USA

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 02 (APP): A senior United Nations official has warned that UN food stocks in Afghanistan could run out this month, underscoring a critical need for US $ 200 million to provide food to the most vulnerable.

Speaking to New York-based correspondents from Kabul via video-link, Deputy Special Representative and Humanitarian Coordinator in Afghanistan Ramiz Alakbarov said every effort was being made to bring in more supplies and that Pakistan was helping to meet the grave situation.

WASHINGTON, Sept 2 (Reuters) - A British-born man who was a member of a team of Islamic State militants in Syria nicknamed "The Beatles" accused of beheading American hostages was due to plead guilty on Thursday to U.S. criminal charges, according to a federal court record.

A docket entry for the U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Virginia, showed a change of plea hearing was scheduled on Thursday for Alexanda Kotey, one of two Islamic State members who had been held in Iraq by the U.S. military before being flown to the United States to face trial on terrorism charges.

NEW YORK, Sept. 1 (Xinhua) -- As the United States is surpassing an average of 160,000 new COVID-19 cases a day, the spread of the more transmissible Delta variant and the return of many students to the classroom for a new academic year seriously concern officials and health experts.

The pandemic is not only stretching hospitals thin with the surge of patients, particularly unvaccinated people and children, but also wearing the country out in the fields of tourism, tech businesses and social welfare.

SCHOOL DIVISION

WASHINGTON (AP) — It looked like a zombie apocalypse.

For the U.S. military pilots and aircrew about to make their final takeoffs out of Afghanistan, the sky was lit up with fireworks and sporadic gunfire and the airfield littered with battered shells of airplanes and destroyed equipment. Stray dogs raced around the tarmac. And Taliban fighters, visible in the darkness through the green-tinged view of night vision goggles, walked the airfield waving an eerie goodbye.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Just last week, managers overseeing the fight against the massive wildfire scorching California’s Lake Tahoe region thought they could have it contained by the start of this week.

Instead, the Caldor Fire crested the Sierra Nevada on Monday, forcing the unprecedented evacuation of all 22,000 residents of South Lake Tahoe and tens of thousands of tourists who would otherwise be winding down their summers by the alpine lake straddling the California-Nevada state line.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Federal officials closed a portion of trails at a national forest in Northern California where a family and their dog mysteriously died last month, citing pending toxicology reports on nearby water.

There was no clear cause of death, prompting authorities to treat the area as a hazmat scene.

Investigators are considering whether toxic algae blooms or other hazards may have contributed to the deaths and are awaiting the results of water tests taken from the area where the family was found.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Wednesday that it’s “possible” the United States will seek to coordinate with the Taliban on counterterrorism strikes in Afghanistan against Islamic State militants or others.

Milley did not elaborate, and his comment did not appear to suggest immediate plans to work with the Taliban.

DENVER (AP) — Three suburban Denver police officers and two paramedics were indicted on manslaughter and other charges in the 2019 death of Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old Black man put into a chokehold and injected with a powerful sedative in a fatal encounter that provoked national outcry during racial injustice protests last year.

NEW YORK (AP) — The remnants of Hurricane Ida blew through the mid-Atlantic states Wednesday with at least two tornadoes, heavy winds and drenching rains that collapsed the roof of a U.S. Postal Service building, left cars and roads underwater and sent garbage floating through the streets of New York.

Social media posts showed homes reduced to rubble in a southern New Jersey county just outside Philadelphia, not far from where the National Weather Service confirmed a tornado Wednesday evening. Authorities did not have any immediate information on injuries.

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 01 (APP): Rich countries must share their supplies of coronavirus vaccines quickly, in line with recommendations made earlier this year by an independent panel appointed by the World Health Organization (WHO), the former co-chairs said Tuesday.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, former President of Liberia, and Helen Clark, former Prime Minister of New Zealand, expressed deep concern over the slow pace of vaccine redistribution from high-income to low-income countries.