Author: Edward Helmore
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Salman Rushdie set to testify as attempted murder trial gets under way
A man accused of attacking Salman Rushdie as he was being introduced at a literary lecture in New York state in 2022 is going on trial this week in a case likely to create global headlines. The trial could upend life in the tiny upstate New York village of Mayville, whose population of less than…
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USAid website offline as Trump moves to put agency under state department
The website for the US Agency for International Development, or USAid, appeared to be offline on Saturday, as the Trump administration moves to put the free-standing agency, and its current $42.8bn budget for global humanitarian operations, under state department control. A message stating that the “server IP address could not be found” appeared when attempts…
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Federal officials extend New Jersey drone ban to parts of New York
Federal aviation authorities have extended a month-long drone ban over New Jersey to parts of New York state as mysterious overflights continue to roil the population despite official efforts to tamp down wild speculation about their origins. A new temporary ban covers parts of Brooklyn, Queens and two communities on Long Island. New York’s governor,…
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‘There’s a lot of drones authorized up there’: Biden sends radar systems and tries to calm fears
Joe Biden has weighed in on public anxieties surrounding the large number of drone or other aerial objects moving in the skies above New Jersey and the US north-east, saying there is nothing alarming about the increased reports. “Nothing nefarious apparently, but they’re checking it all out,” the president told reporters. “We’re following this closely,…
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From UFOs to drones, the US fascination with – and fear of – ‘anomalous detections’
A widespread panic about drones or other unknown low-flying objects has gripped New Jersey in recent days, but many other parts of the US remain cheerfully gripped by another very American mystery in the skies that has had a modern resurgence of interest: UFOs. At the newly opened National UFO Historical Records Center – an…
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Mayorkas says no known foreign involvement in mass drone sightings
Alejandro Mayorkas, the US homeland security secretary, has said federal authorities “know of no foreign involvement” in the apparent mass drone sightings across the nation’s north-east region, though social and political anxieties nonetheless continued surging over the weekend amid a lack of official information. “I want to assure the American public that we are on…
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Trump maintains hard line on Canada after meeting with Trudeau
Donald Trump said he had a “productive” meeting with Justin Trudeau after the Canadian prime minister paid a surprise trip to his Mar-a-Lago estate amid fears about Trump’s promised tariffs. Trudeau became the first G7 leader to meet with Trump before his second term amid widespread fears in Canada and many other parts of the…
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John Bolton rips into Trump’s pick for counter-terrorism chief Sebastian Gorka
Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton has laid into Sebastian Gorka, the president-elect’s pick for counter-terrorism chief, as a “conman” whose selection is not “going to bode well for counter-terrorism efforts when the [national security council’s] senior director is somebody like that”. Trump praised Gorka, an immigrant from Hungary, as a “tireless advocate for…