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Top U.S. lawmakers scrambled Sunday to reach difficult agreements as quickly as possible on a new aid package for the coronavirus-battered economy, a funding bill to avoid a government shutdown and the defense budget.And time was running out.The current federal budget law expires on December 11. If Congress fails to agree on a new one by that date, American public finances will suddenly dry up.In order to avoid a shutdown, Congress could decide to pass a temporary law for a few days, to give itself time between now and Christmas to reach a broad annual agreement on the 2021 budget.Republican and Democratic leaders have indicated that they would like the budget bill to include the next economic aid measures for the coronavirus, which have been the subject of bitter negotiations.”It’s really a superhuman effort on our part to help the American people as quickly as possible,” Democratic Senator Dick Durbin told ABC’s “This Week.”Lawmakers have negotiated for months on passing such a bill but haven’t come to terms on how much to spend and what to spend it on.Durbin has backed a bipartisan $908 billion aid package proposed this week.Democratic and Republican senators and their teams worked all weekend to draft the text of the detailed bill, which “will probably come out early this week,” said Senator Bill Cassidy, a Republican, on “Fox News Sunday.”Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has agreed to make the proposal the basis for negotiations on a final text.But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican, and President Donald Trump, who must sign the bill into law, have not made their positions clear.At the same time, Congress members hope to pass the Pentagon’s defense budget quickly. Democrats and Republicans have reached a consensus on a bill for $740 billion.But Trump is threatening to veto the measure if it does not include abolishing a law protecting the legal status of social media networks, which he says are biased against him.He also opposes plans to rename military bases named for Civil War confederate generals, pushing back on pressure to rid public places of reminders of the once pro-slavery South.Republicans believe they have the votes to override his veto, saying that the military cannot wait and that these issues could be addressed separately.House Majority Leader, Democratic representative Steny Hoyer, has scheduled a vote for as early as Tuesday.
 
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President-elect Joe Biden has picked California Attorney General Xavier Becerra to be his health secretary, putting a defender of the Affordable Care Act in a leading role to oversee his administration’s coronavirus response.  If confirmed by the Senate, Becerra, 62, will be the first Latino to head the Department of Health and Human Services, a $1-trillion-plus agency with 80,000 employees and a portfolio that includes drugs and vaccines, leading-edge medical research and health insurance programs covering more than 130 million Americans.As California’s attorney general, Becerra has led the coalition of Democratic states defending Obamacare, as the Affordable Care Act is often known, from the Trump administration’s latest effort to overturn it, a legal case awaiting a Supreme Court decision next year.  A former senior House Democrat, Becerra played a role in steering the Obama health law through Congress in 2009 and 2010. At the time he would tell reporters that one of the primary motivations for him was having tens of thousands of uninsured people in his Southern California district.Overseeing the coronavirus response likely will be the most complicated task Becerra will have. By next year, the U.S. will be engaged in a mass vaccination campaign, the groundwork for which has been laid under the Trump administration. Although the vaccines appear very promising, and no effort has been spared to plan for their distribution, it’s impossible to tell yet how well things will go when it’s time to get shots in the arms of millions of Americans.The core components of HHS are the boots on the ground of the government’s coronavirus response. The Food and Drug Administration oversees vaccines and treatments, while much of the underlying scientific and medical research comes from the National Institutes of Health. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention takes the lead in detecting and containing the spread of diseases. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services provides insurance coverage for more than 1 in 3 Americans, including vulnerable seniors, as well as many children and low-income people.Under President Donald Trump, the CDC was relegated to a lesser role after agency scientists issued a stark early warning that contradicted Trump’s assurances that the virus was under control, rattling financial markets. The FDA was the target of repeated attacks from the president who suspected its scientists were politically motivated and who also wanted them to rubber-stamp unproven treatments.As California’s attorney general, Becerra jokingly became known in Democratic legal circles as the man who sued Trump more than anyone else. Beyond health care, the lawsuits centered on issues from immigration to environmental policies.Before he became California’s attorney general, Becerra had served for more than a decade in Congress, representing parts of Los Angeles County. He had also served in the California state assembly after attending law school at Stanford.His mother was born in Jalisco, Mexico, and emigrated to the U.S. after marrying his father.
 
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Coronavirus infections across the U.S. continue to rise as the country moves deeper into a holiday season when eagerly anticipated gatherings of family and friends could push the numbers even higher and overwhelm hospitals.Vast swaths of southern and inland California imposed new restrictions on businesses and activities Saturday as hospitals in the nation’s most populous state face a dire shortage of beds. Restaurants must stop onsite dining, and theaters, hair salons and many other businesses must close in the sprawling reaches of San Diego and Los Angeles, along with part of the Central Valley.Five counties in the San Francisco Bay Area were set to impose their own lockdowns Sunday.A new daily high of nearly 228,000 additional confirmed COVID-19 cases was reported nationwide Friday, eclipsing the previous high mark of 217,000 cases set the day before, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.The seven-day rolling average of deaths attributable to COVID-19 in the U.S. passed 2,000 for the first time since spring, rising to 2,011. Two weeks ago, the seven-day average was 1,448. There were 2,607 deaths reported in the U.S. on Friday, according to Johns Hopkins.Johns Hopkins had previously reported Wednesday daily COVID-19 deaths at 3,157. That was later updated to 2,804 because of a change in numbers from Nevada, a spokesperson said Saturday.The U.S. set a new record Thursday with 2,879 COVID-19 deaths, according to the university’s coronavirus resource center.Much of the nation saw surging numbers in the week after Thanksgiving, when millions of Americans disregarded warnings to stay home and celebrate only with members of their household.Arizona’s top public health official took on a blunt tone as she reported the state’s latest case numbers, a near-record of nearly 6,800 new infections, telling people to wear masks around anyone outside their household, “even those you know and trust.”Volunteers from the Baltimore Hunger Project pass out food to people in need outside of Padonia International Elementary school on Dec. 4, 2020, in Cockeysville, Maryland. More children are going hungry in the US as it weathers the coronavirus.”We must act as though anyone we are around may be infected,” Dr. Cara Christ, director of the Arizona Department of Health Services, wrote on Twitter. Arizona’s intensive care units are experiencing caseloads not seen since the summer, when the state had one of the worst outbreaks in the world. Just 8% of ICU beds and 10% of all inpatient beds were unoccupied Friday, according to state data.Hospital officials issued bleak warnings about the potential for severe overcrowding, fearing that Thanksgiving gatherings seeded new outbreaks that are not yet showing in daily case counts. It takes several days after someone is exposed to develop symptoms, and several more to get test results. Eventually, more severe cases will require hospitalization.”In less than a week, we went from exceeding 5,000 new cases reported in one day to exceeding 6,000,” said Dr. Mandy Cohen, North Carolina’s health secretary. “This is very worrisome.”In St. Louis, two children’s hospitals opened their doors to adult patients without COVID-19 as medical centers in the region fill up, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Mayor Lyda Krewson said the city has reopened a temporary morgue. Area hospitals are at 82% capacity for in-patient beds and 81% capacity for ICU beds.In Idaho, the National Guard helped direct people and traffic at a Boise urgent care and family practice clinic converted to a facility for people with coronavirus symptoms. Health officials say Idaho’s attempt to hold the coronavirus in check is failing.Hospitals are struggling not only with the increase in patients but with their own staff as health workers contract COVID-19 themselves or quit under the pressure of caring for so many infectious patients.”We continue to be concerned about the potential implications of the travel we have seen in the past week with Thanksgiving, as well as social gathering related to the holidays,” said Dr. Adnan Munkarah, executive vice president and chief clinical officer for Henry Ford Health System in Detroit.The health system currently has 576 employees out because they have tested positive, have pending tests or are quarantined because of close contact, up from 378 a week ago, Munkarah said.
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The U.S. Justice Department is discussing a deal with lawyers for Huawei’s finance chief, Meng Wanzhou, that would allow her to return to China from Canada, a person familiar with the matter said.Negotiations between Meng’s lawyers and the Justice Department picked up after the U.S. presidential election, the person said, but it is still unclear what kind of deal can be struck.Meng does not think she did anything wrong and therefore is reluctant to make admissions that she does not think are true, the person said.The source said the talks did not appear to be part of a larger deal with Huawei.The Wall Street Journal first reported on the possible deal.Meng, 48, was arrested in Canada in December 2018 on a warrant from the United States. She is facing charges of bank fraud for allegedly misleading HSBC Holdings Plc about Huawei’s business dealings in Iran, causing the bank to break U.S. sanctions.Justice Department spokesman Marc Raimondi declined to comment. Huawei did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office and Canada’s Foreign Ministry had no immediate comment.
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Thousands of Iraqi Kurdish federal employees protested unpaid salaries in Iraq’s northeastern city of Sulaymaniyah this week. VOA’s Rebaz Majeed reports in this piece narrated by Bezhan Hamdard.
Camera: Rebaz Majeed         Producer: Rebaz Majeed
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President Donald Trump’s threat to veto a defense bill if it does not repeal legal protections for social media companies faced stiff bipartisan opposition Wednesday, setting the stage for a confrontation with lawmakers scrambling to pass the massive bill by year’s end. Unusually, members of his Republican Party broke from Trump to join Democrats in objecting to his threat to veto the annual National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, a $740 billion annual bill setting policy for the Pentagon, if it does not include a measure eliminating a federal law — known as Section 230 — protecting tech companies such as Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc. FILE – Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla. gives a victory speech at the Republican watch party in Oklahoma City, Nov. 4, 2014.”First of all, 230 has nothing to do with the military. And I agree with his sentiments. We ought to do away with 230, but you can’t do it in this bill. That’s not a part of the bill,” Senator Jim Inhofe, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told reporters. Lawmakers announced on Wednesday that congressional negotiators had completed the conference report on the fiscal 2021 NDAA, a compromise between separate versions of the bill passed earlier this year by the Republican-led Senate and Democratic-majority House of Representatives. Congressional aides said the final version of the NDAA does not include the Section 230 repeal demanded by Trump. The legislation also includes a provision that will strip the names of Confederate generals from military facilities, something that passed both the House and Senate with support from both parties earlier this year but is also opposed by Trump. The president had earlier threatened to veto the NDAA if it did not allow the Confederate names to remain in place. ‘Partisan preferences’ FILE – House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith, D-Wash., speaks on Capitol Hill in Washington, April 2, 2019.”For 59 straight years, the NDAA has passed because members of Congress and presidents of both parties have set aside their own policy objectives and partisan preferences and put the needs of our military personnel and America’s security first. The time has come to do that again,” Representatives Adam Smith, the House Armed Services Committee’s Democratic chairman, and Mac Thornberry, the panel’s ranking Republican, said in a joint statement. FILE – House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, speaks during a hearing on Capitol Hill, April 12, 2018.Since it is a conference report, and the result of months of negotiations between members of both parties from both the House and Senate, it cannot be amended. Lawmakers take great pride in passing the NDAA every year. It is a rare major bill seen as “must-pass” because it governs everything from pay raises for service members to how many aircraft, missiles and ships should be purchased to how best to compete with Russia and China. With Congress in session only until the end of the year, the House and Senate are running out of time to finalize the massive bill and avoid breaking the 59-year streak. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act protects tech companies from liability over content posted by users and has been under attack from Trump and Republican lawmakers, who accuse internet platforms of stifling conservative voices. White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany said Trump was serious about his veto threat and wanted to use what leverage he had to repeal the tech protection law. “The president has made clear the importance of 230,” she told a news briefing. FILE – House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland speaks during a news conference on health care, on Capitol Hill, Feb. 4, 2020.Steny Hoyer, the No. 2 House Democrat, called Trump’s threat “shameless and indefensible.” Trump and many of his supporters have been calling for the repeal of Section 230 since social media companies began removing or flagging material deemed to be inaccurate, frequently including tweets from Trump. Republican House member Adam Kinzinger summed up the frustration of many with Trump with his own tweet on Wednesday. “I will vote to override. Because it’s really not about you,” Kinzinger wrote. 
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Joseph Varon, a doctor treating coronavirus patients at a Texas hospital, was working his 252nd day in a row when he spotted a distraught elderly man in the COVID-19 intensive care unit. Varon’s comforting embrace of the white-haired man on Thanksgiving Day was captured by a photographer for Getty Images and has gone viral around the world. Varon, chief of staff at United Memorial Medical Center in Houston, told CNN he was entering the COVID-19 ICU when he saw the elderly patient “out of his bed and trying to get out of the room.” “And he’s crying,” Varon said. “So I get close to him and I (ask) him, ‘Why are you crying?'” “And the man says, ‘I want to be with my wife.’ So I just grab him and I hold him,” Varon said. “I was feeling very sorry for him. I was feeling very sad, just like him.” “Eventually he felt better, and he stopped crying,” Varon told CNN on Monday. “I don’t know why I haven’t broken down,” the doctor said. “My nurses cry in the middle of the day.” Varon said the isolation of the COVID-19 unit was difficult for many patients, particularly the elderly. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus. “You can imagine,” he said. “You are inside a room where people are coming in spacesuits. “When you are an elderly individual, it’s more difficult because you are alone,” he said. “Some of them cry. Some of them try to escape,” he said. “We actually had somebody who tried to escape through a window the other day.” Varon said the elderly man in the picture is “doing much better.” “We are hoping that before the end of the week he’ll be able to get out of the hospital,” he said. Take precautions, doctor saysVaron also had a message for people who are not taking precautions amid the pandemic. “People are out there in bars, restaurants, malls,” the doctor said. “It is crazy. People don’t listen and then they end up in my ICU. “What people need to know is I don’t want to have to be hugging them,” he said. “They need to do the basic things — keep your social distance, wear your masks, wash their hands, and avoid going to places where there are a lot of people,” he said. “If people would do that, health care workers like me could hopefully rest.” 
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China has provided North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his family with an experimental coronavirus vaccine, a U.S. analyst said Tuesday, citing two unidentified Japanese intelligence sources. Harry Kazianis, a North Korea expert at the Center for the National Interest think tank in Washington, said the Kims and several senior North Korean officials had been vaccinated. It was unclear which company had supplied its drug candidate to the Kims and whether it had proven to be safe, he added. FILE – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un speaks in Pyongyang, North Korea, in this undated photo released Nov. 16, 2020, by KCNA.”Kim Jong Un and multiple other high-ranking officials within the Kim family and leadership network have been vaccinated for coronavirus within the last two to three weeks thanks to a vaccine candidate supplied by the Chinese government,” Kazianis wrote in an article for online outlet 19FortyFive. Citing U.S. medical scientist Peter J. Hotez, he said at least three Chinese companies were developing a coronavirus vaccine, including Sinovac Biotech Ltd, CanSinoBio and Sinophram Group. Sinophram says its candidate has been used by nearly 1 million people in China, although none of the firms was known to have publicly launched Phase 3 clinical trials of their experimental COVID-19 drugs. North Korea has not confirmed any coronavirus infections, but South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) has said an outbreak there cannot be ruled out as the country had trade and people-to-people exchanges with China, the source of the pandemic, before shutting the border in late January. Microsoft said last month that two North Korean hacking groups had tried to break into the network of vaccine developers in multiple countries, without specifying the companies targeted. Sources told Reuters they included British drugmaker AstraZeneca. The NIS said last week it had foiled North Korea’s attempts to hack into South Korean COVID-19 vaccine makers. 
 
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President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris announced an all-women communications team Sunday. “Communicating directly and truthfully to the American people is one of the most important duties of a president, and this team will be entrusted with the tremendous responsibility of connecting the American people to the White House,” Biden was quoted as saying in a press release from the transition team office. “These qualified, experienced communicators bring diverse perspectives to their work and a shared commitment to building this country back better,” he added. Kate Bedingfield, who served as the communications director for the Biden-Harris campaign, was named the White House communications director.  “It will also be an honor to work alongside the incredible women who are taking on these roles together,” Bedingfield wrote on Twitter, detailing her relationship with the other women named to the team. Bedingfield previously worked for Biden when he was the vice president in the Obama administration. I’m unspeakably proud to have the opportunity to serve as White House Communications Director for @joebiden. Working for him as VP and on this campaign gave me insight into what kind of capable, compassionate, clear-eyed president he will be and it will be a profound honor to 1/— Kate Bedingfield (@KBeds) November 29, 2020Pili Tobar, who served as deputy director of America’s Voice, an immigration reform advocacy group, will serve as her deputy. Ashley Etienne, who served as the communications director for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was named as the communications director for Harris. Symone Sanders, who worked for Senator Bernie Sanders during his bid to be the Democratic nominee, will serve as a senior advisor and chief spokesperson for the vice president.   Jen Psaki, who held several communications positions under the Obama administration, has been named White House Press Secretary.  Karine Jean-Pierre, who worked for NBC and MSNBC as a political analyst, will serve as her deputy. Biden’s transition to the presidency officially began last week after a government agency declared him the apparent winner of the 2020 presidential election, even as President Donald Trump continues his long-shot attempt to upend Biden’s victory at the polls. Biden has named a number of people to positions in his administration, including members of his national security team, secretary of state, and secretary of the treasury. 
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A former Trump campaign associate who was the target of a secret surveillance warrant during the FBI’s Russia investigation says in a federal lawsuit that he was the victim of “unlawful spying.”The suit from Carter Page alleges a series of omissions and errors made by FBI and Justice Department officials in applications they submitted in 2016 and 2017 to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to eavesdrop on Page on suspicion that he was an agent of Russia.”Since not a single proven fact ever established complicity with Russia involving Dr. Page, there never was probable cause to seek or obtain the FISA Warrants targeting him on this basis,” the lawsuit says, using the acronym for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.Page has received death and kidnapping threats and has suffered economic losses and “irreparable damage to his reputation,” according to the lawsuit, which was filed Friday in federal court in Washington.The lawsuit to some extent echoes the conclusions of a Justice Department inspector general report that found significant problems with the four applications. Former FBI and Justice Department leaders who were involved in signing off on the surveillance have since testified they wouldn’t have done so had they known of the extent of the issues, and the FBI has initiated more than 40 corrective steps aimed at improving the accuracy and thoroughness of applications.In the complaint, Page accuses the FBI of relying excessively for information on Christopher Steele, a former British spy whose research during the 2016 campaign into Donald Trump’s ties to Russia was funded by Democrats. It says the FBI failed to tell the surveillance court that Steele’s primary source had contradicted information that Steele had attributed to him, or that Page had denied to an informant for the FBI having “any involvement with Russia on behalf of the Trump campaign.”The complaint also accuses the FBI of having misled the surveillance court about Page’s relationship with the CIA, for whom Page had been an operational contact between 2008 and 2013. A former FBI lawyer, Kevin Clinesmith, pleaded guilty in August to altering an email to say that Page had not been a source for the CIA.The suit names as defendants the FBI and the Justice Department, as well as former FBI Director James Comey, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe and additional officials who were involved in the Russia investigation.Despite the problems with the warrant applications, the scrutiny of Page, who was never charged with any wrongdoing, accounted for only a narrow portion of the overall investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.The same inspector general report that detailed problems in the applications also concluded that the FBI had a legitimate basis for opening the Russia investigation, and did not find evidence that any of its actions were influenced by political bias. 
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Sarah Fuller was playing around with a teammate a couple months ago when she kicked a soccer ball through the uprights from 45 yards away. She joked about being able to kick a football with teammates during the Southeastern Conference soccer tournament.On Saturday, she made history.Fuller became the first woman to participate in a major conference football game when she kicked off for Vanderbilt to start the second half at Missouri, a moment that may take some time to soak in for her.”I just think it’s incredible that I am able to do this, and all I want to do is be a good influence to the young girls out there because there were times that I struggled in sports,” Fuller said. “But I am so thankful I stuck with it, and it’s given me so many opportunities. I’ve met so many amazing people through sports, and I just want to say like literally you can do anything you set your mind to.”Fuller kicked with a holder rather than using a tee in a designed squib kick, and the senior sent a low kick to the 35-yard line where it was pounced on by Missouri’s Mason Pack. Fuller didn’t get any other opportunities in Vanderbilt’s 41-0 loss to Missouri.Vanderbilt Commodores place kicker Sarah Fuller is pictured before a game against the Missouri Tigers, Nov. 28, 2020, in Columbia, Mo. (Denny Medley – USA Today/Reuters)Coach Derek Mason made clear that Fuller kicked for the Commodores because of need, not for history or publicity. COVID-19 protocols and restrictions left Mason with very few options, prompting him to reach out to the soccer team for help.Fuller, a 6-foot-2 goalkeeper, decided she was up for the challenge.”I’m not about making statements,” Mason said. “This was out of necessity. You look at our week. Our students had gone home. The ability to have access to students and tryouts was almost nil in terms of like what’s available. … That just happened to be the most viable option.”After Fuller’s kick, she went straight to the sideline, where she high-fived some of her new teammates and swapped some elbow bumps. Fuller’s parents watched and cheered from the stands along with her boyfriend and best friend.Fuller wore “Play Like A Girl” on the back of her helmet. The senior will get to keep the No. 32 jersey she wore Saturday, the same as her number when playing soccer.After her kickoff, reaction poured in on social media. Fuller was the No. 2 trending topic on Twitter, followed by Vandy. Her soccer team wrote on Twitter: “Glass. Everywhere.”As in glass ceiling.Pat McAfee, a former National Football League punter, reviewed Fuller’s squib kick, noting the ball didn’t go out of bounds and there was no chance of a return, setting up the defense.”Congrats to @SarahFuller_27 for being THE FIRST EVER WOMAN TO KICKOFF A POWER 5 GAME,” McAfee wrote. “Incredibly rare to be the ‘1st ever person to do something’ these days..this is really cool.”Fuller also made clear she’d be up for continuing to help the football team if needed. She believes she can refine her timing and technique with more practice.Vanderbilt (0-8) visits No. 13 Georgia next week.”If she wants to kick and she’s available, we’d love to have her,” Mason said.
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Fearing an imminent assault, people are fleeing Mekele, the capital of Ethiopia’s Tigray region, after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s order for the “final phase” of the military offensive aganist local forces.The government has warned the city of half a million people of “no mercy” if they did not distance themselves from the Tigray leaders in time.Abiy warned Mekele residents Thursday to disarm and stay inside as  military units were ordered in. His government, however, has declared it would protect civilians.”The last peaceful gate which had remained open for the TPLF clique to walk through have now been firmly closed as a result of TPLF’s contempt for the people of Ethiopia,” Abiy said in a statement Thursday, referring to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front.Final Phase of the Rule of Law Operations Commences pic.twitter.com/TAAyZxSe0U— Abiy Ahmed Ali 🇪🇹 (@AbiyAhmedAli) November 26, 2020Earlier this week, Abiy gave the TPLF 72 hours to surrender or face a military offensive on the state’s capital of Mekele.In the meantime, food and other items are running in short supply in the Tigray region of 6 million people. The United Nations has called for immediate access for humanitarian aid that is neutral and impartial.Abiy’s government has said a “humanitarian access route” would become available, managed by Ethiopia’s Ministry of Peace.The Ethiopian army has been battling local forces in Tigray since November 4, when Abiy sent the national defense force into the area, after accusing local forces of attacking a military base there.Hundreds of people have been killed and more than 40,000 have fled to neighboring Sudan, recounting horrific tales of violence.The conflict has raised alarm from rights organizations and the United Nations, which have urged Abiy to seek a diplomatic solution to the problem, noting the harm faced by civilians already victims of a weak economy and the coronavirus pandemic.But Abiy thus far has rejected all calls for dialogue with Tigray leaders.
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U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday he will leave the White House if the Electoral College votes for President-elect Joe Biden, the closest he has come to conceding the Nov. 3 election, even as he repeated his unfounded claims of massive voter fraud.Speaking to reporters on the Thanksgiving holiday, Republican Trump said if Democrat Biden, who is to be sworn in Jan. 20, is certified the election winner by the Electoral College, he will depart the White House.But Trump said it would be hard for him to concede under the current circumstances and declined to say whether he would attend Biden’s inauguration.”This election was a fraud,” Trump insisted at the White House while continuing to offer no concrete evidence of widespread voting irregularities. Earlier Trump spoke by video link with members of the U.S. military for the holiday.Biden won the election with 306 Electoral College votes — many more than the 270 required — to Trump’s 232, and the electors are scheduled to meet Dec. 14 to formalize the outcome. Biden also leads Trump by more than 6 million in the popular vote tally.Trump has so far refused to fully acknowledge his defeat, though last week, with mounting pressure from his own Republican ranks, he agreed to let Biden’s transition process officially proceed.Asked if he would leave the White House if the Electoral College votes for Biden, Trump said: “Certainly I will. Certainly I will. And you know that.””But I think that there will be a lot of things happening between now and the 20th of January. A lot of things,” he said. “Massive fraud has been found. We’re like a third world country.”Desperate efforts by Trump and his aides to overturn results in key states, either by lawsuits or by pressuring state legislators, have failed, and he is running out of options.In the United States, a candidate becomes president by securing the most electoral votes rather than by winning a majority of the national popular vote. Electors, allotted to the 50 states and the District of Columbia largely based on their population, are party loyalists who pledge to support the candidate who won the popular vote in their state.Biden, Trump stay close to homeBiden and Trump both stayed close to home to celebrate Thanksgiving on Thursday as the coronavirus pandemic raged across the country.Biden spent the holiday in the small seaside town of Rehoboth, Delaware, where he and his wife, Jill, have a vacation home. The Bidens hosted daughter Ashley Biden and her husband, Dr. Howard Krein, for the holiday meal.The former vice president, appearing with his wife in a video message posted to his Twitter account on Thanksgiving, said his family typically holds a large gathering on the island of Nantucket off Massachusetts but would remain in Delaware this year “with just a small group around our dinner table” because of the pandemic.In the presidential-style address to a nation that has lost more than 260,000 lives to the coronavirus, the Democratic president-elect said Americans were making a “shared sacrifice for the whole country” and a “statement of common purpose” by staying at home with their immediate families.Trump often likes to celebrate holidays at his Mar-a-Largo resort in Florida. But on Thursday he remained in the Washington area, spending part of the morning at his Trump National Golf Club in Virginia, where he played a round of golf.
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Soccer superstar Diego Maradona was buried Thursday in a private ceremony attended by two dozen people — a stark contrast to earlier in the day when tens of thousands of weeping fans filed past his coffin for hours in an observance that mixed head-of-state-like honors with the chaos of a rowdy stadium.Only family members and close friends were permitted at Jardín Bella Vista cemetery for the final religious ceremony and burial of Maradona next to the graves of his parents, Dalma and Diego.Fans waving Argentine flags had gathered along roads as Maradona’s funeral car drove by under heavy security. Many tried to touch the vehicle whenever it was stopped by traffic.The earlier viewing at the Argentine presidential mansion was halted shortly before 6 p.m., 12 hours after it started, as Maradona’s family wished. The body of the Argentine icon was taken away for burial, frustrating many who were waiting to pay their respects and causing new tensions at the gates of the cemetery.Fans, some draped in the national flag, sang soccer anthems as they formed a line that stretched more than 20 blocks from the Plaza de Mayo, where Argentines gathered to celebrate the Maradona-led triumph in the 1986 World Cup.A sign set up by mourning fans reads in Spanish, “Thank You God for Everything,” as police block their access to the Jardin de Bellavista cemetery during the burial of Diego Maradona in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Nov. 26, 2020.But with the time for viewing the coffin at the presidential palace drawing short, police moved to cut off the crowd, enraging fans who hurled rocks and other objects at officers, who responded with rubber bullets.The crowd overwhelmed organizers and the violence resulted in injuries and arrests, which led Maradona’s family to end the public visitation. The casket was placed in a car that carried the former footballer’s name on a paperboard by the window.Desperate to say goodbye, Maradona’s fans climbed on the fences of the presidential mansion as if they were in a soccer stadium, while firefighters worked to clear the ground.’Diego lives in the people'”Diego is not dead, Diego lives in the people,” people chanted as the coffin was taken to a cemetery outside Buenos Aires. The motorcade, accompanied by police, was followed on a local highway by dozens of honking cars and motorcycles.Hundreds of fans blocked entry to the cemetery before the arrival of Maradona’s casket, dancing and chanting as police moved in to open a way. The crowd continued making noise after the final ceremony began.Maradona died Wednesday of a heart attack in a house outside Buenos Aires where he had been recovering from a brain operation November 3.Mourners embrace as they wait to see football star Diego Maradona lying in state outside the presidential palace in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Nov. 26, 2020.While the viewing bore the hallmarks of a state funeral, with Maradona’s casket laid out in the presidential palace, the atmosphere often was that of a soccer stadium — chanting, singing, pushing and the occasional whiff of alcohol.Fans wept and blew kisses as they passed the wooden coffin, some striking their chests with closed fists and shouting, “Let’s go, Diego.”It was draped with the Argentine flag and shirts bearing his famed No. 10 from the national team and the Boca Juniors club, with other jerseys tossed around it by passing admirers.Family, friends firstOpen visitation began at 6:15 a.m. after a few hours of privacy for family and close friends. The first to bid farewell were his daughters and close family members. His former wife, Claudia Villafañe, came with Maradona’s daughters Dalma and Gianinna. Later came Verónica Ojeda, also an ex-wife, with their son, Dieguito Fernando.Jana Maradona, whom the player recognized as his daughter only a few years ago, also attended.Then came former teammates of the 1986 World Cup-winning squad, including Oscar Ruggeri. Other Argentine footballers, such as Boca Juniors’ Carlos Tévez, showed up, too.President Alberto Fernández appeared at midday and placed on the casket a jersey from the Argentinos Juniors team, where Maradona started his career in 1976.Relatives and friends bury the remains of Diego Maradona while police keep fans outside the Jardin de Bellavista cemetery in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Nov. 26, 2020.In tears, Fernández also laid two handkerchiefs of the human rights organization Mother of the Plaza de Mayo, whose members wore them for years to protest the disappearance of their children under Argentina’s military dictatorship between 1976 and 1983. Maradona, an outspoken leftist who had an image of Argentine revolutionary Che Guevara tattooed on one bicep, was a friend of the Madres and other rights groups.The lines started forming outside the Casa Rosada only hours after Maradona’s death was confirmed and grew to several blocks.A huge mural of Maradona’s face was painted on the tiles that cover the Plaza de Mayo, near the Casa Rosada, which was decorated with a giant black ribbon at the entrance.The first fan to visit was Nahuel de Lima, 30, using crutches to move because of a disability.”He made Argentina be recognized all over the world. Who speaks of Maradona also speaks of Argentina,” de Lima told The Associated Press. “Diego is the people. … Today the shirts, the political flags don’t matter. We came to say goodbye to a great that gave us a lot of joy.”1986 march to gloryMaradona’s soccer genius, personal struggles and plain-spoken personality resonated deeply with Argentines.He led an underdog team to glory in the 1986 World Cup, winning the title after scoring two astonishing goals in a semifinal match against England, thrilling a country that felt humiliated by its loss against the British in the recent Falklands war and that was still recovering from the brutal military dictatorship.Many Argentines deeply sympathized with the struggles of a man who rose from poverty to fame and wealth and fell into abuse of drug, drink and food. He remained idolized in the soccer-mad nation as the “Pibe de Oro” or “Golden Boy.”Many of those in line to enter the Casa Rosada wore masks because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but they struggled to keep social distancing.Social worker Rosa Noemí Monje, 63, said she and others overseeing health protocols understood the emotion of the moment.”It is impossible to ask them to distance. We behave respectfully and offer them sanitizer and face masks,” she said. Monje also paid her last tribute to Maradona.”I told him: To victory always, Diego,” Monje said as she wept.
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Syria’s military said suspected Israeli warplanes struck locations south of the capital, Damascus, late Tuesday, causing only material damage, state-run media reported.  The report, which quotes an unidentified military official, said the warplanes struck shortly before midnight south of Damascus, from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. The statement didn’t elaborate on the target or the damage.  Earlier, the state Syrian Arab News Agency SANA said Syria’s air defenses responded to incoming missiles. Later reports on SANA and Syrian Al-Ekhbariya TV said Israeli warplanes struck in a village in Quneitra province on the edge of the Golan Heights and in southwest of the capital Damascus. They offered no details.  Israel last week acknowledged attacking Iran-linked targets in Syria along the Golan Heights after spotting a squad planting roadside bombs near one of its positions.  Israel has launched hundreds of strikes on Iran-linked military targets in Syria over the years but rarely acknowledges such operations. Last week’s operation appeared to be sending a public message to Iran and Syria after discovering the anti-personnel mines near its troops.  There was no immediate Israeli comment late Tuesday.  Last month, an overnight attack on a location in Quneitra was reported by Syrian media, which also said Israeli warplanes were behind it. A war monitor said three people were killed in that attack on a post used by Iran-allied militias.  Israel seized the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 war and later annexed it in a move that is not internationally recognized. It says it targets mostly sites of Iranian units and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah in Syria, seeking to curb Tehran’s influence near its borders. Such attacks have increased in recent months. 
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Americans are less likely to get food poisoning this Thanksgiving thanks to NASA. Yes, NASA. The space agency’s Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) system created decades ago for the lunar landing initiative is credited to this day with reducing foodborne illnesses.Originally developed for astronaut food in the early days of the Apollo program, the HACCP system has been adopted by major players in the food industry.Sixty years ago, at what is now Johnson Space Center in Houston, a nutritionist and a Pillsbury microbiologist partnered with NASA to provide uncontaminated food for the astronauts on the Gemini and Apollo missions.Instead of testing end products, Paul Lachance and Howard Bauman came up with a method that identified and controlled potential points of failure in the food production process.To make astronaut food safe, the duo introduced hazards in the production line, observed the hazard and determined how it could be prevented.In 1971, the deaths of two people from botulism, a severe foodborne illness caused by bacteria, prompted the National Canners Association to adopt stricter standards. The Food and Drug Administration and the canners association implemented the HACCP regulations for low-acid canned food.In 1993, an outbreak of food poisoning at a fast-food chain prompted meat and poultry manufacturers to adopt to the HACCP regulations as part of an effort to restore public confidence in the industry. A decade after that, the FDA and the Department of Agriculture made HACCP regulations universal for meat, poultry, seafood and juice producers.Standardization was further strengthened in 2011 when the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act came into existence. While HACCP applies to all U.S. food producers, all applications are unique to particular foodstuffs.Take a look at the typical American Thanksgiving meal now.First, all the foods on the Thanksgiving table have been subjected to HACCP regulations. Cranberry sauce, for instance. The critical control points for cranberry sauce include the washing area where berries are first received, filtration and metal detection points where any foreign materials are removed, a heat treatment pasteurization area, and acidity checks, among others, according to Katy Latimer, vice president of research and development for Ocean Spray, known for its cranberry products.Rigorous controls also exist for turkey production at Butterball Turkey LLC, which says the regulations are “ingrained” in how they produce food.While giving thanks for a nourishing Thanksgiving meal, Americans might spare a few words for NASA’s pioneering program that has prevented stomach aches, and much worse, for decades.
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First lady Melania Trump welcomed a Christmas tree to the White House Monday, honoring an age-old tradition in the nation’s capital. The 5.6-meter (18.5-foot) Fraser fir was delivered Monday to the White House via horse-drawn carriage, kicking off a series of traditional holiday events, many of which will continue this year, despite CDC warnings against public gatherings amid the coronavirus pandemic. “Each year the arrival of the #WHChristmas tree brings a spirit of holiday warmth & tradition to the @WhiteHouse,” Melania Trump wrote on Twitter. “This year’s tree will continue to bring joy to those who will pass through the halls of the White House during this most wonderful time of the year.” Each year the arrival of the #WHChristmas tree brings a spirit of holiday warmth & tradition to the @WhiteHouse. This year’s tree will continue to bring joy to those who will pass through the halls of the White House during this most wonderful time of the year. pic.twitter.com/RVHkWtoaWo— Melania Trump (@FLOTUS) November 23, 2020 Two men wearing face masks delivered the tree, greeted by the maskless first lady, as the brass section of the U.S. Marine Band played carols, including “O Christmas Tree” and “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.” President Donald Trump made a brief appearance outside. Since 1966, the National Christmas Tree Association in Colorado has hosted an event attended by 100 people witnessing a White House official picking the tree for the Blue Room.  “But … 2020 is far from a normal year. There was no selection event this year. Instead, the tree was quietly chosen at Dan and Anne Taylor’s farm, they are the 2020 NCTA Grand Champion Grower,” the association wrote in a press release, referring to a tree farm in West Virginia that has been picked a handful of times in recent years to provide the White House Christmas tree. 
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