Texans in the Panhandle recall towering smoke and darkened skies as wildfires crept near their towns
The fires have left at least two people dead and four injured firefighters. Cattle have been lost and homes and businesses decimated in their wake.
As Biden and Trump visit the border, many Texas residents feel ignored
When the two presidents used the Texas-Mexico boundary as a backdrop for the national immigration fight, residents felt they were left out of the conversation.
Laken Riley killing: GOP senators demand Mayorkas release files on migrant murder suspect
Several U.S. senators are demanding answers from Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas about why a Venezuelan migrant accused of killing 22-year-old Laken Riley, an Augusta University nursing student, was let into the U.S. in the first place. A letter sent by 10 Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee requests answers as to why Jose Antonio Ibarra, 26, was granted immigration parole into the United States. Immigration parole should only be granted on a “case-by-case” basis, and only if there is an urgent humanitarian reason or significant public benefit justifying a grant of parole,” the letter states. LAKEN RILEY MURDER SUSPECT’S BROTHER FIRED FROM UGA DINING HALL JOB AFTER PRESENTING FAKE GREEN CARD The senators are demanding a copy of Ibarra’s case file no later than March 8. Specifically, they want to see “what urgent humanitarian reason or significant public benefit justified the decision to grant him parole.” “We have previously expressed significant doubts as to how the Department has been able to make hundreds of thousands of case-by-case determinations for parole every year, but you have assured Congress in your sworn prior testimony that the Department makes an individual determination for each individual alien granted parole,” the letter to Mayorkas states. “Regarding the use of parole, you testified on November 8, 2023, ‘We make our decision on case-by-case basis. That must also apply to Ibarra’s grant of parole.” Fox News Digital has reached out to the Department of Homeland Security. Riley was allegedly murdered while running along dirt trails near Lake Herrick in Athens. She died from blunt force trauma to the head. Authorities have called the killing a “crime of opportunity.” WHITE HOUSE CALLS FOR SANCTUARY CITIES TO COOPERATE WITH ICE AMID FUROR OVER ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT CRIMES Ibarra is charged with malice murder, felony murder, aggravated battery, aggravated assault, false imprisonment, kidnapping, hindering a 911 call and concealing the death of another. He entered the U.S. illegally in 2022, and was granted border “parole,” which allows noncitizens to temporarily enter the country due to an emergency or humanitarian reason, authorities have said. He went to New York City, where he was arrested in August and “charged with acting in a manner to injure a child less than 17, and a motor vehicle license violation,” according to U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement. Fox News reported this week that Ibarra was fired from his dishwasher job at the University of Georgia after it was discovered he presented a fake green card to work in the dining hall. He failed to submit further documentation and was fired without being paid. Fox News Digital’s Audrey Conklin and Adam Shaw contributed to this report.
Lok Sabha polls 2024: PM Modi chairs Central Election Committee meeting in Delhi to finalise first list of candidates
Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived on Thursday evening for the BJP CEC meeting at the party headquarters and received a warm welcome from BJP chief JP Nadda.
Biden calls climate change deniers ‘Neanderthals’ during border speech in Texas
President Biden began his remarks during a Thursday visit to the southern border in Texas by addressing a devastating wildfire in the state’s panhandle and Oklahoma before calling climate change deniers “neanderthals.” Speaking in the border city of Brownsville, Biden first addressed the ongoing wildfire that has ravaged a portion of Texas and destroyed more than one million acres. “I’ve flown over a lot of these wildfires since I’ve been president,” Biden said. “Flown over more land burned to the ground. All the vegetation gone more than the entire state of Maryland in square footage.” US GRID OPERATORS WARN BIDEN’S POWER PLANT CRACKDOWN COULD TRIGGER ‘SIGNIFICANT POWER SHORTAGES’ “The idea there’s no such thing as climate change. I love that, man,” he added. “I love some of my Neanderthal friends who still think there’s no climate change.” Biden didn’t mention Republicans, but he has criticized the GOP in the past for disputing global warming. When the National Climate Assessment, which details climate change impacts, was released in November 2023, Biden blasted the party. “Anyone who willfully denies the impact of climate change is condemning the American people to a very dangerous future. Impacts are only going to get worse, more frequent, more ferocious and more costly,” he said at the time. “None of this is inevitable.” TIM SCOTT RIPS ‘TWO-TIERED STANDARD” BETWEEN TREATMENT OF TRUMP, BIDEN ON BORDER EXECUTIVE ACTION: VIDEO After his brief climate change remarks, he further criticized Congress for failing to pass bipartisan border legislation. “This bill was on its way to being passed. Then it was derailed by rank-and-file politics,” he said. “The U.S. needs to reconsider this bill and those senators who oppose it need to set politics aside and pass it on the merits.” “The majority of Republicans and Democrats in both houses support this legislation until someone came along and said ‘Don’t do that. It’ll benefit the incumbent,’” Biden added. “That’s a hell of a way to do business in America for such a serious problem. He urged former President Trump to “join me” in telling Congress to pass a border security bill. Earlier, Biden visited the Rio Grande and received briefings from Homeland Security officials. Meanwhile, Trump also visited the border some 300 miles away from his successor in Eagle Pass, Texas. “This is a Joe Biden invasion,” Trump said of the border crisis.
Senate passes short-term funding bill to avert partial government shutdown
The Senate passed a stopgap measure Thursday night to avoid a government shutdown, which would have begun on Saturday, the first funding deadline for appropriations bills as laid out in the previous two-pronged spending bill. Senators voted 77-13 to pass the continuing resolution, making the chamber aligned with the House. The bill now goes to President Biden to sign. The continuing resolution passed the House earlier in the day, by a vote of 320-99. The bill moves funding deadlines to March 8 and March 22, rather than March 1 and March 8 initially agreed upon. HOUSE PUNTS GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN DEADLINE TO NEXT WEEK AFTER JOHNSON FORCED TO SEEK DEM SUPPORT AGAIN “We are in agreement that Congress must work in a bipartisan manner to fund our government,” House Speaker Mike Johnson R-La., Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries D-N.Y., said in a joint statement on Wednesday, along with House Appropriations Committee Chair Kay Granger, R-Texas, House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chair Susan Collins, R-Maine. FORMER SPEAKER MCCARTHY SAYS PRESIDENT BIDEN’S TEMPER ISN’T JUST FOR SHOW According to the lawmakers, six funding bills each for Agriculture-FDA, Commerce-Justice and Science, Energy and Water Development, Interior, Military Construction-VA, and Transportation-HUD will be taken up for votes and enacted ahead of the first deadline on March 8. Negotiators are in agreement on the first six measures, which will be guided by both the Fiscal Responsibility Act discretionary spending limits, as well as the January topline spending agreement, per the statement. The deal laid out a $1.6 trillion topline amount for spending in the fiscal year, with $886 billion allotted for defense spending and $704 billion for non-defense purposes. An additional slate of six bills, including those for Defense, Financial Services and General Government, Homeland Security, Labor-HHS, Legislative Branch, and State and Foreign Operations, are set to be agreed upon, taken up for votes, and signed into law ahead of the later March 22 deadline. The latest continuing resolution is the fourth such extension since the Congress’s failure to pass separate appropriations bills by the Sept. 30 deadline. It now heads to President Biden’s desk for a signature to avoid a partial shutdown at midnight on Friday. Fox News Digital’s Bradford Betz contributed to this report.
New Zealand lobbied French on Solomon Islands-China pact, cables show
Taipei, Taiwan – New Zealand lobbied France’s territories in the Pacific to respond to news of a controversial security pact between China and the Solomon Islands that set off alarm in Western capitals, newly released documents reveal. Within days of a draft version of the security pact leaking online in March 2022, representatives of New Zealand, Australia and France were meeting to discuss the implications for the region, the diplomatic cables obtained by Al Jazeera show. While the precise nature of the discussions is unclear due to redactions in the documents, the cables suggest Wellington hoped officials in French Polynesia and New Caledonia would take a position on the China-Solomon Island agreement. New Zealand diplomats in New Caledonia’s capital Noumea noted in their reports to Wellington that neither French Polynesia nor New Caledonia “is likely to take a public position” on the deal. After a meeting with New Caledonia’s High Commissioner Patrice Faure on March 30, New Zealand officials reported that they had relayed an unspecified “suggestion” to their French counterpart, “noting the need for the first response to be from Pacific leaders and from the [Pacific Islands Forum]”. “We suggested it would be helpful for Faure…”, the New Zealand diplomats said, referring to suggested action whose details are redacted in the documents. “Faure undertook to do so, as well as to speak to High Commissioner Sorain, his counterpart in Papeete, with the same aim in mind,” the diplomats said, referring to High Commissioner of French Polynesia Dominique Sorain. New Zealand officials held three meetings in total with officials from the French overseas territories between March 29 and March 30, the documents show, including discussions with President of French Polynesia Édouard Fritch and Francois Behue, the head of the regional cooperation and external relations department in New Caledonia. Australia’s then Consul General in New Caledonia, Alison Carrington, joined the Kiwi diplomats in their meetings with Faure and Behue, according to the documents. [New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade] “The Pacific Islands Forum serves as the pre-eminent regional organisation for Pacific Leaders to discuss, build consensus, and act on shared challenges. Pacific Islands Forum members have the collective capacity — and a strong commitment — to support each other to meet the broader ambitions for the region’s security, as set out in the Biketawa and Boe Declarations,” a spokeswoman for New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said in a statement provided after publication. “For example, New Zealand has a long-term security partnership with Solomon Islands, most recently demonstrated in New Zealand’s participation (with Australia and Fiji) in the Solomon Islands International Assistance Force (SIAF) and the security support we provided to the Solomon Islands’ hosting of the Pacific Games late last year.” Asked about perceptions that New Caledonia and French Polynesia were reluctant to comment publicly on the China-Solomon Islands security pact, the spokeswoman said “it is not for New Zealand to comment on the perspectives of other countries.” “However, security and defence issues are competencies of the French state,” she said. Australia’s foreign ministry, and France’s high commissioners in New Caledonia and French Polynesia, did not respond to Al Jazeera’s requests for comment. News of the Solomon Islands-China security pact in 2022 prompted alarm in the United States, Australia and New Zealand, which have long regarded Pacific Island nations as their geopolitical back yard. Western officials have raised concerns that China could use the pact to establish a military foothold in the Solomon Islands – which lie about 2,000km (1,242 miles) from Australia and 3,000km (1,864 miles) from major US military installations on Guam – which both Beijing and Honiara have denied. Then-New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Arden called the deal “gravely concerning” and warned it could lead to the “militarization” of the Pacific, echoing similar warnings from the US and Australia. France was comparatively muted in its response to the pact despite the presence of more than half a million French citizens and 2,800 military personnel spread out across the Pacific. While New Caledonia and French Polynesia have elected legislatures that handle domestic issues, Paris handles the territories’ security and defence. New Caledonia, home to a French military base, lies less than 1,400km (870 miles) south of Solomon Islands and its native Kanak people share ethnic ties with Solomon Islanders. Anna Powles, a senior lecturer at the Centre for Defence and Security Studies at Massey University, said the diplomatic cables suggested that Wellington wanted to send a “clear message to Paris that any response needed to be Pacific-led”. Powles said that neither France nor its overseas territories have been very active at the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), although French President Emmanuel Macron has made the Asia Pacific a central part of his foreign policy strategy since 2018. France is not a member of the forum but it indirectly has a seat at the table through its overseas territories. French President Emmanuel Macron has sought to boost his country’s influence in the Pacific [Ludovic Marin/EPA-EFE] Macron’s attempts to work more closely with members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance – made up of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the US – in the region took a hit after a submarine deal with Canberra fell apart in 2021, leading to the formation of the AUKUS security alliance between Australia, the UK and the US, although relations have improved since then. In December, France hosted the South Pacific Defence Ministers Meeting in Nouméa, joined by Australia, Chile, Fiji, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Tonga, with Japan, the UK and US attending as observers. France’s bid to expand its influence in the Pacific also comes as pro-independence movements are under way in New Caledonia and French Polynesia, where Paris fears growing Chinese influence. Macron warned last year about a “new imperialism” in the Pacific in remarks believed to have been aimed at China, although he did not mention Beijing by name. Cleo Paskal, a non-resident senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies,
Israel’s killing rage
Another day, another outrage. That is the inevitable lot of Palestinians in the grim, dystopian wasteland that is Gaza. It is inevitable because it does not matter the scale, nature or manner of the outrages, Palestinians have been, and always will be, considered disposable human fodder by Israel’s army of unrepentant enablers and apologists. They are, of course, hard at work trying, as they are conditioned to do, to find an explanation, an excuse, a rationale to absolve Israel of responsibility for the crimes against humanity that it has committed with impunity in Gaza and beyond. In their myopic calculus, Israel is never to blame, never responsible, never the perpetrator, never guilty. To admit that Israel is to blame, responsible, the perpetrator or guilty, would mean, in effect, admitting their guilt too. The usual pallet of lies, distortions, and obfuscations is being deployed, on cue, by the usual suspects in the usual capitals and newsrooms to deny or obscure the obvious. Blindness is a necessary extension of their complicity. They refuse to see what the rest of us can see. Their evangelical allegiance to Israel trumps the truth and decency. It always has. It always will. This, by now, familiar pantomime is playing out in the shocking residue of a massacre of more than 100 desperate Palestinians who surged at aid trucks carrying the stuff of life denied to them by a fanatical regime intent on killing them quickly or slowly. This time, the terror took place on al-Rashid Street in the southwest outskirts of what remains of Gaza City, where thousands of homeless Palestinians had gathered in the open night air. Cold. Sick. Thirsty. Starving. What happened in that place and at that time was not an “incident” or a “chaotic scene”. It was, instead, more lethal evidence of the genocide that is being committed by a ruthless, occupying power against an imprisoned, powerless people with deliberate and malignant efficiency. We know what happened in that place at that time because Al Jazeera’s Ismail al-Ghoul was there. He was not in Tel Aviv or occupied East Jerusalem. He was not in a television studio in Washington, DC, New York, London or Paris, relying on an account from a preening Israeli spokesperson. He was there. This is what al-Ghoul reports he witnessed. Dozens of Palestinians heard that trucks carrying precious flour were about to arrive. While they waited in anxious anticipation early Thursday morning, Israeli soldiers began shooting. You can hear the crackle of gunfire on video that captured the murderous madness. “We went to get flour. The Israeli army shot at us. There are many martyrs on the ground and until this moment we are withdrawing them. There is no first aid,” one witness told Al Jazeera. Another witness added that: “The Israelis just opened random fire on us as if it were a trap.” Then, after strafing Palestinians, Israeli tanks moved forward and ran over the dead and injured, al-Ghoul said. What witnesses appear to be describing is the military tactic known as the “double tap”. The initial strike hits the intended target. A second strike is aimed at bystanders drawn to help the dead and injured. In any event, when the carnage was over, the breathtaking tally of dead and injured Palestinians had grown as it has every day for the past five months with unrelenting ferocity. When daylight arrived, the true measure of the appalling slaughter had become apparent. Ambulances could not reach the dozens of dead and disfigured since roads, like much of Gaza, had been destroyed. The dead were loaded onto the flatbed portion of one of the aid trucks turned mobile mortuary, their limp, lifeless bodies intertwined in a grotesque heap of humanity. The deluge of injured Palestinians who survived the attack descended on overwhelmed hospitals and the caregivers who still populate them. “Hospitals are no longer able to accommodate the huge number of patients because they lack fuel, let alone medicine. Hospitals have also run out of blood,” al-Ghoul said. A Palestinian physician preparing to help the wounded amid the bloody bedlam admitted that there was little he could do. “The majority of cases need surgery and operation rooms,” he said. “To be honest, I don’t know what we can do. The situation is … horrendous.” The situation has been “horrendous” for a long time. But the so-called “international community” dithers. Worse, it spouts meaningless platitudes “calling on” Israel to stop killing civilians. Clearly, the dithering and platitudes are not working. The crimes against humanity go on and on and on. At first, Israel said that Palestinians were responsible for killing and harming Palestinians. The Palestinians were crushed and trampled, Israel said, when they rushed towards the aid trucks. It’s not our fault. Predictably, this sick line of “reasoning” fails to address why hordes of Palestinians are having to charge aid trucks. Israel’s stated goal is to force Palestinians to capitulate by depriving them of food, water, fuel and medicine. Then, Israel tacked. We didn’t mean to start shooting unarmed civilians. We only started shooting because our heavily armed soldiers felt “threatened” by unarmed civilians. Israel knows these blatant absurdities will work. They have worked before. They will work again. Israel knows it has the license to kill as many Palestinians as it wants to, whenever it wants to, for as long as it wants to, by whatever means it wants to, and “the international community” is not going to do a tangible thing to stop it. Instead, it will nod in approval and agreement. It will accept Israel’s stock, exculpatory version of what happened. The “outrage” will last a day or two and then the “international community” will go on its merry, delusional way. Meanwhile, Palestinians will have to bury more of their dead in open pits by hand while they wait for Israel’s insatiable “killing rage” to end. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance. Adblock test
Canada’s former PM Mulroney, who led North American free trade, dies at 84
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hails Mulroney’s role in creating ‘modern, dynamic, and prosperous country’. Canada’s former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, who led his country into a sweeping free trade deal with the United States, has died. He was 84. Mulroney, who governed Canada from 1984 to 1993, died peacefully surrounded by family, his daughter, Caroline Mulroney, said on Thursday. “On behalf of my mother and our family, it is with great sadness we announce the passing of my father, The Right Honourable Brian Mulroney, Canada’s 18th Prime Minister,” she said in a post on X. Born in the French-speaking province of Quebec, Mulroney worked as a lawyer and then business executive before successfully challenging for the leadership of the centre-right Progressive Conservatives in 1983 and entering parliament later that year. Mulroney led the Conservatives to a historic win over the Liberals of Pierre Trudeau the following year and retained power in the 1988 election. During his nine-year tenure, Mulroney emulated the liberal economic policies that were ascendent in the US and the UK during the 1980s under Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. In one of his most consequential achievements, he signed the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement with Reagan in 1988. The deal, which later expanded to include Mexico as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), helped boost Canadian exports, but was criticised in subsequent years for encouraging the outsourcing of jobs to cheaper locales. “Generally speaking, it’s been a success,” Mulroney said in an interview with CBC in 2012. “It hasn’t been a panacea, but I never viewed it as that.” Canada’s last Cold War leader, Mulroney also opposed apartheid in South Africa, forged a landmark treaty on acid rain with Washington and led efforts to respond to the 1984 Ethiopian famine. Mulroney resigned in 1993 with the lowest approval rating in Canadian history amid growing separatist sentiment in Quebec. At the next election, the Progressive Conservative party suffered one of the worst wipeouts in modern political history, losing 154 of 156 seats in parliament. Brian Mulroney loved Canada. I’m devastated to learn of his passing. He never stopped working for Canadians, and he always sought to make this country an even better place to call home. I’ll never forget the insights he shared with me over the years – he was generous, tireless,… — Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) February 29, 2024 Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Thursday he was “devastated” to hear of Mulroney’s death. “He never stopped working for Canadians, and he always sought to make this country an even better place to call home. I’ll never forget the insights he shared with me over the years – he was generous, tireless, and incredibly passionate,” Trudeau said on X. “As we mourn his passing and keep his family and friends in our thoughts, let us also acknowledge – and celebrate – Mr Mulroney’s role in building the modern, dynamic, and prosperous country we all know today.” After leaving politics, Mulroney faced scrutiny over a leaked letter that revealed he had been accused by police of taking bribes from a German-Canadian arms dealer, Karlheinz Schreiber. Mulroney sued the Liberal government and won an apology and damages over the claims in 1997. Mulroney later apologised for taking payments from Schreiber while denying illegal conduct, saying that agreeing to be introduced to Schreiber was the “biggest mistake in life, by far”. Adblock test (Why?)
From GST to FASTag KYC: Six rules to change from March 1; check details
These new rules will result in significant changes which will have an impact on almost every user. Some of the important changes are related to Paytm Payments Bank, SBI Credit Card, FASTag KYC CNG and LPG prices, etc.