Buy American, hire Americans: Trump's 2 simple rules

Melbourne, July 1: Authorities will lock down around 300,000 people in suburbs north of Melbourne for a month from late on Wednesday to contain the risk of infection after two weeks of double-digit rises in new coronavirus cases in Australia's second-most populous state.

Australia has fared better than many countries in the pandemic, with around 7,830 cases and 104 deaths, but the recent surge has stoked fears of a second wave of COVID-19, echoing concerns expressed in other countries.

Globally, coronavirus cases exceeded 10 million on Sunday, a major milestone in the spread of a disease that has killed more than half a million people in seven months.

From midnight, more than 30 suburbs in Australia's second-biggest city will return to stage three restrictions, the third-strictest level in curbs to control the pandemic. That means residents will be confined to home except for grocery shopping, health appointments, work or caregiving, and exercise.

The restrictions will be accompanied by a testing blitz that authorities hope will extend to half the population of the area affected, and for which borders will be patrolled, authorities said. The measures come as curbs ease across the rest of the state of Victoria, with restaurants, gyms and cinemas reopening in recent weeks.

Victoria recorded 73 fresh cases on Tuesday from 20,682 tests, following an increase of 75 cases on Monday. State premier Daniel Andrews warned on Wednesday that the return of broader restrictions across city remained a possibility.

"If we all stick together these next four weeks, we can regain control of that community transmission ... across metropolitan Melbourne," Andrews said at a briefing. "Ultimately if I didn't shut down those postcodes I'd be shutting down all postcodes. We want to avoid that."

Victoria's spike in cases has been linked to staff members at hotels housing returned travellers for which quarantine protocols were not strictly followed. Victorian state authorities have announced an investigation into the matter.

Some other Australian states and territories are preparing to open borders, but applying limits and quarantine measures to citizens of Victoria as the school holiday season gets under way.

South Australia, the country's fifth most populous state, has had just three new cases in the past month. But citing the spike in coronavirus infections, on Tuesday it cancelled its scheduled reopening to other parts of the nation.

New South Wales (NSW), Australia's most populous state, has stopped short of closing its borders to all Victorians, but those holidaying from hotspot areas - not permitted under NSW rules - can be handed a fine of A$11,000 ($7,596) or jailed if they are detected, state authorities said.

The delays reopening internal borders cast doubts over a federal plan to set up "travel bubble" with neighbouring New Zealand that would allow movement between the two countries.

Washington, Jun 2: There is no place for hate and racism in the society, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has said, asserting that empathy and shared understanding are a start, but more needs to be done. Nadella’s remarks come in the wake of the custodial death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old African-American man who was pinned to the ground in Minneapolis on May 25 by a white police officer who kneeled on his neck as he gasped for breath.

“There is no place for hate and racism in our society. Empathy and shared understanding are a start, but we must do more,” Nadella said in a tweet on Monday.

“I stand with the Black and African American community and we are committed to building on this work in our company and in our communities,” Nadella said.

A day earlier, Google CEO Sunder Pichai expressed solidarity with the African-American community.

“Today on US Google & YouTube homepages we share our support for racial equality in solidarity with the Black community and in memory of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery & others who don’t have a voice,” Pichai wrote on Twitter on Sunday.

“For those feeling grief, anger, sadness & fear, you are not alone,” Pichai said, sharing a screenshot of the Google search home page which said, “We stand in support of racial equality, and all those who search for it.”

Nadella’s Microsoft also said they will be using the platform to amplify voices from the Black and African American community at the company.

Nadella had also spoken out a few months ago about the discriminatory Citizenship Amendment Act passed in his native country. Talking to BuzzFeed’s editor-in-chief, Ben Smith, in Manhattan, Nadella said what’s happening in the country is “sad.”

“I think what is happening is sad. I feel, and in fact quite frankly, now being informed (and) shaped by the two amazing American things that I’ve observed which is both, it’s technology reaching me where I was growing up and its immigration policy and even a story like mine being possible in a country like this.

“I think, it’s just bad, if anything, I would love to see a Bangladeshi immigrant who comes to India and creates the next unicorn in India or becomes the CEO of Infosys. That should be the aspiration. If I had to sort of mirror what happened to me in the US, I hope that’s what happens in India,” Microsoft’s India-born CEO was quoted as saying by BuzzFeed.

Jan 7: Body of the senior Iranian military commander, Qasem Soleimani killed in a U.S. drone strike in Iraq last week, has arrived in his home town of Kerman in southeast Iran for burial, the official IRNA news agency said on Tuesday.

State TV broadcast live images of thousands of people in the streets of the town, many of them dressed in black, to mourn Soleimani's death.

Soleimani was widely seen as Iran’s second most powerful figure behind Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 80, who wept in grief along with hundreds of thousands of mourners who thronged the streets of Tehran for Soleimani’s funeral on Monday.

Khamenei led prayers at the funeral in the Iranian capital, pausing as his voice cracked with emotion. Soleimani, 62, was a national hero even to many who do not consider themselves supporters of Iran’s clerical rulers.

He was killed while leaving Baghdad airport last Friday. Mourners packed the streets, chanting: “Death to America!” - a show of national unity after anti-government protests in November in which many demonstrators were killed.

The crowd, which state media said numbered in the millions, recalled the masses gathered in 1989 for the funeral of the Islamic Republic’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

The killing of Soleimani has prompted fears around the world of a broader regional conflict, as well as calls in the U.S. Congress for legislation to keep President Donald Trump from going to war against Iran.