USA

UNITED NATIONS, June 14 (Xinhua) -- The president of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly (UNGA), Volkan Bozkir, on Monday called for urgent action to address unsustainable agriculture.

"We must urgently address unsustainable agriculture, one of the main drivers of desertification, land degradation and drought," the UNGA president, or the PGA, told the General Assembly High-level Dialogue on Desertification, Land Degradation and Drought held at the UN headquarters in New York.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration says it will enhance its analysis of threats from domestic terrorists, including the sharing of intelligence within law enforcement agencies, and will work with tech companies to eliminate terrorist content online as part of a nationwide strategy to combat domestic terrorism.

The National Security Council on Tuesday released the strategy plan, which comes more than six months after a mob of insurgents loyal to President Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol as Congress was voting to certify Joe Biden’s presidential win.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — California, the first state in America to put in place a coronavirus lockdown, is now turning a page on the pandemic.

At the stroke of midnight, California is lifting most of its COVID-19 restrictions and ushering in what has been billed as the state’s “Grand Reopening.”

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A cyberespionage campaign blamed on China was more sweeping than previously known, with suspected state-backed hackers exploiting a device meant to boost internet security to penetrate the computers of critical U.S. entities.

(AP) --- Jerry Ramos spent his final days in a California hospital, hooked to an oxygen machine with blood clots in his lungs from COVID-19, his 3-year-old daughter in his thoughts.

“I have to be here to watch my princess grow up,” the Mexican American restaurant worker wrote on Facebook. “My heart feels broken into pieces.”

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 13 (APP): UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres Sunday kicked off the 100-day countdown to the International Day of Peace, which is observed on September 21, with a call for standing up against hatred and discrimination, and by caring for the pollution-hit planet.

“Peace is the foundation of that recovery. The global vaccination effort cannot advance amidst armed conflict,” he said in his countdown message marking the day on which the UN invites the world to celebrate peace by observing 24 hours of ceasefire and non-violence.

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 14 (APP): A senior United Nations official has welcomed the Group of Seven (G-7) leading industrialized nations’ commitment to immediately share at least 870 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines, supporting global access and helping to end the acute phase of the pandemic.

NEW YORK, June 14. /TASS/: Russia is ready to consider the issue of prisoner swap with the US, President Vladimir Putin said in an interview with NBC.

"Yes, yes," he said when asked a respective question.

Meanwhile Putin noted that much more Russian citizens are held in custody in the US than American citizens - in Russia. "I know that there are convicted US citizens in custody, but their number cannot be compared with that of Russian citizens remaining in American prisons," he said.

WASHINGTON, June 14. /TASS/: The US sanctions on a number of transactions with Russia’s sovereign debt, announced back in April, formally come into force on Monday.

It concerns the next package of anti-Russian restrictions, the US administration announced on April 15. Washington also specified the terms of their entry into force.

NEW YORK, June 14. /TASS/: Predictability and stability are the most important value in international affairs, though Russia has not seen that on the part of the US in recent years, President Vladimir Putin said in an interview with NBC.