Month: September 2019

Tunisia's 26 presidential candidates have launched their campaigns in a political climate marked by uncertainty, money laundering allegations and worries about violent extremism. There is no clear front-runner as campaigning began Monday for the Sept. 15 first-round vote to replace Tunisia's first democratically elected president, who died in office in July. Candidates held rallies Monday in Tunis and in poorer provinces to present their platforms. One prominent candidate is in jail facing accusations of money laundering and tax evasion. Tunisia's provisional leader after its 2011 Arab Spring uprising, former activist Moncef Marzouki, is also running. He lamented to The Associated Press that candidates are "fighting each other with methods unworthy of democracy." The campaign kickoff came the same day that four people were killed in clashes near the Algerian border.…

Iran is for the first time acknowledging that a rocket explosion took place at its Imam Khomeini Space Center, with an official saying a technical malfunction caused the blast.   Government spokesman Ali Rabiei made the statement on Monday in comments broadcast by Iranian state television.   He said the explosion caused no fatalities and also that officials had found no sign that sabotage was involved in the explosion.   Satellite photos showed a rocket on a launch pad at the space center had exploded Thursday. The space center is located about 240 kilometers, or 150 miles, southeast of the capital, Tehran.   President Donald Trump on Friday tweeted a surveillance photo likely taken of the site by an American spy satellite. He wrote that the U.S. had nothing to…

Hurricane Dorian, a powerful category 5 Atlantic storm, is battering the northern Bahamas and headed toward the southeastern U.S. state of Florida. VOA's Mike O’Sullivan reports, a key emergency official expects the storm to weaken before affecting the U.S. coastline but says disruptions from wind, rain and storm surges are likely ...

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said the United States will continue to support Ukraine in the country's conflict with Russia and its right to full territorial integrity. Washington "stands with the people of Ukraine and most especially since 2014, we have stood strongly for the territorial integrity of Ukraine," Pence said after meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Warsaw on Sunday. "And I can assure you that we will continue to stand with the people of Ukraine on your security, on territorial integrity, including Ukraine's rightful claim to Crimea," Pence said. The United States is an important ally for Kyiv, having imposed sanctions on Russia for annexing the Crimean Peninsula in 2014 and backing pro-Moscow separatists in Ukraine's east. Pence and Zelenskiy were in Warsaw for commemorations to mark the…

Hurricane Dorian, a dangerous Category 5 storm, made landfall in the northwestern Bahamas Sunday, slamming the island with 295 kilometer an hour winds. The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Dorian is the strongest hurricane in modern history to hit the area and warned "catastrophic conditions" are occurring in the Abaco Islands. The hurricane agency had said the storm's advance is expected to slow over the next day or two, followed by a gradual turn to the northwest as it edges closer to southeastern U.S. state of Florida Hurricane Dorian Lashes Northern BahamasUS forecasters call storm's 260-kilometer-an-hour winds 'catastrophic' "It's going to stall out...and it hasn't even touched Florida or the southeast (U.S.) coast," Peter Gaynor, acting chief of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told Fox News Sunday. "You've got to…

A list of some of the deadliest mass shootings in the United States in the last two years:    — Aug. 31, 2019: Five people were killed in West Texas in shootings in the area of Midland and Odessa.    — Aug. 4, 2019: A gunman wearing body armor shot and killed nine people at a popular nightlife area in Dayton, Ohio. Police were patrolling the area and killed the suspect.     — Aug. 3, 2019: A gunman opened fire at a shopping center in El Paso, Texas, killing 22 people and injuring more than two dozen. A suspect was taken into custody.    — May 31, 2019: Longtime city worker DeWayne Craddock opened fire in a building that houses Virginia Beach government offices. He killed 12 people and wounded…

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U.S. President Donald Trump’s next round of tariffs on Chinese imports is scheduled to take effect Sunday, escalating the trade war between the world’s two largest economies with a big hit to consumer goods. Trump has targeted about $300 billion in annual goods imports from China for 15% tariffs in two parts, on Sept. 1 and Dec. 15. If fully imposed, virtually all Chinese imports, worth about $550 billion, would be subject to punitive U.S. tariffs imposed since July 2018. Here is a look at U.S. tariffs and expected Chinese retaliation scheduled over the next several months. FILE - A woman shops for Chinese made shoes, Aug. 24, 2019, at a store in the Chinatown area of Los Angeles. Sept. 1 tariffs The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency will…