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JUBA (Reuters) - A South Sudanese rebel group on Friday accused government troops of attacking their base only a day after the parties signed a ceasefire in a four-year war that has killed tens of thousands of people. The ceasefire, that would allow humanitarian groups access to civilians caught in the fighting, formally comes into force on Sunday morning. On Friday afternoon, a spokesman for the SPLA-IO rebel group said army forces had attacked a rebel base in Deim Jalab, in the western part of the country. Lam Paul Gabriel said two rebels and five government troops were killed in the fighting. The army spokesman in the capital, Juba, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The war that began in late 2013 in the world s youngest nation has forced a third of the population to flee their homes. The United Nations describes the violence as ethnic cleansing. Earlier this year, pockets of the country plunged briefly into famine. The latest round of talks in the Ethiopian capital, convened by the East African bloc IGAD, brought the warring sides back to the negotiating table after a 2015 peace deal collapsed last year during heavy fighting in Juba. After the new agreement was signed on Thursday, South Sudan s Information Minister Michael Makuei Leuth told journalists: The cessation of hostilities will be effective 72 hours from now. As of now, we will send messages to all the commands in the field to abide by this cessation of hostilities. From now onwards, there will be no more fighting, he added. Just talks. The German foreign ministry welcomed the agreement as an important step toward bringing peace to South Sudan. We call on all participating parties to implement the agreement in a comprehensive and sustainable manner, and to ensure that humanitarian organizations are not hindered in doing their work, a ministry spokeswoman said.

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HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe s ruling ZANU-PF party has given Robert Mugabe until noon (5.00 a.m. ET) on Monday to step down as President or face impeachment, cyber security minister Patrick Chinamasa said on Sunday. He was speaking at a televised news conference after a special party meeting at which Mugabe was sacked as ZANU-PF leader.

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SYDNEY (Reuters) - Australia will extend its Pacific Islands migrant labor program and fly aerial surveillance missions to protect valuable Pacific fisheries, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said at the Pacific Island Leaders Forum. The meeting, held in Apia, Samoa, brought 17 Pacific Island nations plus Australia and New Zealand to the negotiating table. The new agreement helps tiny low-income Pacific Island nations by giving them access to Australia s large and developed economy, with migrant workers repatriating funds via overseas remittances. The per capita gross national incomes of 11 countries in the region range from $1,540 for the Solomon Islands to $13,496 for Palau, according to World Bank figures, while Australian workers earn an average yearly salary of more than $64,000. Australia s population of 24 million people is highly urbanized, leading to labor shortages in rural areas. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull signed an agreement on Friday to allow 2,000 Islanders to work in rural areas over the next three years, adding to an existing seasonal worker program which supplies agricultural labor. The micro-nations of Kiribati, Nauru and Tuvalu will have first access to the scheme, which will allow workers to engage in non-farm work such as care of the elderly. The World Bank said it was in Australia s interests to encourage stability. Aid dependency in the region is high, and reliance on aid alone is an unbalanced strategy. By improving employment prospects and increasing remittance flows, labor mobility helps stabilize otherwise fragile states, it said in a new report, Pacific Possible, released at the forum. The report said the Pacific region had the potential to create more than 500,000 new jobs and increase incomes by more than 40 percent by 2040, if they focused on developing key areas such as tourism and fisheries. The western and central Pacific Ocean covers about 8 percent of the world s ocean mass and contains the last healthy tuna stocks, supplying 60 percent of the world s tuna, the report said. Australia has agreed to fund aerial surveillance for Pacific Island member states to combat illegal fishing, with the planes to be in the air by the end of this year.

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ROME (Reuters) - Italy seized more than 24 million tablets of a synthetic opiate that Islamic State militants planned to sell to finance attacks around the world, the head of a southern Italian court said on Friday. The pills were seized by finance police and customs officials in the container port of Gioia Tauro, Italy s biggest, according to a statement. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration collaborated in the investigation. A video shows police opening a container filled with boxes of Tramadol, a powerful painkiller normally available only on prescription. With an average sale price of about 2 euros ($2.33) per tablet, the haul was worth 50 million euros, the statement said. Foreign investigators told the court in the city of Reggio Calabria that the drugs belonged to Islamic State. The drugs sales were managed directly by Islamic State to finance the terrorist activities planned and carried out around the world , Reggio Calabria s chief prosecutor Federico Cafiero De Raho said. Part of the illegal profit from their sale would have been used to finance extremist groups in Libya, Syria and Iraq, he said. The seizure comes three days after an Uzbek immigrant, Sayfullo Saipov, drove a truck on a New York City bike path, killing eight, in the latest attack claimed by Islamic State. No details on how the illegal shipment was discovered or on its final destination were provided by the court. A similar shipment was discovered in Greece last year, and an even larger one was found in Italy s Genoa port in May.

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NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (Reuters) - President Donald Trump told reporters on Thursday he has “total” confidence in Attorney General Jeff Sessions amid a controversy over Sessions’ meetings with a Russian diplomat last year. Trump made the comment while preparing to deliver a speech about his proposed defense buildup aboard the Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier.

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OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he spoke with U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday about the air strikes on Syria, adding that Canada had been informed about the strikes about an hour before they occurred on Thursday. “Last night the United States Secretary of Defence briefed Canada’s Minister of Defence in advance of the American military strike in Syria. The Minister of Defence then immediately briefed me. This morning, I spoke with the President directly and emphasized that Canada agrees that Assad’s repeated use of chemical weapons must not continue,” Trudeau told parliament. Trudeau did not indicate what Trump said to him during the phone call.

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NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya s Supreme Court on Wednesday criticized the election board for failing to verify official results of last month s presidential election before announcing them, but did not find any individual at the board responsible for the failings. The court was offering a detailed ruling as to why it annulled the Aug. 8 election and ordered a fresh presidential vote within 60 days. The Sept. 1 decision was the first of its kind in Africa. The election board had said incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta won the contest by 1.4 million votes, but opposition leader Raila Odinga challenged the result in the Supreme Court. He says the previous two elections were also stolen from him. Kenya is a key Western ally in a region often shaken by violence. Its status as a diplomatic, trade and security hub for East Africa means the court s ruling and preparation for the fresh election, now scheduled for Oct. 17, are being closely watched for signs of instability or violence. On Monday, the French technology company supporting the election said it would be nearly impossible to be ready for that date. The court s Sept. 1 ruling identified some procedural problems, but the key finding against the election board on Wednesday was that officials had announced results before being able to verify them. Kenya used two parallel systems: a quick electronic tally vulnerable to typos and a slower paper system designed as a verifiable, definitive back-up. The official results were based on the electronic tally before the paper results were fully collated, the judges said. The system was designed that way after a disputed 2007 presidential vote sparked violence that killed around 1,200 people and displaced some 600,000 more. If elections are not seen to be free and fair, they can trigger instability. We do not need to look far for examples, said Chief Justice David Maraga. The board overseeing the 2017 vote did not have all the tally forms when it announced results, and some forms lacked security features like water marks, signatures or serial numbers, which calls their authenticity into question, the court said, adding there was no evidence of individual wrongdoing. Though the petitioner claimed various offences were committed by the issues of the first respondent, that is the IEBC (elections board), no evidence was placed before us to prove that allegation, Maraga said. We are therefore unable to impute any criminal intent or culpability. Odinga has said he will not take part in the repeat election if several demands, including the sacking of senior staff at the election board, are not met. Judge Philomena Mwilu said the forms should have been quickly available for inspection, noting officials said thousands of forms from polling stations were still unavailable four days after the official results were announced. The (board) cannot therefore be said to have verified the results, she said. It is an inexcusable contravention ... of the election act. She also censured the board s refusal to comply with court orders to open its computer servers, saying it meant that opposition claims of hacking or manipulation might be true. Noncompliance or failure by the board to do as ordered must be held against it, she said. But although the tallying process was questioned, voter registration, identification and voting all appeared to have been conducted in accordance with the law, she said. Opposition claims against Kenyatta were largely dismissed. Maraga said the opposition had failed to show evidence Kenyatta had campaigned using state resources or undue influence. Two judges read lengthy dissenting opinions and accused their four colleagues who issued the majority judgment of misinterpreting the law and other failings, including not paying attention to the evidence and judicial limits. As judges spoke, police used tear gas to disperse groups of rival political supporters holding demonstrations outside the Supreme Court. The election re-run has divided Kenya, with many opposition supporters celebrating it and the president and some members of the ruling party criticizing it harshly. After the majority decision was read, Deputy President William Rut tweeted: Evidently a supreme coup on sovereign Will of the people was executed on basis of technicalities against their verdict captured in ballots. On Tuesday, the chief justice told a news conference that judges were getting threats and the police were not offering adequate protection, an allegation that the chief of police denied.

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MOSCOW (Reuters) - Moscow expects new complications in its relationship with the United States in early 2018 because of possible new U.S. sanctions on Russia, the RIA news agency cited Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov as saying on Tuesday. Ryabkov said Washington could resort to new destructive impulses ahead of next year s Russian presidential election, RIA reported.

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MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - The fourth round of talks to renegotiate the North American Free Trade agreement have been prolonged until Oct. 17, two sources in Mexico said on Tuesday, as negotiators gathering in Washington were expected to start tackling difficult issues. The round of talks due to begin on Wednesday is expected to include discussions about including quotas for U.S. content in autos, a major bone of contention for Mexico, Canada and many companies. Previously, the talks were due to end on Oct. 15. The news was first reported by Bloomberg earlier on Tuesday.

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GENEVA (Reuters) - The European Union s support for the Libyan coast guard is leading to the arbitrary and indefinite imprisonment of migrants in inhuman conditions, the U.N. human rights chief said on Tuesday. The EU anti-trafficking mission Sophia has helped train Tripoli s coast guard, while Italy has supplied it with four patrol boats. Italy also has sent millions of euros and a navy repair ship to fix Libya s marine fleet. So far in 2017, the Libyans have intercepted almost 20,000 migrants at sea, according to the International Organization for Migration. After being taken from the boats, they are brought to land and put in detention centers that were visited by United Nations personnel. Monitors were shocked by what they witnessed, High Commissioner on Human Rights Zeid Ra ad Al Hussein said in a statement. They saw thousands of emaciated and traumatized men, women and children piled on top of each other, locked up in hangars with no access to the most basic necessities, and stripped of their human dignity, he said. Some 20,000 people are now being held in facilities controlled by Tripoli s migration department, up from 7,000 in September, the U.N. said in a statement. While U.N. agencies and other humanitarian groups have access to them and seek to provide health care and some food, Zeid said it was not enough because the EU and its member states have done nothing so far to reduce the level of abuses suffered by migrants . Just a day ago, European and African ministers repeated a pledge to try to improve conditions for migrants in Libya, and on Saturday Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni hailed Italian immigration policy. Italy is the only country in Europe with a decent migration policy, Gentiloni said. We re proud because we don t build walls or close ports. But it was Italy that struck a deal with the U.N.-backed Tripoli in February, which was endorsed by the whole of the EU, aimed at blocking migrants in Libya, much as the EU deal with Turkey did last year. That agreement, combined with the support for the Libyan coast guard, has brought migrant sea arrivals down dramatically in recent months. This year there have been 115,000 sea arrivals in Italy, down 31 percent from last year, official data from Italy s Interior Ministry show. In October alone arrivals dropped by 76 percent from a year earlier.

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PARIS (Reuters) - France is considering whether to host a meeting of the International Lebanon Support Group to discuss the political crisis in the country, a French presidential source said on Saturday. The source said there was no decision yet on whether it would take place or whether it would be a ministerial meeting. The group includes Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States - the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. (This story has been refiled to remove reference to Germany in third paragraph.)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump is sending his son-in-law Jared Kushner and negotiator Jason Greenblatt to the Middle East soon to meet regional leaders and discuss a “path to substantive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks,” a White House official said on Friday. Deputy national security adviser Dina Powell will also be on the trip, which will include meetings with leaders from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, Egypt, Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the official said. “While the regional talks will play an important role, the president reaffirms that peace between Israelis and Palestinians can only be negotiated directly between the two parties and that the United States will continue working closely with the parties to make progress towards that goal,” the official said. Kushner, who serves as a senior adviser to his father-in-law, was charged with helping to broker a deal between Israelis and Palestinians after Trump took office. The president went to Saudi Arabia and Israel during his first post-inauguration trip abroad and has expressed a personal commitment to reaching a deal that has eluded his Republican and Democratic predecessors. The timing of the trip was pegged to the recent “restoration of calm and the stabilized situation in Jerusalem” after a spate of violence last month sparked by Israel’s installation of metal detectors at entry points to the Noble Sanctuary or Temple Mount compound there. Trump directed that the talks focus on a pathway to peace talks, fighting “extremism,” easing the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and identifying economic steps that can be taken to ensure security and stability, the official said. “To enhance the chances for peace, all parties need to engage in creating an environment conducive to peace-making while affording the negotiators and facilitators the time and space they need to reach a deal,” the official said.

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SEOUL (Reuters) - At least four defectors from North Korea have shown signs of radiation exposure, the South Korean government said on Wednesday, although researchers could not confirm if they were was related to Pyongyang s nuclear weapons program. The four are among 30 former residents of Kilju county, an area in North Korea that includes the nuclear test site Punggye-ri, who have been examined by the South Korean government since October, a month after the North conducted its sixth and most powerful nuclear test, Unification Ministry spokesman Baik Tae-hyun told a news briefing. They were exposed to radiation between May 2009 and January 2013, and all defected to the South before the most recent test, a researcher at the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute, which carried out the examinations, told reporters. North Korea has conducted six nuclear bomb tests since 2006, all in tunnels deep beneath the mountains of Punggye-ri, in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions and international condemnation. The researcher cautioned that there were a number of ways people may be exposed to radiation, and that none of the defectors who lived had lived in Punggye-ri itself showed specific symptoms. A series of small earthquakes in the wake of the last test - which the North claimed to be of a hydrogen bomb - prompted suspicions that it may have damaged the mountainous location in the northwest tip of the country. Experts warned that further tests in the area could risk radioactive pollution. After the Sept. 3 nuclear test, China s Nuclear Safety Administration said it had begun emergency monitoring for radiation along its border with North Korea. And in early December, a state-run newspaper in China s Jilin province, which borders North Korea and Russia, published a page of common sense advice on how readers can protect themselves from a nuclear weapons attack or explosion. Cartoon illustrations of ways to dispel radioactive contamination were also provided, such as using water to wash off shoes and using cotton buds to clean ears, as well as a picture of a vomiting child to show how medical help can be sought to speed the expulsion of radiation through stomach pumping and induced urination.

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BEIRUT (Reuters) - Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Friday an Israeli war with Lebanon was unlikely and warned Israel against exploiting the current political crisis in Lebanon. Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri resigned in a speech from Saudi Arabia on Saturday and has yet to return to Lebanon. In a televised address Nasrallah said he believes Hariri is being detained in Riyadh.

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LONDON (Reuters) - A woman at London s Parsons Green underground train station told Reuters on Friday she was injured in a stampede. Armed police were at the scene, a Reuters photographer said. A blast on an underground train at Parsons Green left some passengers with facial burns at the station, London s Metro newspaper reported on its website.

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BEIJING (Reuters) - The United States said on Saturday it was directly communicating with North Korea on its nuclear and missile programs but Pyongyang had shown no interest in dialogue. The disclosure by U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson during a trip to China represented the first time he has spoken to such an extent about U.S. outreach to North Korea over its pursuit of a nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile. “We are probing so stay tuned,” Tillerson told a group of reporters in Beijing. “We ask: ‘Would you like to talk?’ We have lines of communications to Pyongyang. We’re not in a dark situation, a blackout.” He said that communication was happening directly and cited two or three U.S. channels open to Pyongyang. “We can talk to them. We do talk to them,” he said, without elaborating about which Americans were involved in those contacts or how frequent or substantive they were. The goal of any initial dialogue would be simple: finding out directly from North Korea what it wants to discuss. “We haven’t even gotten that far yet,” he said. Trying to tamp down expectations, the State Department said later there were no signs Pyongyang was interested in talks. “North Korean officials have shown no indication that they are interested in or are ready for talks regarding denuclearization,” department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement. Tillerson previously had offered little detail about U.S. outreach. On Sept. 20, he acknowledged only “very, very limited” contact with Pyongyang’s U.N. envoy. When asked about Tillerson’s assertion and what communication there might be between Pyongyang and Washington, a spokesman for the North Korean mission to the United Nations said he “can’t go further into detail.” Tillerson’s remarks followed a day of meetings in Beijing, which has been alarmed by recent exchanges of war-like threats and personal insults between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump. “I think the whole situation’s a bit overheated right now,” Tillerson said. “I think everyone would like for it to calm down. “Obviously it would help if North Korea would stop firing off missiles. That’d calm things down a lot.” South Korean officials have voiced concerns that North Korea could conduct more provocative acts near the anniversary of the founding of its communist party on Oct. 10, or possibly when China holds its Communist Party Congress on Oct. 18. North Korea is fast advancing toward its goal of developing a nuclear-tipped missile capable of hitting the U.S. mainland. It conducted its sixth and largest nuclear test on Sept. 3 and has threatened to test a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific. U.S. officials including Tillerson say Beijing, after long accounting for some 90 percent of North Korea’s foreign trade, appears increasingly willing to cut ties to its neighbor’s economy by adopting U.N. sanctions. Tillerson said China’s more assertive posture was due to its realization that North Korea’s nuclear and missile capabilities had advanced too far. “I think they also have a sense that we’re beginning to run out of time and that we really have to change the dynamic,” Tillerson said. The goal of the sanctions would be getting North Korea’s Kim to view nuclear weapons as a liability, not a strength. Still, the U.S. intelligence community does not believe Kim is likely to give up his weapons program willingly, regardless of sanctions. “(Tillerson’s) working against the unified view of our intelligence agencies, which say there’s no amount of pressure that can be put on them to stop,” Senator Bob Corker told a hearing at the chamber on Thursday. Kim sees nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles as “his ticket to survival,” Corker said. Tillerson agreed that Kim’s nuclear and missile programs were aimed at ensuring his own security, and renewed assurances that the United States did not seek to topple Kim’s government. “Look, our objective is denuclearization (of North Korea),” he said. “Our objective is not to get rid of you. Our objective is not to collapse your regime.” It is unclear how and when any actual negotiations with Pyongyang might be possible. White House national security adviser H.R. McMaster said on Monday there were no set preconditions for talks. He added, however, that Pyongyang’s capabilities were too far advanced to simply freeze its program in return for concessions. He also dismissed the idea of negotiating with Pyongyang even as it continued to develop its nuclear weapons program. Tillerson in March suggested the United States would only engage North Korea in negotiations once it gave up nuclear weapons. But he acknowledged on Saturday that denuclearization would be an “incremental process.” “You’d be foolish to think you’re going to sit down and say: OK, done. Nuclear weapons, gone. This is going to be a process of engagement with North Korea,” he said. Trump, who is due to visit China in November, has called for it to do more regarding North Korea and has promised to take steps to rebalance a trade relationship that his administration says puts U.S. businesses at a disadvantage. Chinese President Xi Jinping did not mention North Korea in his opening remarks while meeting Tillerson on Saturday. He instead offered warm words about Trump, saying he expected the U.S. president’s visit to be “wonderful.” “The two of us have also maintained a good working relationship and personal friendship,” Xi said in comments in front of reporters.

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UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - A subtle diplomat like Talleyrand, Donald Trump is not. The U.S. president, in his first foray at the U.N. General Assembly, derided North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as a rocket man ... on a suicide mission and delivered an unabashed defense of sovereignty at the seat of global multilateralism. But if his speech drew barbs from allies and authoritarian adversaries, it did nothing to deter his dance partners at the premier diplomatic waltz of the year, the 193-member United Nations annual gathering of world leaders known by the acronym UNGA. Trump held bilateral meetings with 13 leaders this week, more than his predecessor Barack Obama had at his first UNGA(five), his last (six) or his busiest (10), according to data compiled by CBS News White House correspondent Mark Knoller. Trump s less than diplomatic speech on Tuesday recalled the fiery nationalist language of his Jan. 20 inaugural address and raised eyebrows across the political spectrum by its bald assertion of the primacy of U.S. interests. Our government s first duty is to its people, to our citizens - to serve their needs, to ensure their safety, to preserve their rights, and to defend their values, he said, evoking his campaign s nationalist themes despite the departure of advocates such as Steve Bannon from the White House. Germany s foreign minister, Sigmar Gabriel, delivered a riposte in a scathing and barely veiled critique on Thursday. National egoism, I believe, is worthless as a regulatory principle for our world, Gabriel said. The motto our country first not only leads to more national confrontations and less prosperity, in the end there can only be losers. Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe s authoritarian 93-year-old leader who has ruled the former British colony since independence in 1980, also sought to nudge Trump in a more peaceable direction. Mr. Trump, please blow your trumpet, blow your trumpet in a musical way towards the values of unity, peace, cooperation, togetherness, dialogue, he said. In his speech, Trump said if the United States were forced to defend itself or its allies, it would have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea and he called Iran s government a murderous regime that exports violence, bloodshed and chaos. His directness contrasts with the subtlety of 18th- and 19th-century French diplomat Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, who is reputed to have said: A diplomat who says yes means maybe, a diplomat who says maybe means no, and a diplomat who says no is no diplomat. Still, Trump s language has seeped into the discourse of other leaders, perhaps seeking to curry his favor. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas spoke of draining the swamp of Israeli occupation while South Korean President Moon Jae-in called North Korean behavior extremely deplorable. Trump, possibly recalling the criticism that his Democratic U.S. presidential opponent Hillary Clinton earned for calling some of his supporters a basket of deplorables, was pleased. I m very happy that you used the word deplorable , Trump told Moon. That s been a very lucky word for me and many millions of people. Both Moon and Abbas had sitdowns with Trump, and there was no shortage of others who wanted to meet him. A U.S. official said the White House accommodated as many requests for meetings as they could schedule, noting some leaders who wanted to meet Trump did not make the cut. The U.S. president has also wanted to see the leaders of China, India and Germany, but they did not come this year. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani met Trump on Thursday, and officials in Kabul said all the impetus had come from the Afghan side, with no burning interest from the White House. French President Emmanuel Macron made clear he would work with any U.S. president, whoever he was, and said he and Trump had clear disagreements on climate change and Iran policy. I want a deep, cordial dialogue to bring him back into the international and multilateral fold on these two subjects, Macron told reporters. As I m a pragmatist, I put myself in a position to work the best way possible with him. Asked if dealing with Trump was like managing a difficult child, the French president replied: Not at all. I m managing a partner of the world s biggest power and a historical partner for our country.

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LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May could have more to say on the Brexit financial settlement at next week s European Union summit, her spokeswoman said on Friday. Brexit talks are deadlocked over money, the EU s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier said on Thursday. He ruled out discussions on future trade being launched by EU leaders next week but spoke of possible progress by December. On financial settlement in general, the prime minister has been clear all along that we need to reach a settlement and we will honor our commitments, May s spokeswoman told reporters. The prime minister will be in Brussels next week where she will be talking to European leaders at the European Council so I am sure that there will be more to say there. May s spokeswoman said that the detail of the financial settlement was for the negotiation and that the issue could only be resolved as part of the settlement of all of the issues that she spoke about in Florence .

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MADRID (Reuters) - Spain s opposition Socialist leader Pedro Sanchez said on Wednesday he had agreed with Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to launch a constitutional reform that could change the way Spain s autonomous regions, including Catalonia, are governed. The two leaders agreed that a committee would study the current system of regional autonomy for six months, after which the Spanish parliament would debate constitutional reforms, Sanchez told reporters. He also backed Rajoy s demand that Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont clarify whether he declared independence from Spain and said he would support constitutional measures that may be taken by the Spanish government if Puigdemont failed to reply or said he had declared independence.

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QUITO (Reuters) - An Ecuadorean court on Wednesday sentenced Vice President Jorge Glas to six years in jail after finding him guilty of receiving bribes from Brazilian construction company Odebrecht [ODBCT.UL] in return for handing the scandal-ridden firm state contracts. A close ally of leftist ex-President Rafael Correa, Glas served as Correa s vice president from 2013 and retained the position under current President Lenin Moreno. But Moreno, who has largely broken from Correa, suspended Glas in August, accusing him of not being a team player. An Ecuadorean judge in October then ordered pre-trial detention for Glas as part of the investigation into Odebrecht. The public prosecutor s office accused him of pocketing a roughly $13.5-million bribe from Odebrecht via his uncle. Glas constructed, with (former Odebrecht executive) Jose Conceicao Santos, the awarding of public contracts in return for payment, Judge Edgar Flores said on Wednesday as he read the decision. Glas, a 48-year-old electrical engineer, has been accused by senior members of Correa s government of corruption while serving as strategic sectors minister and vice president. His lawyer slammed the decision as unjust and vowed to appeal. Glas downfall highlights how fallout from the massive Odebrecht corruption scandal has continued to ripple across South America. The company, which has admitted to paying bribes to win contracts in a number of countries, has paid $3.5 billion in settlements in the United States, Brazil and Switzerland. Odebrecht allegedly paid $33.5 million in bribes to secure contracts in Ecuador. The opposition says that Correa s government was slow to investigate, although he rejects that.

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JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel’s right wing has been eagerly awaiting Donald Trump’s arrival in the White House, hoping a Republican president will usher in a new era of support for Israeli settlement-building on land Palestinians want for a state. The far-right Jewish Home party, along with members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, is promoting legislation that would effectively annex one large settlement in the occupied West Bank to Israel and another bill that would legalize dozens of unauthorized outposts. But there could be a question mark over the issue, with Netanyahu possibly looking to curb settlement laws, wary of the dangers of the far right’s ambitions being too freely unleashed as he feels his way forward with the new U.S. administration. The Israeli leader’s spokesman declined to comment on Netanyahu’s position. In its final weeks, the Obama administration angered the Israeli government by withholding a traditional U.S. veto of an anti-settlement resolution at the United Nations Security Council, enabling the measure to pass. President Barack Obama on Wednesday said he was worried that the prospects for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — the idea of Israel and Palestine living side-by-side in peace and security — were waning. Israeli right wingers contrast Obama’s warnings with what they see as positive signals from Trump that indicate Washington’s attitude towards settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, areas Israel captured in a 1967 war, is about to change. Trump’s nominee to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, echoed his condemnation of the world body over its treatment of Israel at her Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday. Trump, who has said he wants to meet Netanyahu “at the first opportunity”, has pledged to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. In his remarks on Wednesday, Obama cautioned against “sudden unilateral moves” that could be “explosive”. Israel regards all of Jerusalem as its capital but most of the world does not, seeing its final status as a matter for peace negotiations that have been frozen since 2014. In a move that has emboldened Israeli right wingers, the president-elect has already appointed a new U.S. ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, who is considered far right on issues, including settlement building. Naftali Bennett, leader of the Jewish Home, hopes that under Trump’s administration the notion of establishing a Palestinian state will be abandoned. He wants to promote a bill extending Israeli sovereignty to Maale Adumim, a West Bank settlement of about 40,000 Israelis that lies just to the east of Jerusalem. That would in effect mean Israel annexing some of the land it has occupied for almost 50 years. “It’s either (Israeli) sovereignty or Palestine,” Bennett told Army Radio this month. “The question is not what will Trump do but what will Israel ask for. What will Israel present as its vision. We are in the money-time now for forming this vision.” But Professor Itamar Rabinovich, a former Israeli ambassador to the United States, believes the right wing may be getting ahead of itself and its ambitions could backfire. “In reality, where the United States needs to live not just with us but also with the Arab and Muslim world, supporting extremist measures in Israel could turn out to be something the United States cannot live with,” Rabinovich said. Bennett ultimately advocates the annexation of most of the West Bank, leaving just the major Palestinian towns and cities in Palestinian hands. But first he is testing the water with the annexation bill, entitled “Sovereignty in Maale Adumim First”. It is due for a first discussion in a ministerial committee on Sunday, two of its drafters said. “I believe this is the gift that the people of Israel deserve in the run-up to Trump’s inauguration,” Bennett’s fellow party member, Betzalel Smotrich, told parliament on Tuesday. A spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said annexation was a red line. “Any such Israeli decision will be considered a dangerous escalation that would end any possible hope for peace,” Nabil Abu Rdainah told Reuters. Late last year, a separate bill that would retroactively legalize settlement outposts built on privately-owned Palestinian land in the West Bank passed the first of three votes in parliament required to make it law. No dates have been set for final approval, and it has since disappeared from the agenda. Asked about the delay, a source in Netanyahu’s office said: “He wants to freeze the outpost bill.” Asked about the law, a legislative source said: “It’s stuck in committee. There will be attempts to bring it back on the agenda after Jan. 20, but I think it is pretty much buried at this point,” he said, referring to the date of the inauguration. The legislation had drawn anger from the Palestinians and international condemnation. Smotrich told Reuters that it will be brought to a second and third reading in February. “We were waiting for the end of the Obama age,” he said. A political source close to Netanyahu said that with regard to the proposed Maale Adumim annexation, the prime minister may say he wishes to hold off until after he meets Trump. Tzachi Hanegbi, a Likud minister and Netanyahu confidant, said Netanyahu understood that such steps would further isolate Israel. Most countries regard Israeli settlements as illegal, a view that Israel disputes. “He does not want to shake the entire world and put Israel at the center of contention, isolation and criticism,” Hanegbi told Army Radio. “I hope the government will not let itself be dragged after Jewish Home’s agenda.” At the same time, Netanyahu is competing with Jewish Home for right-wing, pro-settlement voters. He may disagree with the party’s approach, but he can’t ignore it. “If the (annexation) bill comes up, Likud ministers will support it. They can do nothing else,” the source said.

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HANOI (Reuters) - A prominent critic of the Vietnamese government said he was taken by police from his home early on Tuesday so that he would be unable to meet U.S. President Barack Obama in Hanoi with other civil society figures. Nguyen Quang A said he was forced into a car by a group of police officers, driven out of the capital, and kept away for 5-1/2 hours. During this time, Obama met six civil society leaders and later said several people had been prevented from meeting him. Obama said that despite great strides made by Vietnam, Washington had concerns about the limits it puts on political freedom.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz vowed to deport immigrants living illegally in the United States and build a wall to keep others out, sharpening his stance on the issue a week before presidential contests in several southern states. Cruz’s comments on the eve of Tuesday’s Nevada caucuses came hours after the public firing of his main spokesman over misleading social media postings involving rival Marco Rubio. Rubio won endorsements on Monday from prominent Republicans as he sought to become the party’s mainstream alternative to front-runner Donald Trump after Jeb Bush dropped out of the race for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. Cruz was asked on Fox News’ “O’Reilly Factor” if he would round up the 12 million illegal aliens in the country, and how. “Listen, we should enforce the law. How do we enforce the law? Yes, we should deport them. We should build a wall. We should triple the Border Patrol,” Cruz said. “And federal law requires that anyone here illegally that’s apprehended should be deported.”  Asked if he, like real estate tycoon Trump, would go out and look for them, Cruz replied, “Of course you would. That’s what ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) exists for. We have law enforcement that looks for people who are violating the laws.”  The comments marked a shift from last month, when Cruz rejected sending authorities to find immigrants as “police state” tactics. “I don’t intend to send jackboots to knock on your door and every door in America. That’s not how we enforce the law for any crime,” Mr. Cruz told CNN in an interview on Jan. 10. Cruz has repeatedly criticized Rubio for having embraced a sweeping immigration reform bill he characterizes as amnesty. Cruz and other Republican candidates vying to represent their party in the Nov. 8 presidential election have been under pressure to toughen their stance on immigration by Trump’s ferocious rhetoric on the issue. Trump responded to Cruz’s comments with a trademark Twitter taunt on Tuesday, referring the U.S. senator from Texas’ third-place finish in South Carolina’s primary on Saturday. “Ted Cruz only talks tough on immigration now because he did so badly in S.C. He is in favor of amnesty and weak on illegal immigration,” Trump said. The New York billionaire has said he would deport all undocumented immigrants, build a wall and rescind U.S. President Barack Obama’s executive orders on immigration.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan expressed confidence on Thursday that Congress will pass an overhaul of the U.S. tax code by the end of this year, a major but elusive goal for President Donald Trump and his fellow Republicans. “We want America to wake up on New Year’s Day 2018 with a new tax system,” Ryan said, adding that his goal was to have a U.S. corporate tax rate at or below 22.5 percent, down from the current 35 percent. “I think it’s still very viable to get it done this year,” Mnuchin said, calling the tax overhaul his and Trump’s top priority. “We don’t need to set a specific date. We’re going to get this done as quickly as we can.” Mnuchin and Ryan made their predictions a day after Trump reached a deal with Democrats to avert an unprecedented default on U.S. government debt, keep the government funded at the outset of the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1 and provide aid to victims of Hurricane Harvey. Mnuchin later met with Ryan, White House economic adviser Gary Cohn, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell and the Republican chairmen of the two congressional committees that are crafting tax legislation. The group of tax policymakers are known as the “Big Six.” “The major blueprint has been outlined. It’s going to go to the committees,” Mnuchin told Fox Business ahead of the meeting. But there were no tangible signs of progress. “I think you’re going to see something very soon,” Cohn told reporters as he left the session. “We had a very good meeting today. We continue to work together. We continue to work well.” A key Republican goal is to slash the corporate income tax rate, which Trump and congressional Republican leaders contend will make U.S. companies more competitive, create jobs and raise wages. But the president and Congress appear to be at odds over rates, and independent analysts say lawmakers may not be able to deliver a corporate rate low enough to be meaningful for companies without expanding the federal deficit. Trump has said he wants to lower the U.S. corporate tax rate to 15 percent from 35 percent. Ryan, in an interview with the New York Times, indicated that a figure that low was unrealistic. “The numbers are hard to make that work,” Ryan said. “He obviously wants to push this as low as possible. I completely support doing that, but at the end of the day we’ve got to make these numbers work.” “Our goal is to be at or below the industrialized world average - and that’s 22.5 (percent). So our goal is to get in the mid- to low 20s. And we think that’s an achievable goal,” he added. The White House hopes Wednesday’s deal clears the decks for Congress to tackle the tax overhaul, a top Trump campaign promise. Even though Republicans control the White House and both chambers of Congress, Trump has yet to win passage of any major legislation, with Democrats typically united against him. His administration previously has offered rosy predictions about the timing of a tax overhaul that have not come to pass. Mnuchin in February said the administration was committed to getting the tax overhaul through Congress by August. Mnuchin, Ryan and the rest of the “Big Six” have been negotiating a tax plan behind closed doors for months, excluding Democrats and producing only a few pages of basic principles. Trump on Tuesday urged congressional leaders to make a big push on taxes with cuts for individuals and companies and tax breaks for businesses to bring back profits from overseas. Republicans are still divided on significant issues such as whether tax cuts should be offset with spending cuts to avoid increasing the federal budget deficit and how much to lower the corporate income tax rate. In an interview with Fox Business Network, Mnuchin said he was not worried about the plan going off track because of either Democrats or conservative Republicans making their own demands. Many Democrats have voiced opposition to a tax plan that primarily benefits the wealthiest Americans and corporations. Asked whether he was concerned that Democrats could use the funding deal struck on Wednesday to make demands such as rejecting any tax cut for the wealthy or pushing for a cut for middle-income earners, Mnuchin said no. He also said he expected some Democrats to back the final tax plan. On Wednesday, Trump said he would offer more details about his tax reform plan in about two weeks.

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MOSCOW (Reuters) - Moscow is deeply concerned by the escalation of tension on the Korean peninsula caused by the continued war of words between the United States and North Korea, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday. Moscow is convinced that there is no alternative to a political and diplomatic settlement of the North Korean problem, he told a conference call with reporters. He said the situation was being further aggravated by the swapping of silly statements full of threats . The Kremlin was reacting to U.S. President Donald Trump s statement in which he vowed to destroy North Korea, leading the reclusive nation to declare that it might test a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific Ocean.

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MELITOPOL, Ukraine (Reuters) - Russia has left troops behind after staging war games in Belarus despite promising not to, Ukraine s Commander in Chief Viktor Muzhenko told Reuters. In an interview on a military plane on Thursday evening, Muzhenko said Russia has withdrawn only a few units from Belarus and had lied about how many of its soldiers were there in the first place. His comments could increase tension between the two neighbors and contradict the Belarussian defense ministry spokesman, who said the last train of Russian troops and equipment had left Belarus on Thursday. Russia s defense ministry did not respond to an immediate request for comment. Relations between Kiev and Moscow nosedived after Russia s annexation of the Crimean peninsula in 2014 and the outbreak of a separatist insurgency in eastern Ukraine that has killed more than 10,000 people. Ukraine sees itself as being at war with Russia and has accused Moscow of sending troops and hardware to fight in the Donbass region, which Moscow denies. There are frequent casualties despite a notional ceasefire agreed in 2015. The Zapad wargames, held by Russian and Belarussian troops on territory in both countries in September, are a new source of concern for neighboring Ukraine and NATO member states on Europe s eastern flank. Russia has said the exercise was to rehearse a purely defensive scenario, that the scale of the wargames was in line with international rules, and that allegations it was a springboard to invade Poland, Lithuania or Ukraine were false. But Muzhenko said the wargames were of an offensive nature. Ukraine staged its own drills in northern Ukraine in response to Zapad and built up troops there. I wouldn t say that the tension has lessened. We can say tension is building up or rising, he said. We had information that they had withdrawn only a few units of the declared 12,500 troops, of which 3,000 were Russians, but there were significantly more of them there. Muzhenko said the Russians had withdrawn air units from Belarus to make a show of leaving. Russia demonstrated, and it was primarily a demonstration, the return of aviation units they took off from the airfields and flew to airfields in Russia. But we understand that 300-400 km for aviation is a distance that can be overcome in a very short time, he said. The 55-year-old, who became Chief of the General Staff in 2014, said Ukraine was still outgunned in terms of its air defense capabilities in the Donbass war and needed air reconnaissance and anti-missile systems. Kiev is hoping to receive lethal defensive weapons from U.S. President Donald Trump. Muzhenko said talks had been concluded. We expect the corresponding decision because all negotiations are over and the relevant issues have been agreed on the list and types of weapons and we expect only the political decisions of our partner countries, he said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House on Thursday said Vice President Joe Biden’s unannounced visit to Iraq to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi was a “good indication” of U.S. support of the prime minister’s efforts to unify that country. “This is a good indication of the United States continued support for Prime Minister Abadi’s efforts to unify the nation of Iraq to confront ISIL,” spokesman Josh Earnest said, using another name for Islamic State.

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KABUL (Reuters) - Civilian casualties from Afghan and American air strikes have risen more than 50 percent since last year, the United Nations said on Thursday, as troops increase attacks on militants under a new strategy announced by U.S. President Donald Trump in August. As of the end of September, at least 205 civilians had been killed and 261 wounded this year in air strikes in Afghanistan, U.N. investigators said in a quarterly report. At least 38 percent of those casualties were caused by international military forces, while the majority were attributed to the Afghan Air Force, which has begun to conduct more attacks on its own. More than two thirds of the civilian victims were women and children, the report said. In September, U.S. warplanes dropped more bombs than in any single month since 2010, driven largely by Trump s strategy of trying to reassert pressure on militants after several years of drawdown by foreign troops. A spokesman for the U.S. military command did not immediately comment on the report. General Dawlat Waziri, spokesman for the Afghan Ministry of Defence, rejected the findings and said the government took civilian casualties seriously. It is quite obvious that Taliban and other insurgent groups cause more civilian casualties, he said, adding that insurgents also use civilians as human shields and hide in residential areas . Overall civilian casualties decreased slightly compared to the same period last year, the report said. At least 2,640 civilians were killed and 5,379 injured this year, compared to 2,616 killed and 5,915 injured in the same period of 2016. The drop reflected fewer casualties from fighting in populated areas, the report noted, as militants failed to capture any major cities. The head of the U.N. mission in Afghanistan, Tadamichi Yamamoto, praised the Afghan government for formally endorsing a national policy designed to reduce civilian casualties. The government owes it to its citizens, particularly the victims of the armed conflict, to ensure full implementation of the policy through a concrete action plan, he said. Overall the U.N. attributed 64 percent of civilian casualties to anti-government militants like the Taliban and Islamic State. Pro-government forces were responsible for 20 percent overall, while the remainder was attributed to joint fighting or unidentified groups, according to the U.N.

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BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany cannot afford to give in to intimidation and threats of protectionism from U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, and to do so even once would invite repeated bullying, a key conservative ally of Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Tuesday. Trump warned German car companies that he would impose a border tax of 35 percent on vehicles imported to the U.S. market, in a newspaper interview published on Monday. Norbert Roettgen, head of Germany’s foreign affairs committee in parliament, said Germany must stay true to its values. The country is one of the world’s leading exporting nations, getting nearly half its gross domestic product from exports. “The smart thing to do is not to yield to intimidation and threats,” Roettgen told a small group of foreign reporters when asked about German industry’s readiness to stand up to Trump. “If you take this path once, you will become the object of threats and intimidation,” said Roettgen, a leader in Merkel’s Christian Democrats. “And I don’t think that makes sense either for Germany as a whole or for individual companies.” A BMW (BMWG.DE) executive said on Monday the carmaker will stick to its plans to open a Mexican plant in 2019, despite Trump’s warnings of a border tax on the German brand’s vehicles made in Mexico and destined for the United States. “I think it is politically right and economically wise to stick to our principles and our policies, which for Germany is a policy of open and fair trade,” Roettgen said. Merkel told German industry leaders on Monday that she would remain committed to free trade, in an indirect rebuttal to Trump’s comments about border taxes on car imports. Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel responded to Trump’s comment that too many German and too few U.S. automobiles were on the streets of New York by saying the United States “should build better cars.” On Tuesday, Gabriel issued an indirect warning to Trump against stoking nationalism and promoting protectionism: “Nationalism and protectionism are not the recipes for greatness,” Gabriel said in a speech in Berlin. The United States is Germany’s top trading partner.

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BERLIN (Reuters) - After a year of disappointment, European businesses are hoping a victory for Hillary Clinton in the U.S. election next week may help break the logjam that has prevented large-scale Western investments in Iran since the opening of its economy. While no one in Europe is predicting a flurry of new deals should Clinton defeat her Republican rival Donald Trump on Nov. 8, a win for the Democrat would remove some of the political clouds hanging over last year’s nuclear deal between Iran and world powers. Business groups say this could help fuel a more aggressive push into the Iranian market in 2017, especially in the second half of the year, if a Clinton victory is followed by the re-election of moderate Iranian President Hassan Rouhani next May. “If Clinton and Rouhani win, then we will have a political window of opportunity that is much bigger than we have now,” said Matthieu Etourneau, who advises French firms on the Iranian market for MEDEF International, the French employers group. “This is what the European banks and companies are waiting for,” he said. Back in January, when the United States and Europe lifted sanctions related to Iran’s nuclear program, the excitement in Europe’s business community was palpable. With a population of 78 million and annual output higher than that of Thailand, Iran was the biggest economy to rejoin the global trading and financial system since the 1991 break-up of the Soviet Union. European politicians flocked to Tehran with dozens of corporate executives in tow. Rouhani, a pragmatist elected in 2013 on a platform to reduce Iran’s isolation, traveled to Paris and Rome to promote his country to eager investors. But within months the euphoria had vanished, replaced by frustration on both sides. The biggest obstacle for European firms seeking to do business in Iran has been the reluctance of the continent’s largest banks to finance deals out of fear they could run afoul of U.S. sanctions and incur massive penalties down the line. The United States has taken steps to reassure the banks. Last month the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued new guidance to allay concerns about doing U.S. dollar transactions with Iran. But Secretary of State John Kerry acknowledged at a think-tank event in London this week that banks remained skittish. German officials raised their concerns about the hurdles during a recent visit by U.S. sanctions coordinator Daniel Fried. This caution is likely to persist, regardless of who is sitting in the White House. Beyond the issue of sanctions, the poor state of Iranian banks after a decade outside the international financial system, the strong state role in the economy and a lack of clarity about the legal system are all deterrents to foreigners. “Everyone knows now that this will be a long, step-by-step process to build up our economic ties,” said Friedolin Strack, head of international markets at the Federation of German Industries (BDI). Still, a Clinton victory would be a reassuring signal to Europe. Her close adviser Jake Sullivan was a key figure in the secret negotiations in Oman that paved the way for the landmark agreement that curbed Iran’s disputed nuclear activity, and she has defended it during the election campaign. Trump, by contrast, has called it “one of the worst deals ever made” and promised to renegotiate it if he is elected. Bankers say the risk of the deal unraveling under a Trump presidency has contributed to the reticence in Europe. Recently however, there have been signs of movement. Smaller German banks, pressed by their clients to support them in Iran, are beginning to offer limited financing and payment services. “Medium-sized banks that finance the German Mittelstand have a great deal of interest in Iran business and are preparing the groundwork intensively,” said Siegfried Utzig, acting head of economic policy and international affairs at the Association of German Banks (BvB). “We can see the light at the end of the tunnel but it’s still quite far away.” In June, the German government began offering export credit guarantees via insurance group Euler Hermes for firms wanting to trade with Iran. Edna Schoene, head of German government business at Euler Hermes, said about 30 formal applications had been received since then with a total value of about 2.5 billion euros. Nine of them have been approved. Add to that roughly 70 non-binding letters of interest (LOIs) that have been issued and the volumes push up into the double-digit billions of euros, Schoene said. “The potential in Iran is enormous and the demand for export credit guarantees is high, both in terms of formal applications and expressions of interest,” Schoene said. “I expect that we will see the first large-scale, credit-financed deals in 2017.” Some European firms are already benefiting from the opening of the Iranian economy. Last week French carmaker PSA Group (PEUP.PA), once the market leader, announced it had produced 105,000 cars in Iran under the Peugeot license in the third quarter, 15 percent of its total sales volume. Etourneau of MEDEF International is also optimistic that Iran’s order of 118 jets from Europe’s Airbus (AIR.PA) and a recent joint venture deal between carmaker Renault (RENA.PA) and Iranian investment fund IDRO will prove a boon for smaller European suppliers. MEDEF International announced last month it was opening an office in Tehran, its first outside France, to support small and medium sized French firms seeking to enter the Iranian market. “We expect that 20-30 billion euros in public contracts to be attributed by the Iranians before the end of their fiscal year in March,” Etourneau said. “What we are telling companies is that they need a 5-10 year strategy. The market will open up progressively.”

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BERLIN (Reuters) - Frauke Petry, co-leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany, said on Tuesday she was leaving the party in a major blow to its credibility just two days after it surged to third place in a national election. The anti-immigrant AfD won 12.6 percent of the vote in Germany s election on Sunday, becoming the third-largest group in parliament and the first from the far-right to win seats in the Bundestag since the 1950s. Petry, the highest-profile figure in the AfD s more moderate wing, had shocked other senior members by saying on Monday she would not sit with the AfD in the Bundestag (lower house) but rather as an independent member of parliament. Her husband, another senior AfD figure, is also leaving the party. We tried to change course but you have to realize when you reach a point when that is no longer possible, Petry, a 42-year-old chemist, told reporters in the eastern city of Dresden. I have five children for whom I am responsible and ultimately you have to be able to look yourself in the mirror. Petry has clashed with other senior members, arguing for the party to take a more moderate course to make it possible for it to join a coalition government. Her husband, Marcus Pretzell - head of the AfD in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and also an MP in the European Parliament - is quitting the party and will become an independent MP, a spokesman for the AfD in NRW said. The spokesman said Pretzell and another AfD lawmaker in NRW s regional assembly who is also leaving the party had made the decision for reasons of personal integrity . On Monday, four of the 17 AfD lawmakers in the assembly of the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern announced they were bolting because the party had become more radical. Europe s far-right parties have a history of infighting among their various factions. Marine Le Pen, leader of France s National Front, last week lost her deputy over policy differences. Alexander Gauland and Alice Weidel, the AfD s top candidates during the election campaign, were elected as chairs of the party s parliamentary group on Tuesday. Gauland is a supporter of Bjoern Hoecke, a senior AfD member who has courted controversy by denying that Adolf Hitler was absolutely evil and calling Berlin s Holocaust Memorial a monument of shame . Weidel was originally an opponent of Hoecke but has not been so critical of him lately. Weidel said she did not expect other lawmakers to quit the party but added: We ll have to see. The step surprised us all, but there are not yet any trends recognizable in the future parliamentary group. Senior AfD member Dirk Driesang, who in July founded a moderate group within the AfD called the Alternative Centre , with which Petry was said to sympathize, told news magazine Der Spiegel that the group could not understand Petry s decision and would not be following in her footsteps. He said the group would continue to fight for the AfD to take a moderate course and added that a spin-off from the AfD is a stillbirth . Driesang pointed to the example of Bernd Lucke, who founded the AfD then left in 2015 due to what he saw as rising xenophobia and then formed a new, unsuccessful party. Petry was the most recognizable face in the AfD during its swift rise over the past two years. But she said on Monday she could not stand with an anarchistic party that lacked a credible plan to govern. For months, Petry has urged the AfD to soften its stance and prepare to join coalition governments, while others wanted the party to stick to opposition. Mainstream parties refuse to work with the AfD. She had also distanced herself from some of the AfD s more radical senior members, saying their comments were putting voters off. Gauland caused a scandal during the election campaign by saying Germans should be proud of their World War Two soldiers. He also said the integration minister should be disposed of in Turkey, where her parents come from. As the AfD convened in Berlin on Tuesday for its first parliamentary group meeting, Gauland said discussions in the Bundestag would not echo those of the party s campaign. It s clear that the talks during the campaign are different to those held in parliament, he said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigned on Monday night in the midst of a raging controversy about his contacts with Russian officials before Trump took office, a White House official said. Retired General Keith Kellogg, who has been the chief of staff at the National Security Council, has been named acting national security adviser.

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KAMPALA (Reuters) - South Sudan s president has given top jobs to three generals facing U.N. sanctions over alleged violations during a four-year-old civil war. Campaign group Human Rights Watch called the promotions a slap in the face of justice - but the presidency said the three men were good officers who had been falsely accused. In a decree read out on state radio late on Thursday, President Salva Kiir appointed Marial Chanuong as his new head of army operations, training and intelligence, and Santino Deng Wol as the head of ground forces. Gabriel Jok Riak was named deputy chief of defense. The U.N. Security Council imposed travel bans and asset freezes on the three and others in 2015. It accused Chanuong of commanding troops who led the slaughter of Nuer civilians in and around (the capital) Juba in December 2013, including hundreds it said were reportedly buried in mass graves. I am in my country. I can do anything in my own country, Chanuong told Reuters Friday. The United Nations said Wol commanded troops who killed children, women and old men during a 2015 offensive, while Riak violated a ceasefire in early 2014. Kiir s spokesman, Ateny Wek Ateny, said the three generals were very genuine, obedient commanders who had been falsely accused. But Human Rights Watch said the announcement, made on the eve of the fourth anniversary of the war s outbreak, showed the impunity enjoyed by commanders accused of abuses. Having these people nominated to new positions is a slap in the face of justice and a slap in the face of the international community, the organization s Jonathan Pednault told Reuters. South Sudan plunged into civil war in December 2013 when a political crisis escalated into fighting between forces loyal to Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, and rebels allied with his former deputy Riek Machar, a Nuer. The conflict has reopened ethnic fault lines and spread across the country, where more than a dozen armed groups are battling for land, resources, revenge, and power amid widespread reports of rape, murder and torture. Several ceasefires have been agreed but broken. Tens of thousands have been killed since the war broke out.

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OSLO/MOSCOW (Reuters) - All eight people on board a missing helicopter off the coast of Svalbard are Russians, the Russian Emergency Ministry told Reuters on Thursday. Rescue teams are still searching for the aircraft, which was first reported missing at around 1335 GMT.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell plans to bring his party’s latest legislative effort to replace Obamacare up for a vote in the Senate next week, a number of media outlets reported on Wednesday. “It is the leader’s intention to consider Graham/Cassidy on the floor next week,” a spokesperson for McConnell said, according to Politico.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The nominee to be U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, said on Wednesday the risk of climate change does exist, and the consequences could be serious enough that action should be taken. When asked during a Senate confirmation hearing to say whether he believed that human activity was contributing to climate change, Tillerson did not answer yes or no, but said: “The increase in greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere are having an effect. Our abilities to predict that effect are very limited.” Tillerson is former chief executive of Exxon Mobil Corp. Trump said during the election campaign that he would seek to quit the 2015 Paris climate accord.

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MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa/IOWA CITY, Iowa (Reuters) - U.S. Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump withdrew on Tuesday from a debate with party rivals this week out of anger at host Fox News (FOXA.O), leaving the last encounter before Iowa’s pivotal nominating contest without the front-runner. Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, told reporters after a combative news conference held by the candidate that Trump would definitely not be participating in the debate scheduled for Thursday in Des Moines, Iowa, and co-hosted by Google (GOOGL.O). During the news conference before he addressed a large crowd in Marshalltown, Iowa, Trump expressed irritation that Fox News planned to leave in place as a moderator the anchor Megyn Kelly, whose questioning of Trump at a debate last August angered him. He also expressed displeasure at a Fox News statement on Monday night saying Trump would have to learn sooner or later that “he doesn’t get to pick the journalists” and that “we’re very surprised he’s willing to show that much fear about being questioned by Megyn Kelly.” “I was all set to do the debate, I came here to do the debate. When they sent out the wise-guy press release done by some PR person along with (Fox News Chairman) Roger Ailes, I said: ‘Bye bye, OK’” “Let’s see how much money Fox makes without me in the debate,” the billionaire businessman added. Trump has been engaged in a public spat with Fox News since the network hosted the first debate and Kelly asked Trump about his treatment of woman, prompting a stream of insults from the candidate. The debate is scheduled for just days before Iowa’s caucuses on Monday, the first nominating contest for the Nov. 8 presidential election. Trump’s campaign announced that instead of participating in the debate, he would hold a fundraiser for “Veterans and Wounded Warriors.” Fox News responded by releasing a statement charging Trump’s campaign manager with threatening Kelly, saying during a call Lewandowski had referred to her “rough couple of days” after the previous debate she moderated and added that he would “hate to have her go through that again.” “We can’t give in to terrorizations toward any of our employees,” Fox said in a statement. The network added that Trump remains welcome to participate in the Thursday night debate. Trump’s Republican rivals quickly criticized him for opting out of the debate. “The fact that Donald is now afraid to appear on the debate stage, that he doesn’t want his record questioned, I think that reflects a lack of respect for the men and women on Iowa,” Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who is in a tight race with Trump for first place in the state, said on Mark Levin’s radio program. “If Donald is afraid of Megyn Kelly, I would like to invite him on your show to participate in a one-on-one debate between me and Donald, mano-a-mano,” Cruz said, adding: “If he thinks Megyn Kelly is so scary, what exactly does he think he’d do with Vladimir Putin?” Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush criticized Trump on Twitter, saying: “exactly” in response to a conservative commentator who cast doubt on whether Trump could run against Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton if he were afraid of Kelly. In the Democratic contest, news channel MSNBC and the New Hampshire Union Leader newspaper sketched out plans to host a debate in New Hampshire among Clinton and challengers Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley, a few days before the state’s primary election on Feb. 9. But the Democratic National Committee raised doubts about whether it would proceed, saying in a statement it had no plans to sanction the debate. It left open the question of whether it would punish any participants by excluding them from the two remaining sanctioned debates. Spokesmen for Clinton, the former secretary of state who leads most polls, and O’Malley, a former Maryland governor, said their candidates would be happy to take part, at least in theory. The New York Times quoted the campaign manager for Sanders as saying the Vermont senator would sit out the unsanctioned debate. Trump’s blunt-spoken candidacy has boosted ratings for the Republican presidential debates. The August debate on Fox News drew 24 million viewers, a record for a presidential primary debate and the highest non-sports telecast in cable TV history. But a boycott could prove risky for Trump as Iowa Republicans seek to take one more look at who they want as their presidential candidate. Rivals like Cruz, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, Bush, and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson could reap the benefits. “How many debates do you have to do?” Trump told reporters. “The Democrats are finished with their debates. ... The Republicans go on forever and ever and ever with debates. We have people on the stand who have zero (percentage points in the poll), who have one, who have nothing. So it’s time that somebody plays grown up.” At his campaign event in Marshalltown, Trump expressed confidence in his position in the race, saying if he were to win Iowa, he could “run the table” and roll up subsequent victories in New Hampshire, South Carolina and beyond. “Iowa is very important. So you’ve got to get out, you’ve got to get out and caucus,” he told his supporters.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States will take the lead in helping to clear rubble and restore basic services after the fall of Islamic State in its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa, the U.S. State Department said on Tuesday. We will assist and take, essentially, the lead in bringing back the water, electricity and all of that, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert told a briefing. But eventually the governance of the country of Syria is something that I think all nations remain very interested in. The United States and our allies have prepared for next steps and will continue to work with partners to provide humanitarian assistance to those in need and support the stabilization efforts in Raqqa and other liberated areas, Nauert said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Vice President Joe Biden on Monday will denounce Republican Donald Trump’s call for a halt to Muslim immigration as an appeal to intolerance and defend the U.S. fight against Islamic State at a time of dissent within the Obama administration over Syria policy. Biden will deliver a wide-ranging rebuke to Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee for the Nov. 8 election, in a speech to the Center for New American Security think tank, according to excerpts released by the White House. Biden, who has joined President Barack Obama in endorsing presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, plans to wade deeper into the campaign a week after Trump sparked criticism for his comments on American Muslims after a U.S.-born Muslim man killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida. In a speech last Monday on national security, Trump stood by his call for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States and proposed a suspension of immigration from countries with “a proven history of terrorism.” Biden, in his remarks, will say: “Wielding the politics of fear and intolerance - like proposals to ban Muslims from entering the United States or slandering entire religious communities as complicit in terrorism - calls into question America’s status as the greatest democracy in the history of the world.” Although not naming Trump, the vice president will say: “Alienating 1.5 billion Muslims - the vast, vast majority of whom, at home and abroad, are peace-loving - will only make the problem worse.” Biden will also apparently chide Trump for having spoken admiringly of Russian President Vladimir Putin. “Embracing Putin at a time of renewed Russian aggression” could call into question the U.S. commitment to Europe’s security,” he will say. Referring to Trump’s vow to erect a wall on the U.S. border with Mexico if elected, Biden will assert: “If we build walls and disrespect our closest neighbors,” it will reignite anti-U.S. sentiment in Latin America. Biden’s defense of Obama’s strategy against Islamic State militants appears intended, at least in part, to push back against a recently leaked internal State Department memo critical of the president’s response to Syria’s civil war. The document, signed by 51 diplomats and reflecting long-standing frustration among Obama’s aides, calls for urgently broadening an approach, now focused on attacking Islamic State, to unleash air strikes against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces. U.S. officials made clear Obama would not be swayed. “The use of force should be precise and proportional,” Biden will say. “There must be a clear mission that advances U.S. interests. Whenever possible, we should act alongside allies and partners.”

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States hopes a new package of U.S. regulatory changes affecting Cuba will encourage people-to-people interactions and provide additional incentives for Havana to make economic and trade reforms of its own, U.S. officials said on Tuesday. The regulatory reforms, which were introduced earlier on Tuesday, loosen travel restrictions on Cuba and ease limits on the use of U.S. dollars in trade transactions there just days ahead of President Barack Obama’s historic visit to the former Cold War enemy. U.S. officials told reporters the new rules would allow more Cubans to work legally in the United States without having to defect, but they declined to predict how that might affect Major League Baseball. “It certainly does address the ability of Cuban athletes who can earn salaries in the United States to do so,” one official told reporters in a briefing.

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LONDON (Reuters) - The World Health Organization said on Friday it had received reports of an attack on medical facilities in eastern Syria that had destroyed a store containing more than 130,000 vaccine doses against measles and polio. If confirmed, the WHO said, the attack would put thousands of children at risk of these serious infectious, viral diseases. Both can spread rapidly in areas of conflict. We unequivocally condemn these actions. Vaccines are not a legitimate target of war, the WHO s representative in Syria, Elizabeth Hoff, said in a statement issued late on Friday. The WHO said the reports it received were of an attack on a vaccine cold room at health facilities in al-Mayadin, near Deir al-Zor in eastern Syria. The WHO did not say whether the reports it received gave any detail on who carried out the reported attack. The store had held 100,000 doses of measles vaccine, 35,000 doses of polio vaccine, plus syringes and other equipment. Until a new cold room is built and the required cold chain equipment - including solar fridges, cold boxes and vaccine carriers - are delivered, this will delay ... routine immunization for vulnerable children in the area, Hoff said. Polio - a viral disease that can cripple its victims - and measles - which can cause diarrhea, blindness and can kill - tend to break out in war zones because low vaccine coverage leaves gaps in population immunity, exposing children to infection. The WHO previously tackled a polio outbreak in the same area of Syria in 2013-2014. The UN health agency said that in its last polio vaccination campaign in Deir al-Zor it reached more than 252,000 babies and children.

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MOMBASA, Kenya (Reuters) - Suspected militants from the Somali group al Shabaab beheaded four men in two different attacks in Lamu County on Kenya s north coast on Wednesday, authorities said, a month after 12 people were killed in similar incidents in the region. Lamu County Commissioner Gilbert Kitiyo said the attacks took place in Silini-Mashambani early on Wednesday where three were killed, while in a separate incident in Bobo village one person was killed. Kitiyo said about 30 heavily-armed assailants went from house-to-house calling out victims by name before pulling some out and slitting their throats. They were dressed in military gear and had AK-47 rifles. They beheaded four men before fleeing into the forest. All the victims are men. Police have already arrived at the scene and taken the bodies to the mortuary, Kitiyo told Reuters by telephone. He said the attackers surrounded all the victims houses making it difficult for them to escape. Abdiasis Abu Musab, al Shabaab s spokesman for military operations, said the group was behind the attack, and put the number of those killed at five, saying it had targeted non-Muslims. In August, al Shabaab attackers killed four men in a similar manner while earlier in July, nine men were slaughtered the same way in nearby villages. After the latest attacks, protesters burned tyres on the roads on Wednesday morning in complaint over insecurity. Riot police to fire teargas and rubber bullets to disperse them. A government-imposed dusk-to-dawn curfew is in force in the area following past attacks. The al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab aims to topple Somalia s United Nations-backed government and impose its own strict interpretation of Islam. They have intensified attacks in Kenya since it sent troops into Somalia in 2011. They have also claimed responsibility for a series of cross-border attacks in recent months, including a spate of roadside bombings targeting security forces.

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CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt s security forces killed 10 suspected militants on Sunday in a shootout during a raid on two apartments in central Cairo, the Interior Ministry said. Nine policemen, including four officers, were injured during the two raids, it said in a statement. An insurgency led by Islamic State in Egypt s rugged Sinai peninsula has killed hundreds of soldiers and policemen since the Egyptian military overthrew President Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood in mid-2013, but attacks have increasingly moved to the mainland in recent months. Authorities received information about militants fleeing North Sinai to hideouts in Cairo, where they were preparing to carry out attacks on more centrally located provinces, the ministry statement said. The police suffered their injuries after a suspected militant detonated an explosive device to block them from entering the building and during an exchange of fire that followed, security sources said. One of the security sources said authorities suspect the individuals to be members of Hasm, a group which has claimed several attacks around the Egyptian capital targeting judges and policemen since last year. Egypt accuses Hasm of being a militant wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist group it outlawed in 2013. The Muslim Brotherhood denies this.

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AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - A senior Texas health official who co-authored a report that criticized the state’s funding cuts to Planned Parenthood for reducing access to reproductive healthcare will retire from his post next month, a Texas commission said on Friday. Rick Allgeyer, the Texas Health and Human Services Commission’s director of research, faced criticism from the state’s Republican leaders over the report published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine this month. The report said state funding cuts to Planned Parenthood and its affiliates had an adverse effect on family planning for lower-income people. Allgeyer is eligible to retire and decided to do so effective on March 31, the commission said. Allgeyer, who has been at the commission for 16 years and was one of the study’s five listed authors, declined to comment. In 2011, the Texas state legislature cut Planned Parenthood out of one family-planning program and revamped the way another program hands out funds, placing it and other private clinics at the bottom of the list. Top Texas political leaders have said after cutting off funding for Planned Parenthood that the state has been able to rebuild its safety net. Independent health experts dispute the claim, saying Texas still has a long way to go before it can provide the level of service it did when Planned Parenthood was an integral part of its family planning efforts. The Texas plan has garnered attention among Republicans in the U.S. Congress who are looking to defund the nation’s largest family-planning provider at the national level. The study said the cuts appeared to lead to an increase of unintended pregnancies among lower-income residents and a decrease in access to long-acting reversible contraception. It also said the cuts appeared to increase the rate of childbirths covered by Medicaid. Some Texas Republicans said it was inappropriate for a state employee to be involved in such a study and that its results were flawed, putting political pressure on Allgeyer.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Members of the U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee are close to an agreement on how to overhaul a controversial National Security Agency surveillance program and hope to complete legislation soon, the top Democrat on the panel said on Wednesday. Representative Adam Schiff said he had proposed a compromise that would let intelligence agencies query a database of information on Americans in national security cases without a warrant, but would require a warrant to use the information in other cases, such as those involving serious violent crime. “This would prevent law enforcement from simply using the database as a vehicle to go fishing, but at the same time it would preserve the operational capabilities of the program,” Schiff told reporters. At issue is Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which allows the NSA to collect vast amounts of digital communications from foreign suspects living outside the United States. U.S. intelligence officials consider Section 702 among the most vital of tools at their disposal to thwart national security threats. But the program, classified details of which were exposed in 2013 by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, incidentally gathers communications of Americans, such as when they compete with foreigners. Currently, those communications can then be subject to searches without a warrant. Congress must renew Section 702 in some form by Dec. 31 or the program will expire. Schiff said he believed the compromise would be acceptable to many lawmakers, as well as the intelligence community and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It is similar to legislation backed by the House Judiciary Committee. However, there are still deep divides in both the Senate and the House over what to do about Section 702, as lawmakers balance demands for more privacy protections with spy agencies’ desire to preserve what they see as a valuable tool. There are different renewal proposals in the House and Senate. One Senate bill would not require any warrants, which Schiff said he did not think could pass the House. It was not clear whether lawmakers will vote on a standalone 702 bill or whether it would be part of a broader must-pass bill, such as a spending measure Congress must pass next month to keep the government open. Another possibility would be a short-term extension to keep the current surveillance system in place and give Congress more time to come up with a solution that could become law.

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The following statements were posted to the verified Twitter accounts of U.S. President Donald Trump, @realDonaldTrump and @POTUS. The opinions expressed are his own. Reuters has not edited the statements or confirmed their accuracy. @realDonaldTrump : - Based on the fact that the very unfair and unpopular Individual Mandate has been terminated as part of our Tax Cut Bill, which essentially Repeals (over time) ObamaCare, the Democrats & Republicans will eventually come together and develop a great new HealthCare plan! [0658 EST] - WOW, @foxandfrlends Dossier is bogus. Clinton Campaign, DNC funded Dossier. FBI CANNOT (after all of this time) VERIFY CLAIMS IN DOSSIER OF RUSSIA/TRUMP COLLUSION. FBI TAINTED. And they used this Crooked Hillary pile of garbage as the basis for going after the Trump Campaign! [0824 EST] - All signs are that business is looking really good for next year, only to be helped further by our Tax Cut Bill. Will be a great year for Companies and JOBS! Stock Market is poised for another year of SUCCESS! [17:17 EST] -- Source link: (bit.ly/2jBh4LU) (bit.ly/2jpEXYR)

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MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin and his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump may discuss a Syria settlement at an Asian economic summit in Vietnam next week, the RIA news agency reported on Saturday. Relations between Moscow and Washington have soured further since Putin and Trump first met at a G20 summit in Hamburg in July when they discussed allegations of Russian meddling in the U.S. election, but agreed to focus on better ties.. Tensions have risen over the conflict in Syria, after Russia vetoed a United Nations plan to continue an ongoing investigation into chemical weapons.. A Syria settlement is being discussed for the agenda of a possible meeting between the two presidents, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was quoted as saying by RIA, adding it was in their common interest to have enough time to discuss the issue. Somehow or another it requires cooperation, Peskov said. Trump told Fox News this week that it was possible he would meet Putin during his Asia trip. We may have a meeting with Putin, he said. And, again Putin is very important because they can help us with North Korea. They can help us with Syria. We have to talk about Ukraine.

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(Corrects paragraph 7 to show Trump issued a warning on travel to Cuba, not a ban on travel to Cuba) HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba told senior U.S. officials during talks on migration in Havana on Monday that the U.S. decision to suspend visa processing at its embassy on the island was “seriously hampering” family relations and other people exchanges. Relations between the former Cold War foes became strained after Donald Trump became the U.S. President, partially reversing the thaw seen during Barack Obama’s presidency. In September, after allegations of incidents affecting the health of its diplomats in Havana, the U.S. administration reduced its embassy to a skeleton staff, resulting in the suspension of almost all visa processing. “The Cuban delegation expressed deep concern over the negative impact that the unilateral, unfounded and politically motivated decisions adopted by the U.S. government ... have on migration relations between both countries,” the Cuban foreign ministry said in a statement. The statement was issued after delegations led by Cuba’s Foreign Ministry chief for U.S. Affairs Josefina Vidal and U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs John Creamer met to discuss migration issues. Many Cubans said they were heartbroken because they could not visit, or be with, their loved ones. While Cuba has a population of 11.2 million people, there are an estimated 2 million Cuban Americans in the United States. The Trump administration also issued a warning on travel to Cuba and in October expelled 15 Cuban diplomats from Washington. The Cuban foreign ministry said this had “seriously affected the functioning of the diplomatic mission, particularly the Consulate and the services it offers to Cubans residing in the United States”. The U.S. decision to cancel the visits of official delegations to Cuba was also having a “counterproductive effect” on cooperation in fields like migration, the ministry said. On the positive side, both the U.S. and Cuban delegations commented on the drop in illegal Cuban migration to the United States during the talks as a result of past moves towards normalizing relations. Obama, who announced the detente with Cuba nearly three years ago, eliminated a policy granting automatic residency to virtually all Cubans who arrived on U.S. turf in January, just before leaving office. Cuba had asked for the change for years, saying that policy encouraged dangerous journeys and people trafficking. “Apprehensions of Cuban migrants at U.S. ports of entry decreased by 64 percent from fiscal year 2016 to 2017, and maritime interdictions of Cuban migrants decreased by 71 percent,” the U.S. State Department said in a statement. Trump said in June he was canceling Obama’s “terrible and misguided deal” with Havana, returning to Cold War rhetoric, and his administration has tightened trade and travel restrictions. He has however in practise left in place many of Obama’s changes including restored diplomatic relations and resumed direct U.S.-Cuba commercial flights and cruise-ship travel.

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SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A U.S. appeals court on Thursday suspended proceedings over President Donald Trump’s travel ban for individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries, after Trump announced a new executive order would come soon. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had been mulling whether to reconsider its ruling temporarily suspending Trump’s directive. In a court order, the 9th Circuit said it would put that process on hold pending further developments.

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BUDAPEST (Reuters) - Hungary is facing a frontal assault from U.S. financier George Soros who is attacking the country via his non-government organizations and European Union bureaucrats, a top ruling party politician said on Monday. Fidesz Vice Chairman Gergely Gulyas said Soros claims that the Hungarian government lied in its campaign against him were not substantial , adding the billionaire and the European Union pushed the same pro-migrant agenda. He rejected charges by Soros that the government s campaign stoked anti-Muslim sentiment and employed anti-Semitic tropes.

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NAIROBI (Reuters) - Eight Kenyan teenage schoolgirls died and 10 more were hospitalized after a fire engulfed their boarding school dormitory in Nairobi early on Saturday morning, a government official said. The cause of the fire was not known, and the government ordered Moi Girls School closed for two weeks while it investigated, education minister Fred Matiangi told reporters when he visited the school. A fire broke out at the school at 2:00am in the morning in one of the dormitories, said Matiangi. He said the school, which has nearly 1,200 students, is one of our top schools in the country and... (one) that we are very proud of. A statement from his office on Saturday evening said the death toll had risen from seven to eight. A shaken 16-year-old schoolgirl, Daniella Maina, told Reuters: We were sleeping and a girl woke us up and said that our hostel was burning. We were helped to safety by some teachers. Fires have in the past claimed the lives of dozens of Kenyan boarding school students. In 2001, 58 schoolboys were killed in a dormitory fire at Kyanguli Secondary School outside Nairobi. In 2012, eight students were killed at a school in Homa Bay County in western Kenya. Lax safety standards and poor emergency procedures have been blamed for some past fires at schools and for other tragedies such as the collapse of a residential building in Nairobi in May that killed nearly 50 people. The Kenyan police did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on Saturday morning.

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LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) - Spain s finance minister on Monday blamed the Catalan government for companies moving their headquarters out of the region, while his euro zone colleagues played down the impact of the Spanish crisis on the shared currency. In recent weeks, a stream of Catalonia-based firms and banks have moved their legal bases outside the regionas a crisis over a Catalonian push for independence from Spain deepened. Caixabank, Spain s number 3 bank, and Banco Sabadell, the number 5, have both moved their head offices out of Catalonia last week following an independence referendum that the Madrid government attempted to block. The exit of many companies from Catalonia is the consequence of the irrational and radical policies implemented and pursued by the (regional) government, minister Luis de Guindos said as he arrived for a meeting of euro zone finance ministers in Luxembourg. Losing Catalonia would have a significant impact on Spain, as the region makes up a fifth of the country s economic output and more than a quarter of its exports. Some fear it will impact on the euro zone economy, which is slowly recovering from a recession at the start of the decade. Nevertheless, most euro zone ministers declined to get drawn into a discussion on the situation in Catalonia, with Eurogroup president Jeroen Dijsselbloem describing it as a domestic issue . I hope that those prevail in Spain, who understand that, as the Spanish Prime Minister has said, law and constitution are the basis on which we operate, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said. European Economics Commissioner Pierre Moscovici, asked about the economic impact of the Catalan debate, said the Spanish constitutional order must be respected. This situation cannot be solved by violence, we have to find a solution through dialogue, this is also true when you consider the economic oint of view, he said. Spain also sought to reassure international investors concerned about the political situation in the country. The message is crystal clear: Catalonian independence is not going to happen, De Guindos said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch said on Wednesday it is not yet clear how big a tax cut Congress can deliver through tax reform, despite calls by President Donald Trump and other Republicans for steep reductions in business tax rates. Hatch, whose panel oversees tax policy in the Senate, told a Washington tax policy forum he could also accept a tax reform plan that expands the federal deficit, despite opposition from deficit hawks. Trump and other Republicans have promised the biggest overhaul of the U.S. tax system since the Reagan era. But the White House says a detailed proposal is not expected until September, allowing little time in 2017 for Congress to act on such a major piece of legislation. The White House wants to cut the corporate tax rate to 15 percent from 35 percent, while Republicans in the House of Representatives have proposed 20 percent. But Hatch said he is not committed to any rate targets, because discussions have yet to focus on specific policy changes, including the elimination of tax breaks, needed to help pay for rate reductions. “Until we perform the surgery and start eliminating preferences and credits in order to bring down rates ... we cannot speak definitively on the rate targets,” the Utah Republican said. “All of that is going to take some time,” he added, a day after joining Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, White House economic adviser Gary Cohn and Republican congressional leaders for a weekly tax reform meeting on Capitol Hill. The Trump administration and congressional Republicans are trying to forge agreement on a tax reform package that can clear the House and Senate this year. The main challenge is the 100-member Senate, where Republicans cannot afford to lose more than two votes from their 52-seat majority. A top issue for debate is whether tax reform should avoid expanding the deficit by including policy changes that pay for tax cuts. “I don’t see a problem with a tax reform proposal that loses revenue in the short term, if we can show that it will help put our economy on a better growth path,” Hatch said.  “However, we do have some budget hawks in our conference who will have a difficult time supporting a package that adds to the deficit, and we’ll have to take that into account, because once again we can’t afford to lose too many votes.”

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BEIJING (Reuters) - China and Vietnam s Communist parties have a shared destiny and there is great potential for bilateral economic cooperation, a senior Beijing official said on Tuesday on a visit to Vietnam, which has clashed with China over the South China Sea. Although both nations are under Communist rule, they are deeply suspicious of each other and relations have been strained over the past few years because of disputes in the strategic South China Sea. China has appeared uneasy at Vietnamese efforts to rally Southeast Asian countries over the busy swathe of sea as well as at its neighbor s growing defense ties with the United States, Japan and India. In July, under pressure from Beijing, Vietnam suspended oil drilling in offshore waters that are also claimed by China. However, Hanoi and Beijing have also tried to prevent tensions from getting out of control, and senior officials from two countries make fairly regular visits to each other. Liu Yunshan, a member of the Chinese Communist Party s elite Standing Committee that runs the country, told Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc in Hanoi, in the first such high level visit since relations deteriorated in July, that the two parties constitute a community of shared destiny with strategic significance , China s official Xinhua news agency reported. The sound and stable development of the bilateral ties will help to solidify the ruling position of the two parties, which is in the interests of the two parties and people of the two nations, Xinhua cited Liu as saying. The two economies are highly complementary, with huge potential for practical cooperation, the report quoted him as saying. Phuc told Liu that two countries should strive to maintain peace and stability in the South China Sea and avoid all activities that could increase tension, the Vietnamese government news website reported. He also urged China to have substantial discussions soon with Southeast Asian nations to reach a code of conduct in the disputed sea, the report said. While both the Chinese and Vietnamese reports made no direction mention of the South China Sea by Liu, they quoted him as suggesting the two countries properly manage and control their divergences, so as to create favorable environment for bilateral cooperation . China claims nearly all the South China Sea, through which an estimated $3 trillion in international trade passes each year. Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan also have claims.

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HONG KONG (Reuters) - Chinese President Xi Jinping urged the international community to make concerted efforts to solve the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula, in a phone call with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the official Xinhua news agency said on Thursday. During the telephone conversation, Xi said that facts had repeatedly proven that an ultimate settlement of the nuclear issue can only be found through peaceful means, including dialogue and consultation, Xinhua said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration is seeking a 17 percent cut to the budget of the government’s meteorological agency that monitors the climate and issues daily weather forecasts, the Washington Post reported on Friday. Citing a four-page budget memo, the Post said the proposed reductions in the budget of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) would affect research and satellite programs and eliminate funding for some smaller programs. The NOAA is part of the Commerce Department, whose overall budget “would be hit by an overall 18 percent reduction from its current funding level,” it said. The paper did not give a total figure for the proposed cuts, but said the White House Office of Management and Budget outline for the Commerce Department’s budget for fiscal year 2018 included sharp reductions for specific parts of the NOAA. The agency’s satellite data division would lose $513 million, or 22 percent, of its current funding under the proposal, and its Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research would lose $126 million, or 26 percent, the Post said. The paper said a spokesperson for the Commerce Department declined to comment, and that an unnamed White House official said the process was “evolving” and cautioned against specific numbers.

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BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The Iraqi government plans to soon start paying the salaries of Kurdish Peshmerga fighters and civil servants working for the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said on Tuesday. The semi-autonomous KRG has been struggling to pay the Peshmerga and its employees since 2014, after Baghdad stopped payments to it because of a dispute about oil-sharing revenue. We will soon be able to pay all the salaries of the Peshmerga and the employees of the region, Abadi told reporters The cost of a three-year war on Islamic State added to the Kurdistan region s financial difficulties, and Iraqi troops captured the oil region of Kirkuk from the Peshmerga two weeks ago, halving the KRG s oil income. Paying Kurdish salaries would help defuse tensions in the northern Iraqi region, where a referendum vote in favor of Kurdish independence in September triggered economic and military retaliation from the Iraqi government. The Peshmerga had taken over the multi-ethnic region of Kirkuk in 2014, after the Iraqi army collapsed in the face of Islamic State, preventing the militants from controlling its oilfields.

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SARAJEVO (Reuters) - Thousands of pensioners from across Bosnia s Bosniak-Croat Federation, most of whom live on the edge of poverty, took to the streets in Sarajevo on Wednesday to protest for a rise in pensions and better social and health care. Out of about 410,000 pensioners living in the Bosnian region, nearly two-thirds live on minimum payments of 326 Bosnian marka ($196) a month, while the average pension amounts to 370 marka compared to an average wage of 870 marka. With five pensioners to every six employed people in the Bosnian region, the government, which has yet to come up with an overall reform plan for the pension system, is struggling to make payments on time. Some pension fund officials say the system survives on low pensions, which are the lowest in the Balkans. The pensioners, some carrying placards reading Stop the Robbery and Give Us back Our Dignity , called for a 10 percent rise in payments which have not been increased since 2014. Pensions are low, medicines expensive and we have to pay electricity, water, telephone, said Alosman Halic from the northern town of Lukavac, who has worked for 45 years and receives 326 marka pension. After we pay our bills, there is nothing left for us, says his wife Isura, adding they could not survive without help from their children. Youth unemployment is high at more than 60 percent, scores of young people having left the Balkan country which was left impoverished by the 1992-95 war and is riven by political and ethnic divisions. On Tuesday, the Federation government adopted a new draft pension law, envisaging a 10 percent rise of pensions for some categories and five percent increase for other categories. The law now needs to be approved by the region s parliament, where the passage of laws is often blocked over political bickering. The situation is also grave in the Serb Republic, Bosnia s other autonomous region, where the level of employed is almost equal with that of retired people. Earlier this month, the government there decided to raise the minimum pension to 360 marka.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The District of Columbia’s city council approved a $15-an-hour minimum wage on Tuesday, a rate adopted by a growing number of U.S. cities and states seeking to battle income inequality. The council voted unanimously to pass the measure boosting the minimum hourly wage to $15 by 2020, with subsequent hikes tied to inflation. A final vote will come later this month, and Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser has backed the bill. Once approved, the U.S. capital will join California and New York in making $15 the hourly minimum. At least eight cities, including Seattle, have also approved the $15 base. “Raising the minimum wage will help address the issues of residents being pushed out of the District due to rising costs of living and income inequality,” Council member Vincent Orange, a sponsor of the bill, said in the hearing. He and other supporters say Washington’s robust economy and growing population mean it can support a higher minimum wage. The District of Columbia’s base wage is $10.50, and will go up by $1 on July 1 under existing law. The federal minimum is $7.25 an hour. The $15 minimum is estimated to raise wages for 114,000 workers, or about 14 percent of the District of Columbia’s workforce, according to an analysis for the council by the non-profit Economic Policy Institute. The higher pay proposal was supported by unions but was opposed by the District’s Chamber of Commerce. It said the District should not raise wages until neighboring suburbs do. The District of Columbia’s booming restaurant industry also opposed it. Restaurant owners and the local restaurant association said that higher costs would lead to layoffs. Some lawmakers said the measure did not go far enough to address a widening income gap and 18 percent poverty rate. Council member David Grosso added an amendment requiring the government to study a minimum income system to help the poorest residents. “Raising the minimum wage is a good thing, but is $15 enough? Or should the number be $35, or $50 an hour?” he asked. Under the measure, the minimum for workers who get tips, like waiters and bartenders, would also be $15 an hour by 2020. Following talks with unions, restaurateurs and community activists, employers would have to make up the difference between a base for tipped workers that will be $5 an hour in 2020, up from the current $2.77, Orange said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump will announce new U.S. responses to Iran’s missile tests, support for “terrorism” and cyber operations as part of his new Iran strategy, the White House said on Friday. “The president isn’t looking at one piece of this. He’s looking at all of the bad behavior of Iran,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, told reporters. “Not just the nuclear deal as bad behavior, but the ballistic missile testing, destabilizing of the region, Number One state sponsor of terrorism, cyber attacks, illicit nuclear program,” Sanders continued. Trump “wants to look for a broad strategy that addresses all of those problems, not just one-offing those,” she said. “That’s what his team is focused on and that’s what he’ll be rolling out to address that as a whole in the coming days.” A senior administration official told Reuters on Thursday that Trump was expected to announce he will decertify the landmark international deal curbing Iran’s nuclear program, in a step that could cause the accord to unravel. Trump on Friday declined to explain what he meant when he described a gathering of military leaders the evening before as “the calm before the storm,” but the White House said his remarks were not meant to be mischievous. The administration was considering Oct. 12 for Trump to give a speech on Iran, but no final decision had been made, an official said previously. It was not clear to what illicit nuclear program Sanders was referring as the International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran is complying with the 2015 nuclear deal reached with the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France, Germany and the European Union. The Trump administration also has acknowledged that Iran has not breached the accord’s Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, which is designed to prevent Iran developing a nuclear weapon. The administration, however, contends that Tehran has violated the “spirit” of the deal. The issue came up during a telephone call on Friday between Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron. The pair discussed “ways to continue working together to deny Iran all paths to a nuclear weapon,” according to a White House statement. Macron has been a fierce defender of the JCPOA, denounced by Trump as “the worst deal ever negotiated.” But the French leader also has suggested that restraints on Iran’s nuclear program that expire in 2025 could be bolstered, a senior French official said last month. A senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said on Friday that steps Trump is reviewing as part of a broader strategy also include imposing targeted sanctions in response to Iran’s ballistic missile tests, cyber espionage and backing of Lebanese Hezbollah and other groups on the U.S. list of foreign terrorist organizations. The administration earlier this year considered, but then put on hold, adding the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Iran’s most powerful internal and external security force, to the U.S. list of foreign terrorist organizations. The Quds Force, the IRGC’s foreign espionage and paramilitary wing, and individuals and entities associated with the IRGC are on the list, but the organization as a whole is not. Last month, current and former U.S. officials told Reuters the broader strategy Trump is weighing is expected to allow more aggressive U.S. actions to counter what the administration views as Iran’s efforts to boost its military muscle and expand its regional influence through proxy forces. Under a 2015 U.S. law, Trump has until Oct. 15 to certify to Congress that Iran is complying with the JCPOA. If he decides to decertify, lawmakers would have 60 days in which to consider reimposing U.S. sanctions on Iran lifted under the deal, an action that many experts warn could unhinge the accord. Knowledgeable sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, have said the administration is looking for ways to fix what it views as serious flaws without necessarily killing the deal. Critics say the flaws include the so-called sunset clauses, under which some of the restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program expire over time. Trump’s national security adviser, General H.R. McMaster, met with Republican and Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday in an effort to win their support for the strategy.

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TRIPOLI (Reuters) - Libya s coastal guard has rescued more than 250 illegal migrants trying to leave the North African country in small boats bound for Italy, officials said on Saturday. Libya s western shores are the main departure point for migrants mainly from sub-Saharan countries fleeing poverty and conflict trying to reach Europe. Arrivals to Italy have fallen by two-thirds since July from the same period last year after officials working for the U.N.-backed government in Tripoli, Italy s partner, managed to cut back human smuggling in the city of Sabratha west of the capital. That has pushed the trade further east, with the coast guard intercepting several boats off the coast near Qaraboulli and Zliten, two towns located east of Tripoli. The naval forces Ibn Ouf vessel rescued (on Friday) illegal migrants including women, children and men ... they are from different sub-Saharan and Arab countries, Coast Guard Captain Abdulhadi Fakhal told Reuters. They were rescued off Qaraboulli and Zliten towns ... and they are about 250 to 270 persons, Fakhal said. Libya has plunged into chaos since the 2011 overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in a NATO-backed uprising. A U.N.-backed Government of National Accord in Tripoli has been trying to gain control of territory.

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SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Police in southern China have detained seven people in connection with an underground banking scheme involving more than 20 billion yuan ($3 billion), the state news agency Xinhua reported. From a suspicious bank account in Shaoguan, a city in Guangdong province, the investigation snowballed to involve a suspected 10,000 people and 148 accounts across more than 20 provinces, Xinhua reported. The suspects allegedly profited from changes in the exchange rates for yuan and Hong Kong dollars, it said without giving details. The yuan, or renminbi, is not fully convertible and the government limits the amount of foreign currency to which individuals and businesses in China have access, which has given rise to networks of underground money changers and banks. ($1 = 6.6086 Chinese yuan renminbi)

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BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The sweet smell of waffles is familiar in Belgium but on Thursday people were left choking as a fire at a waffle factory sent a dense black cloud across Brussels, disrupting some rail traffic in the capital. Police said the blaze at the Milcamps factory, which produces the national sweet treat in various regional variants, broke out at lunchtime. It was not immediately clear what started it or whether anyone was hurt. A lot of smoke has been emitted and we are advising people to keep doors and windows shut and to stay inside. Drivers should close air vents in their cars, local police said. A sharp smell of burned waffle caused coughing in the city center, 6 km (4 miles), from the blaze. Belgian waffles, traditionally sold from mobile vendors and street kiosks, have become popular around the world. They are batter cooked between hotplates patterned according to various regional traditions and dusted with icing sugar. Their history dates back to the wafers baked for Mass in the medieval monasteries of the Low Countries.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Opponents of a bill that would allow lawsuits against Saudi Arabia’s government over the Sept. 11 attacks kept up their fight against the measure on Tuesday, a day before the U.S. Senate is expected to oppose President Barack Obama’s veto, allowing the bill to become law. Opponents circulated a letter from Ash Carter, Obama’s Secretary of Defense, saying that the “Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act,” known as JASTA, posed risks for U.S. forces abroad. “While we are sympathetic to the intent of JASTA, its potential second- and third-order consequences could be devastating to the Department and its Service members and could undermine our important counterterrorism efforts abroad,” Carter wrote to Representative Mac Thornberry. As Reuters reported on Friday, Thornberry, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, has circulated a letter to his fellow House of Representatives Republicans saying that he will vote to sustain Obama’s veto and urging them to do the same. Obama vetoed the legislation on Friday. If Congress gets enough votes to override the veto for the first time since Obama became president in 2009 the bill would become law. It takes two-thirds majorities in both the Senate and House to override a veto. The legislation passed the Senate and House without opposition, in reaction to long-running suspicions, denied by Riyadh, that the hijackers of the four U.S. jetliners that attacked the United States in 2001 were backed by the Saudi government. Fifteen of the 19 hijackers were Saudi nationals. While a few lawmakers have expressed concerns about the implications of the bill, it still has strong support, among both Republicans and Obama’s fellow Democrats. Nancy Pelosi, the House Democratic leader, told reporters on Tuesday she would vote to override. She said the vote was about giving a day in court to survivors and relatives of victims of the 2001 attacks, not a rebuke of Obama. “It isn’t anti-president,” she said.

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OMAHA, Neb. (Reuters) - Billionaire investor Warren Buffett on Monday campaigned alongside U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton at a rowdy rally in his home state of Nebraska, where he challenged Republican Donald Trump to release his tax returns and questioned Trump’s business acumen. Trump, a New York real estate developer making his first run at public office, has said he cannot release his tax returns, a ritual of U.S. presidential campaigns, until the Internal Revenue Service has completed an audit. “Now I’ve got news for him,” said Buffett, whose Berkshire Hathaway (BRKa.N) conglomerate is based in Omaha. “I’m under audit, too, and I would be delighted to meet him anyplace, anytime, before the election. “I’ll bring my tax return, he can bring his tax return ... and let people ask us questions about the items that are on there,” Buffett added, saying Trump was “afraid” not of the tax-collecting IRS but of voters. In response, Trump’s spokeswoman Hope Hicks said: “As you know, Mr. Trump is undergoing a routine audit.” She had no immediate comment when asked to respond to Buffett saying that he too was under audit but would release his tax returns. Trump has asserted his success as a businessman qualifies him to lead the country, but Buffett, who backs Clinton in the Nov. 8 election, said Trump lost money the only time he went to the American people and asked them to invest. He said it was in 1995 when Trump listed his Trump hotels and casino resorts on the New York Stock Exchange. He said the company lost money every year for the next decade. A monkey would have outperformed Trump’s company, Buffett said. In 1995, “if a monkey had thrown a dart at the stock page, the monkey on average would have made 150 percent,” he said. Buffett spoke for nearly 30 minutes to a raucous capacity crowd of roughly 3,100 people in a suburban Omaha high school with Clinton sitting at his side. He said Trump’s “final straw” was an ABC interview broadcast on Sunday in which he criticized the Muslim parents of a decorated U.S. soldier killed by a bomb in Iraq 12 years ago. The father Khizr Khan spoke at last week’s Democratic National Convention about their son and attacked Trump for proposing a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States. Trump said he was “viciously” attacked by Khan, a naturalized U.S. citizen, when the father publicly doubted Trump had read the U.S. Constitution. Khan said that Trump had “sacrificed nothing,” prompting Trump in his ABC interview to say, “I think I’ve made a lot of sacrifices.” Buffett on Monday bluntly contradicted Trump. “No member of the Buffett family has gone to Iraq or Afghanistan. No member of the Trump family has gone to Iraq or Afghanistan,” Buffett said. “We’ve both done extremely well during this period and our families haven’t sacrificed anything.” In his remarks Buffett announced the launch of a get-out-the vote effort, pledging to take at least 10 people to the polls who would otherwise have difficulty getting there. Buffett said he was backing a website, Drive2Vote, that would coordinate transportation to cast votes and that he had reserved a trolley that seats 32 people for the same purpose. “I’m going to be on it all day. I’m going to do selfies, whatever it takes,” Buffett said. Buffett said his goal is to generate the highest voter turnout in the congressional district that includes Omaha of any in the country. Nebraska is one of two U.S. states that award electoral votes in presidential elections by congressional district. Clinton responded to Buffett’s pledge with a promise of her own, if his turnout goal is met. “Warren and I will dance in the streets of Omaha together! Maybe if we’re really lucky he’ll wear his Elvis costume again!” she said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will press China and other Asian countries to take tougher action against North Korea when he attends regional meetings in Manila starting this week, a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday. Susan Thornton, the acting assistant secretary of state for East Asia, said Tillerson would have the chance to engage with China’s foreign minister at the meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Manila, but had no plans to meet North Korea’s foreign minister there. Thornton said Tillerson, who is due in Manila on Saturday, would be seeking greater cooperation in isolating North Korea and in enforcing U.N. sanctions over its missile and nuclear weapons programs. She said Washington wanted to see countries “drastically” reduce their dealings with Pyongyang. “What we are trying to do is galvanize this pressure and isolate North Korea so it can see what the opportunity cost is over developing these weapons programs,” she told reporters in a telephone briefing to preview Tillerson’s trip. Thornton said China had taken “significant steps, ... frankly unprecedented steps” to increase pressure on its neighbor North Korea, but it could do “a lot more” to step up enforcement of existing sanctions and to impose more. “We would like to see more action faster and more obvious and quick results, but I think we’re not giving up yet.” Thornton’s remarks contrasted with those of U.S. President Donald Trump, who on Saturday accused Beijing of doing “nothing” to help on North Korea and pointed to the huge U.S. trade deficit with China. A senior Trump administration official said on Tuesday that Trump was close to a decision on how to respond to what he considers China’s unfair trade practices and was considering action that could lead to tariffs or other trade restrictions on Chinese goods. Thornton declined to comment on any possible action but stressed that despite Trump’s tweets, North Korea and the trade issue were not linked in a “transactional,” but “in a sort of philosophical way.” “Can we work together jointly on the key security challenge facing Northeast Asia, which is the North Korea challenge?” she said. “If we can work together to do that, surely we can have a productive, mutually beneficial economic relationship in which we both enjoy reciprocal and fair access to each other’s markets.” Thornton said Tillerson would continue to press China on the South China Sea issue while in Asia, where the United State has been pressing for rapid adoption of a code of conduct over competing territorial claims. She said the United States would “certainly” raise human rights with Philippine President Duterte’s government. U.S. criticism of Duterte’s bloody war on drugs under Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama damaged relations between the long-standing allies. Duterte has remained defiant, accusing critics of “trivializing” his drug campaign with human rights concerns. Tillerson will also visit Thailand next Tuesday and then Malaysia. His visit to Bangkok will be the first by a U.S. secretary of state since before the military seized power in a 2014 coup.

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BOSTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump has dismissed fellow White House hopefuls as liars, journalists as disgusting people and Mexican immigrants as rapists with a belligerent public speaking style that has helped catapult him to the front of the Republican pack. The verbal tactics, on display in Thursday night’s debate in Detroit, have given the billionaire real estate developer front-runner status in early primary contests and opinion polls of U.S. Republican voters. But they would not last long on an academic debate stage, according to high school and college competitors and their coaches. “He would last one tournament and then be removed from the team,” said Eric Di Michele, coach of the speech and debate team at Regis High School in New York, one of the country’s top-ranked teams. “This kind of ‘ad hominem’ attack followed by insults, I’ve never seen it.” “Ad hominem” attacks, a Latin phrase meaning directed at a person rather than an idea, have long been a staple of the U.S. campaign trail where candidates are selling themselves as much as their ideas to voters. Referring to his closest rivals to be the Republican presidential nominee in November’s election, Trump has repeatedly called U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas a “liar” and dismissed Senator Marco Rubio of Florida as “little Marco.” His wins in the early nominating contests have prompted some of his rivals to take a similar approach. Cruz has labeled Trump “profane” and “vulgar.” Rubio has poked fun at Trump’s tan, suggested he urinated in his pants and rolled out a sexual double entendre about the size of his hands. With a flourish, Trump kicked back at that on Thursday night, flashing his hands at the audience and asking, “Look at those hands. Are they small hands?” before dismissing any suggestion he might be small elsewhere. “I guarantee you there is no problem.” Di Michele called it “a surreal moment.” “In 34 years of coaching debate, I’ve never seen any debater reference the size of any part of his anatomy,” he said. Asked in Thursday’s debate about his own use of personal attacks, Rubio argued, “For the last year, Donald Trump has basically mocked everybody ... If there’s anyone who’s ever deserved to be attacked that way it’s Donald Trump.” Of the remaining Republican candidates, Ohio Governor John Kasich has steered away from the personal, sticking doggedly to policy amid Thursday night’s sometimes chaotic exchanges. Trump’s language, admired by his supporters as frank, has drawn wide criticism for its crude insults. Republican 2012 presidential nominee Mitt Romney attacked Trump’s style as well as his policies in a speech on Thursday, citing “the bullying, the greed, the showing off, the misogyny, the absurd third-grade theatrics.” In schools, the campaign antics have inspired academic debaters to become more civilized. “That sort of coarse language has made people more critical of the political parties,” said Charlie Barton, a 17-year-old Regis senior debater. “What we’ve seen is a greater shift away from that sort of rhetoric.” NO LINCOLN-DOUGLAS HERE Academic debating, also known as forensics, has a long history in the United States and takes much of its form and inspiration from politics. Indeed, one style of debating is named after the storied 1858 debates between Abraham Lincoln and U.S. Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois, which put the future president on the national stage. But the judging in academic debating is relentlessly focused on facts; students study examples and background before making their cases. The discipline can bear as much resemblance to current televised presidential debates as Greco-Roman wrestling does to chair-throwing WWE spectacles. “They are less like politicians and more like lawyers, because they are not necessarily going for a vote on personality, they are arguing that their case is correct,” said Derek Yuill, the speech and debate coach at Gabrielino High School in San Gabriel, California, a top-ranked U.S. forensics team. Some young debaters have watched the Republican matchups more as an example of what not to do. “I really wish I could take on Donald Trump in some kind of debate round, because he especially among the candidates would not fare well in academic debate,” said Jacqueline Dang, a 17-year-old senior at Gabrielino. “He doesn’t seem to have any kind of evidence or numbers to substantiate his claims, other than his poll numbers.” College debaters have also been watching Trump’s performance with bemusement, said Connie Lee, 18, the president of Dartmouth College’s Parliamentary Debate Team. “The name-calling and the ad hominem attacks get made fun of” at debate-watching parties, Lee said. She said that while many collegiate debaters are politically liberal, they still respect skilled oratory from conservatives when they see it. Cruz, who holds a spot on Princeton University’s debate hall of fame, is admired for his abilities. “There are jokes about ambitious debaters being the next Ted Cruz,” Lee said. A Trump spokeswoman said the campaign had no doubts about his debating ability. “According to all the online polls, Mr. Trump has performed exceptionally well and won all the debates,” spokeswoman Hope Hicks said by e-mail. Despite giving poor marks for Trump’s debate performances, Gabrielino’s Yuill said he does tell his students to note how well Trump gets into the spotlight to convey his message: “That’s what I tell them, how important it is to get their attention.” (Reporting by Scott Malone; Editing by Frances Kerry) This article was funded in part by SAP. It was independently created by the Reuters editorial staff. SAP had no editorial involvement in its creation or production.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Qatar s foreign minister on Friday criticized reckless leadership in the Gulf for a number of crises including the Gulf rift and Lebanon, taking apparent aim at Saudi Arabia. The diplomatic crisis, in which Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt have boycotted Qatar, has been brewing since the summer after the four countries cut diplomatic, transport and trade ties with Qatar, accusing it of financing terrorism. Doha denies the charges. Saudi Arabia and its allies are fighting for sway across the region against a bloc led by Iran, which includes the heavily armed Lebanese Shi ite Hezbollah group. Attention on the dispute has shifted recently especially in the wake of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri s shock resignation announcement this month while in Saudi Arabia. Hariri s abrupt resignation and his continued stay in Riyadh have caused fears over Lebanon s stability and thrust it into the bitter rivalry between Riyadh and Iran. Saudi Arabia and Hariri - whom Riyadh backs - say his movements are not restricted. Riyadh also denies accusations it forced Hariri to resign. We see a pattern of irresponsibility and a reckless leadership in the region which is just trying to bully countries into submission, Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said in Washington. What we are witnessing now in the region ... it s something we just witness(ed) in recent history, bullying small countries into submission. Exactly what happened to Qatar six months ago is happening now to Lebanon. The leadership in Saudi Arabia and the UAE need to understand ... there is no right for any country to interfere in other countries affairs, he told a group of reporters. Asked to comment on those remarks, the Saudi Embassy in Washington s spokeswoman, Fatimah Baeshen, said: The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia s foreign policy has always been premised on regional stability, peace, and security. The Kingdom does not interfere with its neighbors domestic affairs. Riyadh says Qatar backs terrorism and cozies up to Iran. Qatar rejects the accusation and says it is being punished for straying from its neighbors backing for authoritarian rulers. Since Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman rose to power less than three years ago, Riyadh has struck a more aggressive posture towards Iran, launching a war in Yemen, leading the boycott of neighboring Qatar, and ratcheting up its rhetoric against Hezbollah. U.S. efforts to bring an end to the dispute have yet to bear fruit. Qatar hosts the largest U.S. air base in the region which is used in the international coalition fighting Islamic State. Thani said Qatar s Boeing C-17 transport aircraft, used by Doha for logistical support within the coalition, were forced to fly over Iran given that Saudi Arabia and the UAE have blocked Qatari planes from flying over their airspace. So if we imagine that any emergency will happen, those C-17 planes which might have U.S. troops will land in Iran. So this is the impact of this blockade ... on the global coalition and on U.S. military operations there, Thani said. A spokesman for the U.S. Air Forces Central Command said the Qataris have flown nearly 30 mobility missions in support of Coalition operations to defeat ISIS, moving more than a million pounds of cargo, including parts and supplies since Doha recommitted its C-17 fleet to Operation Inherent Resolve in July. At this time, we are aware of no Qatari C-17 flights having traversed Iranian airspace while carrying Coalition cargo, Lt. Colonel Damien Pickart told Reuters.

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LIMA (Reuters) - Former authoritarian leader Alberto Fujimori sought forgiveness from Peruvians from the bottom of my heart on Tuesday for shortcomings during his rule, and thanked President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski for granting him a Christmas pardon. In a video on Facebook, Fujimori, 79, vowed that as a free man, he would support Kuczynski s call for reconciliation, hinting that he would not return to politics. I m aware the results of my government were well received by some, but I acknowledge I also disappointed other compatriots, the ailing Fujimori said, reading from notes while connected to tubes in a hospital bed. And to them, I ask for forgiveness from the bottom of my heart. The remarks were Fujimori s first explicit apology to the Andean nation that he governed with an iron fist from 1990-2000. They came after two days of unrest as protesters slammed the pardon as an insult to victims and part of a political deal to help Kuczynski survive a scandal. The pardon cleared Fujimori s convictions for graft and human rights crimes during his leadership of the rightwing government. Late on Monday, Kuczynski, a 79-year-old former Wall Street banker, appealed to Peruvians opposed to the pardon to turn the page and defended his decision as justified clemency for a sick man whose government helped the country progress. I cannot keep from expressing my profound gratitude for the complex step that the president took, which commits me in this new stage of my life to decidedly support his call for reconciliation, Fujimori said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump will not necessarily insist on including funding for a border wall with Mexico in legislation to address protections for children brought to the United States illegally, a senior aide said on Tuesday. White House legislative director Marc Short, speaking to reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast, said the administration will lay out its priorities for a fix for the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program in the next couple of weeks. While Trump remains committed to his campaign promise to build the wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, “whether or not that is specifically part of a DACA package or a different legislative package, I am not going to prejudge here today,” Short said. “I don’t want to bind ourselves into a construct that makes reaching a conclusion on DACA impossible,” Short said. Short’s comments were the latest signal that the Republican president wants to see if he can engage Democrats as well as Republicans in trying to enact his agenda. On Tuesday evening, he is scheduled to have dinner with a bipartisan group of senators whose support he hopes to win on legislation to overhaul the tax code. Democrats welcomed Short’s DACA comments, saying they cleared away a major stumbling to legislation to help DACA recipients, known as Dreamers. Democrats have insisted they will not allow border funding to be part of any legislation and would likely have the votes in the Senate to block a provision to which they objected. “That’s an important position because we cannot make a 2,200 mile (3,540 km) wall a condition for passing the Dream Act and we’ve been very clear from the start,” said Senator Dick Durbin, a senior Democrat who has been working for the past 16 years to legislate protections for the Dreamers. Democrats are willing to work with the White House and congressional Republicans on other border security measures as part of the legislation, Durbin added. But Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which seeks to limit legal and illegal immigration, criticized the potential shift on DACA, saying the White House forfeited leverage it needs to tighten border enforcement. Krikorian said the administration seemed to be looking for an “escape hatch” on the controversial DACA program. “It does suggest how much Trump wants this DACA issue to go away,” he said. Trump said last week he was ending an Obama-era program that protects from the deportation of immigrants brought illegally into the United States as children, but he gave U.S. lawmakers six months to act on the issue. The move put the onus on Congress to address the nearly 800,000 Dreamers now facing uncertainty about their status in a country that for many is the only one they have known.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has designated White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau until a permanent director is nominated and confirmed, the White House said on Friday. The action came hours after Richard Cordray submitted his formal resignation and named a deputy director as his replacement, setting the stage for a political and legal battle over the regulator’s leadership. “The president looks forward to seeing Director Mulvaney take a common sense approach to leading the CFPB’s dedicated staff, an approach that will empower consumers to make their own financial decisions and facilitate investment in our communities,” the White House said in its statement. Democratic lawmakers are eager to preserve the regulator for as long as possible while Republicans want to put in place new leadership to chart a drastically different course. The six-year-old bureau has policed consumer financial markets, drafting aggressive rules curbing products like payday loans, while issuing multimillion dollar fines against large financial institutions like Wells Fargo. But Republicans have consistently complained the agency is too powerful and lacks oversight from Congress on its operations, and they are eager to take control. Mulvaney, who has criticized the bureau in the past, said, “I look forward to working with the expert personnel within the agency to identify how the bureau can transition to be more effective in its mission, while becoming more accountable to the taxpayer.” The succession plan has never been tested, with Cordray as its first and only full-time director. Cordray had previously announced plans to resign by the end of November. In a statement to staff, he said that Leandra English, the CFPB’s chief of staff, had been named deputy director and would take over as acting director of the agency upon his exit. However, the White House had already said it planned to name its own interim leadership at the regulator. Trump has pushed to ease regulations on businesses, including the financial sector, a stance seemingly at odds with Cordray’s more aggressive regulatory approach. Earlier this month, White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah said that the administration “will announce an acting director and the president’s choice to replace Mr Cordray at the appropriate time.” There are competing theories in Washington as to who can name Cordray’s replacement. Democrats point to language in the Dodd-Frank law that created the CFPB, stipulating the deputy director replaces the director when he or she leaves. But others say a separate law governing federal vacancies gives Trump power to name someone elsewhere in the administration to that role temporarily, while the White House identifies a full-time nominee who would be confirmed by the Senate.

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LONDON (Reuters) - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has lost the support of the people, a spokesman for British Prime Minister Theresa May said on Monday, while urging a peaceful and swift resolution to the uncertain political situation there. We don t yet know how developments in Zimbabwe are going to play out but what does appear clear is that Mugabe has lost the support of the people and of his party, the spokesman said.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama imposed sweeping new sanctions on North Korea on Wednesday intended to further isolate the country’s leadership after recent actions by Pyongyang that have been seen by Washington and its allies as provocative. The executive order freezes any property of the North Korean government in the United States and prohibits exportation of goods from the United States to North Korea. It also allows the U.S. government to blacklist any individuals, whether or not they are U.S. citizens, who deal with major sectors of North Korea’s economy. Experts said the measures vastly expanded the U.S. blockade against Pyongyang. North Korea conducted a nuclear test on Jan. 6, and a Feb. 7 rocket launch that the United States and its allies said employed banned ballistic missile technology. Pyongyang said it was a peaceful satellite launch. “The U.S. and the global community will not tolerate North Korea’s illicit nuclear and ballistic missile activities, and we will continue to impose costs on North Korea until it comes into compliance with its international obligations,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. Despite decades of tensions, the United States has not had a comprehensive trade ban against North Korea of the kind enacted against Myanmar and Iran. Americans were allowed to make limited sales to North Korea, although in practice such trade was tiny. U.S. officials had believed a blanket trade ban would be ineffective without a stronger commitment from China, North Korea’s largest trading partner. But with China signing on to new U.N. sanctions earlier this month, that obstacle has been removed, experts said. “North Korean sanctions are finally getting serious,” said Peter Harrell, a former senior State Department official who worked on sanctions. The new sanctions threaten to ban from the global financial system anyone, even Europeans and Asians, who does business with broad swaths of Pyongyang’s economy, including its financial, mining and transportation sectors. The so-called secondary sanctions will compel banks to freeze the assets of anyone who breaks the blockade, potentially squeezing out North Korea’s business ties in China and Myanmar. “It’s going to be very hard for North Korea to move money anywhere in the world,” said Harrell, now with the Center for a New American Security.

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BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian warplanes took off from an air base which was hit by U.S. cruise missiles on Friday, and carried out air strikes on rebel-held areas in the eastern Homs countryside, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The U.S. Navy had fired dozens of missiles at the air base near Homs city in response to a chemical attack this week which Washington and its allies blamed on the Damascus government. The British-based Observatory, a group monitoring the Syrian war using sources on the ground, said eight people had been killed in the U.S. attack. The extent of the damage to the Shayrat air base was not entirely clear, but the Syrian warplanes had “done the impossible” in order to continue using it for sorties, the Observatory told Reuters.

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QUETTA, Pakistan (Reuters) - A Pakistani Taliban suicide bomber rammed a car into a police truck in the southwestern city of Quetta on Wednesday, killing at least seven people, police said. The attack killed five police officials and two passers-by on the outskirts of the city of Quetta, police chief Abdur Razzaq Cheema said. He said 22 people were wounded, eight of them critically. Sarfraz Bugti, the home minister of Baluchistan province, of which Quetta is capital, told Reuters: It was a suicide blast. Quetta is about 100 km (60 miles) east of the border with Afghanistan. Bugti said the truck carrying the police officials was on its way to the city to drop them at their posts when the suicide bomber rammed into the vehicle. Television pictures showed the burnt wreckage of the vehicles. The Pakistani Taliban, an umbrella organisation of various militant groups within Pakistan, and loosely allied to the Afghan Taliban, issued a statement claiming responsibility. Baluchistan province has long been the scene of an insurgency by separatists fighting against the state to demand more of a share of the gas- and mineral-rich region s resources. They also accuse the central government of discrimination. The Taliban, Sunni Islam militants and sectarian groups linked to al Qaeda and the Islamic State group also operate in the strategically important region, which borders Iran as well as Afghanistan. The violence has fuelled concern about security for projects in the $57 billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor, a transport and energy link planned to run from western China to Pakistan s southern deep-water port of Gwadar. A suicide bombing claimed by Islamic State at a Sufi Muslim shrine this month killed 22 people and wounded more than 30. Ayub Qureshi, the provincial police chief, said a counter-terrorism police officer was shot and killed in another part of Quetta as authorities were dealing with the suicide bombing. A militant sectarian faction, the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi al-Almi, claimed responsibility for killing the counter-terrorism official, and for planting a roadside bomb in a northwestern region, that killed two soldiers. Security officials said a remote-controlled bomb was set off as an army vehicle passed by.

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BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Parliament President Martin Schulz on Wednesday said he hoped for a “rational cooperation” with Donald Trump as the next U.S. president after a bitter political campaign. “It will not be easy because during the election campaign we heard some elements of protectionism, also some worrying words about women, about minorities,” said Schulz, a German Social Democrat. “But my experience is also that election campaigns are different from the real politics during a term of the president so I hope that we will get back to a rational cooperation,” he said in televised remarks. In a separate written statement, he highlighted need for Trump to formulate more detailed policies after a campaign that capitalized on voters’ discontent with the status quo and he also listed key international policies that could be affected by the change of administration in Washington. “Mr. Trump has managed to become the standard-bearer of the angst and fears of millions of Americans. Those concerns must now be addressed with credible policies,” Schulz said. “Vitriol and polarization have fueled this electoral contest. President Trump will have the daunting task of bringing together a divided nation. “From Syria to Iraq, from Ukraine to Libya, Trump’s role in diplomacy and dealmaking will be tested from Day One,” he added. “From the fight against global warming to its commitment to NATO, the world awaits and hopes for an outward-looking presidency aiming at shaping international relations and upholding the values of freedom and democracy.”

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House said in a letter on Friday that a tweet by President Donald Trump on Thursday was the formal answer to a request by the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee for information about records of conversations with fired FBI Director James Comey. The letter to Republican Representative Mike Conaway, who is leading the panel’s investigation into Russian interference to the 2016 election, and Representative Adam Schiff, the committee’s top Democrat, said: “In response to the committee’s inquiry, we refer you to President Trump’s June 22, 2017, statement regarding this matter.” The House panel said on June 9 it had written to Don McGahn, the White House counsel, asking about the existence of any recordings or memos covering Comey’s conversations with Trump and asked that copies of the materials be provided to the panel by June 23. Trump wrote on Twitter on Thursday, a day before the deadline, that he did not know if there were recordings of his conversations with Comey, but he did not make or have any such recordings. Conaway told reporters Friday morning that Trump’s tweet was not a sufficient response. Schiff said in a statement on Thursday that Trump’s Twitter comment stopped short of denying the White House had tapes or recordings and said the White House must respond in writing. (This version of the story corrects Conaway’s role to leader of investigation from chairman in second paragraph)

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FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Around 60,000 inhabitants of Germany s financial capital Frankfurt will be ordered to leave their homes on Sunday while a large World War Two bomb discovered at a building site is made safe, the police said. Germany s central bank, the Bundesbank, Frankfurt s Goethe University, and at least two hospitals will also be evacuated, in one of the largest evacuations in German post-war history. The 1.4-tonne HC 4000 bomb dropped by the British air force during World War Two was uncovered on a building site on Wismarer Strasse in Frankfurt s leafy Westend where many wealthy bankers live. Bomb disposal experts who examined it said the massive evacuation could wait until the weekend. We are still working on the modalities of the evacuation plan, a spokeswoman for Frankfurt police said on Wednesday.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump has given the military the authority to reset a confusing system of troop limits in Iraq and Syria that critics said allowed the White House to micro-manage battlefield decisions and ultimately obscured the real number of U.S. forces. The Pentagon, which confirmed the move on Wednesday, said no change has yet been made to U.S. troop limits. It also stressed the U.S. strategy in Iraq and Syria still was focused on backing local forces to fight Islamic State - a tactic that has averted the need for a major U.S. ground force. But the shift on troop limits was another sign of the greater authority Trump appears comfortable giving his military commanders to make battlefield decisions and could allow for more rapid increases in troop levels in the future. The Force Management Level system was introduced in Iraq and Syria during Barack Obama’s administration as a way to exert control over the military. Obama periodically raised FML limits to allow more troops in Iraq and Syria as the campaign against Islamic State advanced. But the numbers did not reflect the extent of the U.S. commitment on the ground since commanders found often less-than-ideal ways to work around the limits - sometimes bringing in forces temporarily or hiring more contractors. The force management levels, which are officially at 5,262 in Iraq and 503 in Syria, are believed to be more than a couple of thousands troops shy of the actual number of U.S. forces in both countries. Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White said Trump delegated authority to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to determine force management levels for Iraq and Syria going forward. “We want our reporting to Congress and to the public to be more easily and clearly understood,” White said in a statement, which was reported earlier on Wednesday by BuzzFeed News. “We will conduct a review to ensure that the numbers we provide to Congress and to the public accurately reflect the facts on the ground. This is about transparency.” Proponents within the U.S. military of changing the system also argue that bringing that decision-making authority to the Pentagon from the White House will allow more flexibility in responding to unforeseen developments on the battlefield. Replacing the force management level system with something more transparent could be a tricky task, not least because of political sensitivities about U.S. forces in Iraq. Influential Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr already has called on Iraq’s government to order the withdrawal of U.S. and allied forces after the battle to retake the city of Mosul from Islamic State is complete. The Iraqi and U.S. governments, however, have signaled the need for a continued U.S. military presence. How large that would be has yet to be determined. Too much information about the comings and goings of U.S. troops, particularly if announced in advance, could give information to enemy, experts say.

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MOGADISHU (Reuters) - A Somali television journalist was killed in a car bombing in the capital Mogadishu on Monday, an editor for the TV station and local authorities said. Mohamed Ibrahim Gabow had borrowed the car from a friend, Mohamed Moalim Mustaf, an editor at Kalsan TV, told Reuters. Unexpectedly it exploded and he died on the spot. We do not know who was behind it, he added. Local government officials confirmed the incident. The journalist ... died after a bomb planted in a car he drove exploded. His body has now been taken to a hospital. The police will investigate, said Abdifatah Omar Halane, the spokesman for the mayor of Mogadishu. Gabow is the fourth journalist killed this year in Somalia, currently ranked 167th out of 180 countries for journalist safety by Reporters Without Borders. No group has ever claimed the killing of a journalist in the capital. Somalia has been convulsed by instability, violence and lawlessness since early 1990s following the toppling of military dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Here are some of the highlights of the Reuters interview with U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday. “There’s a chance that we could end up having a major, major, conflict with North Korea, absolutely.” QUESTION: Is that your biggest global worry at this point? “Yes, I would say that’s true, yes. ... North Korea would be certainly that.” ON GETTING SOUTH KOREA TO PAY FOR THAAD MISSILE DEFENSE SYSTEM “On the THAAD system, it’s about a billion dollars. I said, ‘Why are we paying? Why are we paying a billion dollars? We’re protecting. Why are we paying a billion dollars?’ So I informed South Korea it would be appropriate if they paid. Nobody’s going to do that. Why are we paying a billion dollars? It’s a billion dollar system. It’s phenomenal. It’s the most incredible equipment you’ve ever seen - shoots missiles right out of the sky. And it protects them and I want to protect them. We’re going to protect them. But they should pay for that, and they understand that.” ON WHETHER THE WAR AGAINST ISLAMIST EXTREMISM WILL EVER END “Yours is the toughest question. Because at what point does it end? But we can’t let them come over here. I have to say, there is an end. And it has to be humiliation. There is an end. Otherwise it’s really tough. But there is an end. We are really eradicating some very bad people. When you take a look at what’s going on with the cutting off of the heads. We haven’t seen that since Medieval times. Right?” ON CHINESE PRESIDENT XI’S EFFORTS TO REIN IN NORTH KOREA “He certainly doesn’t want to see turmoil and death. He doesn’t want to see it. He’s a good man. He’s a very good man and I got to know him very well ... We’ll see how it all works out. I know he would like to be able to do something. Perhaps it’s possible that he can’t. But I think he’d like to be able to do something.” “He’s 27 years old, his father dies, took over a regime, so say what you want but that’s not easy, especially at that age. You know you have plenty of generals in there and plenty of other people that would like to do what he’s doing. So I’ve said this before and I’ve, I’m just telling you, and I’m not giving him credit or not giving him credit. I’m just saying that’s a very hard thing to do.” “As to whether or not he’s rational, I have no opinion on it. I hope he’s rational.” “I get a call from Mexico yesterday, ‘We hear you’re going to terminate NAFTA.’ I said that’s right. They said, ‘Is there any way we can do something without you – without termination?’ I said, ‘What do you want to do?’ He said, ‘Well, we’d like to negotiate.’ I said we’ll think about it. Then I get a call, and they call me, I get a call from Justin Trudeau and he said, ‘We’d like to see if we can work something out,’ and I said that’s fine. Because I’ve always - I’ve been very consistent. It’s much less disruptive if we can make a fair trade deal than if we terminate.” “It’s unacceptable. It’s a horrible deal made by Hillary. It’s a horrible deal. And we’re going to renegotiate that deal, or terminate it.” QUESTION: When will you announce it? “Very soon. I’m announcing it now.” “By the way, with South Korea, just so you know. They’re ready for it. Mike Pence was representing me, he was just over there, he’s told them. And we have the five-year anniversary coming up very shortly. And we thought that would be a good time to start ... It’s a great deal for South Korea. It’s a terrible deal for us.” “Frankly, Saudi Arabia has not treated us fairly, because we are losing a tremendous amount of money in defending Saudi Arabia.” “Well, my problem is that I’ve established a very good personal relationship with (Chinese) President Xi. And I really feel that he is doing everything in his power to help us with a big situation, so I wouldn’t want to be causing difficulty right now for him ... So I would certainly want to speak to him first.” “If there’s closure, there’s closure. We’ll see what happens. If there’s a shutdown. It’s the Democrats’ fault. Not our fault. It’s the Democrats’ fault. Maybe they’d like to see a shutdown.” ON TRUMP’S PLAN TO GENERATE REVENUE TO OFFSET TAX CUTS “We will do trade deals that are going to make up for a tremendous amount of the deficit. We are going to be doing trade deals that are going to be much better trade deals ... “There will be other ways that we are going to raise revenues. But we are going to run the country properly, and we are going to be reimbursed when we do things. Why should we be paying for somebody else’s military?” ON MIDDLE EAST PEACE AND POSSIBLE TRIP TO ISRAEL, SAUDI ARABIA “It’s a possibility, we’re talking to both. It’s a possibility, but I want to see peace with Israel and the Palestinians. There is no reason there’s not peace between Israel and the Palestinians - none whatsoever. So we’re looking at that and we’re also looking at the potential of going to Saudi Arabia.”

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senior Trump administration officials said on Sunday that the United States was committed to remaining part of the Iran nuclear accord for now, despite President Donald Trump s criticisms of the deal and his warnings that he might pull out. Nikki Haley, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said that Tehran is complying with the 2015 nuclear accord intended to increase Iran s accountability in return for the lifting of some economic sanctions. I think right now, you re going to see us stay in the deal, Haley told NBC s Meet the Press. In a speech on Friday, Trump laid out an aggressive approach on Iran and said he would not certify it is complying with the nuclear accord, despite a determination by the United Nations nuclear watchdog that Tehran is meeting its terms. The Republican president threw the issue to the U.S. Congress, which has 60 days to decide whether to reinstate U.S. sanctions. He warned that if we are not able to reach a solution working with Congress and our allies, then the agreement will be terminated. So far, none of the other signatories to the deal - Britain, France, Germany, Russia, China, Iran and the European Union - have cited serious concerns, leaving the United States isolated. In her Meet the Press interview, Haley said the United States was not saying that Iran was in breach of the agreement, but she raised concerns about its activities that are not covered by the pact, including weapons sales and sponsorship of militant groups such as Hezbollah. Haley said that other countries were turning a blind eye to these Iranian activities in order to protect the nuclear agreement. She said the United States needed to weigh a proportionate response to Tehran s actions on the world stage. The goal at the end of the day is to hold Iran accountable, Haley said in the interview, which mainly focused on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, as the nuclear deal is formally known. Haley and U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson hammered away at the need to address what they see as shortcomings in the two-year-old international accord while simultaneously placing pressure to rein in Iranian activities outside the scope of that deal. Tillerson, alluding to other signatory countries opposition to reopening the Iran pact, raised the possibility of a second agreement to run parallel to the existing one. Among the areas of concern he mentioned were its sunset provisions and Tehran s ballistic missile program. Haley also said the reason the United States was looking closely at the Iran nuclear deal is because of escalating tensions over North Korea s nuclear weapons development. What we re saying now with Iran is don t let it become the next North Korea. On Friday, Trump also said he was authorizing the U.S. Treasury to sanction Iran s Revolutionary Guards, and on Sunday Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he was planning to move ahead. Mnuchin, interviewed on Fox News Sunday Morning Futures, said he has spoken about Iran with his counterparts attending World Bank and International Monetary Fund meetings in recent days. He did not provide any details on possible sanctions. U.S. Senator Susan Collins, appearing on ABC s This Week, noted that Trump could have taken a more extreme step by withdrawing from the agreement. But in words of support for Trump, the moderate Republican lawmaker said, Instead, he put a spotlight on two troubling deficiencies in the agreement, referring to a lack of limitations on Iran s tests of ballistic missiles and a pathway to developing a nuclear weapon down the road. While many U.S. allies strongly criticized Trump s decision not to recertify the Iran deal, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the move, saying the current terms of the Iran nuclear accord would allow it to have a nuclear stockpile within a decade. We cannot allow this rogue regime 30 times the size of North Korea s economy to have a nuclear arsenal, Netanyahu said on CBS Face the Nation.

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BEIJING (Reuters) - China s largely rubber-stamp parliament formally extended a law banning disrespect of the national anthem on Saturday to cover Hong Kong, a move that critics have said undermined the Chinese-ruled city s autonomy and freedoms. In the past few years, some Hong Kong football fans have booed the national anthem during World Cup qualifiers and other matches, mirroring protests in the United States where football players knelt during the national anthem, a practice denounced by U.S. President Donald Trump. China passed a new law in September mandating up to 15 days in police detention for those who mock the March of the Volunteers national anthem, a law that also covers the Chinese territories of Hong Kong and Macau but was not immediately given a legal basis for enforcement there. The National Anthem Law, which went into effect on Oct. 1, has now been included in an annex of Hong Kong s Basic Law, or mini constitution, state news agency Xinhua said. It will also be included in an annex of Macau s Basic Law, Xinhua reported. He Shaoren, spokesman for the National People s Congress Standing Committee, said in a news conference on Saturday that it was up to the Hong Kong government to enact a local law to abide by the amendment in a timely manner. A Hong Kong official said on Wednesday that the Special Administrative Region would enact such a law as soon as possible . Hong Kong is a former British colony that returned to Chinese rule in 1997 under a so-called one country, two systems formula that promises the city a high degree of autonomy, including an independent judiciary. China s growing reach into Hong Kong s affairs has, however, stoked tensions and mass protests including the 2014 Occupy civil disobedience movement that blocked major roads in the city for 79 days to pressure China to allow full democracy. Chinese authorities have strived to instill greater patriotism into Hong Kong, while condemning a push from democracy activists to distance Hong Kong. China s national legislature on Saturday also passed an amendment to its criminal law that extends punishments for publicly desecrating the national flag and emblem to disrespecting the national anthem. Punishments include jail terms of up to three years, Xinhua reported. This law does not appear to apply to Hong Kong or Macau.

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ULAANBAATAR (Reuters) - Mongolia s parliament confirmed the nomination of motorbike enthusiast Ukhnaa Khurelsukh as prime minister on Wednesday, putting the country back on track to receive funds from a $5.5 billion IMF economic rescue package. Khurelsukh, of the ruling Mongolian People s Party (MPP), received unanimous approval from the lawmakers in attendance for his confirmation as Mongolia s 30th prime minister. He will face challenges in bringing back foreign investment to the mineral-rich former Soviet satellite and manage the country s heavy debt load. The International Monetary Fund has approved an economic bailout program to help relieve debt pressures and buoy the currency, the tugrik, that includes austerity policies. An IMF visit to review the program that included the disbursement of $37.82 million of the funds was delayed in September until a new government was formed. The IMF had said that once a new government was in place, it would engage with the authorities on how best to move forward with the program. Khurelsukh succeeds Jargaltulga Erdenebat, who was voted out of office in September amid allegations of corruption and incompetence. The new prime minister holds the title of colonel, although he only served in the military from 1989 to 1990. He projects a tough rule of law image, said Dale Choi, head of Altan Bumba Financial Group. He s a very tough and strong guy himself. I think the electorate likes it very much. Khurelsukh, 49. is seen as a leader to the party s so-called youth faction and is also a noted motorcycle enthusiast. He is president of the fan club for Harley-Davidson in Ulaanbaatar. Mongolia s democracy has been turbulent since its transition from a socialist state in 1990, and no premier has completed a four-year term since 2000. Government infighting and reshuffles have contributed to the delays of development projects. The closest Mongolia came to handing over the operations of state-owned Erdenes Tavan Tolgoi coking coal mine to a consortium of Mongolian Mining Corp, China Shenhua Energy and Sumitomo Corp was in 2015, before the parliament speaker stepped in to block the deal. We would hope to see the new government advance the privatization of Tavan Tolgoi, said Thomas Hugger CEO and a fund manager at Asia Frontier Capital. Mongolia s coal miners are looking to ramp up production to meet growing demand from China, but longstanding transportation issues continues to hold back sales. Mongolia s proximity to China means it could play a large role in coal supply to China, said Hugger, if a key railway is built. There s no reason Mongolia shouldn t be the largest supplier of coking and thermal coal to China.

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SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China s Big Four state-owned banks have stopped providing financial services to new North Korean clients, according to branch staff, amid U.S. concerns that Beijing has not been tough enough over Pyongyang s repeated nuclear tests. Tensions between the United States and North Korea have ratcheted up after the sixth and most powerful nuclear test conducted by Pyongyang on Sept. 3 prompted the United Nations Security Council to impose further sanctions on Tuesday. Chinese banks have come under scrutiny for their role as a conduit for funds flowing to and from China s increasingly isolated neighbor. China Construction Bank (CCB) (601939.SS) has completely prohibited business with North Korea , said a bank teller at a branch in the northeastern province of Liaoning. The ban started on Aug. 28, the teller said. Frustrated that China had not done more to rein in North Korea, the Trump administration was mulling new sanctions in July on small Chinese banks and other firms doing business with Pyongyang, two senior U.S. officials told Reuters. A person answering the customer hotline at the world s largest lender, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd (ICBC) (601398.SS), said the bank had stopped opening accounts for North Koreans and Iranians since July 16. The person did not explain why or answer further questions. The measures taken by the largest Chinese banks began as early as the end of last year, when the Dandong city branch of China s most international lender, Bank of China Ltd (BoC) (601988.SS), stopped allowing North Koreans to open individual or business accounts, said a BoC bank teller who declined to be identified. Existing North Korean account holders could not deposit or remove money from their accounts, the BoC bank teller said. At Agricultural Bank of China Ltd (AgBank) (601288.SS), a teller at a branch in Dandong, a northeastern Chinese city that borders North Korea, said North Koreans could not open accounts. The teller did not provide further details. Official representatives for BoC, ICBC, CCB and AgBank could not be reached for comment. Banks in Dandong have been under the microscope as tensions have risen, given their proximity to North Korea. In June, the United States accused the Bank of Dandong, a small lender, of laundering money for Pyongyang. Attempts to slowly choke off the flow of funds to and from North Korea come after the United States sanctioned a Chinese industrial machinery wholesaler that it said was acting on behalf of a Pyongyang bank already sanctioned by the United Nations for supporting the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. The Chinese wholesaler was found to be operating through 25 accounts at banks in China. Although measures are in place, some bankers questioned how well the rules would be enforced. Chinese lenders have experienced high-profile failures to police money-laundering in recent years, with some facing allegations that bankers were complicit in the movement of illicit funds. Asking whether we will be able to enforce the new rules is the same question as asking how tight our know-your-client checks are, said a senior corporate banker at the Bank of China who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter. There will always be holes, she said.

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AMMAN (Reuters) - Jordan said on Monday it was working with Russia to roll out a plan to end fighting in southwestern Syria in the fastest possible time - part of a peace pact for the border area brokered by Amman, Moscow and Washington. Jordan and Russia s foreign ministers met in Amman to discuss progress in setting up a de-escalation zone in the particularly sensitive region that includes Syrian territory neighboring Israel. Neither side gave details on any sticking points, but diplomats told Reuters they have included the final positions of fighting forces, U.S. unease about Russian involvement in policing the deal, and when to reopen a key border crossing. Russia, which backs Syria s government in the civil war, and the United States, which backs rebel forces seeking to topple President Bashar al-Assad, met secretly in Jordan in June and announced a ceasefire in Syria s southwest a month later. The truce - the first peacemaking effort in the war by the U.S. government under President Donald Trump - has reduced fighting there and is meant to lead to a longer-lasting de-escalation, a step toward a full settlement more than six years into the complex war. We expressed our support to resolve all issues relating to the de-escalation zones performance, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters in Amman. The goal is to set up a de-escalation zone in the fastest possible time, his Jordanian counterpart Ayman Safadi said. Our priority is that our borders are secure and that means that there should be no Daesh nor Nusra nor sectarian militias, Safadi added, referring to Islamic State and a rebel force once linked to Al Qaeda, both operating in Syria. An official and two senior diplomats told Reuters the powers have made progress in drawing up a map of the de-escalation zone, including Quneitra province bordering Israel, alongside the southern Deraa province adjoining Jordan. The official and diplomats said Washington had also secured an understanding with Moscow that militias backed by the Syrian government s ally Iran must be pushed 40 km (25 miles) from the border. That might help allay Israeli and Jordanian concerns about the presence of Lebanon s Iran-backed Hezbollah group in the area. Diplomats said Lavrov also pressed Jordan to re-open its Nasib border crossing with Syria, something Amman has so far resisted, saying it needs more security. But it has strongly backed the broader de-escalation deal, seeing it as paving the way for an eventual return of tens of thousands of refugees in its territory. Rebels say the ceasefire remains fragile and fear Syria s army will return to attack them once it has consolidated gains in the north and other areas. Insurgents say the de-escalation zones merely free up Syria s army to make territorial gains elsewhere. Syria s army, supported by Russian air power and Iranian-backed militias, has in recent weeks gained a string of post along the border with Jordan in southeastern Syria, a zone that is outside the ceasefire area.

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SANTO DOMINGO/CARACAS (Reuters) - Various Latin American nations will join an attempt to mediate Venezuela s political crisis in new talks later this month, the president of the Dominican Republic said on Thursday. Danilo Medina hosted high-level delegations from Venezuela s feuding government and opposition for two days in the latest foreign-led effort to ease a standoff alarming the world. We advanced definition of an agenda on Venezuela s big problems. A commission of friendly countries was agreed, the Dominican leader told reporters, saying Mexico, Chile, Bolivia, Nicaragua would join the process with others to be announced. The next talks would be held on Sept. 27, again in the Dominican capital Santo Domingo, he added. Mexico and Chile have been bitterly critical of President Nicolas Maduro s socialist government over rights and democracy issues, while fellow leftist-led Bolivia and Nicaragua are staunch allies. Venezuelan s government is eager to ease foreign censure of and its delegates came out of Thursday s talks smiling. A dialogue of peace is being installed so that Venezuela can resolve its affairs among Venezuelans, senior Socialist Party official Jorge Rodriguez told reporters. Earlier, opposition leaders, who faced a backlash from supporters after failed talks with Maduro last year, insisted they had only traveled to push long-standing demands, including a presidential election and the release of jailed activists. Decrying Maduro as a dictator who has wrecked the OPEC member s once-prosperous economy, Venezuelan opposition leaders led street protests earlier this year seeking his removal that led to the deaths of at least 125 people. Maduro says they were seeking a coup with U.S. connivance. Though both sides met the Dominican president this week, it was unclear if they had also sat down and talked together. In a statement after Thursday s meetings, the opposition Democratic Unity coalition said it had accepted an invitation by Medina and the United Nations to an exploratory meeting in the hope of advancing Maduro s exit by constitutional means. Only through democratic and non-violent change will it be possible to overcome the current social and economic tragedy afflicting all Venezuelans, it said. The coalition said six countries would be acting as guarantors, and any final accord must include a date for a presidential vote, reform of the national electoral board, release of political prisoners, and emergency humanitarian aid. Any agreement should go to a referendum, it added. The government delegation included Delcy Rodriguez, leader of Venezuela s all-powerful and pro-Maduro Constituent Assembly whose creation brought widespread foreign condemnation as it overrides the existing opposition-led congress. The opposition delegation was led by Julio Borges, head of that congress, fresh from a trip to Europe where he was received by the leaders of Germany, France and Spain. Maduro routinely calls for dialogue, but his adversaries suspect he may use talks as a stalling tactic to help his image without producing concrete results. A dialogue brokered by former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and the Vatican in 2016 did nothing to advance opposition demands.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republicans struggling to agree on healthcare legislation to overhaul Obamacare obeyed U.S. President Donald Trump’s orders to try to swiftly reach a deal but were unable to resolve their differences in a long, late-night meeting. Earlier on Wednesday, Trump took Senate Republicans to task for failing to agree on how to dismantle Obamacare, as a new report showed 32 million Americans would lose health insurance if senators opt to repeal the law without a replacement. Trump gathered 49 Republican senators for a White House lunch after a bill to repeal and replace the 2010 Affordable Care Act collapsed on Monday amid dissent from a handful of the party’s conservatives and moderates. After Trump’s exhortation to keep trying, party members met with Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price behind closed doors on Wednesday night to try to finally come together on a major Republican promise of the past seven years - undoing former Democratic President Barack Obama’s signature legislation, popularly known as Obamacare. There was no immediate breakthrough. “We still have some issues that divide us,” said Senator Ted Cruz, a conservative who has proposed letting insurers offer cheaper bare-bones plans that do not comply with Obamacare regulations. Republicans attending the late meeting sent their staff away in order to talk frankly and Senator John Kennedy said everyone was negotiating in good faith but he added he did not know if they would reach agreement. Almost all the other senators rushed off after the meeting without comment. As it was getting underway, the nearly two dozen Republican senators were shaken by news that their colleague, veteran Senator John McCain, had been diagnosed with brain cancer. McCain’s absence from the Senate makes the job of passing a healthcare bill more difficult because leaders need every Republican vote they can get. “Obviously, I think more people are worried about his health than thinking about the math. You understand the math. Obviously it makes things difficult,” Senator Bob Corker said as he left the meeting. Trump had taken a hands-off approach to the healthcare debate last week and suggested on Tuesday that he was fine with letting Obamacare fail. Then on Wednesday he switched course and demanded senators stay in Washington through their planned August recess until they find common ground on healthcare. “We can repeal, but we should repeal and replace, and we shouldn’t leave town until this is complete,” Trump said at the meeting. Trump made the repeal and replacement of Obamacare, which he has called a “disaster,” a central promise of his 2016 campaign. Even with Trump’s new push, Republican leaders in the Senate face a difficult task getting moderates and conservatives to agree on an overhaul that can pass. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had planned to hold a straight repeal vote next week, but several Republican senators have already said they oppose that approach. Thirty-two million Americans would lose their health insurance by 2026 if Obamacare is scrapped without an alternative in place, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported on Wednesday, while 17 million would become uninsured next year alone. At the same time, premiums on individual insurance plans would rise 25 percent next year and double by 2026. The CBO’s estimates were unchanged from a previous report that assessed the impact of a 2015 bill to repeal Obamacare that passed the House of Representatives and Senate and was vetoed by Obama. Democrats were swift to highlight the CBO’s assessment, while Republicans remained silent. “President Trump and Republicans have repeatedly promised to lower premiums and increase coverage, yet each proposal they offer would do the opposite,” Senate Democratic leader Charles Schumer said in a statement. Insurers and hospitals have lobbied against straight repeal, saying the limbo would increase uncertainty and their costs. “CBO projects half the country would have no insurers in the individual market by 2020 under the new repeal bill. That’s a true death spiral,” tweeted Larry Levitt, vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation, a healthcare research group. Republicans say Obamacare is a costly intrusion into the healthcare system. But the party is divided between moderates concerned the Senate bill would eliminate insurance for millions of low-income Americans and conservatives who want to see even deeper cuts to Obamacare, which boosted the number of Americans with health insurance by 20 million through mandates on individuals and employers, and income-based subsidies. Moderate Republican Senators Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Shelley Moore Capito said they opposed McConnell’s plan for a repeal that would take effect in two years. All three attended the lunch with Trump. With Democrats united in opposition to repeal, McConnell can only lose two votes from the Republicans’ 52-48 majority in the 100-seat Senate to pass healthcare legislation. Opponents of repeal protested throughout Senate buildings on Wednesday afternoon, leading to 155 arrests, police said. Demonstrators returned in the evening to yell as senators arrived for the meeting. Party fractures also emerged in the House of Representatives. The chamber passed a plan to repeal and replace Obamacare in May. But on Wednesday, the House Freedom Caucus, the Republican Party’s conservative wing, filed a petition to vote on a straight repeal. House Speaker Paul Ryan’s spokeswoman, AshLee Strong, said: “The House passed an Obamacare repeal-and-replace bill we are proud of and we hope the Senate will take similar action.”

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BERLIN (Reuters) - German police arrested a 29-year-old man they said was an active member of Islamic State who was plotting a truck attack on an ice rink. The arrest, a year after Anis Amri, a failed Tunisian asylum seeker with Islamist links, hijacked a truck and drove it into a Christmas market in Berlin, killing 12 people, comes as security services have warned of growing numbers of radical Islamists in Germany. He was considering an attack on the ice rink on the Schlossplatz in Karlsruhe, police in the south-western state of Baden-Wuerttemberg said, adding that the suspect was a German citizen whose name they gave only as Dasbar W. To that end he was assessing areas around Karlsruhe Castle and, from September 2017, had begun seeking employment as a delivery driver - without success, the police statement said. In 2015, the suspect traveled to Iraq to fight for Islamic State, receiving weapons training and working as a scout seeking potential attack targets in the city of Erbil, police said. He returned to Germany the following year. Before leaving for Iraq, Dasbar worked for Islamic State from Germany, producing propaganda videos and proselytizing to converts in online chat rooms, police said. Earlier this month, Germany s security service warned that the number of Salafists - followers of a radical Islamist ideology - had risen to an all-time high of 10,800, though the number prepared to mount attacks was in the order of hundreds.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration will not issue executive orders calling for a review of international treaties and U.S. funding of the United Nations and other international bodies “at this time,” a senior U.S. administration official said on Friday. The Trump administration was preparing executive orders that would review U.S. funding of the United Nations and other international organizations and certain forms of multilateral treaties, the New York Times reported on Wednesday. “We remain committed to supporting the useful and necessary work performed by such organizations and alliances, and look forward to continuing that support,” the official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity. “While no executive orders on these subjects are expected at this time, this president and his administration intend to be watchful stewards of the American people’s interests and of the American taxpayer’s dollars,” the official added. It was immediately clear why the orders were being shelved. According to one draft executive order published by The Daily Beast, Trump wants a committee, including his secretary of state, attorney general and director of national intelligence, to carry out a one-year review of U.S. funding to international organizations with the aim of almost halving voluntary funding. The United States is the largest contributor to the United Nations, paying 22 percent of the $5.4 billion core U.N. budget and 28 percent of the $7.9 billion U.N. peacekeeping budget. These are assessed contributions - agreed by the U.N. General Assembly - and not voluntary payments. U.N. agencies, such as the U.N. Development Programme, the children’s agency UNICEF, the World Food Programme and the U.N. Population Fund, are funded voluntarily. The new U.S. ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, pledged on Friday to overhaul the world body and warned U.S. allies that if they did not support Washington then she is “taking names” and will respond. During her Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirmation hearing this month, Haley said she did not back “slashing” U.N. funding.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The North Korean foreign minister s statement that the United States has declared war on Pyongyang is absurd, the White House said on Monday. We ve not declared war on North Korea. Frankly, the suggestion of that is absurd, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters.

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TUNIS (Reuters) - A group of 25 refugees have been evacuated from Libya to Niger to have resettlement claims processed, in the first operation of its kind from the North African country, the United Nations said on Sunday. The move is part of efforts to provide protection for refugees and other vulnerable migrants who travel to Libya, often intending to attempt the dangerous sea crossing to Italy. Many are trapped in smuggling networks or detention centers where they are exposed to a range of abuses including rape and torture that have been widely documented by human rights organizations and U.N. agencies. About 43,000 refugees and asylum seekers registered by U.N. refugee agency UNHCR are now in Libya. It is hard to resettle refugees directly from Libya partly because most countries closed their embassies in Tripoli after fighting escalated there in 2014. The initial group evacuated by air from Tripoli to Niamey on Saturday was made up of 15 women, six men and four children from Eritrea, Ethiopia and Sudan, according to the United Nations. Today s evacuation symbolizes hope in finding safe solutions for vulnerable refugees in Libya, Roberto Mignone, the UNHCR representative for Libya, said in a statement. The operation was the result of a joint initiative by UNHCR and the governments of Libya and Niger, and Niger has agreed to host the group until their claims to be resettled in third countries are dealt with, it said. We hope to be able to carry out more evacuations in the near future, said Vincent Cochetel, UNHCR s Special Envoy for the Central Mediterranean. But he said the scheme would remain limited in scale as long as commitments to resettle refugees remained insufficient . These refugee evacuations can only be part of broader asylum-building and migration management efforts to address the complex movement of migrants and refugees who embark on perilous journeys across the Sahara Desert and the Mediterranean Sea, he said. Most migrants traveling through Libya towards Europe come from sub-Saharan African countries. Many fleeing poverty, repression or conflict journey across the desert through Niger, Algeria or Sudan. The Libya to Italy crossing has become the main migrant route to Europe since an agreement between the EU and Turkey shut down smuggling through Greece last year. More than 600,000 have crossed by boat to Italy since 2014. European states have pledged tens of millions of euros to Libya, Niger and migrants countries of origin in an effort to stem the flows. Departures from Libya have dropped since July due to changes in smuggling activity and increased activity by Libya s European-backed coastguard. European policy has drawn criticism from human rights groups that say it traps migrants in Libya, exposing them to further abuse there. UNHCR is seeking to open a refugee transit center in Tripoli early next year to shelter some of the most vulnerable refugees as they await evacuation or resettlement. The International Organization for Migration carries out voluntary repatriations of migrants from Libya, flying home more than 10,600 so far this year.

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said on Tuesday his comments questioning the impartiality of a Mexican-American judge had been misconstrued as a broad attack on people of Mexican heritage. Trump said, however, that it was fair to question the judge’s impartiality in the civil suit against Trump University and whether he could receive a fair trial.

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LOME (Reuters) - Security forces in Togo used batons, tear gas and live bullets against protesters seeking an end to President Faure Gnassingbe s rule on Wednesday and a child was killed in the ensuing clashes, according to Amnesty International. Tensions are mounting over the president s tenure and thousands marched nationwide against government reforms announced on Tuesday which they say will allow the Gnassingbe family dynasty to run the West African country until 2030. There was a 9-year-old boy killed in Mango by military forces. He was shot in the head, said Francois Patuel, of Amnesty International, citing local sources including family members. Security Minister Damehame Yark confirmed that a child had been shot dead in Mango, hundreds of kilometres north of the capital Lome, but blamed the PNP opposition party. Riots also broke out in the northern city of Bafilo between protesters against Gnassingbe and his supporters, injuring several, opposition leader Jean-Pierre Fabre said at the end of a peaceful march in Lome. The former French colony of 8 million people that is home to several large firms, including Ecobank and regional airline ASKY, has a history of violent political repression. Hundreds were killed in the aftermath of Gnassingbe s contested election win in 2005. Shortly afterward, he pledged to re-introduce the term limits his father scrapped and align Togo with most of its West African neighbors, which are bucking a trend toward life-long presidencies elsewhere on the continent. Gnassingbe, now in his third term, dropped the reforms until parliament this week attempted to cap future presidencies to two terms of five years, but the bill did not get enough backing due to an opposition boycott and will be decided by referendum instead. In Lome, people wearing the red and orange T-shirts of the opposition banged on tam-tams and sang a traditional battle song Strength to the Great in the local Ewe language. Others carried a giant banner saying: People of Togo say No! 50 years is enough! The referendum is not what we want. We are asking for the president to leave, said 42-year-old Paulin Kossi. Nearby, a large crowd gathered on a beachside boulevard to show their support for the UNIR ruling party while a motorcycle parade bearing flags with Gnassingbe s snaked through the streets, flanked by a police escort. Residents also complained of internet cuts - a method increasingly used by governments to stifle criticism at sensitive times. Protests both against and in support of the president are set to resume on Thursday.

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WARSAW (Reuters) - Poland lowers its retirement age on Sunday, a costly election promise by the ruling conservatives which goes against a European trend of gradually increasing the pension age as people live longer and stay more healthy. Lowering the age to 60 for women and 65 for men is popular in particular among supporters of the governing right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party, and reverses an increase to 67 approved in 2012 by the former centrist government. It is seen as having a limited immediate impact on the economy, which is booming, but might put pressure on state budgets in the future. The move comes at a time when unemployment in Poland has fallen to its lowest level since the transition from communism in the early 1990s, and could increase the pressure on wages which are already growing at their fastest pace in five years. The Polish labor market faces increasingly limited access to workers, said Rafal Benecki, a Warsaw-based economist covering central Europe at the ING Bank. Poland s population of 38 million is among the most rapidly aging in the European Union. The government is throwing away the most effective tool to increase the labor market participation rate, Benecki said. The state pension agency ZUS has estimated that 331,000 people could decide to take advantage of the option to retire earlier, which would amount to 2.0 percent of Poland s 16.3 million workers. Economists and central bankers say the rising flow into Poland of hundreds of thousands of workers from Ukraine could reduce the pressure on wages. Labour ministry figures show that Polish employers requested over 900,000 short-term permits for Ukrainian workers in the first half of 2017, compared to 1.26 million in the whole of the previous year. With the inflow of workers from Ukraine, so far the problem that some have foreseen - labor shortages, pressure on the labor market - is diminishing, central bank Governor Adam Glapinski said in early September. The PiS government has estimated the cost of the retirement age reduction at about 10 billion zlotys ($2.74 billion) in 2018, roughly 0.5 percent of GDP. Since coming to power in 2015, the current government has sharply increased public spending to meet campaign pledges to help families and distribute the fruits of economic growth more evenly. Despite the increase in spending, the state budget posted the first surplus for the January-August period in more than two decades, mainly due to a government crackdown on tax evasion and because a new child benefit has fueled consumption. Economic growth reached 3.9 percent in the second quarter, but economists warn that the higher cost of pensions could cause problems if the economy slows. I m worrying what will happen when the economic cycle turns, said Marcin Mrowiec, chief economist at Bank Pekao. We might wake up with wages above levels that firms can cope with and ... permanently higher budget spending on pensions. ($1 = 3.6471 zlotys)

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ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey s President Tayyip Erdogan will travel next week to Qatar, which Ankara has supported in its dispute with powerful Gulf Arab neighbors, presidential sources said on Wednesday. They said Erdogan would visit Doha on Wednesday, following trips to Russia and Kuwait. Turkey has backed Qatar since Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, cut economic and diplomatic ties in July, accusing Doha of supporting terrorism, a charge it denies. Turkey has increased trade with Qatar since the start of the embargo and the two countries have held joint military exercises in the Gulf state, where Ankara has a military base. It has said it will deploy 3,000 troops at the base.

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MOSCOW (Reuters) - Four Russian reporters were injured by an explosion in Syria s Deir al-Zor area, RIA news agency reported on Monday, citing Russian defense ministry. RIA said that two of the men injured worked for the NTV TV station and another two for the Zvezda TV station. All four are alive, RIA said.

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ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu urged Greece on Tuesday to not become a safe haven for plotters of last year s coup attempt, citing the 995 people who have applied for asylum since the failed putsch. Speaking at a joint news conference with his Greek counterpart, Nikos Kotzias, Cavusoglu said asylum seekers needed to be evaluated to determine those linked to the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, blamed by Turkey for masterminding the putsch. We would not want our neighbor Greece, with whom we are improving our ties, to be a safe haven for Gulenists. We believe these applications will be evaluated meticulously and that traitors will not be given credit, Cavusoglu said. Responding to Cavusoglu s comments, Kotzias said the decisions on asylum seekers were made by the Greek judiciary and had to be respected even if it doesn t please some . Relations between Turkey and Greece were further strained in May after a Greek court ruled to not extradite eight Turkish soldiers who fled to Greece following last year s coup attempt. Turkey alleges the men, who fled to Greece in a military helicopter as the July coup unfolded, were involved in efforts to overthrow President Tayyip Erdogan and has repeatedly demanded they be sent back. Greek courts have blocked two extradition requests by Ankara, drawing an angry rebuke from Turkey and highlighting the tense relations between the NATO allies, who remain at odds over issues from territorial disputes to ethnically split Cyprus. Unfortunately, the Greek courts did not extradite (the eight soldiers), and this has greatly disappointed us, Cavusoglu said. He said two other soldiers, accused of trying to assassinate Erdogan on the night of the coup, had also fled to Greece, and that Turkey had demanded their extradition. In the aftermath of the coup, some 50,000 people have been jailed pending trial and more than 150,000 have been sacked or suspended from their jobs in the military, public and private sectors. Rights groups and Turkey s Western allies have said President Tayyip Erdogan is using the failed coup as a pretext to crush dissent, but the government says the measures are necessary to fight the threats it is facing.

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DETROIT (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump stepped up his bid to win over minority voters by addressing a largely black church in Detroit on Saturday and calling for a new civil rights agenda to support African-Americans. As scores of protesters outside chanted “No justice, no peace,” Trump said he wanted to make Detroit - a predominantly African-American city which recently emerged from bankruptcy - the economic envy of the world by bringing back companies from abroad. Trump separately met with about 100 community and church leaders, his campaign said, in his latest push to peel away minority voters from Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. His outreach to minorities over recent weeks comes as he seeks to improve his chances in the Nov. 8 election and shake off months of offending the sensibilities of black and Hispanic voters with his hard line on immigration and rough-hewn rhetoric. “I fully understand that the African American community is suffering from discrimination and that there are many wrongs that must still be made right,” Trump said at the church which was half-full. “I want to make America prosperous for everyone. I want to make this city the economic envy of the world, and we can do that.” His address of over 10 minutes at the Great Faith Ministries International church received moments of applause, including when he said Christian faith is not the past, but the present and the future. Accompanying Trump to the church was Ben Carson, the former Republican presidential hopeful who grew up in the city and whose childhood neighborhood Trump visited on Saturday. Trump has argued that his emphasis on job creation would help minority communities in a way that Democrats have failed to. But Clinton has accused Trump of aligning himself with racists. Opinion polls show Trump has low support among minorities. “I believe we need a civil rights agenda for our time, one that ensures the rights to a great education, so important, and the right to live in a good-paying job and one that you love to go to every morning,” Trump said. “That can happen. We need to bring our companies back,” he added. Emma Lockridge, 63, said as she entered the church that she found his comments about Mexicans and Muslims “hateful.” “That’s my major reservation with Mr. Trump is how he’s treated those particular sets of people,” said Lockridge, who is retired and an environmental activist. But she said she also had concerns about Clinton’s support in the 1990s for crime legislation signed by her husband, former President Bill Clinton, which many black Americans say contributed to high incarceration rates in their communities. Vicki Dobbins, an activist protesting outside, said she was disappointed the church asked Trump to speak. “I believe that Trump coming to Detroit is a joke, and I’m ashamed of the pastor who invited him,” she said. “In my opinion, he stabbed everyone in the back.”

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A raid on the Virginia home of President Donald Trump’s former 2016 election campaign manager showed an investigation of possible ties between the campaign and Russia is intensifying and focused on the financial dealings of Trump associates, sources familiar with the probe said. Longtime political consultant and lobbyist Paul Manafort is being investigated for possible money laundering and has been targeted as someone who might testify against former colleagues, said two people familiar with the work of Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Manafort’s spokesman Jason Maloni confirmed on Wednesday that the FBI executed a search warrant at one of Manafort’s homes. “Mr. Manafort has consistently cooperated with law enforcement and other serious inquiries and did so on this occasion as well,” Maloni said in an email. Manafort’s house in Alexandria, near Washington, was raided in the early morning of July 26, the Washington Post reported. The previous day Manafort had met with Senate Intelligence Committee staff, the Washington Post reported, citing unidentified people familiar with the probe. Tax documents and financial records were sought by agents for Mueller in the raid, the New York Times reported, citing a person familiar with the matter. Mueller’s team is poring over Manafort’s financial and real estate records in New York and his involvement in Ukrainian politics, the two sources told Reuters last month. Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal called the raid a “highly significant step” and said it was “typical of the most serious criminal investigations dealing with uncooperative or untrusted potential targets.” The FBI did not immediately return a request for comment. Joshua Stueve, a spokesman for Mueller’s office, declined to confirm the raid. Trump has been attacking Blumenthal on Twitter this week after the senator urged Mueller to press his inquiry forward. U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that Russia interfered in the presidential race, in part by hacking and releasing emails embarrassing to Trump’s opponent, Democrat Hillary Clinton, to help him get elected in November. Trump has called Mueller’s investigation a “witch hunt.” Allegations of collusion between Trump associates and Moscow have hounded the Republican president since he took office in January, presenting a major distraction from his policy agenda. Russia has repeatedly denied meddling in the U.S. election. The Manhattan District Attorney’s office has been trying to track money that Manafort used to buy properties in New York, and looking into millions of dollars of loans later taken out on the properties, according to a person familiar with the matter. The prosecutor issued a subpoena to Federal Savings Bank, a small Chicago bank founded by a former Trump campaign adviser, and is interested in the loan paperwork, the person said. It is unclear when the subpoena went out, but the first subpoenas in the probe went out months ago, the person said. Joan Vollero, a spokeswoman for Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr., declined to comment. Steve Calk, the bank’s chairman and CEO, who was named to Trump’s economic advisory council during the campaign, declined to comment through a spokeswoman for the bank. “Mr. Manafort’s real estate loans are all arm’s length transactions at or above market rates,” said Maloni. “There is nothing unusual about buying real estate through an LLC.” The New York Attorney General’s office also is looking into Manafort’s real estate transactions, another person said. One question for investigators was whether Manafort had knowledge of any Trump campaign dealings with Russia, including meetings with Russians with government ties, said one source familiar with Mueller’s work. The same question was relevant to investigators in regard to Trump’s fired former national security adviser, retired Army Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, the source said. “Financial matters have paper trails that can be easy to pick up and follow, so that’s a logical place to start,” the source added. Congressional committees are looking at a June 2016 meeting in New York with a Russian lawyer organized by Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr. Trump Jr. released emails last month that showed he welcomed the prospect of receiving damaging information about Clinton. Manafort attended the meeting. Legal experts noted that the FBI had enough evidence to get approval for a search warrant concerning Manafort. “Somewhere, there now exists under seal what is likely a very detailed affidavit laying out criminal allegations involving Paul Manafort, and specifically, there is probable cause to believe he has committed a crime or there is evidence of a crime at his home,” said Alex Little, a former federal prosecutor now with the law firm Bone McAllester Norton. A Senate Judiciary Committee aide said the panel has received more than 20,000 pages of documents from Trump’s presidential campaign, Manafort and Trump Jr.

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