USA

MODESTO, Calif., Aug 24 (Reuters) - Former U.S. Army interpreter Hamidullah Ehsan saw what was coming.

Two weeks before the Taliban forces marched into Kabul this month, he managed to get his mother and two siblings out of Afghanistan. They are now registered with the United Nations refugee agency in neighboring Tajikistan.

It is a huge relief for Ehsan, who translated for multiple army units in Kandahar from 2008 to 2012 during the 20-year war against the Taliban and fears reprisals from the militants.

WASHINGTON, Aug 24 (Reuters) - President Joe Biden is set to be briefed on the U.S. intelligence community's investigation into how COVID-19 started, with the report likely to disappoint in delivering clear answers about the deadly pandemic's origin in China.

Biden in May ordered aides to work to resolve disputes among intelligence agencies examining rival theories about how the novel coronavirus started, including a once-dismissed theory about the possibility of a laboratory accident in China, as well as that the virus originated naturally with animals, such as bats or birds.

WASHINGTON, Aug 24 (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden sent CIA Director William Burns to meet Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar in Kabul on Monday in the highest level official encounter since the militant group took over the Afghan capital, a U.S. official and a source familiar with government activity told Reuters on Tuesday.

Both sources spoke on condition of anonymity.

The Biden administration has been evacuating U.S. citizens and other allies amid chaos at Kabul airport ahead of an Aug. 31 deadline to pull out of Afghanistan. 

WASHINGTON, Aug. 24 (Xinhua) -- "I was the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) director. We lied, we cheated, we stole," then U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said when addressing Texas A&M University in April 2019. "We had entire training courses. It reminds you of the glory of the American experiment."

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Nine activists from Bahrain had their iPhones hacked by advanced spyware made by the Israeli company NSO Group, the world’s most infamous hacker-for-hire firm, a cybersecurity watchdog reported on Tuesday.

Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto said NSO Group’s Pegasus malware successfully hacked the phones between June 2020 and February 2021. Those reportedly hacked included members of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights and two political dissidents living in exile. At least one of the activists lived in London when the hacking occurred, Citizen Lab said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military pulled off its biggest day of evacuation flights out of Afghanistan by far on Monday, but deadly violence that has blocked many desperate evacuees from entering Kabul’s airport persisted, and the Taliban signaled they might soon seek to shut down the airlifts.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The lightning-fast changes in Afghanistan are forcing the Biden administration to confront the prospect of a resurgent al-Qaida, the group that attacked America on Sept. 11, 2001, at the same time the U.S. is trying to stanch violent extremism at home and cyberattacks from Russia and China.

With the rapid withdrawal of U.S. forces and rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan, “I think al-Qaida has an opportunity, and they’re going to take advantage of that opportunity,” says Chris Costa, who was senior director for counterterrorism in the Trump administration.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Confronting moderates, House Democratic leaders tried to muscle President Joe Biden’s multitrillion-dollar budget blueprint over a key hurdle, working overnight to ease an intraparty showdown that risks upending their domestic infrastructure agenda.

Tensions flared and spilled into early Tuesday as a band of moderate lawmakers threatened to withhold their votes for the $3.5 trillion plan. They were demanding the House first approve a $1 trillion package of road, power grid, broadband and other infrastructure projects that’s already passed the Senate.

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Kathy Hochul became the first female governor of New York on Tuesday, inheriting immense challenges as she takes over an administration facing criticism for inaction during Andrew Cuomo’s distracted final months in office.

Hochul, a Democrat and former member of Congress from Western New York, took the oath of office just after midnight in a brief, private event overseen by the state’s chief judge, Janet DiFiore.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two months ago, the leaders of the world’s seven major industrialized democracies met in summer sunshine on England’s southwest coast. It was a happy occasion: the first in-person summit of the Group of Seven nations in two years due to the coronavirus pandemic and the welcomed appearance of President Joe Biden and his “America is back” message on matters ranging from comity to COVID-19 to climate change.