UNSC renewed Syria cross-border humanitarian aid deliveries mechanism

Washington, May 1:The novel coronavirus, that has killed over 230,000 people globally so far and has shattered economies, emerged from a virology lab in the Wuhan city of China, US President Donald Trump claimed Thursday with a high degree of confidence.

"Yes, I have. Yes, I have," Trump told reporters at the East Room of the White House when asked if he has seen anything at this point that gives him a high degree of confidence that the Wuhan Institute of Virology is where the virus originated.

The president, however, refuse to provide any details, except for saying that investigations are on and it would be out soon.

Asked what gave him a high degree of confidence that the virus originated from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, he said, "I can't tell you that. I'm not allowed to tell you that."

The president, however, did not hold his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping responsible for this. "I don't want to say that, I don't want to say that, but certainly it could have been stopped. It came out of China and it could have been stopped and I wish they had stopped it and so does the whole world wish they had stopped it."

Reiterating that this is something that could have been contained at Wuhan ground zero, he said that China could have contained it. "They were either unable to, or they chose not to. And the world has suffered greatly."

One of two things happened, he reasoned. "They either didn't do it and you know they couldn't do it from a competent standpoint or they let it spread and I would say probably it got out of control."

"But there's another case that how come they stopped all of the planes and all of the traffic from going into China, but they didn't stop the planes and the traffic from coming into the United States and from coming into all over Europe," he said, citing the example of Italy, the hardest-hit European country.

"This country (the US) is very lucky and I'm very lucky that I put the ban on China, as you know, very early on. In January, we put the ban on China and that was a very early day. That wasn't a late day, that was an early day. Then, we later put the ban on in Europe," he said.

Before holding them accountable, Trump said he wants to find out what happened. "I think we'll be able to get a very good -- a very powerful definition of exactly what happened. We're working on it strongly now and I think it's going to be very powerful," he said.

"But they could have stopped it. They are a very brilliant nation, scientifically and otherwise. It got loose, let's say, and they could have capped it. They could have stopped it, but they didn't. And they stopped the planes from going to China, but they didn't stop them from going to the rest of the world. What was that all about?” he asked.

"We should have the answer to that in the not-too-distant future and that will determine a lot how I feel about China," Trump said.

When asked if President Xi misled him, Trump said, "Something happened. I don't say misleading or not. I'll let you know that. I mean, I'll be able to give you that answer at some point in the hopefully not-too-distant future."

The entire world has suffered as a result of this, he said.

"We have had tremendous death and tremendous sorrow, sadness, and nobody's ever seen anything like it. So, have most of the countries of the world. They've suffered tremendously. It's something that is going to have to be dealt with. We'll have to see," said the president.

LGeneva, Jun 27:: The number of confirmed coronavirus cases worldwide has risen by over 177,000 in the past 24 hours to 9.4 million and the death toll has topped 480,000, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday (local time).

On Thursday, the WHO reported 167,056 new cases and 5,336 related deaths.

The fresh daily situation report estimates the number of infections confirmed in the past 24 hours at 177,012. Further, 5,116 virus-related deaths were reported over the same period, taking the toll to 484,249.

The Americas lead the count with over 4.7 million cases, followed by Europe with more than 2.6 million.

Washington, Jul 7: The US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee will grill the CEOs of US tech giants Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon during an antitrust hearing on July 27.

Apple's Tim Cook, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Alphabet's Sundar Pichai and Amazon's Jeff Bezos will testify before the antitrust panel that is working on proposals to reform and regulate the digital market.

The hearing would mark the first time all four top executives testify together in front of Congress, virtually or in-person depending on the panel's call in the COVID-19 pandemic times.

"Since last June, the Subcommittee has been investigating the dominance of a small number of digital platforms and the adequacy of existing antitrust laws and enforcement," House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) and Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman David Cicilline (D-RI) said in a statement on Monday.

"Given the central role these corporations play in the lives of the American people, it is critical that their CEOs are forthcoming. As we have said from the start, their testimony is essential for us to complete this investigation.”

The House Judiciary Committee announced its antitrust probe into the four tech giants in June last year.

Last month, the committee sent letters to technology giants Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Alphabet (Google's parent company), asking them to confirm if their chief executives will testify as part of the committee's tech competition investigation.

Committee chair David Cicilline said the documents that the investigators sought were "essential" to the probe and that requests like this were part of the "appropriate process" to obtain them.

"The only CEO who has expressed reservation about appearing, through a representative, has been Amazon," Cicilline said. "No one in this country is above the law ... nobody is above answering a congressional subpoena".

The lawmakers want the tech giants to furnish documents that have been produced in relation to other competition probes and internal communications.

The letters that the committee sent also posed questions related to possible harms to competition in the market.

In addition to the antitrust probe, Apple's App Store policies are also facing scrutiny from the US Department of Justice.