USA

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Volunteers and county employees set up cots and stacked hundreds of bottles of water in an air-conditioned cooling center in a vacant building in Portland, Oregon, one of many such places being set up as the Northwest sees another stretch of sizzling temperatures.

Scorching weather also hit other parts of the country this week. The weather service said heat advisories and warnings would be in effect from the Midwest to the Northeast and mid-Atlantic through at least Friday.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Top Republicans are battling school districts in their own states’ urban, heavily Democratic areas over whether students should be required to mask up as they head back to school — reigniting ideological divides over mandates even as the latest coronavirus surge ravages the reddest, most unvaccinated parts of the nation.

(AP) --- Redistricting season officially kicks off with the release of detailed population data from the U.S. Census Bureau that will be used to redraw voting districts nationwide — potentially helping determine control of the U.S. House in the 2022 elections and providing an electoral edge for the next decade.

WASHINGTON, Aug 11 (APP): US President Joe Biden has said there is no change in his country’s plan to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan, even as Taliban fighters step up attacks and make territorial gains, arguing that the Afghan army must fight for itself while Washington provides military and financial support.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- Vaccine mandates are increasingly a sticky issue in the United States as the country's COVID-19 cases topped 36 million Tuesday, fueled by the unchecked spread of the Delta variant among under-vaccinated areas.

As of 6:21 pm on Tuesday local time (2221 GMT), the U.S. COVID-19 cases totaled 36,039,748, with 618,044 deaths, according to a Johns Hopkins University tally.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — People in the Pacific Northwest braced for another major, multiday heat wave starting Wednesday, just over a month after record-shattering hot weather killed hundreds of the region’s most vulnerable when temperatures soared to 116 degrees Fahrenheit (47 Celsius).

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has proposed a series of benchmarks for Sudan’s transitional government to meet that could lead the U.N. Security Council to lift the arms embargo and other sanctions it imposed after the conflict in Darfur began in 2003.

In a 16-page report to the council circulated Tuesday, the U.N. chief cited improvements in Darfur largely brought on by the democratic revolution of December 2018 that led the military to overthrow autocratic President Omar al-Bashir four months later after nearly three decades of rule.

GREENVILLE, Calif. (AP) — California’s largest single wildfire in recorded history kept pushing through forestlands on Tuesday as fire crews tried to protect rural communities from flames that have destroyed hundreds of homes.

Clear skies over parts of the month-old Dixie Fire have allowed aircraft to rejoin nearly 6,000 firefighters in the attack this week.

“Whether or not we can fly depends very much on where the smoke is. There’s still some areas where it’s just too smoky,” fire spokesman Edwin Zuniga said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senior members of President Joe Biden’s administration met with counterparts in Mexico Tuesday for talks on addressing illegal migration to the U.S., according to the White House.

National security adviser Jake Sullivan and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas led the delegation to meet with senior Mexican government officials about working jointly to slow crossings along the U.S. southern border. Officials also discussed other economic and security issues as well as COVID-19 response.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Tropical Storm Fred swirled just south of Puerto Rico early Wednesday heading for the Dominican Republic and Haiti, with forecasters warning that its heavy rains could cause dangerous flooding and mudslides.

After a quiet month of no named storms in the region, Fred became the sixth of the Atlantic hurricane season as expected late Tuesday and tropical storm warnings were already in effect for the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.