North America

NEW YORK, Aug 27 (APP): Pakistani-American community members have swung into action, collecting funds and relief materials for their flood-hit compatriots in Pakistan, as rescuers in the country’s devastated areas work to evacuate thousands of marooned people.

On Friday, Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United States, Masood Khan, made an impassioned appeal to the Pakistani-American community to step forward and help the flood affectees in Pakistan.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 27 (NNN-AGENCIES) — UN member states ended two weeks of negotiations without a treaty to protect biodiversity in the high seas, an agreement that would have addressed growing environmental and economic challenges.

“Although we did make excellent progress we still do need a little bit more time to progress towards the finish line,” said conference chair Rena Lee, adding that a plenary session had nonetheless approved resumption of the
negotiations at a future unspecified date.

HAVANA, Aug 26 (Reuters) - Cuba said on Friday it sought U.S. technical assistance in cleaning up after a massive fire at an oil storage facility that killed 16 fire fighters.

Experts from Cuba and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency met virtually on Wednesday to discuss the clean-up effort at the Matanzas supertanker port east of Havana in what the Cuban foreign ministry characterized as a “professional and fruitful exchange.”

Aug 27 (Reuters) - The United States plans to name an ambassador at large for the Arctic, reflecting the region's growing strategic and commercial importance as its shrinking opens up new sea lanes and vast oil and mineral resources.

Russia has reopened hundreds of Soviet-era military sites in the region, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said on Friday, a day after visiting the Arctic, saying Russian capabilities there pose a strategic challenge to the 30-nation alliance.

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — Illinois voters have the chance to sign up to send their ballots for November and spring elections by mail — forever.

Elections officials are sending applications for permanent permission to vote by mail to each of the state’s 8 million registered voters.

No one is obligated to sign up. But for as long as they stay at the same address, those who do will receive ballots they can complete at home and put in the mail for all future elections.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Federal agents in Memphis have seized a potentially 3,000-year-old ancient Egyptian artifact that was shipped in from Europe.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection says they intercepted the Egyptian canopic jar lid of the funeral deity named Imsety on Aug. 17. The jars were used to hold the internal organs of mummies.

The agency says the item was sent from a dealer to a private buyer in the U.S., and the shipper made contradicting statements about its value.

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Two decades after her release from prison, Teresa Beatty feels she is still being punished.

When her mother died two years ago, the state of Connecticut put a lien on the Stamford home she and her siblings inherited. It said she owed $83,762 to cover the cost of her 2 1/2 year imprisonment for drug crimes.

Now, she’s afraid she’ll have to sell her home of 51 years, where she lives with two adult children, a grandchild and her disabled brother.

JACKSON HOLE, Wyoming (AP) — When Diane Swonk first attended the Federal Reserve’s annual economic conference in Jackson Hole in the late 1990s, there was a happy hour for women who attended the event. It barely filled a single table.

Now, the “Women at Jackson Hole” happy hour draws dozens of female economists and high-level decision-makers, from the United States and overseas.

“I’m just glad that now there’s a line for the ladies’ room,” said Swonk, a longtime Fed watcher who is chief economist for the accounting giant KPMG.

ATLANTA (AP) — Four years ago, Georgia Democrats had a contested primary for governor because the party old guard didn’t believe in Stacey Abrams. She blew away the elders’ alternative and, in a close general election loss, established herself as de facto party boss in a newfound battleground.

That previewed 2020, when Joe Biden put Georgia in Democrats’ presidential column for the first time in 28 years, while Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff captured two Senate seats in early 2021 to give Democrats control on Capitol Hill.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A newly released FBI document helps flesh out the contours of an investigation into classified material at former President Donald Trump’s Florida estate. But plenty of questions remain, especially because half the affidavit, which spelled out the FBI’s rationale for searching the property, was blacked out.