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MANILA, Philippines — U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Tuesday condemned China’s dangerous actions against the Philippines and renewed a warning that the United States would defend its treaty ally if Filipino forces come under an armed attack in the increasingly volatile waters.

During a visit to the Philippine province of Palawan next to the disputed South China Sea, Austin was asked if the strong U.S. military support to the Philippines would continue under incoming President Donald Trump, including $500 million in new military funding.

Austin expressed the belief that the strong alliance “will transcend” changes of administration.

“We stand with the Philippines, and we condemn dangerous actions by the PRC against lawful Philippine operations in the South China Sea,” he said, using the acronym of China’s official name.

He added: “The behavior of PRC has been concerning. They’ve used dangerous and escalatory measures to enforce their expansive South China Sea maritime claims.”

China has also had recent territorial spats with smaller coastal states, including Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia, over the key global trade and security route. Brunei and Taiwan are also involved in long-unresolved disputes.

The outgoing Biden administration has taken steps to strengthen an arc of military alliances across the Indo-Pacific region to better counter China, including in any future confrontation over Taiwan or in the South China Sea, which Beijing has claimed almost in its entirety.

That has dovetailed with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s thrust to strengthen his country’s external defenses, given an alarming escalation of territorial confrontations between Chinese and Filipinos forces in the South China Sea.

There has been intense speculation over how Trump would steer U.S. military engagements in Asia.

Marcos told reporters Tuesday that he congratulated Trump on his presidential election victory in a telephone call and renewed Philippine commitment to continue strengthening its alliance with the U.S.

“I expressed to him our continuing desire to strengthen that relationship between our two countries, which is a relationship that is as deep as can possibly be because it has been for a very long time,” Marcos said.

Austin was speaking during a joint news conference with his Philippine counterpart, Gilberto Teodoro, in the military headquarters in Palawan.

They were given a demonstration of an unmanned vessel the U.S. has funded for use by the Philippine Navy for intelligence-gathering and defense surveillance.

Austin “reaffirmed the ironclad U.S. commitment to the Philippines” and reiterated that the allies’ Mutual Defense Treaty covers both countries’ armed forces, public vessels and aircraft…”anywhere in the South China Sea.”

He also reaffirmed his department’s “commitment to bolstering the Philippines’ defense capabilities and capacity to resist coercion,” according to a joint statement.

Austin and Teodoro signed an agreement on Monday to secure from possible leakages the exchange of highly confidential military intelligence and technology in key weapons the U.S. would provide to Manila.

The Department of National Defense in Manila said the agreement aims to ensure the security of classified military information exchanges and would “allow the Philippines access to higher capabilities and big-ticket items from the United States.”

Neither side provided more details or released a copy of the agreement.

Two Philippine security officials, however, have told The Associated Press that such an agreement, similar to those Washington has signed with other allied countries, would allow the U.S. to provide the Philippines with higher-level intelligence and more sophisticated weapons, including missile systems.

It would also provide the Philippine military access to U.S. satellite and drone surveillance systems with an assurance that such intelligence and details about sophisticated weapons would be kept secure to prevent leaks, the two officials said on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to discuss the sensitive issue publicly.

China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said in Beijing on Monday that no military agreement “should target any third party … nor should it undermine regional peace or exacerbate regional tensions.”
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«52-річний чоловік, який перебував на вулиці, зазнав травми, несумісні з життям»
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Одного чоловіка госпіталізували у тяжкому стані
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RIO DE JANEIRO — With just two months remaining in President Joe Biden’s administration, the United States is ramping up financial, military and diplomatic support for Kyiv’s effort to defend itself against Russian aggression.

At the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where Biden and leaders of 20 of the world’s largest economies are meeting, U.S. officials are pushing for the “strongest possible” language on Ukraine, deputy national security adviser Jon Finer told VOA during a briefing Monday.

Western diplomats have renewed their push for stronger criticism on Moscow following Russia’s weekend airstrike, its largest on Ukrainian territory in months.

They’ve also warned that increased Russian war efforts could have a destabilizing effect beyond Europe. Earlier this month, the U.S. and Ukraine announced that North Korea has sent more than 10,000 troops to help Moscow reclaim territory seized by Ukraine in Russia’s Kursk region.

However, the final leaders’ statement did not include the language the U.S. pushed for. It highlights human suffering and the negative impacts of the war in Ukraine to the global economy without any condemnation to Russia. On Gaza, it called for cease-fire in Gaza and in Lebanon and commitment to the two-state solution, without mentioning Israel’s right to defend itself.

Finer acknowledges that finding a consensus on global conflicts is elusive given the diversity of the G20. In addition to mostly like-minded countries of the G7, the G20 also includes Russia, China and nations of the Global South.

Ever since the G20 summit in Bali in 2022 — held months after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine — the global grouping has faced challenges hammering out a response to the conflict.

Long-range missiles authorized

The U.S. has been surging its military assistance to Kyiv. It is also authorizing Ukraine to use American-supplied long-range missiles to strike inside Russia, according to media reports quoting officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Finer declined to confirm but said it is “consistent” with the U.S. approach of tailoring its response to meet developments on the ground to “allow the Ukrainians to continue to defend their territory and their sovereignty.”

On Monday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that if true, authorization for Kyiv to strike inside Russia with U.S. long-range missiles, “will mark a qualitatively new round of tensions and level of Washington’s involvement in the Ukraine conflict.”

Last week in Brussels, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken sought to reassure European allies that Biden is “committed to making sure that every dollar we have at our disposal will be pushed out the door between now and January 20,” the date of President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.

Trump has been critical of using American taxpayer’s money to help Kyiv. Without providing details, Trump often boasts he can swiftly end the war — a statement that many in Europe fear would mean forcing Ukraine to capitulate.

Earlier this month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he wants a “just end” to the war, and that a swift end “means losses.” On Saturday, he told Ukrainian public radio that under the Trump administration, “the war will end faster.”

“This is their approach, the promise to their country,” he said. “And for them, it is also very important.”

At the State Department, spokesperson Matthew Miller told VOA during Monday’s briefing that the U.S. seeks an end to the war in Ukraine that upholds the country’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, while ensuring it does not “reward a dictator” intent on seizing land by force.

The sentiment is shared by many European leaders, but they may ultimately be forced to accept a new political reality.

“No government in Europe is going to officially endorse a land-for-peace deal at this point. It’s diplomatically and legally impossible to do that,” said Edward Hunter Christie, a former NATO official and now senior research fellow at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs.

Behind the scenes, however, some European leaders believe Ukraine’s chances are not strong enough, Christie told VOA, especially if the U.S. under Trump does not continue its assistance to Ukraine.

The U.S. is racing to disburse $20 billion as part of a Biden-driven G7 initiative agreed in June to provide Kyiv with $50 billion in loans. The funds are to be paid back using interest income from Russian assets frozen in Western financial institutions.

A senior administration official briefing reporters in Rio told VOA they are “working full speed” to get the loan disbursed before the end of the year.

Climate change, poverty alleviation

G20 host Brazil has worked to keep the focus of talks away from global conflicts and more on addressing divisions in the ongoing U.N. conference on climate change in Azerbaijan, as well as accelerating efforts to reduce global hunger and poverty — an initiative championed by summit host President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

Lula’s approach to resist pressures from the G7 and the rest of the G20 on Ukraine and Gaza reflects Brazil’s strategy of “multi-alignment” in an increasingly fragmented global landscape, said Bruna Santos, director at the Wilson Center’s Brazil Institute.

However, “neutrality risks alienating all sides in an increasingly polarized world,” Santos told VOA.

Negotiators in Rio have also been struggling to find consensus on shared language on climate financing, said diplomatic sources who spoke to VOA on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing negotiations.

Western nations have been pushing for China and wealthy Middle Eastern countries to join them in contributing to global funds for climate change mitigation — a proposal resisted by Brazil and other member countries of the Global South.

Another Lula proposal, a 2% tax on the super-rich that Brazil says can potentially generate up to $250 billion per year to help the world’s poor, has also met new resistance.

Argentinian right-wing President Javier Milei rejected the proposal after visiting Trump at his Florida residence, the first foreign leader to visit the president-elect.

Milei’s rejection is an example of how as president-elect, Trump has already affected dynamics among world leaders and upended Biden’s international priorities.

The senior administration told VOA that the U.S. was “really supportive” of Lula’s proposal, which was “very much in line” with the fiscal policy Biden has pushed in his term.

In the G20 joint statement released Tuesday, leaders agreed to work to “ensure that ultra-high-net-worth individuals are effectively taxed.”

State Department bureau chief Nike Ching contributed to this report.
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NEW YORK — Arthur Frommer, whose “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day” guidebooks revolutionized leisure travel by convincing average Americans to take budget vacations abroad, has died. He was 95.

Frommer died from complications of pneumonia, his daughter Pauline Frommer said Monday.

“My father opened up the world to so many people,” she said. “He believed deeply that travel could be an enlightening activity and one that did not require a big budget.”

Frommer began writing about travel while serving in the U.S. Army in Europe in the 1950s. When a guidebook he wrote for American soldiers overseas sold out, he launched what became one of the travel industry’s best-known brands, self-publishing “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day” in 1957.

“It struck a chord and became an immediate best-seller,” he recalled in an interview with The Associated Press in 2007, on the 50th anniversary of the book’s debut.

The Frommer’s brand, led today by his daughter Pauline, remains one of the best-known names in the travel industry, with guidebooks to destinations around the world, an influential social media presence, podcasts and a radio show.

Frommer’s philosophy — stay in inns and budget hotels instead of five-star hotels, sightsee on your own using public transportation, eat with locals in small cafes instead of fancy restaurants — changed the way Americans traveled in the mid- to late 20th century. He said budget travel was preferable to luxury travel “because it leads to a more authentic experience.” That message encouraged average people, not just the wealthy, to vacation abroad.

It didn’t hurt that his books hit the market as the rise of jet travel made getting to Europe easier than crossing the Atlantic by ship. The books became so popular that there was a time when you couldn’t visit a place like the Eiffel Tower without spotting Frommer’s guidebooks in the hands of every other American tourist.

Frommer’s advice also became so standard that it’s hard to remember how radical it seemed in the days before discount flights and backpacks. “It was really pioneering stuff,” Tony Wheeler, founder of the Lonely Planet guidebook company, said in an interview in 2013. Before Frommer, Wheeler said, you could find guidebooks “that would tell you everything about the church or the temple ruin. But the idea that you wanted to eat somewhere and find a hotel or get from A to B — well, I’ve got a huge amount of respect for Arthur.”

“Arthur did for travel what Consumer Reports did for everything else,” said Pat Carrier, former owner of The Globe Corner, a travel bookstore in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The final editions of Frommer’s groundbreaking series were titled “Europe from $95 a Day.” The concept no longer made sense when hotels could not be had for less than $100 a night, so the series was discontinued in 2007. But the Frommer publishing empire did not disappear, despite a series of sales that started when Frommer sold the guidebook company to Simon & Schuster. It was later acquired by Wiley Publishing, which in turn sold it to Google in 2012. Google quietly shut the guidebooks down, but Arthur Frommer — in a David vs. Goliath triumph — got his brand back from Google. In November 2013 with his daughter Pauline, he relaunched the print series with dozens of new guidebook titles.

“I never dreamed at my age I’d be working this hard,” he told the AP at the time, age 84.

Frommer also remained a well-known figure in 21st century travel, opinionated to the end of his career, speaking out on his blog and radio show. He hated mega-cruise ships and railed against travel websites where consumers put up their own reviews, saying they were too easily manipulated with phony postings. And he coined the phrase “Trump Slump” in a widely quoted column that predicted a slump in tourism to the U.S. after Donald Trump was elected president.

Frommer was born in Lynchburg, Virginia, and grew up during the Great Depression in Jefferson City, Missouri, the child of a Polish father and Austrian mother. “My father had one job after another, one company after another that went bankrupt,” he recalled. The family moved to New York when he was a teenager. He worked as an office boy at Newsweek, went to New York University and was drafted upon graduating from Yale Law School in 1953. Because he spoke French and Russian, he was sent to work in Army intelligence at a U.S. base in Germany, where the Cold War was heating up.

His first glimpse of Europe was from the window of a military transport plane. Whenever he had a weekend leave or a three-day pass, he’d hop a train to Paris or hitch a ride to England on an Air Force flight. Eventually he wrote “The GI’s Guide to Traveling in Europe,” and a few weeks before his Army stint was up, he had 5,000 copies printed by a typesetter in a German village. They were priced at 50 cents apiece, distributed by the Army newspaper, Stars & Stripes.

Shortly after he returned to New York to practice law at the firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, he received a cable from Europe. “The book was sold out, would I arrange a reprint?” he said.

Soon after he spent his month’s vacation from the law firm doing a civilian version of the guide. “In 30 days I went to 15 different cities, getting up at 4 a.m., running up and down the streets, trying to find good cheap hotels and restaurants,” he recalled.

The resulting book, the very first “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day,” was much more than a list. It was written with a wide-eyed wonder that verged on poetry: “Venice is a fantastic dream,” Frommer wrote. “Try to arrive at night when the wonders of the city can steal upon you piecemeal and slow. … Out of the dark, there appear little clusters of candy-striped mooring poles; a gondola approaches with a lighted lantern hung from its prow.”

Eventually Frommer gave up law to write the guides full-time. Daughter Pauline joined him with his first wife, Hope Arthur, on their trips starting in 1965, when she was 4 months old. “They used to joke that the book should be called ‘Europe on Five Diapers a Day,'” Pauline Frommer said.

In the 1960s, when inflation forced Frommer to change the title of the book to “Europe on 5 and 10 Dollars a Day,” he said “it was as if someone had plunged a knife into my head.”

Asked to summarize the impact of his books in a 2017 Associated Press interview, he said that in the 1950s, “most Americans had been taught that foreign travel was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, especially travel to Europe. They were taught that they were going to a war-torn country where it was risky to stay in any hotel other than a five-star hotel. It was risky to go into anything but a top-notch restaurant. … And I knew that all these warnings were a lot of nonsense.”

He added: “We were pioneers in also suggesting that a different type of American should travel, that you didn’t have to be well-heeled.”

To the end of his life, he said he avoided traveling first class. “I fly economy class and I try to experience the same form of travel, the same experience that the average American and the average citizen of the world encounters,” he said.

As Frommer aged, his daughter Pauline gradually became the force behind the company, promoting the brand, managing the business and even writing some of the content based on her own travels. Her relationship with her father was both tender and respectful, and she summed it up this way in a 2012 email to AP: “It’s wonderful to have a working partner whose mind is a steel trap, and who doesn’t just have smarts, but wisdom. His opinions, whether or not you agree with them, come from his social values. He’s a man who puts ethics at the center of his life, and weaves them into everything he does.”

In addition to Pauline, Frommer’s survivors include his second wife, Roberta Brodfeld, and four grandchildren.
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The U.S. House of Representatives Ethics Committee is set to meet Wednesday to decide whether to release its investigative report on former Representative Matt Gaetz, who was accused of sexual misconduct and illicit drug use before he was picked by President-elect Donald Trump to be attorney general in his new administration.

Several U.S. senators, Democrats and Republicans alike, are demanding that the report be released so they can consider the scope of Gaetz’s background as they undertake their constitutionally mandated role of confirming or rejecting a new president’s Cabinet nominees.

Last Wednesday, Trump named Gaetz, 42, a Republican congressman from Florida for eight years, to become the country’s top law enforcement official. Hours later, Gaetz resigned from Congress, even though he had just been reelected to a fifth term. His resignation ended the House Ethics Committee’s investigation, which had been nearing a conclusion.

But it remained uncertain whether the panel would divulge what conclusions it had reached.

The committee, with five Democrats and five Republicans, had been looking into allegations that Gaetz had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl and used drugs illicitly. Gaetz has denied the allegations. The Justice Department, which Gaetz hopes to lead, investigated the case but declined last year to bring any charges.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, who leads the narrow Republican majority in the chamber, has contended that no ethics report should be made public because Gaetz is no longer a member of Congress. However, there have been instances where that has occurred in the past.

Johnson told CNN on Sunday that senators reviewing the Gaetz nomination as the country’s top law enforcement official will “have a vigorous review and vetting process,” but that they did not need to see the House Ethics Committee’s report. Some senators have suggested they could move to subpoena it if it is not turned over to them voluntarily.

Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin on Sunday told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the panel should share its report with the Senate.

“The Senate should have access to that,” Mullin said. “Should it be released to the public or not? That I guess will be part of the negotiations.”

Gaetz is one of several Trump appointees to his Cabinet who do not have the credentials normally seen in candidates for high-level government jobs.

Over the weekend, a lawyer for another Trump choice, Pete Hegseth, a 44-year-old Fox News host named to be defense secretary, revealed that Hegseth several years ago paid an undisclosed amount to a woman who accused him of sexual assault in 2017 to avert the threat of what he viewed as a baseless lawsuit becoming public.

Trump has stood by his Cabinet nominees, refusing to withdraw their nominations. But the controversies surrounding Gaetz, Hegseth and others could threaten their confirmations by the Senate to be in Trump’s Cabinet.

The president-elect also has sought — with little success so far — to get the Senate, in Republican control come January when he takes office, to agree to recess at times so he could name and install his Cabinet members without the need for contentious and time-consuming confirmation hearings.
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WASHINGTON — U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said on Monday that he is nominating former Wisconsin Representative Sean Duffy, now a Fox News host, to be transportation secretary.

If confirmed, Duffy will oversee aviation, automotive, rail, transit and other transportation policies at the department with about a $110 billion budget as well as significant funding that remains under the Biden administration’s 2021 $1 trillion infrastructure law and EV charging stations.

Trump has vowed to reverse the Biden administration’s vehicle emissions rules. He has said he plans to begin the process of undoing the Biden administration’s stringent emissions regulations finalized earlier this year as soon as he takes office. The rules cut tailpipe emissions limits by 50% from 2026 levels by 2032 and prod automakers to build more EVs.

Duffy will face a number of major transportation issues.

U.S. traffic deaths have fallen this year but still remain sharply above pre-COVID levels. The fatality rate remains higher this year than in any pre-pandemic year since 2008. He will face pressure to ease rules for self-driving cars sought by Tesla and other automakers.

Trump said Duffy will prioritize “Excellence, Competence, Competitiveness and Beauty when rebuilding America’s highways, tunnels, bridges and airports. He will ensure our ports and dams serve our Economy without compromising our National Security.”

Duffy will oversee the continuing enhanced oversight of Boeing. The Federal Aviation Administration, which is part of USDOT, capped production at 38 737 MAX planes per month in January after a door panel missing four key bolts flew off an Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9 in midair that month, exposing serious safety issues at Boeing.

If confirmed, Duffy will also decide whether to continue the Biden administration’s aviation passenger rights push and whether to approve more airline joint ventures.

He will also be in charge of oversight of companies run by Elon Musk, who has been closely involved in Trump’s transition.

USDOT is investigating Tesla Autopilot, while the FAA has proposed to fine SpaceX for violating space license rules. Musk has called for the resignation of FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker.

A persistent shortage of controllers has delayed flights and, at many facilities, while a series of near miss incidents involving passenger jets have raised safety concerns.

Congress also has been considering significant rail safety reforms in the aftermath of the February 2023 derailment of a Norfolk Southern train in East Palestine, Ohio.
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fergus falls, minnesota — Nearly three years after a couple from India and their two young children froze to death while trying to cross the border from Canada into the U.S., two men went on trial Monday on human smuggling charges, accused of being part of a criminal network that stretched around the world.

Prosecutors say Indian national Harshkumar Ramanlal Patel, 29, ran part of the scheme and recruited Steve Shand, 50, of Florida, to shuttle migrants across the border. Both men have pleaded not guilty in federal court in Minnesota. They’re standing trial before U.S. District Judge John Tunheim, with proceedings expected to last about five days. They each face four counts related to human smuggling.

On January 19, 2022, Shand was allegedly waiting in a truck for 11 migrants, including the family of four from the village of Dingucha in Gujarat state. Prosecutors say 39-year-old Jagdish Patel; his wife, Vaishaliben, who was in her mid-30s; the couple’s 11-year-old daughter, Vihangi; and 3-year-old son, Dharmik, died after spending hours wandering fields in blizzard conditions as the wind chill reached minus 36 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 38 Celsius).

Prosecutors say when Jagdish Patel’s body was found, he was holding Dharmik, who was wrapped in a blanket.

Before jury selection began Monday morning, defense attorneys objected to prosecutors’ plan to show seven photos of the frozen bodies of Jagdish Patel and his family, including close-up images of the children.

Shand’s attorney, Aaron Morrison, said the heart-wrenching images could cause “extreme prejudice to the jury” and asked for the photos to be removed as evidence.

Prosecutors argued the photos were necessary to show the family was not adequately prepared by Shand and Harshkumar Patel for the frigid conditions.

Tunheim allowed the images to remain evidence.

Patel is a common Indian surname and the victims were not related to Harshkumar Patel. Federal prosecutors say Harshkumar Patel and Shand were part of an operation that scouted clients in India, got them Canadian student visas, arranged transportation and smuggled them into the U.S., mostly through Washington state or Minnesota.

The U.S. Border Patrol arrested more than 14,000 Indians on the Canadian border in the year ending this Sept. 30. By 2022, the Pew Research Center estimates more than 725,000 Indians were living illegally in the U.S., behind only Mexicans and El Salvadorans.

Harshkumar Patel’s attorney, Thomas Leinenweber, told The Associated Press that his client came to America to escape poverty and build a better life for himself and now “stands unjustly accused of participating in this horrible crime. He has faith in the justice system of his adopted country and believes that the truth will come out at the trial.” Attorneys for Shand did not return messages.

Court documents filed by prosecutors show Patel was in the U.S. illegally after being refused a U.S. visa at least five times, and that he recruited Shand at a casino near their homes in Deltona, Florida, just north of Orlando.

Over a five-week period, court documents say, Patel and Shand often communicated about the bitter cold as they smuggled five groups of Indians over a quiet stretch of border. One night in December 2021, Shand messaged Patel that it was “cold as hell” while waiting to pick up one group, the documents say.

“They going to be alive when they get here?” he allegedly wrote.

During the last trip in January, Shand had messaged Patel, saying: “Make sure everyone is dressed for the blizzard conditions, please,” according to prosecutors.

Prosecutors say Shand told investigators that Patel paid him about $25,000 for the five trips.

Jagdish Patel grew up in Dingucha. He and his family lived with his parents. The couple were schoolteachers, according to local news reports.

Satveer Chaudhary is a Minneapolis-based immigration attorney who has helped migrants exploited by motel owners, many of them Gujaratis. He said smugglers and shady business interests promised many migrants an American dream that doesn’t exist when they arrive.

“The promises of the almighty dollar lead many people to take unwarranted risks with their own dignity, and as we’re finding out here, their own lives,” Chaudhary said.
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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is requesting nearly $100 billion in emergency disaster aid after Hurricanes Helene and Milton, and other natural disasters, telling lawmakers that the money is “urgently needed.” 

The letter Monday to House Speaker Mike Johnson comes as lawmakers meet during a lame-duck session to finish key priorities before making way for a new Congress and the incoming Trump administration. Biden said he has met firsthand with those harmed by the storms and he heard what residents and businesses needed from the federal government. 

“Additional resources are critical to continue to support these communities,” Biden said. 

The largest share of the money, about $40 billion, would go to the main disaster relief fund at the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Biden said the fund would face a shortfall this budget year without additional money. He said that would not only affect the agency’s ability to provide lifesaving assistance to survivors, but also would slow recovery efforts from prior disasters. 

An additional $24 billion would help farmers that have experienced crop or livestock losses, and $12 billion would go toward community development block grants administered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. 

Some $8 billion more would help rebuild and repair highways and bridges in more than 40 states and territories. The administration is also seeking $4 billion for long-term water system upgrades to mitigate future damage from natural disasters. Several other agencies would also receive emergency funds if Congress agrees to the request. 

Lawmakers were expecting a hefty number from the administration. Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, said Congress will evaluate the request and “we’ll make sure we deliver for the hurricane victims and the people that have suffered from that.” 

The Senate Appropriations Committee is expected to hear Wednesday from the heads of several of the government agencies that would receive funding through Biden’s request. It’s possible that emergency aid could be attached to any spending bill designed to keep federal agencies operating after current funding expires Dec. 20. 

Biden noted that Congress had provided more than $90 billion in aid after Hurricane Katrina nearly two decades ago, and more than $50 billion after Hurricane Sandy in 2013. He urged Congress to take “immediate action.” 

“Just as the Congress acted then, it is our sworn duty now to deliver the necessary resources to ensure that everyone in communities reeling from Hurricanes Helene and Milton — and those still recovering from previous disasters — have the Federal resources they need and deserve,” Biden wrote.
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Раніше місцева влада повідомила, що російський обстріл Одеси вночі 15 листопада пошкодив будівлю сімейної амбулаторії, яка є пам’яткою архітектури
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The Holocaust Museum LA recently installed a new exhibit on its roof: a German-made freight car that was used to deport Jews across Nazi-occupied Europe to the Majdanek concentration camp near Lublin, Poland. From Los Angeles, Angelina Bagdasaryan has the story, narrated by Anna Rice.
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In New York City, where some communities have limited access to fresh produce, a unique classroom program is teaching students how to grow their own food and improve their eating habits. Aron Ranen has more on how gardening is shaping healthier futures for kids.
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За попередньою інформацією, армія РФ вдарила по мешканцях Токарівки та Гоптівки з FPV-дронів
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У звʼязку з загибеллю 10 людей, завтра, 19 листопада, в Одесі та області оголошено день жалоби
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Manila, Philippines — The Philippines and the United States signed on Monday a military intelligence-sharing deal in a further deepening of defense ties between the two nations facing common security challenges in the region.

Visiting U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin signed the agreement with his Philippine counterpart, Gilberto Teodoro, at Manila’s military headquarters where both officials also broke ground for a combined coordination center that will facilitate collaboration between their armed forces.

Called the General Security of Military Information Agreement or GSOMIA, the pact allows both countries to share classified military information securely.

“Not only will this allow the Philippines access to higher capabilities and big-ticket items from the United States, it will also open opportunities to pursue similar agreements with like-minded nations,” said Philippines’ defense ministry spokesperson Arsenio Andolong.

Security engagements between the United States and the Philippines have deepened under President Joe Biden and his Philippine counterpart Ferdinand Marcos Jr., with both leaders keen to counter what they see as China’s aggressive policies in the South China Sea and near Taiwan.

The two countries have a mutual defense treaty dating back to 1951, which could be invoked if either side came under attack, including in the South China Sea.

“I want to start by underscoring our ironclad commitment to the Philippines,” Austin said during the groundbreaking ceremony for the coordination center.

Austin said the coordination center should enable real-time information sharing between the two defense treaty allies and boost interoperability.

‘’It will be a place where our forces can work side by side to respond to regional challenges,” Austin said.

The Philippines has expressed confidence the alliance will remain strong under incoming U.S. president-elect Donald Trump.

Both the Philippines and the United States face increasingly aggressive actions from China in the South China Sea, a conduit for more than $3 trillion in annual ship-borne commerce, which it claims almost entirely as its own.

In 2016, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague said China’s claims had no legal basis, siding with the Philippines, which brought the case.

But China has rejected the ruling, leading to a series of sea and air confrontations with the Philippines that have turned the highly strategic South China Sea into a potential flashpoint between Washington and Beijing.

“The United States’ presence in the Indo Pacific region is essential for maintaining peace and stability in this region,” Teodoro said during the inauguration, echoing previous remarks made by Marcos.
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«Пріоритетом є зараз боронити країну. Ми дивимося, що ворог збільшує кількість особового складу» – Рустем Умєров
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Spirit Airlines said Monday that it has filed for bankruptcy protection and will attempt to reboot as it struggles to recover from the pandemic-caused swoon in travel and a failed attempt to sell the airline to JetBlue.

Spirit, the biggest U.S. budget airline, has lost more than $2.5 billion since the start of 2020 and faces looming debt payments totaling more than $1 billion over the next year.

Spirit said it expects to operate as normal as it works its way through a prearranged Chapter 11 bankruptcy process and that customers can continue to book and fly without interruption.

Shares of Miramar, Florida-based Spirit dropped 25% on Friday, after The Wall Street Journal reported that the airline was discussing terms of a possible bankruptcy filing with its bondholders. It was just the latest in a series of blows that have sent the stock crashing down by 97% since late 2018 — when Spirit was still making money.

CEO Ted Christie confirmed in August that Spirit was talking to advisers of its bondholders about the upcoming debt maturities. He called the discussions a priority, and said the airline was trying to get the best deal it could as quickly as possible.

“The chatter in the market about Spirit is notable, but we are not distracted,” he told investors during an earnings call. “We are focused on refinancing our debt, improving our overall liquidity position, deploying our new reimagined product into the market, and growing our loyalty programs.”

People are still flying on Spirit Airlines. They’re just not paying as much.

In the first six months of this year, Spirit passengers flew 2% more than they did in the same period last year. However, they are paying 10% less per mile, and revenue per mile from fares is down nearly 20%, contributing to Spirit’s red ink.

It’s not a new trend. Spirit failed to return to profitability when the coronavirus pandemic eased and travel rebounded. There are several reasons behind the slump.

Spirit’s costs, especially for labor, have risen. The biggest U.S. airlines have snagged some of Spirit’s budget-conscious customers by offering their own brand of bare-bones tickets. And fares for U.S. leisure travel — Spirit’s core business — have sagged because of a glut of new flights.

The premium end of the air-travel market has surged while Spirit’s traditional no-frills end has stagnated. So this summer, Spirit decided to sell bundled fares that include a bigger seat, priority boarding, free bags, internet service and snacks and drinks. That is a huge change from Spirit’s longtime strategy of luring customers with rock-bottom fares and forcing them to pay extra for things such as bringing a carry-on bag or ordering a soda.

In a highly unusual move, Spirit plans to cut its October-through-December schedule by nearly 20%, compared with the same period last year, which analysts say should help prop up fares. But that will help rivals more than it will boost Spirit. Analysts from Deutsche Bank and Raymond James say that Frontier, JetBlue and Southwest would benefit the most because of their overlap with Spirit on many routes.

Spirit has also been plagued by required repairs to Pratt & Whitney engines, which is forcing the airline to ground dozens of its Airbus jets. Spirit has cited the recall as it furloughed pilots.

The aircraft fleet is relatively young, which has made Spirit an attractive takeover target.

Frontier Airlines tried to merge with Spirit in 2022 but was outbid by JetBlue. However, the Justice Department sued to block the $3.8 billion deal, saying it would drive up prices for Spirit customers who depend on low fares, and a federal judge agreed in January. JetBlue and Spirit dropped their merger two months later.

U.S. airline bankruptcies were common in the 1990s and 2000s, as airlines struggled with fierce competition, high labor costs and sudden spikes in the price of jet fuel. PanAm, TWA, Northwest, Continental, United and Delta were swept up. Some liquidated, while others used favorable laws to renegotiate debts such as aircraft leases and keep flying.

The last bankruptcy by a major U.S. carrier ended when American Airlines emerged from Chapter 11 protection and simultaneously merged with US Airways in December 2013.
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