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Judge dismisses Khashoggi lawsuit against Saudi prince; Biden granted him immunity

2022-12-07T00:46:56Z

Saudi Arabia Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud arrives to attend the APEC Leader’s Informal Dialogue with Guests during the APEC 2022 in Bangkok, Thailand, 18 November 2022. Rungroj Yongrit/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

A federal judge in Washington on Tuesday dismissed a lawsuit filed by the fiancee of slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi against Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, citing President Biden’s grant of immunity.

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Twilight for Busquets, last of Spain’s champs at World Cup

AL RAYYAN, Qatar (AP) — Sergio Busquets stood in the center circle, hands on hips, a blank look on his face.

He reached soccer’s top step with Spain and now had been stung by La Roja’s third straight elimination from a major tournament on penalty kicks, this time 3-0 to Morocco after a 0-0 draw Tuesday in the round of 16 of the World Cup.

Spain has become a team of the past, its passing game passé.

“What we did was dominate the game but we lacked the goal, that is the reality,” Spain coach Luis Enrique said through a translator, accepting defeat without anger or expressions of sorrow. “There is no point in punishing oneself.”

Now 34, Busquets contributed to Spain’s demise.

Morocco had taken a 1-0 lead in the shootout when Pablo Sarabia put his attempt off a post, and Carlos Soler’s effort was blocked by diving goalkeeper Yassine Bounou, keeping the Moroccans ahead 2-0. Spain goalkeeper Unai Simón saved Badr Benoun’s effort, and Bounou leaped to his right and batted away Busquets’ penalty. Achraf Hakimi followed with the winner.

“It’s always a tossup. This time we got tails,” Busquets said. “We missed the first three penalties, and then it’s very difficult to go through.”

Four years ago, Busquets didn’t shoot in the penalty-kick loss to Russia, also in round of 16. Last year, he hooked a shot and hit a post with the opening kick as Spain beat Switzerland in the European Championship quarterfinals.

One by one, Spain’s greatest generation has aged out of the national team, the defensive duo of Carles Puyol and Gerard Piqué, the steady superiority of goalkeeper “San Iker” Casillas and the dazzling duo of the midfield, Andrés Iniesta and Xavi Hernández. Of the 2012 European champions, only Busquets in defensive midfield and left back Jordi Alba remain.

Spain and its Barcelona core group made “tiki-taka” a style emulated around the globe and that style has lived on. Spain loves the ball, but the opponents have figured out how to neutralize.

If games were decided by passes or possession, Spain would be en route to another title. The Spaniards completed 988 of 1,063 passes to 238 of 331 for the Moroccans. They had 63% possession to 21% for Morocco with 16% contested.

Spain didn’t look like itself even before the opening kickoff. Known for red jerseys, the Spaniards were the visiting team and had to wear alternate light blue jerseys because the Moroccans were in red.

Busquets wore the captain’s armband, the leader and senior statesman. He came up through Barcelona’s La Masia and made his league debut in September 2008, about 2 1/2 months after Spain beat Germany for its first European title since 1964. His national team debut was that April and he helped Spain win its first World Cup in 2010 and then another European Championship in 2012. Busquets was picked for the World Cup All-Star team and the Euro 2012 team of the tournament.

He made his 143rd international appearance against Morocco, third behind Sergio Ramos’ 180 and Iker Casillas’ 167, and with his 17th World Cup appearances he tied those two for the most among Spaniards.

Luis Enrique and a pair of Moroccans tried to console Busquets. He remained in the center circle for a full four minutes before heading to an onfield television interview. Busquets wouldn’t address his national team future.

“Now the important thing is the team and not me,” he said. “It’s a difficult night. We’ll pick ourselves up and use it as a learning experience. We’re in a good dynamic, with young people. This is going to make them stronger.”

___

AP World Cup coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/world-cup and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

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EPA head visits WVa city that had 10-year water advisory

The head of the federal Environmental Protection Agency is scheduled Tuesday to visit a West Virginia county where some residents recently got access to clean water after years of having to boil it before drinking because of persistent infrastructure issues.

EPA Administrator Michael Regan will speak with community members in McDowell County about drinking water and wastewater inequity in this latest phase of his “Journey to Justice” tour, which launched last year. Regan began his tour in the U.S. south, traveling to Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas over the winter and then to Puerto Rico this past summer.

Regan said “Journey to Justice” is about “talking with people on their front porches or in their churches, or where people gather, to listen and to learn from the community.”

The tour focuses on historically disadvantaged communities, such as low income communities, communities of color and tribal communities and others that “have been struggling for quite some time but haven’t had a seat at the table,” he said.

He said many former and current coal communities — like those in McDowell County — fit that description.

“It’s a community, like many energy communities throughout the United States, that once powered our nation, helped cement American competitiveness, now being one of the poorest counties in the country, not only just in that state,” Regan said Monday in an interview with The Associated Press.

“As we continue to transition as the market transitions our country towards new, more competitive technologies and away from older technologies, especially those that rely on coal, we know that those communities will be hit the hardest,” he continued. “It’s important that we pay attention to these communities to ensure that no one is left behind.”

This isn’t Regan’s first trip to West Virginia, but it’s his first trip to McDowell County, where residents in the small majority-Black community of Keystone had to boil their water for a decade until finally getting hooked up to a new water system about a year ago. A coal company had built the original system, but left leaving no one in charge and the lines deteriorated.

The system is now run by McDowell Public Service District, which focuses on consolidating and upgrading systems in the county’s coal communities.

Regan said his team has visited McDowell County at least six times this year to assess how the federal government can support communities and leverage federal money included in packages like the bipartisan infrastructure act.

“We’ve been in McDowell to collect information and engage with the communities on the ground to hear firsthand from them what they believe the solutions are to the many issues that have plagued communities for decades,” he said. “We know that communities know their issues the best.”

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Democratic Senator Warnock faces challenge by Trump-backed Walker in Georgia

2022-12-07T00:20:07Z

Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and Republican football legend Herschel Walker faced off on Tuesday in a final election that will determine whether Democrats can expand their razor-thin majority in the U.S. Senate and solidify Georgia as a battleground state in the next presidential election.

Polls closed on Tuesday in a hard-fought runoff election between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and Republican former football star Herschel Walker that will determine whether Democrats can expand their razor-thin Senate majority.

With 10% of the estimated vote tallied, Warnock led Walker by 65% to 35%, according to Edison Research. Most of those results were from Atlanta’s Fulton County, a Democratic stronghold and reflected early votes, which tend to lean Democratic. Final results were not expected until later in the evening.

The race is a last test of Donald Trump’s clout with midterm voters as he seeks the Republican nomination to challenge President Joe Biden in 2024. The former president, who endorsed Walker, had a mixed record in his most competitive endorsements for Congress in this year’s elections.

Walker’s campaign was plagued by repeated gaffes and a variety of allegations, including claims by former girlfriends that he paid for their abortions, even though he has campaigned for the procedure to be outlawed. He has denied the accusations.

Retired firefighter Keith Fields, 58, showed up an hour before polls opened in Smyrna to cast his ballot for Walker because of his stance on immigration, taxes and abortion without exceptions.

“It’s not so much Herschel as the man – but I do like the man – but I’m also voting for the policies that he is going to vote for,” Fields said.

The runoff set early voting records in Georgia in a race that has become the most expensive of the 2022 U.S. midterm election season, with more than $400 million spent so far. The contest went to a runoff after neither candidate secured 50% of the vote on Nov. 8.

A victory by Warnock would give Democrats a 51-seat majority in the 100-seat Senate, which would make it slightly easier to advance Biden’s nominees for judicial and administrative posts. Most legislation would still require Republican support.

A Walker win, on the other hand, would keep the Senate at its current 50-50 split, with Democrats controlling the chamber thanks to Vice President Kamala Harris’s tie-breaking vote.

On a wider scale, a Warnock victory could solidify Georgia as a battleground in presidential elections. It also would be another midterm defeat at the polls for a protege of Trump, who spurred Walker to run.

At least 1.9 million people cast their votes before Election Day, equal to 47% of the Nov. 8 turnout, and state election official Gabe Sterling has said he expected 1 million more would vote on Tuesday.

Analysts say the early votes likely tilted Democratic, which means Walker will need strong Election Day turnout from his supporters to overcome the gap.

“We should not rest on our laurels. The job is not done. The truth is my opponent could still win this election,” Warnock told a crowd in Norcross, Georgia, on Tuesday.

Warnock is pastor of the historic Atlanta church where assassinated civil rights leader Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. preached. Both Warnock and Walker are Black.

Along with the abortion claims, former girlfriends have accused Walker of domestic abuse. He has also faced accusations that he maintains his primary residence in Texas, not Georgia.

Walker has denied the charges, but they may have discouraged some Republican voters. Warnock edged him 49.44% to 48.49% in November, even as Republican Governor Brian Kemp and other statewide Republican candidates easily won re-election.

Cobb County resident Guri Ben-Hashal, 60, who works in real estate, said he cast a vote against Walker. “I feel that Herschel Walker is unsuitable for the job, to say the least,” he said.

At a diner in Marietta, Walker deflected questions about his character, which Warnock has made a centerpiece of his campaign.

“Right now I put my character up against Raphael Warnock any day,” Walker said on Tuesday.

This is the third Senate runoff in two years in the state – and the second for Warnock, who first won the seat in a runoff in January 2021. Republicans won a narrow majority in the U.S. House of Representatives in the Nov. 8 election, but fell short of the “red wave” that some in the party had forecast, despite flagging approval ratings for Biden.

In a Reuters/Ipsos poll finished on Tuesday, Biden’s approval rating dipped to 38%, down 2 points from a week earlier. The poll has a credibility interval — a measure of precision — of 4 percentage points either way.

While Biden did not campaign for Warnock, former President Barack Obama rallied for him in Atlanta last week.

Related Galleries:

Local residents wait in line to cast their ballot during the runoff U.S. Senate election between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and his Republican challenger Herschel Walker in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., December 6, 2022. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Local residents wait in line to cast their ballot during the runoff U.S. Senate election between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and his Republican challenger Herschel Walker in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., December 6, 2022. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Local residents wait in line to cast their ballot during the runoff U.S. Senate election between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and his Republican challenger Herschel Walker in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., December 6, 2022. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Local residents wait in line to cast their ballot during the runoff U.S. Senate election between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and his Republican challenger Herschel Walker in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., December 6, 2022. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Local residents wait in line to cast their ballot during the runoff U.S. Senate election between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and his Republican challenger Herschel Walker in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., December 6, 2022. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Reverend Raphael Warnock, Democratic Senator for Georgia, speaks during his final midterm runoff election campaign rally in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., December 5, 2022. REUTERS/Cheney Orr
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Maryland governor bans use of TikTok on state devices

2022-12-07T00:02:21Z

TikTok app logo is seen in this illustration taken, August 22, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan issued an emergency directive on Tuesday prohibiting the use of Chinese-owned short-video sharing app TikTok on state government devices and networks, the latest U.S. Republican to crack down on TikTok.

South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem last week signed an executive order barring state employees and contractors from installing or using TikTok on state-owned devices and South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster on Monday asked a state agency to ban TikTok from state government phones and computers.

Hogan’s ban covers numerous Chinese and Russian-influenced products and platforms because he said they present an “unacceptable level of cybersecurity risk to the state.”

Maryland executive branch agencies must remove the products from state networks and prevent access.

TikTok said the concerns prompting state bans were largely fueled by misinformation.

“We are disappointed that the many state agencies, offices, and universities that have been using TikTok to build communities and connect with constituents will no longer have access to our platform,” the company said on Tuesday.

Hogan’s directive also applies to Huawei Technologies, ZTE Corp (000063.SZ), Tencent Holdings’ (0700.HK) WeChat, QQ and QQ Wallet, Alibaba products and Russia’s Kaspersky Lab.

Brendan Carr, a Republican member of the Federal Communications Commission, praised Hogan’s action he said would “protect Maryland from the threats posed by malign foreign actors.”

Last month, FBI Director Chris Wray said TikTok’s U.S. operations raised national security concerns, flagging the risk the Chinese government could harness the video-sharing app to influence users or control their devices.

Beijing could also use the popular app, owned by ByteDance, to “control software on millions of devices,” giving it the opportunity to “technically compromise” those devices, Wray added.

The government’s Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which reviews foreign acquisitions of U.S. assets for potential national security risks, in 2020 ordered ByteDance to divest TikTok because of fears that U.S. user data could be passed on to Beijing.

CFIUS and TikTok have for months sought to reach a national security agreement to protect the data of TikTok’s more than 100 million U.S. users but sources said it appears unlikely a deal would be reached before January.

TikTok executive Vanessa Pappas told lawmakers in September that TikTok was making progress toward a final agreement with the U.S. government.

Former President Donald Trump in 2020 attempted to block new U.S. users from downloading WeChat and TikTok, which would have effectively blocked the apps’ use in the United States, but lost a series of court battles.

President Joe Biden in June 2021 withdrew Trump’s executive orders that sought to ban the downloads and directed the Commerce Department to conduct a review of security concerns posed by the apps.

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U.S. to increase rotational military presence in Australia, invite Japan

2022-12-06T23:57:50Z

The United States will increase the rotational presence of air, land and sea forces in Australia, including bomber aircraft and fighter jets, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Tuesday, amid shared concerns about China.

Speaking after annual AUSMIN talks between the allies, Austin said the two countries also agreed to “invite Japan to integrate into our force posture initiatives in Australia.”

Austin did not detail when there would be an increase in the rotations, or how many troops, ships and aircraft they would involve, and it was unclear how the announcement differed from a similar statement more than a year ago.

“The United States and Australia share a vision of a region where countries can determine their own futures,” he told a joint news conference with his Australian counterpart that included the nations’ foreign ministers.

“Unfortunately, that vision is being challenged today. China’s dangerous and coercive actions throughout the Indo- Pacific, including around Taiwan, and toward the Pacific Island countries and in the East and South China Seas, threaten regional peace and stability,” he said.

Washington sees Canberra as a vital partner in its efforts to push back against China in the Indo-Pacific and analysts say Australia could have a crucial logistical role to play in the defense of Taiwan against any move by Beijing to reclaim the strategic, self-administered island.

Australia’s Northern Territory is already host to frequent military collaborations with the United States. Thousands of U.S. Marines rotate through the territory annually for training and joint exercises, started under former President Barack Obama.

The United States is planning to deploy up to six nuclear-capable B-52 bombers to an air base in northern Australia, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters in October.

Just before last year’s AUSMIN talks, the United States, Britain and Australia created a security deal, known as AUKUS, that will provide Australia with the technology to deploy nuclear-powered submarines.

The two sides said they had further discussions on that issue and Britain’s defence minister, Ben Wallace, will attend a first in-person meeting of AUKUS ministers on Wednesday in Washington.

The meetings come at a critical time for the partners, which are due to decide in March whether the submarine will be British or American, and set a road map for an Australian fleet.

Australia Defense Minister Richard Marles said Tuesday’s agreements would “see an increased level of activity between our two countries across all domains” and they were also looking at increased force-posture cooperation to enhance the capacity of facilities in Australia.

“It’s really important that we are doing this from the point of view of providing balance within our region and involving other countries within our region,” he said.

Marles said he and Foreign Minister Penny Wong would hold similar 2+2 talks with Japan in Tokyo later in the week “with an invitation for Japan to be participating in more exercises with Australia and the United States.”

He also said the United States and Australia had taken steps on Tuesday “to create a more seamless defense industrial base” and that they needed to work together more closely “to enhance our military capability and to develop new technologies.”

The White House coordinator for the region, Kurt Campbell, said earlier this year that “moving forward, everything we do of consequence in the Indo-Pacific, we will do with Australia.”

China is Australia’s largest trading partner and the top market for exported iron ore, but Canberra has grown increasingly concerned about Beijing’s military ambitions in the Indo-Pacific region, particulary after it struck a security pact with Australia’s neighboring Solomon Islands this year.

A meeting between Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Chinese President Xi Jinping last month at the G20 was a step towards normalizing ties but Australian diplomats said it would not bring a shift in Canberra’s defense policy.

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U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin escorts Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles into the Pentagon for their meeting in Washington, U.S., December 5, 2022. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin escorts Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles into the Pentagon for their meeting in Washington, U.S., December 5, 2022. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles meet at the Pentagon in Washington, U.S., December 5, 2022. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
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Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 287 of the invasion

US says it did not ‘enable’ Ukraine to strike inside Russia; Kremlin says no prospect of peace talks ‘at the moment’

Continue reading…

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Internet sleuths: More helpful or harmful?

(NewsNation) — As news spread of the quadruple homicide in Moscow, Idaho, amateur internet sleuths began scouring social media looking for clues: Who did the victims follow on Instagram? When did they last comment on TikTok?

With the case unsolved, online speculation continues to run wild.

On TikTok, videos with the hashtag “IdahoMurders” have almost 215 million views. A subreddit dedicated to the case has over 43,000 members who analyze every new development.

A few days after the attack, video emerged of Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves at a food truck just hours before they were killed. Armchair detectives immediately homed in on a hooded man that can be seen in the footage, publicizing his name and digging into his social media accounts.

Police were flooded with questions about the man’s alibi, but that individual has since been cleared.

So far, actual investigators have collected 113 pieces of physical evidence.

And that’s the primary challenge facing amateur internet detectives: they’re working off incomplete information.

When NewsNation reported that Goncalves had suffered “more brutal” injuries than Mogen, experts warned against jumping to conclusions.

“We have to be careful that we don’t overinterpret the information,” former FBI profiler Gregg McCrary told NewsNation’s Ashleigh Banfield on Monday.

It’s possible Goncalves had more severe injuries because she was the target of the attack, but it’s also possible she put up the most resistance and suffered greater injuries that way, McCrary pointed out.

The former FBI profiler said it’s important “not to get tunnel vision” on a single hypothesis and said that multiple competing theories are often crucial to solving investigations.

In some cases, information crowdsourced online has been useful.

Just last year, amateur social media sleuths helped solve the Gabby Petito case.

After weeks of mystery, YouTubers Jenn and Kyle Bethune found video of a white van they caught on their camera during a trip to Wyoming’s Grand Teton National Park. The van matched the description of the one Petito and Brian Laundrie traveled in.

They gave the footage to the FBI and days later, authorities found Petito’s body near where the van had been spotted in the footage.

In another case that drew international attention, everyday internet sleuths helped bring convicted murderer Luka Magnotta to justice. The 2019 Netflix docuseries, “Don’t F**K with Cats,” celebrated the power of amateur detectives in the Magnotta case.

But the line between internet sleuthing and unwarranted harassment is razor thin. Professional investigators are bound by the law and prosecutors must prove their case in court. Armchair detectives have no such obligation and are often reckless in their rush to judgment.

In 2013, citizen detectives misidentified 22-year-old Sunil Tripathi as a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing. Tripathi’s family, who had been looking for Sunil after he disappeared a month earlier, was inundated with phone calls and hateful messages. Tripathi was later found dead. Authorities determined that he had taken his own life.

Online attention can also add to the noise, burying investigators tasked with sifting through information. As of Monday, detectives have received more than 2,645 emailed tips, 2,770 phone tips and 1,084 digital media submissions related to the Idaho stabbings.

“Everyone has an opinion, and they want to come out and say it. So, what that does is it detracts from the public’s ability to trust the information that is out there,” said Aaron Snell, a spokesman for the Moscow Police Department. “We want to be the source.”

More than three weeks after the four University of Idaho students were stabbed to death, police have yet to identify a suspect or find a murder weapon.

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Arizona shipping container wall faces criticism, hurdles

(NewsNation) — Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey continues to direct contractors to fill holes along the U.S.-Mexico border by stacking shipping containers, but not without opposition.

Supporters say a finished wall is necessary to streamline border crossings and make Border Patrol more effective, but critics say it’s dangerous for people and the environment.

Those opposed to the governor’s shipping container plan say it threatens to harm the environment, presents a public safety risk, and violates federal law. The plan is running into a number of hurdles.

Ducey says he’s not backing down from his plan despite the list of concerns.

Safety concerns

From heavy machinery to bomb threats, the construction of a shipping-container barrier has raised safety concerns among police and forest officials.

Recently, a group of about 20 protesters showed their disdain for the governor’s project by holding signs reading, “Stop trashing our public land” and “Governor Ducey’s 100 million dollar junkyard.”

Additionally, a representative from the National Forest Service told Arizona-based KTAR News the project is a “safety concern” and urged visitors to stay away from the makeshift border wall.

The National Forest Service has also issued a warning advising people to avoid the area, where construction equipment and unauthorized armed security personnel are on site.

Independent of those concerns, a group in late October allegedly threatened to blow up the shipping containers along the border near Yuma, Arizona, NewsNation’s Ali Bradley reported at the time.

Federal land

It was about four months ago that Ducey ordered the closure of a 1,000-foot gap in the border wall — an order that affected, without explicit permission, on federal land, 

Federal government agencies have said the containers are unlawful and have pushed for the dismissal of Ducey’s lawsuit, which seeks to have the land designated for state use.

The federal government also has called for the containers’ removal, citing pre-existing plans and contracts to fill the holes along the border wall in the coming months.

In any case, Ducey’s office said it has no intention of halting the project as it moves forward.

Santa Cruz County Sheriff David Hathaway, however, said anyone who tries to place shipping containers along the border in his jurisdiction will be arrested on illegal dumping charges, according to a Dec. 2 report from Nogales International.

Wildlife migration

The Center for Biological Diversity said that in addition to violating federal law, harming endangered wildlife and blighting the landscape, the shipping containers will block hundreds of ephemeral streams and washes.

In October, the center filed a notice of intent to sue Ducey’s administration if the shipping containers in Cochise County are not removed, and it has since asked to join the Biden administration as a defendant in the governor’s lawsuit challenging federal authority along the border.

The notice said the containers would obstruct a critical migration path for jaguars and ocelots and prevent their recovery in the United States, violating the Endangered Species Act.

The Bureau of Reclamation has additionally raised concerns that the containers are on federal and Cocopah Indian tribal land and therefore violate federal law.

The construction of the border wall before the shipping containers had already done damage, according to some wildlife activists.

A portion of the wall — construction of which began during President Donald Trump’s administration — cuts through Organ Pipe Natural Cactus Park in Southern Arizona.

Construction of the wall risks both destroying cacti that can live to be 200 years old and cutting off animals from essential water sources, activists have said.

What’s next?

As the project moves ahead, Ducey’s office says it has no intention of halting it. Earlier this month, Cochise County Sheriff Mark Dannels told NewsNation he hopes it sends a message to the Biden administration.

“We feel like we are being forgotten down here; enough is enough,” Dannels said. “Work with us, we are willing to work with you as national sheriffs, state sheriffs, western sheriffs; let’s work together for the good of the people.”

The Biden administration is considering plans to deal with the ongoing immigration situation across all border states, as the pandemic-era immigration restrictions under the policy known as Title 42 come to an end on Dec. 21.

In Arizona, Ducey said the shipping container wall will cost $95 million and will span 10 miles, utilizing roughly 3,000 shipping containers when it is completed. Incoming Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs has called the container wall a political stunt. She has not said, however, if she’ll have them removed when she takes office.

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Ukraine appears to show ability to strike far inside Russia

2022-12-06T23:42:56Z

A third Russian airfield was set ablaze by a drone strike, a day after Ukraine demonstrated an apparent new ability to penetrate hundreds of kilometres into Russia with attacks on two air bases.

Officials in the Russian city of Kursk, around 90 km (60 miles) north of the Ukraine border, released pictures of black smoke above an airfield after the latest strike on Tuesday. The governor said an oil storage tank had gone up in flames, but there were no casualties.

On Monday, Russia said it had been hit hundreds of kilometres from Ukraine by what it said were Soviet-era drones – at Engels air base, home to Russia’s strategic bomber fleet, and in Ryazan, a few hours’ drive from Moscow.

Ukraine did not directly claim responsibility for the strikes, but nonetheless celebrated them.

Late on Tuesday, sirens sounded on the territory of the airfield in Engels, Russian state-run news agencies reported, citing Yevgeny Shpolsky, first deputy of the Engels district administration.

In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken repeated his country’s determination to provide Ukraine with equipment it needs to defend itself while saying it has neither encouraged nor enabled the Ukrainians to strike inside Russia.

Russia’s defence ministry said three service members were killed in the attack at Ryazan. Although the attacks struck military targets, it characterised them as terrorism and said the aim was to disable its long-range aircraft.

Ukraine never publicly acknowledges responsibility for attacks inside Russia. Asked about the strikes, Defence Minister Oleskiy Reznikov repeated a longstanding joke blaming carelessness with cigarettes. “Very often Russians smoke in places where it’s forbidden to smoke,” he said.

The damage to the warplanes also caused grumbling among Russian military bloggers, whose social media posts can provide a window into the mood in Russia on the course of the war.

At least 20 oil tankers queuing off Turkey face more delays to cross from Russia’s Black Sea ports to the Mediterranean as operators race to adhere to new Turkish insurance rules added ahead of a G7 price cap on Russian oil, industry sources said.

The disruptions in tanker traffic were not the result of the price cap on Russian oil agreed by a coalition of G7 countries and Australia, an official with the group said.

The price cap of $60-a-barrel was imposed on Monday at a level above the current price for Urals crude from Russia, the world’s second largest oil exporter.

G7 countries and Australia would be busy in coming weeks determining two more price cap levels on Russian refined oil products slated to be in place by Feb. 5, a U.S. Treasury official told Reuters on Tuesday.

“I think the point is that we have all the leverage and all the control now that we’ve been able to set the ceiling at $60,” the official said. “Any adjustments will be in the interest of the G7 and will be in the interest of Ukraine, it will be in the interest of the world economy and will not be in the interest of Russia.”

Meanwhile on the battlefields of eastern, northeastern and southern Ukraine, Russian forces kept up their shelling of towns and villages, the Ukrainian military said in its Tuesday evening report.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy visited troops close to front lines in eastern Ukraine on Tuesday. Addressing servicemen later in the presidential palace in the capital Kyiv, Zelenskiy said he had spent the day with troops in Donbas, theatre of the heaviest battles, and in Kharkiv region, where Ukrainians have retaken swathes of occupied territory from Russian forces who invaded more than nine months ago.

“Thousands of Ukrainians have given their lives so that the day might come when not a single occupying soldier will remain in our land and when all our people will be free,” Zelenskiy, clad in his trademark khaki green, told the gathering.

Related Galleries:

A satellite image shows bomber in flight at northeast of Engels Air Base in Saratov, Russia, December 3, 2022. Satellite image 2022 Maxar Technologies/Handout via REUTERS

Russian media footage shows the aftermath of an alleged drone attack on an airfield in the Russian region of Kursk, December 6, 2022, a day after drone strikes were reported in two other locations in Russia. Ostorozhno Novosti via REUTERS
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