USA

WASHINGTON, Jan 23 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday rebuffed calls to immediately impose economic sanctions on Russia, saying that doing so would undercut the West's ability to deter potential Russian aggression against Ukraine.

Russia's massing of troops near its border with Ukraine has sparked Western concerns that it may invade. If Russia does make an incursion, the West has threatened sanctions with profound economic effects. Moscow has said it has no plans to invade.

MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS, Wyo. (AP) — A record number of visitors flocked to Yellowstone National Park last year despite fewer hotel rooms and campsites being available because of the coronavirus pandemic and construction projects.

About 4.86 million visits were tallied in 2021, breaking the prior record set in 2016. It’s a million more people than visited in 2020.

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — The death of a 13-year-old student who apparently overdosed on fentanyl at his Connecticut school has drawn renewed pleas for schools to stock the opioid antidote naloxone, as well as for training of both staffers and children on how to recognize and respond to overdoses.

The seventh grader was hospitalized Jan. 13 after falling ill at a Hartford school that did not have naloxone on hand. City officials vowed Wednesday to put the antidote in all city schools, as part of a wider drug use and overdose prevention strategy.

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Joe Biden’s run for the Democratic presidential nomination was all but declared dead as he headed to the South Carolina primary in late February 2020.

He had finished fifth in New Hampshire and fourth in Iowa. Still, Biden advised skeptics to withhold judgment until a state with a large pool of Black voters, the most reliable Democratic constituency, had a chance to weigh in.

“Too often your loyalty, your commitment, your support for this party has been taken for granted,” he said. “I give you my word as a Biden that I never, ever, ever will.”

United Nations, Jan 22 (PTI) UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has said that he hopes the Kashmir issue between India and Pakistan can be solved peacefully.

Well, the position of the UN and the resolutions that were taken are the same, remain the same. We have, as you know, a peacekeeping operation there. We are, of course, committed, Guterres said on Friday.

WASHINGTON, January 22. /TASS/: US officials have asked their Russian colleagues not to publish Washington’s written response to Moscow’s proposal on security guarantees, The Washignton Post has reported.

However, according to the paper, "a senior State Department official acknowledged that the Kremlin may decide to publish it after the United States sends it next week."

NEW YORK, January 22. /TASS/: A possible evacuation of the family members of US diplomats from Kiev would be an "overreaction" to the situation around Ukraine. According to a source close to the Ukrainian government, this opinion was expressed by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky in a conversation with US State Secretary Antony Blinken, CNN reported on Friday.

The TV channel did not report Blinken’s reaction to these remarks.

NEW YORK, Jan 22 (NNN-AGENCIES) — New York’s mayor called on the federal government to help “stop the flow of weapons” in the city after a police officer was killed and another wounded in a shooting on Friday.

   America’s largest city has been rocked by a spate of shootings in recent days with Mayor Eric Adams — a former police officer who was elected on a pledge to fight crime — vowing to tighten gun control.

UNITED NATIONS, Jan 22 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The UN has condemned an air strike on a Yemen detention centre that has killed more than 70 people.

The facility in Saada, a stronghold of the rebel Houthi movement in north-western Yemen, was hit on Friday.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said in a statement that the “escalation needs to stop”.

In a statement on Saturday, the Saudi-led coalition fighting Houthi rebels in the country denied it had carried out the air strike.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell pushed back Friday against the uproar over a comment he made about African American voters, calling the criticism directed his way “outrageous.”

McConnell had been accused of racism for saying that “African American” voters cast ballots at similar rates to “Americans.” The comment implied that Black voters are somehow not American and underscored the concerns of voting rights advocates that Republicans in state legislatures across the country are explicitly seeking to disenfranchise Black voters.