World War II bomb removed from airport in Japan

Washington, Feb 18: The upcoming visit of President Donald Trump to India later this month has the potential to usher in a new era of bilateral ties between the two countries, a top American business advocacy group has said.

President Trump will pay a state visit to India on February 24 and 25 at the invitation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He would be accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump.

This would be the president's first bilateral visit in the third decade of the 21st century and also the first after his acquittal by the Senate in the impeachment trial.

"I believe President Trump's upcoming visit to India has the potential to usher in a new era of our bilateral ties," Mukesh Aghi, President of the US India Strategic and Partnership Forum (USISPF) said in a statement on Monday.

On the sidelines of the visit, the USISPF, in collaboration with the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) and the ORF, has announced to organise a program entitled "US-India Forum: Partners for Growth".

The full-day discussion will focus on the key pillars defining India and the US' strategic, economic, and cultural partnership over the next decade.

"We have an opportunity before us to make real progress on multiple aspects of the relationship— whether it is upholding peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region; building upon an already strong energy partnership; developing co-production and co-development opportunities in the defense space; or strengthening bilateral trade," Aghi said.

"We look forward to an extremely successful visit and some concrete outcomes from the visit," he said.

The day-long programme on February 25 in New Delhi, will bring together over 500 senior business executives, members of the US-India think tank community and leading figures of the Indian diaspora to set the agenda for this strategic partnership.

Discussions during the day will touch upon areas, including the Indo-Pacific Strategy and Maritime Security; the US-India Defence Partnership, the US-India Energy Partnership, Elevating US-India Trade and Investment and Role of the Indian Diaspora in US-India Relations.

Washington, Jun 26: The United States reported more than 39,000 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, its highest-ever single-day count as the government relaxed restrictions and is downplaying the threat of the deadly virus.

According to the Washington Post, experts believe there is a troubling lack of consistent, unified messaging from President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence. They have downplayed the danger and denigrated effective disease defences such as mask-wearing, testing, and social distancing.

Churches, beaches, and bars are filling up with people and so are hospital beds, the report said.

The counties home to Dallas, Phoenix, and Tampa all reported record-high averages on at least 15 straight days in June.

The hardest-hit states are California, Texas, Florida and those that thought they had the virus under control, like Utah and Oregon.

"I think the politicians are in denial," said Kami Kim, director of the Division of Infectious Disease and International Medicine at the University of South Florida.

The chief of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at the University of Utah Health, Andrew T. Pavia, is of the view that the push to reopen quickly even as cases climb sends a dangerous and inaccurate message.

"On the one hand, you get messages from politicians and the business community that we have to go, go, go and open up," he said. "On the other hand, you're seeing epidemiological indicators that we still have to be very careful."

"It's cognitive dissonance," he added.

The Trump administration has tried to downplay the rising number. Pence called concerns about another surge of infections "overblown," the product of media "fearmongering."

Some governors have followed the administration's lead, blaming rising caseloads on more testing.

Testifying before a congressional committee this week, Anthony S. Fauci, the nation's top infectious-diseases expert, said the new cases were "a disturbing surge" spurred by community transmission rather than testing.

"That's something I'm really quite concerned about," Fauci said. "A couple of days ago, there were 30,000 new infections. That's very disturbing to me."

Several states like Arizona, Arkansas, the Carolinas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Texas and Utah have recently reported new highs in the number of coronavirus patients hospitalized.

"We're seeing a 40 per cent increase in the last two weeks in hospitalizations," said Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins (D), the jurisdiction's top elected official. "We're by far at our record numbers, and we're at record numbers in north Texas. Houston is at a record, the state is at a record." The Texas Medical Center in Houston, a massive medical complex, reported Thursday that 100 per cent of the beds in its intensive care unit are occupied.

Washington, Jun 16: The United States will reduce its troop strength in Germany from the nearly 52,000 at present to 25,000, President Donald Trump has said in Washington.

In an interaction with reporters at the White House on Monday, Trump attributed the move to high costs and Germany being "delinquent" in its payment to NATO.

"We have 52,000 soldiers in Germany. That's a tremendous amount of soldiers. It's a tremendous cost to the United States and Germany, as you know, is very delinquent in their payments to NATO.

"They are paying one per cent and they're supposed to be a two per cent. And then two percent is very low. It should be much more than that. So they are delinquent of billions of dollars," Trump alleged.

"So, we're putting the number down to 25,000 soldiers. We'll see what happens, but Germany has not been making payments. In addition to that, I was the one that brought it up. Everybody talks about Trump with Russia. Well, I brought this up a long time ago. Why is Germany paying Russia billions of dollars for energy and then we're supposed to protect Germany from Russia? How does that work? It doesn't work," the US president said.

US soldiers, he said, are paid well. "They live in Germany. They spend vast amounts of money in Germany. Everywhere around those bases is very prosperous for Germany. So, Germany takes. And then on top of it, they treat us very badly on trade. We have trade with the EU, Germany being the biggest member, and very, very badly on trade and we are negotiating with them on that. But right now, I'm not satisfied with the deal they want to make," Trump said.

"They've cost the United States hundreds of billions of dollars over the years on trade," he said.

The US protects them and then they take advantage of America on trade, the president said.

"So we are working on a deal with them, but it's very unfair and I would say by far, the worst abuser is Germany," he said.