Author: Techman

U.S. President Donald Trump announced new sanctions Friday on Iran's central bank, calling them the most severe sanctions ever imposed on a country. But it appears that he wants to avoid military action against Tehran, in response to recent cruise missile and drone strikes against…

Francis Rooney is a Republican congressman from a conservative Florida district who opposes federal funding for abortions and supports President Donald Trump’s plans for construction of a wall along the Mexican border. But he also recently co-sponsored a carbon pricing bill and is one of…

The United States said it is deeply disappointed in Kiribati's decision to abandon its diplomatic ties with Taiwan, in favor of China. Several Republican and Democratic lawmakers voiced grave concerns. A Senate panel plans to move forward with a congressional proposal that could “impose consequences…

The Zimbabwean doctor whose disappearance sparked off a wave of doctors’ protests across the country, has reappeared, alive. Speaking Thursday on VOA Zimbabwe Service’s Livetalk program, a disoriented-sounding Dr. Peter Magombeyi, the president of the Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors’ Association, confirmed he was the one on…

Sound checks echoed from a distant main stage while Daniel Martinez whirled and danced at dusty makeshift festival grounds just after sunset in Rachel, the Nevada town closest to the once-secret Area 51 military base. Martinez's muse was the thumping beat from a satellite set-up…

More than 1,000 United Nations employees have called for the global body to reduce its carbon footprint, including through curbs on their own diplomatic perks like business-class flights and travel handouts, a letter obtained by Reuters showed. The United Nations calls climate change the "defining…

A team of French diggers has restored three Sudanese artifacts, including a 3,500-year-old wall relief, and it handed them to the African country's national museum Thursday, a French archaeologist said.    The three artifacts were discovered at separate archaeological sites in recent years in Sudan…

Any attack on Iran by the U.S. or Saudi Arabia will spark an “all-out war,” Tehran’s top diplomat warned Thursday, raising the stakes as Washington and Riyadh weigh a response to a drone-and-missile strike on the kingdom’s oil industry that shook global energy markets. The…

Chinese tech giant Huawei launched its latest high-end smartphone in Munich on Thursday, the first of its mobile devices not to carry popular Google apps because of U.S. sanctions. "Today because of the U.S. ban ... we cannot pre-install" Google's applications, said Richard Yu, who…

In a hearing Wednesday to examine the spread of extremism online and the effectiveness of measures taken to prevent violent content, leaders from Facebook, Twitter and Google faced tough questions from U.S. lawmakers, accentuating the positive steps taken, while acknowledging the work remaining. Policy representatives…

The border wall literally became President Donald Trump’s signature project Wednesday. Trump used a permanent marker to sign a new portion of the rust-colored metal barrier, reinforced with concrete and rebar, rising as high as 9 meters at Otay Mesa, a suburb of San Diego…

Canadian leader Justin Trudeau's campaign for national elections was hit Wednesday by the publication of a yearbook photo showing him in brownface makeup at a costume party in 2001. Time magazine posted the photo, which it says was published in the yearbook from the West…

Nigeria's frenetic commercial capital, Lagos, is plunged into darkness several times a day. Then its generators roar, and the lights flood back on. Nigeria is one of the world's largest economies where businesses rely so heavily on diesel-powered generators. More than 70% of its firms…

A judge cleared the way Tuesday for OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma to stay in business while it pursues bankruptcy protection and settlement of more than 2,600 lawsuits filed against it in a reckoning over the opioid crisis. At the first court hearing since the Chapter…

International Criminal Court judges said Tuesday that the court's prosecutor can appeal against the rejection of her request to open an investigation into crimes linked to the long-running conflict in Afghanistan. In April, a panel of judges rejected the proposed investigation, saying it would not…

The recent attacks on Saudi Arabia’s crude oil hub at the Abqaiq and Khurais production facilities reveal that even a nation with a sophisticated military and a massive defense budget is still vulnerable to drone strikes. The United States says satellite images and intelligence information…

It may be possible to help tackle climate change while still munching on the occasional bacon sandwich or slurping a few oysters, a new study suggested on Tuesday. Scientists found that diets in which meat, fish or dairy products were consumed only once a day…

Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani escaped an attack on his campaign rally in Parwan province that killed 24 people and wounded more than 30 others Tuesday. The president was about to address the rally when a suicide bomber on a motorcycle detonated his explosives near the…

Colombia will increase protection for political candidates running in October's local and regional elections after the murders of seven aspirants, President Ivan Duque said on Monday. The killings have sparked renewed calls for more to be done to prevent political violence in the country, where…

The nation’s worst measles epidemic in 27 years could be in its final stages as a week went by with no new reported cases. “To get to zero is tremendously encouraging,” said Jason Schwartz, a Yale University expert on vaccination policy. The current epidemic emerged…

World leaders meeting at the United Nations General Assembly, which begins Tuesday in New York, must make nuclear arms control a priority, according to a group of over 100 political, military and diplomatic figures. They have issued a statement warning that the risks of nuclear…

Several Democratic presidential candidates on Sunday lined up to call for the impeachment of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in the face of a new, uninvestigated, allegation of sexual impropriety when he was in college. Kavanaugh was confirmed last October after emotional hearings in the…

Visiting a black church bombed by the Ku Klux Klan in the civil rights era, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden said Sunday the country hasn’t “relegated racism and white supremacy to the pages of history” as he framed current tensions in the context of the…

Roughly 49,000 workers at General Motors plants in the U.S. plan to go on strike just before midnight Sunday, but talks between the United Auto Workers and the automaker will resume. About 200 plant-level union leaders voted unanimously in favor of a walkout during a…

Tropical Storm Humberto is expected to become a hurricane Sunday as it slowly strengthens to the north of the Bahamas, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center. Weather forecasters have not issued any coastal watches or warnings for the storm that is moving north-northwest with…

A watery grave of old sunken ships has been designated the newest national marine sanctuary in the United States. Located in Maryland about 60 kilometers south of Washington, the "ghost fleet" rises like an apparition out of the water when the tide is low. VOA's…

Selecting a college or university from the thousands in the U.S. can be mind-boggling. Many applicants turn to a web search to find rankings of the “best” colleges and will find U.S. News & World Report, Forbes, Princeton Review, and Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education…

U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday confirmed that Hamza bin Laden, the son and designated heir of Al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden, was killed in a counter-terrorism operation along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. "The loss of Hamza bin Laden not only deprives Al-Qaida of important leadership…