Biden picks transgender woman as assistant health secretary
WASHINGTON: President-elect Joe Biden has tapped Pennsylvania Health Secretary Rachel Levine to be his assistant secretary of health, leaving her poised to become the first openly transgender federal official to be confirmed by the US Senate. A pediatrician and former Pennsylvania physician general, Levine was appointed to her current post by Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf […]
SEARCH 5 times as many troops in US capital than Afghanistan, Iraq combined ahead of Biden inauguration
As housekeepers prepare the White House for President-elect Joe Biden, over 25,000 National Guard troops will be occupying the streets of Washington. That is five times more than the number deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq combined. Acting US Secretary of Defence Christopher Miller said on Monday there were “25,000 Guardsmen” who would leave “no stone […]
12 workers trapped week ago in China mine blast are alive
Chinese state media say 12 out of 22 workers trapped for a week by an explosion in a gold mine are alive, as hundreds of rescuers seek to bring them to safety. The Xinhua News Agency said on Monday, a note passed through a rescue shaft Sunday night reported the fate of the other 10 […]
Thousands of Rohingya left homeless after fire in BD camp
COX’S BAZAR: Fire tore through a Rohingya refugee camp on Thursday, destroying more than 550 shanty homes, but while 3,500 people were left homeless there were no serious casualties. The blaze started when most people in the sprawling Nayapara camp were asleep. Tens of thousands of members of the Muslim minority who fled a military […]
Twitter bans Trump, citing risk of violent incitement
Twitter banned President Donald Trump’s account Friday, citing “the risk of further incitement of violence.” “After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence,” the company said in a blog post on Friday. The White House […]
Brazil’s COVID-19 deaths top 2,00,000 amid a return to fun
The night before New Year’s Eve in Rio de Janeiro, thousands of revellers clad in their bathing suits crowded onto the iconic Ipanema beach to have some seaside drinks. It was one of many open-air parties occurring along Brazil’s vast coastline since the summer heat set in, and as the COVID-19 death toll climbed higher. […]
US Congress certifies Biden’s win after mob attack kills four
The US Congress certified on Thursday that Democrat Joe Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris have won the 2020 presidential election, but the certification followed a mob attack on the Capitol building that resulted in the deaths of four people. The invasion also forced lawmakers to abandon the premises and they returned only after Washington’s Mayor […]
Afghan journalist shot dead in car ambush
An Afghan journalist was shot dead in a car ambush in the central province of Ghor, the fifth media professional to be killed in the country in two months, officials said on Saturday. Bismellah Adel Aimaq, 28, the editor-in-chief of Sada-e-Ghor (Voice of Ghor) radio station, was killed near Firoz Koh city, the capital of […]
BD moves biggest group of Rohingya to isolated island
BHASHAN CHAR: Four Bangladesh navy ships on Tuesday took the second and biggest group of Rohingya Muslims yet from crowded refugee camps to an uncertain future on a bleak island three hours from the mainland. The government insisted that the 1,800 refugees, who have been in camps since fleeing a Myanmar military clampdown, want to […]
Chinese citizen journalist jailed for Wuhan virus reporting
SHANGHAI: A Chinese citizen journalist was jailed for four years on Monday for her reporting from Wuhan as the Covid-19 outbreak began, her lawyer said, almost a year after details of an “unknown viral pneumonia” surfaced in the central China city. Zhang Zhan, a former lawyer who arrived at court in a wheelchair, was sentenced […]
