades. 

The attorney general’s “zero-tolerance” for border-crossing prosecutions calls for taking action against people who are caught illegally entering the United States for the first time. In the past, such offenses have been treated as misdemeanors. 

He also recently set quotas for immigration judges to reduce enormous court backlogs, saying they must complete 700 cases a year to earn a satisfactory grade. The quotas take effect Oct. 1. 
…