POPGAZETA

Gaylen Grandstaff is back at his Moscow home after spending two years in a Russian jail. His crime: buying a cleaning solvent from the Chinese company Alibaba, that is illegal in Russia because it can also be used as a drug. Nastassia Jauman has his story.   …

A nascent immigration deal between the United States and Guatemala continued to take shape Thursday, as the U.S. Homeland Security acting secretary visited the impoverished Central American nation. According to reports, Kevin McAleenan and Guatemalan officials outlined details of the safe third country agreement signed between the United States and Guatemala five days ago. Under the new deal, the Trump administration is planning to send asylum-seekers from Honduras and El Salvador back to Guatemala to process their requests for help outside the U.S. Their claims would not initially go through the U.S. immigration courts. Phased in approach McAleenan said the plan is expected to start slowly, with single adults and not children. “We’re working on the details … and ensuring that the Guatemalans understand that we’re talking about a phased and measured approach to implementation that will not overwhelm Guatemalan resources and will be supported by U.S.-funded international organization capacity,” he said in an interview reported in The Washington Post. Those who claim fear of return to their home country would still be eligible for a lesser form of protection, “withholding of removal,” which requires a much higher burden of proof and doesn’t lead to legal permanent residency. Homeland Security …

Updated on Aug. 2, at 2:32 a.m. SEOUL — Japan has removed South Korea from a list of its preferred trading partners, a major escalation in a trade dispute rooted in historical tensions. The Cabinet of Shinzo Abe, Japan’s conservative prime minister, Friday approved plans to remove South Korea from the list of so-called “white countries” with preferred trade status. Beginning Aug. 28, Japanese companies must now seek case-by-case approval from Japan’s trade ministry before shipping certain products, which could be diverted for military use, to South Korea. South Korean President Moon Jae-in called the move “selfish” and a “grave challenge” to Korean-Japan relations, warning it could damage the global economy. Earlier, a South Korean presidential Blue House spokesperson vowed a “resolute” response. Japan last month restricted exports of high-tech materials to South Korea. The materials are used to produce semiconductors and displays in smartphones and other electronics that serve as the backbone of South Korea’s export-driven economy. FILE – Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe speaks during a press conference at Abe’s official residence in Tokyo, June 26, 2019. Retaliation for court rulings Japan’s moves are widely seen as retaliation for recent South Korean court rulings ordering Japanese companies to compensate …

Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha on Friday ordered an investigation into several small bombings in Bangkok that took place as Thailand was hosting a high-level meeting attended by U.S.  Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his counterparts from China and several Asia-Pacific countries. The explosions took place near two stations of the Thai capital’s elevated train system. A police spokesman said that one of the two injured men was being treated at a hospital and the other was sent home. Two other blasts were reported at a government complex on the outskirts of the city, and near the offices of a company associated with supporters of Prayuth’s new government. Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan told reporters that police arrested two suspects connected to the explosions at five different locations in Bangkok. Prawit said the perpetrators were trying to create a “situation.” When asked whether it was connected to the junta’s recent relinquishing of power, he said “I don’t know either, let authorities investigate first.” Thailand recently ended five years of military rule following a 2014 coup. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, center, stands between Singapore’s Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan, left, and Thailand’s Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai at the East …

Britain’s pro-European Union Liberal Democrats have won a parliamentary seat from the governing Conservatives, a blow to Prime Minister Boris Johnson in his first electoral test since taking office. The loss reduces Johnson’s working majority in parliament to one ahead of an expected showdown with lawmakers over his plan to take Britain out of the European Union on Oct. 31 without an exit agreement if necessary. Johnson’s government already relies on the support of a small Northern Irish party for its wafer-thin majority, with just a handful of rebels in his own Conservatives needed to lose key votes. ‘No mandate’ for no-deal Brexit The Liberal Democrats won the Welsh seat of Brecon and Radnorshire with a majority of 1,425 votes. “Boris Johnson’s shrinking majority makes it clear that he has no mandate to crash us out of the EU,” Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson, whose party now have 13 seats in parliament, said in a statement following the result early Friday. “I will do whatever it takes to stop Brexit and offer an alternative, positive vision. … We now have one more MP (Member of Parliament) who will vote against Brexit in parliament,” Swinson added. Wales, and the Brecon area, …

Less than 24 hours before Gov. Ricardo Rossello was expected to leave office, Puerto Ricans had no idea who would replace him as political chaos threatened to paralyze the island with a constitutional crisis. Rossello has promised to step down at 5 p.m. Friday in response to huge street protests by Puerto Ricans outraged at corruption, mismanagement and an obscenity-laced chat that was leaked in which the governor and 11 male allies made fun of women, gay people and victims of Hurricane Maria. “It’s frustrating. We’re in limbo,” said Jose Ramos, a taxi driver. “The island doesn’t have a path forward.” Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello announces his resignation in San Juan, Puerto Rico, July 25, 2019. As one of his last acts, Rossello put forward veteran politician and lawyer Pedro Pierluisi to fill the vacant secretary of state post, next in line for the governorship under the U.S. territory’s constitution. Pierluisi is a former representative to the U.S. Congress seen by most ordinary Puerto Ricans as a conciliatory, relatively uncontroversial figure, unlikely to be met by continued street demonstrations. “I offered to take a step forward for Puerto Rico at this moment given my love for my country,” Pierluisi …

President Donald Trump says he is considering a blockade or quarantine of Venezuela, where President Nicolas Maduro continues to hold power. Trump gave no details about such plans when answering a reporter’s question Thursday about Chinese and Iranian backing for Maduro. Russia and Cuba have also sent forces to Venezuela in support of Maduro. Trump has always said a military option is on the table for Venezuela, but so far has relied on sanctions and support from other nations to try to drive out Maduro. The United States was the first to recognize opposition leader Juan Guaido as the legitimate president of Venezuela after he used his constitutional power as National Assembly leader to declare Maduro’s presidency illegitimate. Guaido claimed Maduro’s re-election last year was fraudulent. Guaido led a popular uprising against Maduro earlier this year, which appears to have fizzled. The collapse in world energy prices, corruption and failed socialist policies have wrecked oil-rich Venezuela’s economy and millions have fled the country and its severe shortages of fuel, quality medical care and many food staples.   …

U.S. Rep. Will Hurd, an ex-CIA undercover officer and the lone African-American Republican in the House, says he won’t seek a third House term in next year’s elections. The El Paso Republican’s announcement came in a Thursday statement posted on his House web page. He’s the third Texas Republican to announce that he won’t seek re-election to the House, joining Michael Conaway of Midland and Pete Olson of Sugar Land. Hurd says he wants to work in the private sector toward solutions to “problems at the nexus between technology and national security.” Hurd has served the sprawling 23rd Congressional District, which extends from San Antonio to El Paso. He was one of only four House Republicans to vote to condemn President Donald Trump’s racist tweets taunting four Democratic congresswomen. …

The Vatican’s diplomatic envoy to Nicaragua said Thursday he has received a letter from President Daniel Ortega’s government apparently saying talks with the opposition on resolving the country’s more than year-old political standoff are over. Apostolic Nuncio Waldemar Somertag told The Associated Press that this week’s letter said the government’s position is that the dialogue “concluded with the definitive absence of the other side.”    Somertag declined to share the letter’s full contents, but said it was dated July 30 and addressed to the Vatican. He added that his understanding was a similar letter was sent to the Organization of American States. The nuncio and OAS representative Luis Rosadilla had served as witnesses and observers to the February-May negotiations.    Asked if he interpreted the letter from Foreign Minister Denis Moncada as a definitive end to dialogue, Somertag said: “Regrettably, I have that impression. … I would very much like to be wrong.”    There was no immediate comment from Ortega officials on the letter, which was also reported in Nicaraguan media.    The Central American nation’s crisis erupted in April 2018 with protests that grew to demand Ortega’s exit from office and early elections, with demonstrators accusing him of …

President Donald Trump opened a revved-up rally Thursday in Cincinnati by tearing into the Democrats he has been elevating as his new political foils, with attacks on four liberal congresswomen of color and their party’s leadership of cities. The president, who faced widespread criticism for not doing more to stop the chants of “Send her back” about Somali-born Rep. Ilhan Omar at a rally two weeks ago, did not mention Omar or her three colleagues by name in the opening moments of his Ohio gathering, but the target of his attacks was unmistakable. “The Democrat party is now being led by four left-wing extremists who reject everything that we hold dear,” Trump said of Omar and her fellow House Democrats Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. But the fleeting mention did not lead to further chants. Nor did an extended attack on Democratic leaders of urban areas, which Trump has laced into in recent days as part of his incendiary broadsides against Rep. Elijah Cummings and the majority-black city of Baltimore. “No one has paid a higher price for the far-left destructive agenda than Americans living in our nation’s inner cities,” Trump …

Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Thursday called U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, a “slumlord” because of the poor conditions of housing he owns in Baltimore. These were Pelosi’s first public remarks since Trump called the part of her hometown — represented in Congress by Elijah Cummings — “a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess” and a “very dangerous and filthy place. No human being would want to live there.” “The president — this comes as no surprise — really doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Pelosi told reporters. “But maybe you could ask his son-in-law, who’s a slumlord there, if he wants to talk about rodent infestations.” A mail carrier delivers mail at a home at the Dutch Village apartments, July 30, 2019, in Baltimore. The apartment complex is owned by Jared Kushner, son-in-law of President Donald Trump, who days earlier vilified Congressman Elijah Cummings. Kushner’s real estate company owns thousands of apartments and homes in the Baltimore region and has been cited hundreds of times for such infestations as black mold and mice. Residents in many of these homes have complained about poor responses to their complaints and harassment when the rent is due. FILE – Jared …

The pilot of a U.S. Navy jet fighter that crashed in Death Valley National Park was killed, the military said Thursday. The identity of the pilot will be withheld until 24 hours after notification of next-of-kin in accordance with Defense Department policy, the Navy said in a statement. The F/A-18E Super Hornet was assigned to Strike Fighter Squadron VFA-151 based at Naval Air Station Lemoore in California’s Central Valley. The unit goes by the nickname Vigilantes. The jet went down Wednesday during low-level flying in what was described as routine training. The crash injured seven people who were at a scenic overlook where aviation enthusiasts routinely watch military aircraft speeding low through a chasm dubbed Star Wars Canyon. The crash sent dark smoke billowing in the air, said Aaron Cassell, who was working at his family’s Panamint Springs Resort about 10 miles (16 kilometers) away and was the first to report the crash to park dispatch. FILE – Tourists walk along a ridge at Death Valley National Park, Calif., April 11, 2010. A U.S. Navy fighter jet crashed July 31, 2019, in the national park, injuring several people who were at a scenic overlook. “I just saw a black mushroom …

Croatia is known to most Americans for its picturesque walled city of Dubrovnik, the setting for many of the scenes in the immensely popular television series Game of Thrones. That is a source of satisfaction for Croatia’s ambassador in Washington, Pjer Šimunović. But he also wants Americans to recognize his country as a security partner contributing to the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan and elsewhere, as well as an increasingly notable economic and trade partner, including as a major importer of liquified natural gas (LNG), a rising field in American business. Pjer Šimunović, Ambassador of The Republic of Croatia to the U.S., is seen in Washington in July 2019. Photo Credit: Natalie L American tourists have flocked to Croatia in recent years to walk through the settings of fictional warfare and intrigue in the fantasy drama, which has been aired in more than 200 countries. But Šimunović noted in an interview with VOA that Croatian soldiers have participated in very real battles in Afghanistan alongside their counterparts from the United States, which he describes as “by far the most important” ally of his country.  “Everything else pales by comparison,” he says. “Our soldiers have been fighting shoulder to shoulder with our American friends, in all theaters,” including the Middle …

The maker of the assault-style rifle used in the 2012 mass shooting at a Newtown, Connecticut, school asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday to overturn a court ruling that allowed families of the victims to sue the company over its marketing practices. Gun maker Remington Outdoor Co made its plea to the nation’s top court after the Connecticut Supreme Court in March reinstated a wrongful death lawsuit against the gun maker by the families of nine people slain and one survivor of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre. The families argued that the Remington AR-15 Bushmaster rifle that a 20-year-old gunman used to kill 20 children aged 6 and 7 and six adult staffers was a weapon of war that was wrongly marketed to civilians for use in combat-style missions. FILE – A heart is emblazoned with crosses to commemorate the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims in Sandy Hook village in Newtown, Connecticut, Dec. 13, 2013. The gun maker argued that the lawsuit should never have been allowed to proceed because a 2005 federal law, the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, shields gun manufacturers in most cases from liability when the firearms they produce are used …

A strong earthquake hit off the coast of central Chile on Thursday, though there were no immediate reports of damage or injury. The U.S. Geological Survey said the magnitude 6.8 quake struck at 2:28 p.m. local time (19:28 GMT) and was centered 59 miles (95 kilometers) northwest of San Antonio in the region of Valparaiso. It was felt throughout the central part of the South American nation, but the national emergency office said there were no immediate reports of damage or injury and the navy discounted any threat of a tsunami. …

A U.S. citizen who joined the Islamic State terrorist group in Syria in 2014 and was captured by pro-American Kurdish forces earlier this year has been returned to his home state of Texas, where he faces charges of supporting a terrorist organization, the Justice Department announced Thursday. According to prosecutors, Omer Kuzu, who was born in Dallas, allegedly received weapons training in Iraq and later moved to Syria, where he was paid $125 a month to repair communications equipment for front-line IS fighters.  Kuzu, 23, is the sixth U.S. citizen or permanent resident to be indicted in the United States on charges of supporting IS overseas.  A federal grand jury in northern Texas recently indicted Kuzu on one count of traveling to Syria and conspiring to provide material support to IS. He made an initial court appearance before a magistrate judge Tuesday in northern Texas. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.   “The United States continues to demonstrate its commitment to holding accountable those who have left this country in order to join and support ISIS,” John C. Demers, assistant attorney general for national security, said in a statement.  According to a criminal complaint, in October …

Poland on Thursday scrapped its personal income tax for young employees earning less than $22,000 a year, as part of a drive to reverse a brain drain and demographic decline that’s dimming the prospects of a country that is otherwise experiencing strong economic growth. A new law by the right-wing government took effect Thursday, slashing the personal income tax from 18 percent to zero for workers under the age of 26 below the income threshold. It is expected to boost the earnings of nearly 2 million Poles at home, and the government hopes it will also persuade young Poles working abroad to return home.   Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki recently said he hoped it would “prevent a further loss, a bleeding of the population that is especially painful for a nation, a society, when it concerns the young generation.”   But there were strong doubts if the tax relief would stop the drain of talented and educated young Poles to London, Berlin and other cities that offer higher wages and other opportunities. ”I do not think it would stop me and my peers from leaving,” said Paulina Rokicka, a 19-year-old in Warsaw who works part-time at a TV station. “It …

The heat wave that smashed high temperature records in five European countries a week ago is now over Greenland, accelerating the melting of the island’s ice sheet and causing massive ice loss in the Arctic. Greenland, the world’s largest island, is a semi-autonomous Danish territory between the Atlantic and Arctic oceans that has 82% of its surface covered in ice. The area of the Greenland ice sheet that is showing indications of melt has been growing daily, and hit a record 56.5% for this year on Wednesday, said Ruth Mottram, a climate scientist with the Danish Meteorological Institute. She says that’s expected to expand and peak on Thursday before cooler temperatures slow the pace of the melt. More than 10 billion tons (11 billion U.S. tons) of ice was lost to the oceans by surface melt on Wednesday alone, creating a net mass ice loss of some 197 billion tons (217 billion U.S. tons) from Greenland in July, she said. ”It looks like the peak will be today. But the long-term forecast is for continuing warm and sunny weather in Greenland, so that means the amount of the ice loss will continue,” she said Thursday in a telephone interview from …

Plugged In with Greta Van Susteren examines the global cancer crisis and the search for a cure. Insights from Dr. J. Leonard Lichtenfeld, Chief Medical and Scientific Officer for the American Cancer Society; Cary Adams, CEO of the Union for International Cancer Control; and Dr. Otis Brawley, Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Oncology & Epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University. VOA’s Mil Arcega anchors the show for Greta. …

A hard-won budget and debt deal easily cleared the Senate on Thursday, powered by President Donald Trump’s endorsement and a bipartisan drive to cement recent spending increases for the Pentagon and domestic agencies. The legislation passed by a 67-28 vote as Trump and his GOP allies relied on lots of Democratic votes to propel it over the finish line.   Passage marked a drama-free solution to a worrisome set of looming Washington deadlines as both allies and adversaries of the president set aside ideology in exchange for relative fiscal peace and stability. The measure, which Trump has promised to sign, would permit the government to resume borrowing to pay all its bills and would set an overall $1.37 trillion limit on agency budgets approved by Congress annually.  It also would remove the prospect of a government shutdown in October or the threat of deep automatic spending cuts. The administration and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., played strong hands in the talks that sealed the agreement last week, producing a pragmatic measure that had much for lawmakers to dislike.   Trump did step back from a possible fight over spending increases sought by liberals, and achieved his priorities on Pentagon budgets …

Human Rights Watch has accused Kenya’s police force of carrying out the extrajudicial killings of around two dozen young men and boys in the low-income areas of Nairobi over the past year. In a When she went to the police station, she was told her son was killed for snatching a mobile phone. But she denies he was a criminal and sees no justification for the way he died. Wamburu said when she later went to the morgue, she found her son had been killed in a beastly manner. She said he had seven bullet wounds. She said her efforts to seek justice for her son’s killing have so far been fruitless. At the Mathare Social Justice Center, coordinator Kennedy Kyungu has for the last seven years documented killings at the informal settlements. “The age is between 13 to 27,” he said. “That is the age of young guys who are being executed in the informal settlements. Their reason is they are fighting crime.” In its latest report, Human Rights Watch said Kenyan police have killed at least 21 men and boys in Nairobi’s low-income areas since August of last year. “The specific cases that we documented were 21, but …

The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Thursday confirmed private sales to China of 68,000 tonnes of soybeans for the 2019/20 marketing year, the first such purchase by a private buyer since the trade war between the world’s two largest economies broke out more than a year ago. It was the first new soybean purchase by China since a 544,000-tonne sale was announced in late June, and the first since Beijing offered to exempt five private crushers in the country from 25-percent import tariffs on U.S. beans arriving by the end of the year. In its weekly export sales report, the USDA also said China bought 66,800 tonnes of soybeans for 2018/19 delivery, including 62,000 tonnes that had previously been listed as headed for unknown destinations. But China also canceled previous purchases totaling 72,900 tonnes for the current marketing year, USDA said. Widespread market rumors last week suggested that a large Chinese crusher purchased a small number of soybean cargoes for shipment in October from terminals in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, traders said. Prices for soybeans shipped to Asia from the PNW this autumn are lower than prices for beans shipped from rival exporter Brazil if China’s import tariffs are removed, …

If U.S. President Donald Trump is unlike anyone who’s occupied the Oval Office, the same could be said of new British Prime Minister Boris Johnson when it comes to 10 Downing Street. Both are unpredictable and unconventional. Their readiness to break with custom and their checkered personal lives — let alone their distinctive hairstyles — have attracted comparisons. Both have surfed populist political waves to power. The U.S. president sees an affinity, lauding Johnson as “Britain Trump.” And there are high expectations among Trump supporters and British Brexiters that the Anglo-American relationship is about to be spruced up in new ways. Their aides talk enthusiastically of a revived relationship that has been buffeted in the past two years. As Brexit Storm Gathers, Britain Looks to Trump for Hope video player. FILE – Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt appear on BBC TV’s debate with candidates vying to replace British PM Theresa May, in London, Britain, June 18, 2019. Campaigning to replace May, Johnson offered the highest form of flattery by imitating Trump, echoing some of the U.S. leader’s slogans, promising among other things to “make Britain great again.” Both men share a disdain for the European Union — although Johnson is …

When Lee Kyung Eon and her friend recently scrapped their plans to go to Japan for their summer vacation and paid $135 penalty for canceling plane tickets, they joined a growing public campaign in South Korea to boycott Japanese goods and services. ”We intended to do something that is unhelpful to Japan even a little bit,” said Lee, a 26-year-old office worker in Bundang city, just south of Seoul. “Many people told us we did something really good … but some with strong patriotic spirits said we shouldn’t boast of things that we have to do.” A widespread anti-Japan boycott has gained ground in South Korea since Tokyo on July 1 tightened its control of exports of three chemicals used to manufacture semiconductors and display screens — key export items for South Korea. The boycott could worsen as Japan is expected to expand its export curbs to other materials as early as Friday by removing South Korea from a list of countries granted preferential trade status. South Korea accuses Japan of retaliating over local court rulings last year that ordered two Japanese companies to pay compensation to former Korean employees for forced labor during Tokyo’s 1910-45 colonization of the Korean …