It’s a challenge many Muslims in America are facing this year. Ramadan falls in the summer, and the fast can last between 16 and 20 hours day. Those long hours drove Dr. Imran Posner, a psychiatrist in Philadelphia, to create a food supplement that helps curb hunger during Ramadan. Anne Budianto reports from Philadelphia.
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Algae blooms are a part of California summers, but something in the water is different this year, and it’s making the local wildlife sick. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Apple has hired two longtime Sony Pictures Television executives to expand the iPhone maker’s push into original television programming, plunging deeper into a field crowded by Hollywood studios and online streaming services.
Jamie Erlicht and Zack Van Amburg, responsible for hit shows such as “Breaking Bad,” “Better Call Saul” and “The Crown,” will join Apple in newly created positions to oversee all aspects of video programming, the technology company said Friday.
“Jamie and Zack are two of the most talented TV executives in the world and have been instrumental in making this the golden age of television,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of internet software and services.
“There is much more to come,” Cue said of Apple’s video effort.
No word on strategy
The new hires demonstrate a serious commitment by another deep-pocketed technology company to produce quality television shows. Erlicht and Van Amburg have served as senior Sony television executives since 2005.
But Apple did not elaborate on its strategy, leaving investors guessing how many shows it plans to distribute, how much it will spend and where the programming will be available.
The company is playing in an increasingly competitive field.
Amazon.com and Netflix have invested billions of dollars in award-winning comedies and dramas featuring A-list Hollywood stars. And social media company Facebook has signed deals with millennial-focused news and entertainment creators, including Vox and BuzzFeed, to make shows for its upcoming video service.
Apple began its move last week with reality program “Planet of the Apps,” an unscripted show about developers competing for venture capital funding. The series is available only to subscribers to Apple Music, a $10-a-month streaming service.
Apple has one huge advantage compared with other companies: 1 billion iPhones, iPads and other devices that run Apple’s mobile operating system and offer a broad distribution platform.
The company has widely promoted “Planet of the Apps” across iTunes, the App Store, Apple’s website and elsewhere.
Pressure on traditional outlets
As tech companies push further into the content business, pressure mounts on traditional media outlets that do not have the same amount of data on viewers or the ability for content to be a loss leader, said Rich Greenfield, an analyst with BTIG.
“These companies do not need to make money off video because they can make money other ways,” Greenfield said. “And they are going to have tons of data on their viewers.”
It is more cost-effective for Apple to pay for original content and secure licensing deals on its own than to buy a content company, said Moody’s analyst Gerald Granovsky.
“From a credit perspective, we’d much rather see Apple overpay to deliver original content than pay $50 billion to buy Netflix and basically compete for the same content,” he said. “They’ll definitely get a better bang for their buck by focusing on their Apple TV product.”
No Disney deal
Greenfield said news of Apple’s hires should put to rest rumors that Apple might acquire another content company, Walt Disney.
“It’s pretty clear now that Apple isn’t buying Disney,” he said.
Disney shares were down 0.5 percent at $105.40 on Friday afternoon. Apple shares were down 0.9 percent at $143.01.
For Sony, the departures come as the Japanese conglomerate revamps its movie and television studio under new Chief Executive Tony Vinciquerra. In a memo to staff, Vinciquerra suggested Apple could be a buyer of Sony programming.
“While we are sad to see them go, we are excited by the opportunity to work with them as partners in the future,” he said.
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Colombia on Friday reached a deal with public school teachers to end a 37-day strike that has kept millions of children out of classes, amid criticism the government has failed to keep its promise to improve public education after a peace deal with Marxist rebels.
Union members participating in the nationwide walkout held near-daily marches, often blocking busy roads in the capital Bogota to demand more funding for school maintenance, supplies, student meals and salaries.
President Juan Manuel Santos says he is focused on combating inequality and improving education now that a peace deal with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), an end of more than 52 years of war, is under way.
But educators said improvements are nowhere to be seen and their salaries, some as low as 1.8 million pesos per month (about $610), are not adequate compensation for work that requires extensive and expensive higher education.
“The government’s priority was always to reach an agreement that recognizes the work of teachers and the indispensable role of education in the development of the country and, at the same time, be responsible with public finances,” Education Minister Yaneth Ghia told reporters.
The deal, among other things, will improve salaries through progressive bonus payments and allow bigger union involvement in how money is spent on education, she said.
The powerful Colombian Federation of Education Workers (Fecode) union, which represents more than 350,000 teachers, agreed to the deal after meeting with Finance Minister Mauricio Cardenas.
“The president said the money that went to the war would go to education but now there’s no FARC, no guns and we don’t see the funds,” said high school teacher Jose Escobar, 36, earlier on Friday during a protest in Bogota’s main square.
Places at his school, Colegio German Arciniegas in Bogota’s poor Bosa neighborhood, are in such high demand that it has been impossible to implement the government’s goal of full-day classes, Escobar said. Instead, 4,800 students in grades nine through 11 attend half-day, or six hours.
Friday’s deal will push toward the aim of full-day study.
Santos has weathered a wave of strikes in recent weeks, reaching agreements to halt protests in the port city Buenaventura and a strike by public workers.
“If the government truly is working for peace, they need to start here,” said Adriana Tunjo, a fifth-grade teacher in southern Bogota, who like other protesters decried problems which included electricity outages and sporadic provision of meals.
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McDonald’s Corp ended its 41-year-old sponsorship of the Olympic Games three years early, the International Olympic Committee said Friday, reflecting the U.S. fast-food giant’s focus on its core business as well as rising Olympics sponsorship costs and declining TV ratings.
McDonald’s deal would have run through the Tokyo Olympics in 2020, and bowing out will likely to save it hundreds of million of dollars if it had continued into the next four-year Olympics cycle and beyond.
McDonald’s has been trying to hold down costs as it invests in improving food quality, restaurant service and online ordering to woo back U.S. diners. Intense competition has gnawed away at sales.
“We are reconsidering all aspects of our business and have made this decision in cooperation with the IOC to focus on different priorities,” said McDonald’s Global Chief Marketing Officer Silvia Lagnado.
Sponsor since 1976
The company, first involved with the games in 1968 and a sponsor since 1976, was the Olympics’ food retail sponsor. Despite pulling out with immediate effect, McDonald’s will continue at next year’s Pyeongchang winter Olympics as a domestic sponsor.
The company’s move may also reflect a rising view among consumer brands that exclusive Olympics sponsorship deals do not offer the marketing impact they once did. Some companies find it is much cheaper to work directly with athletes or specific countries than the IOC.
Moreover, in a trend that began after the Beijing games in 2008, shrinking television audiences for the games could be diminishing the value of sponsors’ ads. With the Rio de Janeiro games in 2016, many viewers turned to social media alternatives like Twitter and Facebook.
In the United States, Comcast’s NBCUniversal said it had attracted 8.6 percent fewer eyeballs for Rio than it did for London in 2012.
$1 billion every four years
The fast food chain has been part of the IOC’s top sponsors program that contributes more than $1 billion in each four-year cycle for the games.
While terms of Olympic sponsorship are not disclosed, a source who negotiated previous IOC sponsorship deals said that top global sponsors like McDonald’s spend about $25 million a year or about $100 million for a four-year period that includes a summer and winter games.
Reuters previously reported that the IOC had wanted to roughly double fees to $200 million per four-year period starting in 2021.
While it is unusual for an Olympic sponsor to leave early, sponsors change regularly within the IOC’s top program. The most recent addition was China’s Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., which signed a deal in January for a partnership through 2028.
The next three Olympics take place in Asia, and this could turn off U.S. sponsors trying to reach a U.S. audience. The U.S. Olympic Committee also has lost recent sponsors such as AT&T and Citigroup ahead of the 2018 winter games in South Korea.
The IOC said it was not planning a direct replacement for McDonald’s, but it is expected to announce a new global deal with Intel next week, according a source familiar with the matter.
Intel did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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The University of Manitoba has terminated its project to study climate change in the Hudson Bay area because of hazardous ice conditions caused by a change in the climate.
The canceled part of the $17 million, four-year study involved the Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker Amundsen, which was scheduled to sail through the area making scientific measurements and observations.
But the southward flow of Arctic sea ice, caused by climate change, led to unusually severe ice conditions along the northern coast of Newfoundland, where the Amundsen is involved in marine safety operations. That meant the ship could not depart for Hudson Bay, a huge ocean basin in northeastern Canada, in time to meet the research objectives.
Forty scientists from five Canadian universities planned to study the impact of climate change on Arctic marine and coastal ecosystems.
However, the reminder of the study will continue, and scientists say results so far indicate that climate change already affects environments and communities, not only in the north but also in the south of Canada.
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President Donald Trump’s Washington hotel saw almost $20 million in revenue during its first few months of operation, a period that coincided with his election and inauguration as the 45th president. His Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, which he’s visited seven times as president, pulled in millions of dollars more than it had previously.
The new details were included in a financial disclosure that Trump voluntarily submitted Friday to the Office of Government Ethics, the first snapshot of the Trump Organization’s finances since its longtime leader became president.
Liabilities listed
The disclosure forms also listed his personal liabilities of at least $315.6 million to German, U.S. and other lenders as of mid-2017, according to a federal financial disclosure form released late Friday by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics.
Trump reported income of at least $594 million for 2016 and early 2017 and assets worth at least $1.4 billion.
The 98-page disclosure document posted on the ethics office’s website showed liabilities for Trump of at least $130 million to Deutsche Bank Trust Company Americas, a unit of German-based Deutsche Bank AG.
For example, Trump disclosed a liability to Deutsche exceeding $50 million for the Old Post Office, a landmark historic property in downtown Washington that he recently redeveloped into a hotel near the White House.
Trump reported liabilities of at least $110 million to Ladder Capital, a commercial real estate lender with offices in New York, Los Angeles and Boca Raton, Florida.
The largest component of Trump’s income was $115.9 million listed as golf-resort related revenues from Trump National Doral in Miami. His assets probably exceeded $1.4 billion because the disclosure form provided ranges of values.
Disclosures’ importance
When he took office in January, Trump turned over the reins of his global real estate, property management and marketing empire to his two adult sons and a senior executive. But Trump did not divest, instead placing his enormous portfolio of financial assets in a trust controlled by the executive and Donald Trump Jr. He can take back control of the trust at any time, and he’s free to withdraw cash from it as he pleases.
Trump’s financial disclosures have added importance because he isn’t following the long tradition of presidential candidates and office-holders making public their tax returns. Those returns provide more precise financial information than the disclosure forms that have broad ranges for income, assets and debts.
The latest report shows Trump resigned from more than 500 positions, stepping down from many on the day before his inauguration. His liabilities were about the same as in the previous report.
Income listed
Some of Trump’s ventures appear to be making more money than they had a year earlier.
His book The Art of the Deal is having a comeback of its own. Royalties from the 1987 autobiography ranged between $100,000 and $1 million, according to the new report. The 2016 report listed royalties as being between $50,000 and $100,000, and the 2015 report put them at $15,000 to $50,000.
Trump’s management fees from Indonesian companies tied to two planned resorts there more than doubled. The latest disclosure puts the fees at $380,000, up from $167,000 he reported in 2016. Trump is partnering with a billionaire Indonesian, Hary Tanoesoedibjo, on the two ventures. One is planned for the tourist island of Bali, the other near Jakarta.
Mar-a-Lago, where Trump played host to several foreign dignitaries during his seven weekends there this winter, has improved its finances. Trump listed the resort’s income as about $37 million, up from about $30 million it had taken in before his 2016 financial report.
His golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, on the other hand, produced almost $20 million in revenue, about what it had during the previous reporting period. Trump recently began decamping to that property some weekends.
The documentation of revenue from each of those properties doesn’t account for expenses, meaning those figures are not pure profit.
The Trump International Hotel, housed in the Old Post Office building, has seen a burst of activity since opening its doors last fall. In addition to serving as a hub during inauguration festivities, it has hosted numerous events for foreign diplomatic and business interests.
The hotel is cited in three separate lawsuits arguing that Trump is violating the Constitution’s “emoluments” clause, a ban on foreign gifts and payments. Trump and the Justice Department have called those claims baseless.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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Scientists from several U.S. and Chinese universities say new findings about microbes and their interaction with other species show that Darwin’s theory of evolution needs an update.
Their contention is based on discoveries that all plants and animals, including humans, evolved in interaction with a huge number of microscopic species — bacteria, viruses and fungi — not only in harmful but also in beneficial ways.
In a paper published by the scientific journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution, scientists from the University of Colorado, Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, China, and several other universities say Darwin’s tree of life fails to recognize that many forms of life are linked physically and evolved together in so-called symbiomes.
The authors propose creating a working group that would use advanced computational methods to create a multidimensional evolutionary tree describing our complex interaction with microbes.
For centuries, mythologies around the world used the so-called tree of life as a metaphor for diversity stemming from a single source.
In 1859, Charles Darwin used the same concept to explain his theory of evolution, depicting it as a two-dimensional tree with individual species evolving independently of other branches.
Scientists say an updated view on symbiomes could have a profound effect not only on biology but also on many areas of science, including technology and even on society.
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Nationwide strikes left commuters and tourists stranded across Italy on Friday, as transport unions called for better job conditions for workers and protested against privatization.
Underground and overground trains, airplanes and buses were cancelled in a series of strikes over a 24-hour period starting on Thursday evening.
Transport Minister Graziano Delrio said he had tried to negotiate with union leaders, but “sadly, it will be a black Friday.”
People seeking shade from the summer sun at bus stops around Rome’s Termini train station, the city’s main transport hub, said it was unfair that the country’s powerful labour unions still resorted to striking.
“I’ve waited for buses from three different lines for two hours and not even one has passed,” said Rome resident Franco Marini. “I find this way of protesting uncivil, in the 21st century there should be other ways to resolve labor issues.”
Italy is due to spin off parts of the state railway company under a delayed privatization plan to cut its huge public debt.
It is also looking for a buyer for struggling airline Alitalia, which was put under state management in May after making losses for years.
“The doctrine of privatization has gradually, dangerously spread through this sector, creating economic instability, unemployment, fewer services, and worrying reductions in safety, and sending salaries and workers’ rights and protections into free fall,” the SGB union said in a statement.
One of the special commissioners brought in to help salvage Alitalia said the strikes were “irresponsible” and “a gift to competitors”, adding the airline would try to cancel no more than 160 of 620 flights scheduled during the walk out.
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Greek stocks rallied to two-year highs Friday after the government struck a deal with European creditors that means the country won’t face another brush with bankruptcy anytime soon.
However, for austerity-weary Greeks, the deal does little to lift the pall from years of belt-tightening.
After months of haggling that raised fears of another escalation in Greece’s nearly eight-year debt crisis, the 19-country eurozone agreed late Thursday to release a further 8.5 billion euros ($9.5 billion) from its current, third bailout after the Greek government delivered on an array of reforms. Getting the money was becoming increasingly urgent because Greece has a big debt repayment hump next month.
Extending repayments
With an eye to the longer term, the eurozone creditors also made clear they are ready to ease the burden of Greece’s debt repayments when its bailout program ends next year, possibly by extending repayments by up to 15 years. The International Monetary Fund may also get involved financially, with up to $2 billion, but only if and when it sees the specifics of the debt relief and agrees it can make Greece’s debt bearable.
“I think that’s really the best agreement we’ve had for quite a while,” said Pierre Moscovici, the top economy official for the European Union, the 28-country bloc that includes the 19 states using the euro.
Even though some details remain sketchy, investors breathed a sigh of relief if just on the mere fact that a deal wasn’t postponed, as has occurred so many times previously. The main Athens stock index hit a two-year high, later closing up 0.8 percent on the day. The yields on both the two-year and 10-year Greek bonds fell, reflecting diminished investor fears of the chances of bankruptcy.
“While the deal might have proved the usual exercise in issue avoidance, the fact is that it’s now unlikely that a fresh crisis will emerge in Greece in July,” said Simon Derrick, chief markets strategist at BNY Mellon.
Greece’s left-led coalition government sought to present the deal as favorably as possible, even though the precise nature of the debt relief has to still be ironed out.
“We had a decisive step yesterday,” Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras told the country’s president. “A decisive step for the country’s exit from the long-running crisis.”
Government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said Greece’s European creditors had accepted “nearly all the points that the Greek side was asking for.”
The spokesman highlighted the creditors’ acceptance of a long-standing Greek demand that debt repayments be linked to economic growth, meaning that repayments could be postponed if the economy entered recession.
Less optimism
Outside the government, the view was less rosy.
Dozens of protesting hospital workers held a rally outside the finance ministry building in central Athens, building a fake wall outside the entrance topped with a banner reading “They have made us drown in debt.”
Pictures pinned to the fake wall depicted Tsipras, with a tie pinned to his neck. Tsipras doesn’t wear a tie, and had once joked that the only time he would do so would be on the day Greece won debt relief.
Tsipras, elected in 2015 on promises to repeal bailout-related budget cuts, has lost popularity after implementing further austerity measures in return for the bailout money and a promise on debt relief.
As part of Thursday’s deal, the government committed to deliver primary budget surpluses — that is, a surplus excluding the cost of servicing debt — worth 3.5 percent of Greece’s annual gross domestic product until 2022, and 2 percent thereafter each year until 2060. That is a big commitment for Greece, but seems to have been agreed on in principle to show Greece’s debt can be sustained with help from creditors.
Despite years of spending cuts and tax increases since Greece was first bailed out in 2010, the public sector debt burden stands at about 320 billion euros, or 180 percent of GDP. That’s largely because the economy has contracted by around a quarter, meaning a worsening in the relative debt load even though the budget has improved.
An outright cut in Greece’s debt is not allowed under euro rules, but the length of time the country has in paying back its debts can be extended, and the interest rates can be cut. More comprehensive details should emerge in the coming months.
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In the never-ending battle against cancer, scientists are incessantly refining their tools and developing new methods. Some of the most important advances have been made in treating breast cancer, with the five-year survivability rate now at 90 percent VOA’s George Putic reports.
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From the president of Mozambique to the US Secretary of Commerce, greater US economic engagement in Africa is the dominant theme at this year’s business summit organized by the Corporate Council on Africa. VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo was there and reports.
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U.S. authorities moved on Thursday to seize a Picasso painting given to American movie star Leonardo DiCaprio and the rights to two Hollywood comedies, as they filed complaints to recover about $540 million they say was stolen from the 1Malaysia Development Berhad sovereign wealth fund.
The U.S. Justice Department filing was the latest legal action tied to alleged money laundering at the fund set up by Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak in 2009 to promote economic development. In the complaints, the department alleges more than $4.5 billion was taken from 1MDB by high-level fund officials and their associates.
“This money financed the lavish lifestyles of the alleged co-conspirators at the expense and detriment of the Malaysian people,” Kenneth Blanco, acting assistant attorney general, said in a statement. 1MDB could not be immediately reached for comment.
Najib has denied taking money from 1MDB or any other entity for personal gain, after it was reported that investigators traced nearly $700 million to bank accounts that were allegedly in his name.
The assets U.S. authorities are seeking to seize include the rights to Dumb and Dumber To, a 2014 comedy starring Jim Carrey, they allege was financed with tens of millions of dollars stolen from 1MDB, and the 2015 film Daddy’s Home, starring Will Ferrell. Last year, U.S. authorities moved to seize rights to the 2013 film The Wolf of Wall Street, which starred DiCaprio.
The three films were produced by Red Granite, a company founded by Najib’s stepson Riza Aziz. Red Granite said in a statement it was in discussions with the Justice Department “aimed at resolving these civil cases and is fully cooperating.”
U.S. authorities accuse Jho Low, a Malaysian financier, of laundering more than $400 million stolen from the fund through an account in the United States, where he and his friends used the money to pay for lavish parties, gambling and yachts.
Despite the civil allegations, U.S. authorities have not charged Low with any crime.
Low did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent to his Hong Kong-based company Jynwel Capital.
Artwork, Oscar for DiCaprio
Authorities said that in 2014 Low used $3.2 million diverted from a 1MDB bond sale to buy a Picasso painting for DiCaprio.
“Dear Leonardo DiCaprio, Happy belated Birthday! This gift is for you,” a friend of Low’s wrote in a note.
Low also used $9.2 million diverted from 1MDB bond sales to buy a collage made by the New York artist Jean-Michel Basquiat which was also given to DiCaprio. DiCaprio and Low signed a note in March 2014 absolving the star of “any liability whatsoever resulting directly or indirectly from these art-work,” according to the filings.
A spokesman for DiCaprio said in an emailed statement on Thursday the actor last July “initiated the return” of gifts he had received from financiers connected to the 1MDB case. The spokesman said DiCaprio also returned an Oscar won by actor Marlon Brando which was given to DiCaprio by Red Granite “to thank him for his work on The Wolf of Wall Street,” the statement said.
DiCaprio’s spokesman said the star accepted the gifts to raise funds in an auction for his environmental foundation.
Complaints against 1MDB
Fraud allegations against 1MDB go back to 2009, the Justice Department said, and the fund is subject to money laundering investigations in at least six countries, including Switzerland and Singapore.
The complaints allege that officials at 1MDB, their relatives and other associates allegedly laundered the funds using complex transactions and shell companies with bank accounts located in the United States and abroad.
That allowed the origin, source and ownership of the funds to be hidden and ultimately passed through U.S. financial institutions, with the money being used to buy and invest in assets in the United States and overseas, according to the complaints.
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The White House lacks a unified plan to increase the government’s borrowing cap as a likely September deadline is drawing near, said Mick Mulvaney, director of the Office of Management and Budget.
A failure by Congress to raise the debt ceiling could send dangerous shock waves through the global economy. The federal government could be at risk of defaulting on obligations such as interest payments on bonds as well as temporarily halting benefit programs.
The White House budget director suggested in an interview Thursday with reporters that neither the Trump administration nor Capitol Hill lawmakers had set their terms for an agreement.
“It’s fair to say we haven’t settled on a final way to address the debt ceiling any more than the Hill has,” Mulvaney said.
The former South Carolina congressman added that none of this was necessarily “unusual.”
Possible extension
Under the current borrowing restrictions, the government has already been taking extraordinary measures and will likely be unable to pay its bills at some point in September. But Congress still has a recess scheduled in August that could create time pressures. Private analysts say the debt ceiling deadline could be extended into October.
Mulvaney said he would like to see the debt ceiling raised in July.
But Trump administration officials still have yet to resolve internal differences on the best strategy to increase the legal cap on government debt, which already exceeds $19.8 trillion.
Mulvaney suggested he would like to have any increase in the borrowing authority be attached to other spending changes, a move that could attract Republican support but alienate Senate Democrats. President Donald Trump’s budget proposal seeks to beef up spending on the military and border security while cutting many social programs.
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin has indicated he would like a “clean” bill to raise the debt ceiling, so it would not have to be tied to any spending changes, but Capitol Hill conservatives are resisting the idea.
“Secretary Mnuchin believes it needs to be clean. I think the vast majority of the Republican conferences would not agree,” said Representative Mark Meadows R-N.C., chairman of the Freedom Caucus, a group of strongly conservative House Republicans.
Mulvaney said Mnuchin would ultimately be in charge of handling the debt ceiling push “once we do settle on our formal policy, if we do.”
A 2011 standoff between Republicans and the Obama administration over the debt ceiling led to tighter controls on spending. That standoff was not resolved until the 11th hour and prompted Standard & Poor’s to impose the first-ever downgrade to the country’s credit rating.
Talks with lawmakers
The administration is also engaged in talks with House and Senate Republican leaders about what kind of increase they could possibly pass. Mulvaney said the issue was not a source of division inside the White House or the Republican Party.
The discussions involve whether the House should increase the debt limit enough to last through the 2018 election or the president’s first term.
“It would be foolish of us to come up with a policy devoid of having talked to the Hill,” Mulvaney said.
Congress also faces pressure to pass a budget in September for next fiscal year, as well as to address administration priorities that include a tax code rewrite and the proposed repeal of former President Barack Obama’s 2010 health insurance law.
Failure to pass spending bills could cause a government shutdown and cause nonessential government agencies to close. Trump suggested on Twitter last month that he might welcome a shutdown to help shake up the government.
Mnuchin told the Senate Budget Committee this week that “at times there could be a good shutdown,” though he cautioned it’s not the administration’s “primary objective.”
With action on the budget front otherwise stalled, the House Appropriations Committee on Thursday approved the first of 12 spending bills, an $89 billion measure that contains generous increases for veterans programs and Pentagon construction projects.
But the White House and its GOP allies — much less opposition Democrats — haven’t come up with an overall plan for implementing Trump’s promises to increase the Pentagon budget and advance more than $500 billion worth of annual domestic agency spending bills.
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American tourists strolling the ample squares and narrow streets of colonial Havana may not know it, but from novelist Ernest Hemingway’s famed Floridita bar to Sloppy Joe’s eatery, they are probably patronizing businesses owned by Cuba’s military.
It is that lucrative line of business that President Donald Trump will target when he rolls out his new Cuba policy Friday in Miami, the heart of the country’s hard-line exile community, according to U.S. officials who have seen a draft presidential memorandum.
Trump will significantly restrict U.S. companies from doing business with some military-linked enterprises, the officials said.
“Any ban on using military-owned tourism facilities would make it very difficult to bring groups larger than seven people, because for logistical reasons you need to work with the government,” said Collin Laverty, president of Cuba Educational Travel.
The number of Americans traveling to Cuba, mostly in large groups because of U.S. regulations, has nearly tripled in recent years and was expected to reach around 400,000 in 2017, according to U.S. travel agencies.
Trump’s expected limits on U.S. business deals will target the Armed Forces Business Enterprises Group (GAESA), a conglomerate involved in all sectors of the economy that is led by General Luis Alberto Rodriguez, reportedly President Raul Castro’s son-in-law.
That is bad news for the pro-engagement U.S. politicians and hundreds of businesses that flocked to Cuba in the last few years in search of new opportunities.
Lone hotel deal
The only hotel deal struck to date may prove the last for now, at least in the capital. Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, which is owned by Marriott International, signed on to manage a Gaviota hotel in Havana under the Sheraton brand, which opened in 2016.
Gaviota is part of GAESA, and tourism development projects in Havana and other choice locations are almost exclusively in its hands.
U.S. Gulf Coast ports and the Port of Virginia, which have signed letters of intent to work with the new Mariel container terminal, will most likely have to look elsewhere for shipping partners because it is controlled by Almacenes Universales, another GAESA company.
The terminal feeds a surrounding Chinese-style development zone that allows investors 100 percent ownership and that was visited by dozens of U.S. business delegations beginning in 2015, though no deals were signed. It also is controlled by Almacenes Universales.
GAESA does not run Cuba’s airports, or its cruise ship terminals, meaning U.S. airlines and cruise operators might not be directly affected, but it does control the marinas.
All the state hotels, stores and eateries in colonial Old Havana are owned by Habaguanex, which was recently taken over from the city historian’s office by GAESA.
GAESA began modestly enough in the 1980s as an effort to bring modern management to the civilian sector mired in the ways of Soviet-style administration.
It has grown dramatically over the last decade since Raul Castro took over for his ailing and now deceased older brother, Fidel.
Today GAESA boasts dozens of companies that control 40 percent to 60 percent of the Caribbean island’s foreign exchange earnings, according to Cuban economists.
GAESA’s books, like those of other state-run companies, are not public.
Military’s self-interest
Some Cuba experts and diplomats believe the military is feathering its own nest and perhaps preparing to cash in if the government falls.
But others believe revenues flow to the cash-strapped state.
A former British ambassador to Cuba, Paul Hare, who lectures at Boston University’s Pardee School of Global Studies, said the military was viewed as a guardian of the Revolution.
“Their function is to ensure that private Cubans and foreign investors do not undermine the principles of ‘socialism,’ ” he said.
The holding company controls virtually all of the thousands of stores, supermarkets and malls in the country that sell imported products ranging from food and beverages to clothing and appliances, and hundreds of gas stations and eateries.
That means when you enter a shop in Cuba to purchase a bottle of water, soda or beer, you probably are patronizing a military establishment.
If you want to rent a condominium or satellite TV service, you have to go through a GAESA company.
The holding company also controls two banks and all credit card and money transfer transactions through Fincimex. RAFIN, the conglomerate’s mini-hedge fund, owns shares in the telecommunications monopoly ETECSA.
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Scientists have identified three mutations that, if they occurred at the same time in nature, could turn a strain of bird flu now circulating in China into a potential pandemic virus that could spread among people.
The flu strain, known as H7N9, now mostly infects birds but it has infected at least 779 people in outbreaks in and around China, mainly related to poultry markets.
The World Health Organization said earlier this year that all bird flu viruses need constant monitoring, warning that their constantly changing nature makes them “a persistent and significant threat to public health.”
At the moment, the H7N9 virus does not have the capability to spread sustainably from person to person. But scientists are worried it could at any time mutate into a form that does.
To assess this risk, researchers led by James Paulson of the Scripps Research Institute in California looked at mutations that could potentially take place in the genome of the H7N9 virus.
They focused on the H7 hemagglutanin, a protein on the flu virus surface that allows it to latch onto host cells.
The team’s findings, published in the journal PLoS Pathogens on Thursday, showed that in laboratory tests, mutations in three amino acids made the virus more able to bind to human cells — suggesting these changes are key to making the virus more dangerous to people.
Scientists not directly involved in this study said its findings were important, but should not cause immediate alarm.
“This study will help us to monitor the risk posed by bird flu in a more informed way, and increasing our knowledge of which changes in bird flu viruses could be potentially dangerous will be very useful in surveillance,” said Fiona Culley, an expert in respiratory immunology at Imperial College London.
She noted that while “some of the individual mutations have been seen naturally, … these combinations of mutations have not,” and added: “The chances of all three occurring together is relatively low.”
Wendy Barclay, a virologist and flu specialist also at Imperial, said the study’s findings were important in showing why H7N9 bird flu should be kept under intense surveillance.
“These studies keep H7N9 virus high on the list of viruses we should be concerned about,” she said. “The more people infected, the higher the chance that the lethal combination of mutations could occur.”
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Like many online video games, the one developed by scientists at the University of Exeter challenges players to quickly find hidden objects, but with a twist. They’re not looking for gold or swords or magical mirrors in an imaginary universe, but for birds in real photos. And everyone who plays “Where is that Nightjar” is contributing to a study of animal vision.
Nightjars are ground-nesting birds, whose mottled feathers help them disappear into the fallen leaves and twigs where they lay their eggs. They are hunted by a variety of predators and rely on their camouflage for their survival.
Some predators, such as mongooses, are color-blind and cannot see reds and greens. They are called dichromats. Others, like baboons and humans, are trichromats, and can see a wider range of colors. Researchers wanted to know how color vision affected an animal’s ability to find camouflaged prey.
“A huge number of mammals are dichromats,” ecologist Jolyon Troscianko explains. “But it does not take a huge evolutionary leap to develop this third color channel. So it is surprising that this has not happened more often in nature, suggesting there could be some advantage to being a dichromat.”
The game uses actual photos of nightjars, manipulated so the images appear as they would through the eyes of a dichromat predator, and also as we would see them. People could choose to play as a trichromat or a dichromat, and they had just 30 seconds to try to find each camouflaged bird.
After 30,000 volunteers played the game, the researchers got some surprising results, published in Behavioural Ecology.
Scientists assumed that dichromats, which are better at differentiating between light and shadow, would be better at finding camouflaged prey. But the trichromat competitors found the birds and their eggs faster, at first. Troscianko says as the game progressed, the dichromats improved faster, and were performing equally well by the end of the game.
“That shows that there is a huge element of learning, which has previously been largely ignored in the importance of camouflage. But if a predator in the wild is learning to try to find one type of prey, one type of camouflage faster than another, that could actually change the whole dynamics of an ecosystem where there is now a disadvantage to having a camouflage type that is easily learned by predators over time.”
The Exeter Sensory Ecology Group has also developed games to study camouflage in other animals, like crabs and moths.
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Foreign fishing in Indonesian waters has long been a concern for the government, for which it has recently taken a literally explosive approach: blowing up illicit fishing boats. But the country’s wildly popular Minister of Marine Affairs lobbied the United Nations last week to declare illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUUF) an organized crime, signaling growing frustration and a new approach from Jakarta.
That said, even if the U.N. takes this step, Indonesia faces an uphill battle in protecting its fisheries. As the world’s largest archipelagic nation, it has somewhere between 15,000 and 17,000 islands and many kilometers of unsecured coastline. President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo created a task force to address illegal fishing in October 2015, which reports directly to him and gives the Navy, the National Police and the Maritime Security Agency wide jurisdiction to deter illegal fishing by any means necessary.
But the fleet and law enforcement personnel are still small given the scale of the problem, which costs Indonesia, by one estimate, $3 billion a year.
Surprisingly empowered task force
Task forces, or “Satgas” (satuan tugas in Bahasa Indonesia) are almost a punchline in Indonesian governance because they are created for a wide variety of issues and often with unclear mandates. But the fishing task force feels different, according to Mas Achmad Santosa, head of the IUUF Fisheries Task Force.
“This is the first time for Indonesians that the president has set up a task force and it actually works well,” Santosa told VOA. “Every element needed for enforcement is there: investigators [from the Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fishery, Marine Police, Coast Guard, and Navy], prosecutors under the attorney general’s office, and several experts from fields like money laundering and environmental law.”
There are about 60 dedicated members of this task force, but they work closely with the above institutions so their effective numbers are larger, Santosa said.
The task force only directly prosecutes cases with “elements of serious crime,” said Santosa, and they have prosecuted 42 such cases over the last year.
“But our fleet is far from sufficient, we must admit,” Santosa said. “Compared to our oceans, which are huge, the technology is limited.” They only have four patrol boats, for instance.
Since Jokowi took office in 2014, Indonesia has blown up over 300 illegal fishing boats, taking out 81 near Ambon over a single weekend last April. The eye-catching strategy has become something of a local tourist attraction. Its symbolic impact, though, could be larger.
“Blowing up boats is just one of our treatments. But we hope it creates a general deterrent effect,” Santosa said.
Charismatic leader
Indonesia’s Fisheries Minister Susi Pudjiastuti, known as “Bu Susi,” is a high school dropout turned entrepreneur with a knack for viral photo opportunities (smoking on a paddleboard, sleeping in an airport) and a no-nonsense style that has raised the profile of her relatively obscure ministry.
“It’s very important to have a strong leader, and she is a person of integrity who leads by example,” Santoso said.
Foreign fishing is concentrated in Maluku, Sumatra, and the Indian Ocean, according to the maritime ministry. Beyond that, there are also illicit Indonesian vessels that engage in what Santoso calls “unsustainable fishing that will destroy ecosystems.” So international cooperation is not a silver bullet; the task force’s inroads on domestic fishing will be equally important, and somewhat harder to attack in such a spectacular manner.
Domestic agenda
The Peoples Coalition for Fishery Justice (KIARA) has urged the maritime ministry to revise regulations that they say hinder the development of the local fishing industry.
“Today the biggest challenge faced by coastal communities, especially fishermen, is the investment from and development through foreign capital,” KIARA secretary-general Susan Herawati Romica told VOA. For instance, she said, on the island of Gili Sunut, Lombok, there are 109 households who have been displaced by construction on a Singaporean beach resort to more dangerous cliffside areas.
“Today, 90 percent of Indonesian fishermen are traditional fishermen with vessels that average below 10 gross tons,” she said. “They rely heavily on marine and coastal areas, but they still face major challenges in accessing the coast.”
According to KIARA data, there have been at least 34 recent cases of mine reclamation or development that have displaced local communities. “To that end, we say, if the country wants to push fisheries to provide the maximum benefit to coastal communities, then access to the sea [for local communities] should be guaranteed by the state.”
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Teen vaping, which has been skyrocketing, fell dramatically last year in the United States.
A government survey released Thursday suggests the number of high school and middle school students using electronic cigarettes fell to 2.2 million last year, from 3 million the year before.
Health officials have worried about the booming popularity of vaping products among kids and the potential impact on adult smoking rates in the future.
“It certainly is a public health win,” said Brian King, an expert on smoking and health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
It’s the first decline CDC has reported in teen vaping since the agency began tracking it in 2011. The findings echo a recent University of Michigan survey, which also detected a decline in 2016.
It’s unclear why teen vaping fell last year, and it’s too soon to know if the numbers will continue to drop.
One possibility may be a growing push to ban sale of e-cigarettes to minors, including a federal regulation that took effect in August. Another may be the influence of ad campaigns by the government and other organizations to discourage kids from smoking, the CDC said.
E-cigarettes may also be losing their novelty among teens, said Matthew Farrelly, a tobacco control researcher at RTI International.
Studies suggest many kids who vape use the products less often than kids who smoke cigarettes — a sign that vaping seems to be more social and experimental, some experts said.
“These products were new and novel and now we’re starting to see that change,” said Robin Koval, president of Truth Initiative, a public health education organization that runs anti-tobacco ads.
E-cigarettes are battery-powered devices that provide users with aerosol puffs that can contain nicotine. Research has found kids like to vape flavorings like strawberry and bubble gum, though often in nicotine-free versions.
They’re generally considered a less dangerous alternative to regular cigarettes. But health officials have warned nicotine in e-cigarettes is harmful to developing brains.
The CDC study is based on a questionnaire filled out annually by about 20,000 students in grades 6 through 12. It focused on “current users” — kids who said they had used a tobacco product within the 30 days before they answered the survey.
It found an overall decline in use of vaping devices, traditional cigarettes and other tobacco products. Based on the survey responses, the CDC estimates that the number of middle and high school students using tobacco products fell to 3.9 million last year, from 4.7 million the year before.
Adolescent cigarette smoking has been falling for many years, but the decline in e-cigarette and hookah use was more remarkable.
In 2011, 1.5 percent of high school students said they’d recently vaped. That jumped to 16 percent in 2015, and it’s become more common than cigarette smoking. But it dropped to about 11 percent last year, the CDC said.
For middle school students, about 5 percent said they’d recently vaped in 2015. That fell to about 4 percent last year, the study found.
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Among the people socializing in a tavern in Alexandra township in Johannesburg is Karabo Sathekge, who asked that VOA not give her real name. She is a slight, attractive 19-year-old in a veil of an orange dress, defying the winter chill.
Sathekge often meets one of her partners here. He is more than twice her age.
Sathekge explains that sex with older men is sometimes “rough,” and always without a condom.
South Africa has almost 7 million people living with HIV and manages the globe’s largest antiretroviral program, keeping about 4 million people alive with the drugs. At the South African National AIDS Conference in Johannesburg this week, specialists voiced their concern about the spiking rates of infections among young women, a trend reflected throughout the continent.
“What does it tell you about the lack of knowledge about HIV, 20, 30 years into the HIV epidemic?” said Mark Heywood, the director of the Section 27 social justice movement. “We have seen, shockingly, a decline in knowledge of HIV amongst young people. It is like we have taken our foot off the accelerator, in certain respects.”
Heywood says more than 200 young women, ages 15 to 24, are infected with HIV each day in South Africa.
In 2015, that demographic accounted for the largest segment of new HIV infections in South Africa and a disproportionate number of new cases in the region. Adolescent and young women made up a quarter of the new cases in sub-Saharan Africa, according to UNAIDS most recent global report.
UNAIDS says adolescent and young women in Africa are at “particularly high risk” for a variety of reasons, such as poverty, lack of education and violence.
Like Sathekge, many poor young women in South Africa have “transactional” sexual relationships with older men who have jobs and money. The men buy them food, clothes and gifts.
Health care workers in South Africa say transactional sex is a key driver of the new infections among young women in the country.
Heywood is at the forefront of protests to demand the government make a new weapon against HIV infection available to young women. That weapon is a combination of antiretroviral drugs called “pre-exposure prophylaxis,” or Prep. Taken correctly, the pill can prevent people from getting HIV.
Heywood says the state could afford to give the drugs to young women for free.
“If you have literally tens of billions of rand being stolen every year out of different government departments, that is money that could be generating programs that reduce the vulnerability of young women,” he said. “But there has to be a [political] will.”
South Africa’s health minister, Aaron Motsoaledi, says he plans to provide Prep to young women in about two to three years, after educating them about the pill. It must be taken at about the same time every day, and ideally is used with condoms.
However, Heywood says Motsoaledi’s “innovative” policies to prevent new HIV infections are likely to stall, as Motsoaledi has been politically isolated after publicly opposing President Jacob Zuma over Zuma’s alleged corruption.
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The electronic bleeps and squawks of “Tetris,” “Donkey Kong” and other generation-shaping games that you may never have thought of as musical are increasingly likely to be playing at a philharmonic concert hall near you.
From the “ping … ping” of Atari’s 1972 ground-breaking paddle game “Pong,” the sounds, infectious ditties and, with time, fully-formed orchestral scores that are an essential part of the sensory thrill for gamers have formed a musical universe. With its own culture, sub-cultures and fans, game music now thrives alone, free from the consoles from which it came.
When audiences pack the Philharmonie de Paris’ concert halls this weekend to soak in the sounds of a chamber orchestra and the London Symphony Orchestra performing game music and an homage to one of the industry’s stars, “Final Fantasy” Japanese composer Nobuo Uematsu, they will have no buttons to play with, no characters to control.
Music triggers nostalgia
They’re coming for the music and the nostalgia it triggers: of fun-filled hours spent on sofas with a Game Boy, Sonic the Hedgehog and the evergreen Mario.
“When you’re playing a game you are living that music every day and it just gets into your DNA,” says Eimear Noone, the conductor of Friday’s opening two-hour show of 17 titles, including “Zelda,” “Tomb Raider,” “Medal of Honor” and other favorites from the 1980s onward.
“When people hear those themes they are right back there. And people get really emotional about it. I mean REALLY emotional. It’s incredible.”
Dating the birth of game music depends on how one defines music. Game music scholars — yes, they exist — point to key milestones on the path to the surround-sound extravaganzas of games today.
Game music remix
The heartbeat-like bass thump of Taito’s “Space Invaders” in 1978, which got ever faster as the aliens descended, caused sweaty palms and was habit-forming.
Namco’s “Pac-Man,” two years later, whetted appetites with an opening musical chirp. For fun, check out the 2013 remix by Dweezil Zappa, son of Frank, and game music composer Tommy Tallarico. Their take on the tune speaks to the sub-culture of remixing game music, with thousands of redos uploaded by fans to sites like ocremix.org — dedicated, it says, “to the appreciation and promotion of video game music as an art form.”
Based on the Russian folk song “Korobeiniki,” the music of the 1984 game “Tetris” has similarly undergone umpteen remixes — including “Tetris Meets Metal,” with more than 2.2 million views on YouTube.
Fame for Kondo
By 1985, the can’t-not-tap-along-to-this theme of “Super Mario Bros.,” the classic adventure of plumber Mario and his brother Luigi, was bringing fame for composer Koji Kondo, also known for his work on “Legend of Zelda.” Both are on the bill for the “Retrogaming” concert in Paris. Kondo was the first person Nintendo hired specifically to compose music for its games, according to the 2013 book, “Music and Game.”
Noone, known herself for musical work on “World of Warcraft,” “Overwatch” and other games, says the technological limitations of early consoles — tiny memories, rudimentary chips, crude sounds — forced composers “to distill their melodies down to the absolute kernels of what melodic content can be, because they had to program it note by note.”
But simple often also means memorable. Think “da-da-da-duh” — the opening of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.
‘It speaks to people’
“That is part of the reason why this music has a place in people’s hearts and has survived,” Noone says of game tunes. “It speaks to people.”
She says game music is where movie music was 15 years ago: well on its way to being completely accepted.
“I predict that in 15 years’ time it will be a main staple of the orchestral season,” she says. “This is crazy to think of: Today, more young people are listening to orchestral music through the medium of their video game consoles than have ever listened to orchestral music.”
She still sometimes encounters snobbism from orchestras: “They saw ‘Pong’ once and that’s video game music to them, you know?”
‘The Rolling Stones’
But “halfway through the first rehearsal, their attitude has changed,” she adds. “And then when they walk out on stage and the audience treats them like they’re The Rolling Stones.”
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the first game-music concert: The Tokyo Strings Ensemble performed “Dragon Quest” at Tokyo’s Suntory Hall in August 1987. Now there are six touring shows of symphonic game music, Noone says.
“This is just the best way, the most fun way to introduce kids to the instruments of the orchestra,” she adds. “It may be the first time ever they are that close to a cellist, and that’s really exciting for me.”
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Facebook has revealed it is using artificial intelligence in its ongoing fight to prevent terrorist propaganda from being disseminated on its platform.
“We want to find terrorist content immediately, before people in our community have seen it,” read the message posted Thursday. “Already, the majority of accounts we remove for terrorism we find ourselves. But we know we can do better at using technology — and specifically artificial intelligence — to stop the spread of terrorist content on Facebook.”
The company has been under increasing pressure from governments around the world to do a better job of removing posts made by terrorists
Some of the roles AI plays involve “image matching” to see if an uploaded image matches something previously removed because of its terrorist content.
“Language understanding,” the company says, will allow it to “understand text that might be advocating for terrorism.”
AI, Facebook says, is also useful for identifying and removing “terrorist clusters.”
“We know from studies of terrorists that they tend to radicalize and operate in clusters,” according to the blog post. “This offline trend is reflected online as well. So when we identify pages, groups, posts or profiles as supporting terrorism, we also use algorithms to “fan out” to try to identify related material that may also support terrorism.”
Facebook said AI has helped identify and remove fake accounts made by “repeat offenders.” It says it has already reduced the time fake accounts are active.
However, the company does not rely completely on AI.
“AI can’t catch everything,” it said. “Figuring out what supports terrorism and what does not isn’t always straightforward, and algorithms are not yet as good as people when it comes to understanding this kind of context.
“A photo of an armed man waving an ISIS flag might be propaganda or recruiting material, but could be an image in a news story. Some of the most effective criticisms of brutal groups like ISIS utilize the group’s own propaganda against it. To understand more nuanced cases, we need human expertise.”
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New data show the U.S. job market becoming a bit stronger, while credit card costs are increasing for American consumers.
Thursday’s report from the Labor Department says the number of newly-laid off workers signing up for assistance fell 8,000 last week to a nationwide total of 237,000. Experts say any level below 300,000 indicates strong demand for workers and a healthy job market. Jobless claims have been under this benchmark now for well over two years, the longest streak since 1970.
On Wednesday, the U.S. central bank cited the improving job market as evidence that the economy no longer needs the boost it has been receiving from ultra-low interest rates. The Federal Reserve increased the key interest rate by a quarter of a percent. It is the latest in a series of gradual increases intended to bring interest rates closer to the average rates seen over the past few decades.
While economists say the increases are a vote of confidence in the economy, higher rates also raise costs for consumers who have run up credit card bills. The business group WalletHub says U.S. consumer credit card debt will likely exceed $1 trillion this year, a record high. The company says that means a quarter of a percentage point interest rate hike will cost consumers an extra $1.5 billion this year.
Wednesday’s action is the latest of several rate increases, and if all the higher costs are tallied, the bill for consumers will be $6 billion more this year than it would have been in the past.
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The U.S. Senate voted 98-2 Thursday to approve sweeping sanctions against Russia and make it harder for President Donald Trump to ease punitive measures against Moscow.
“We have no time to waste,” said Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona. “The United States of America needs to send a strong message to [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and any other aggressor that we will not tolerate attacks on our democracy.”
“We must not allow this kind of interference in our elections become a normal process,” said Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire.
Adopted overwhelmingly as an amendment to an Iran sanctions bill, the measure targets Russia’s cyber espionage entities, energy sector, financial interests, and the flow of Russian weaponry to war zones like Syria.
“It expands the list of where sanctions can apply to the energy projects and foreign financial institutions,” said Ben Cardin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “It provides for actors undermining cyber security being subject to sanctions. It provides sanctions against suppliers of Russian arms to Syria. It’s comprehensive.”
The measure also asserts a role for Congress if the White House opts to ease any sanctions against Moscow.
“The president can’t remove a sanction until he’s given Congress notice and an opportunity to review,” Cardin said. “We can have congressional hearings, we can put a spotlight on it. And then we have an expedited process where we could reject the president’s decision to give relief. And all during that process, the sanctions remain in place.”
The Trump administration reportedly is weighing the return of Russian compounds on U.S. soil seized by the Obama administration, and the president has repeatedly expressed a desire for better relations with Moscow while downplaying the impact of Russia’s cyber activities.
“It’s particularly significant that a bipartisan coalition is seeking to reestablish Congress, not the president, as the final arbiter of sanctions relief,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat.
McCain described existing punitive measures against Russia as “modest” and “reversible at the discretion of the president.”
“We must take our own side in this fight, not as Republicans, not as Democrats, but as Americans,” McCain said.
The White House has not said if Trump would sign or veto the legislation, which would have to be passed by the House of Representatives before it could go to the president‘s desk. Testifying this week on Capitol Hill, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson acknowledged the need to take action against Russia but warned against measures that would cut off dialogue with Moscow.
“We would ask for the flexibility to turn the heat up when we need to, but also to ensure that we have the ability to maintain a constructive dialogue,” Tillerson said.
The underlying bill imposed new sanctions on Iran for its ballistic missile program and support for international terrorism. Lawmakers of both parties stressed the measures in no way target Iran’s nuclear program or the landmark international nuclear accord with Tehran.
“We see destabilizing act after destabilizing act [by Iran], from missile launches to arms transfers to terrorist training to illicit financial activities to targeting Navy ships and detaining American citizens,” said the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Republican Bob Corker of Tennessee.
“It’s past time for us to take steps to protect the interests of the United States and our allies. This bill is the first time Congress has come together since the JCPOA, the Iran nuclear deal, to do just that,” Corker added.
“This bill will impose sanctions on Iran for its non-nuclear violations,“ Cardin said. “The debate we have here is on the non-nuclear activities of Iran that violate international norms and international agreements.”