US allows UN denounce Israeli settlements

Washington, Jan 25: US President Donald Trump's legal team was preparing his defence on Saturday after the Democratic prosecutors ended their marathon 24-hour argument to oust him from office during the Senate trial.

In the arguments spread over three days ending on Friday, the Democrat prosecutors from the House of Representatives that had impeached Trump last month, mostly rehashed the testimonies from the hearings before their committees during the investigation and statements in their chamber.

Like the Democrats' arguments, the Trump defence's counter-arguments, also with 24 hours allotted for it, will be mind-numbing monologues for the most part and the real drama will be on a tussle between the two parties on calling witnesses.

The Democrats failed in their repeated attempts on the first day of the trial on January 28 to include calling testimonies from witnesses in the rules of procedure, but they will get another chance to press their case when the defence rests.

There is a tense wait speckled with speculations to see if the Democrats can get four Republicans to defect and vote to call witnesses after failing to sway a mass defection to get the two-thirds majority to convict Trump.

Trump is charged with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress in the trial presided over by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts with the Senators acting as jurors.

As the time allotted for the prosecution wound down on Friday, the leading prosecutor, Adam Schiff, demanded that the Republican-controlled Senate convict and remove Trump from office, because he was an "imminent threat" to the US and the nation could not wait for the election to throw him out.

Schiff, who heads the House Intelligence Committee that investigated Trump, gave them a personal warning: "No matter how close you are to this president, do you think for a moment that if he felt it was in his interest, he wouldn't ask you to be investigated?

Jerry Nadler, the head of the Judicial Committee that framed the charges in the impeachment, called Trump a "dictator".

Instead of a full sitting of eight hours, the defence will present its case for only two to three hours on Saturday in what Trump's lawyer Jay Sekulow called a "trailer (for) coming attractions" in the defence counterarguments.

They will get to use their remaining time next week.

The shorter session starting with fuller presentations next week is partly a concession to media savvy Trump who tweeted that daytime Saturday when his defence was slated is a "death valley" on TV as few viewers would watch a political event at that time.

With Trump certain to be acquitted because the Democrats do not have the two-thirds vote, the impeachment process and the Senate trial are only meant to be an extended media show in their campaign for the November election.

The Democrats want to spiff up the TV spectacle by calling former National Security Adviser John Bolton and Trump's acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney as witnesses.

Trump could exercise his executive privilege to stop them from testifying, in which case they could go to court to compel their appearance at the Senate trial extending its duration by months if not weeks.

The House charged him with obstruction of Congress because he refused to allow some of this staff to testify and release documents requested by the House investigators.

The Republicans, who want a quick end to the trial, can also counter the Democrats' request for witnesses by calling former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, to testify in order to embarrass them and their party.

The Bidens are at the root of the abuse of power charges against Trump.

Trump had asked newly-elected Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelentsky in a July phone call to investigate the Bidens' dealings in his country as a "favour".

Democrats say that this was inviting foreign intervention in US elections because Joe Biden is the leading Democratic party candidate for the nomination to oppose him.

Moreover, they say that he froze about $400 million in Congressionally-approved military aid for pressure Zelentsky to order the probe and this endangered US national security as Ukraine is at war with Russia.

chiff and the other prosecutors said delaying the aid was an attempt at a quid pro quo.

Zelentsky has said that he did not feel pressured by Trump.

Hunter Biden, who was removed from the Navy allegedly due to drug use and had no energy business experience landed a directorship in a Ukrainian gas company with monthly payments reportedly between $50,000 and $83,000 while his father was overseeing Washington's dealings with Kiev.

The former Vice President has publicly admitted that he got the Ukrainian leaders to fire the prosecutor investigating his son's company.

The Republicans have said that the son's appointment was unethical and the father had the prosecutor removed to protect his son's company.

In their arguments, the Democratic prosecutors said there was nothing wrong in Hunter Biden getting the job and his father had the prosecutor dismissed because he was corrupt.

The defence team is expected to assert that Trump withheld the aid because he wanted to be sure that the new government was not corrupt and the aid was released without a probe.

Anticipating the argument, Schiff said that Trump had allowed the aid to go forward only because it became known and his intent still made him guilty.

In another development impinging on the Trump case, a secret recording said to be of the president ordering the firing of Marie Yovanovitch as US ambassador to Ukraine in 2018 has surfaced.

She was one of the witnesses at the House investigations of the charges against Trump.

Saint Martin's Island, Feb 12: At least 15 women and children drowned and more than 50 others were missing after a boat overloaded with Rohingya refugees sank off southern Bangladesh as it tried to reach Malaysia Tuesday, officials said.

Some 138 people -- mainly women and children -- were packed on a trawler barely 13 metres (40 feet) long, trying to cross the Bay of Bengal, a coast guard spokesman told news agency.

"It sank because of overloading. The boat was meant to carry maximum 50 people. The boat was also loaded with some cargo," another coast guard spokesman, Hamidul Islam, added.

Nearly one million Rohingya live in squalid camps near Bangladesh's border with Myanmar, many fleeing the neighbouring country after a 2017 brutal military crackdown.

With few opportunities for jobs and education in the camps, thousands have tried to reach other countries like Malaysia and Thailand by attempting the hazardous 2,000-kilometre journey.

In the latest incident, 71 people have been rescued including 46 women. Among the dead, 11 were women and the rest children.

Anwara Begum said two of her sons, aged six and seven, drowned in the tragedy.

"We were four of us in the boat... Another child (son, aged 10) is very sick," the 40-year-old told news agency.

Fishermen tipped off the coast guard after they saw survivors swimming and crying for help in the sea.

The boat's keel hit undersea coral in shallow water off Saint Martin's Island, Bangladesh's southernmost territory, before it sank, survivors said.

"We swam in the sea before boats came and rescued us," said survivor Mohammad Hossain, 20.

Coast guard commander Sohel Rana said three survivors, including a Bangladeshi, were detained over human trafficking allegations.

An estimated 25,000 Rohingya left Bangladesh and Myanmar on boats in 2015 trying to get to Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. Hundreds drowned when overloaded boats sank.

Begum said her family paid a Bangladeshi trafficker $450 per head to be taken to Malaysia.

"We're first taken to a hill where we stayed for five days. Then they used three small trawlers to take us to a large trawler, which sank," she said.

Shakirul Islam, a migration expert whose group works with Rohingya to raise awareness against trafficking, said desperation in the camps was making refugees want to leave.

"It was a tragedy waiting to happen," he said.

"They just want to get out, and fall victim to traffickers who are very active in the camps."

Islam said in the past two months dozens of Rohingya reported approaches from traffickers to his OKUP migration rights group.

"Human smuggling and trafficking in the Bay of Bengal is particularly difficult to address as it requires concerted effort from multiple states," the Bangladesh head of UN agency the International Organization for Migration, Giorgi Gigauri, told news agency.

"The gaps in coordination are easily exploited by criminal networks."

Since last year, Bangladeshi authorities have picked up over 500 Rohingya from rickety fishing trawlers or coastal villages as they waited to board boats.

Trafficking often increases during the November-March period when the sea is safest for the small trawlers used by traffickers.

Bangladesh and Myanmar signed a repatriation deal to send back some Rohingya to their homeland, but none have agreed to return because of safety fears.

The charity Save the Children called on Myanmar to "take all necessary steps to ensure the Rohingya community can return to their homes in a safe and dignified manner".

"The tragic drowning of women and children... should be a wake-up call for us all," the group's Athena Rayburn said in a statement.

Washington, Apr 28: US President while addressing a news conference on coronavirus pandemic said his administration has launched "very serious investigations" into China's response to the novel coronavirus.

"And we are not happy with China, we are not happy with that whole situation, because we believe it could have been stopped at the source," he said. "It could have been stopped quickly and it wouldn't have spread all over the world," the BBC reported.

Trump has been critical of China as the pandemic has progressed and has frequently touted his decision to close the US borders to China in an effort to curb the outbreak. Some health experts have said the effort bought time for the US to prepare, but the Trump administration has been accused of squandering the opportunity.

"Nobody except one country can be held accountable for what happened," Trump said.

"Nobody's blaming anybody here, we're looking at a group of people that should've stopped it at the source."

The US will never forget those who were "sacrificed for a reason of incompetence or something else other than incompetence," he added.

"They" - referring to China - "could've protected the whole world - not just us - the whole world," he said.

At the starting of the conference Trump said COVID-19 cases are declining or stablising across the country.

"In all cases getting better," he said. "Really a horrible situation that we've been confronted with, but they're moving along."

He added there's a "hunger" to get back to work.

"Ensuring the health of our economy is vital to ensuring the health of our nation - these goals work in tandem."

The president has suggested an unnamed individual "a long time ago" could have stopped the "unnecessary death[s]" due to COVID-19.

"There has been so much unnecessary death in this country," he said.

"It could've been stopped and it could've been stopped short, but somebody a long time ago, it seems, decided not to do it that way and the whole world is suffering because of it."

He did not say who he was referencing and gave no other details.

Trump was asked if he has considered delaying the November presidential election.

"I never even thought of changing the date of the election," he answered. "Why would I do that? November 3rd. That's a good number."

Trump called the suggestion "made up propaganda" and said that "sleepy Joe" Biden - his presumptive Democratic rival - was likely unaware his campaign had put the statement out.

Former Vice-President Joe Biden said at a virtual fundraiser last week that he thought Trump would "try to kick back the election somehow".

The president has frequently levelled insults at his Democratic opponent by questioning the former vice-president's mental fortitude.

"I look forward to that election," Trump said.

The president responded to a question criticising Health Secretary Alex Azar's early downplaying of the disease by saying it was "unfair". He claimed Democrats did the same, including Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi.

"I was very fortunate through luck or whatever that we closed the border, we put a ban on China," he said.

"But I could tell you that Nancy Pelosi was dancing in the streets in Chinatown. She wanted to go, let's go out and party. That was late in February."

Back in February, Pelosi had encouraged people to visit San Francisco's Chinatown to help struggling businesses. She did not propose any parties, as the president suggested.

The city issued a stay-at-home order in March.

A reporter asked: If an American president loses more Americans over the course of six weeks than died during the entirety of the Vietnam war, does he deserve to be reelected?

Trump took the question in stride.

"So, yeah, we've lost a lot of people but if you look at what original projections were, 2.2 million, we're probably heading to 60,000 - 70,000," he said.

"It's far too many - one person is too many for this. I think we've made a lot of really good decisions," he added. "The big decision was closing the border, doing the ban on people coming in from China."

He also brings up the "unbelievable" job his administration did with ventilators.

"I think we've done a great job. And I will say this - one person is too many."