A veteran U.S. diplomat is set to appear before lawmakers Tuesday in the House of Representatives impeachment inquiry of allegations that President Donald Trump held up military aid to Ukraine unless it opened an investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son.

William Taylor, the top official at the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine, will testify behind closed doors about a series of text messages with other officials expressing concerns about the White House’s actions. Taylor wrote that it was “crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign.”

Deputy Assistant Defense Secretary Laura Cooper, who has worked on Russia and Ukraine policy at the Pentagon, is scheduled to testify in Wednesday.

The Democratic-led inquiry was set off when an intelligence whistleblower expressed concern to the inspector general about Trump’s July 25 telephone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in which he appeared to urge Zelenskiy to open an investigation into the former vice president, who is running for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.  

Trump has alleged that Biden threatened to withhold loan guarantees to Ukraine unless an earlier corruption probe into a gas company that employed his son Hunter was stopped.

No evidence of wrongdoing by Joe or Hunter Biden has surfaced. But reaching out to a foreign government to dig up dirt on a rival is considered to be interference in a presidential election and an impeachable offense.

Trump has insisted there was no “quid pro quo” involved in his call to Zelenskiy, describing the conversation as “perfect” and accusing the Democratic-led House of a witch hunt.

But that assertion was bungled just last week by Mick Mulvaney, Trump’s acting chief of staff. Mulvaney admitted to reporters that Trump froze $400 million in aid to Kyiv because of the president’s concerns over corruption in Ukraine and suspicions it was involved in the Russian hacking of the Democratic National Committee e-mails in 2016.

Mulvaney defiantly said there will always be political influence over foreign policy and told people to “get over it.” He later issued a statement attempting to clarify his comments.

After Trump urged Republican lawmakers to “get tougher and fight” the probe Monday, they appeared to respond by introducing a resolution censuring California Democrat Adam Schiff, who is leading the inquiry as chairman of the Intelligence Committee.  The resolution failed by a vote of 218-185.  

Kenya’s reputation as a producer of world-class marathon runners was further boosted this month when Kenyans Eliud Kipchoge and Brigid Kosgei broke world records on the same weekend.  Running is a big thing for the East African nation, where regular competitions give Kenyans a chance to prepare for greater glory. Mohammed Yusuf has more from Nairobi.

Thousands of satellites orbit the Earth for a multitude of purposes. Some circle the planet to check on the health of the swirling blue orb below.  Reaching the perfect place to collect that information can mean an arduous and frigid journey back on Earth.  VOA’s Arash Arabasadi bundles-up tight for this story from the Arctic Circle.

Associate Justice Elena Kagan said Monday that it “behooves” the U.S. Supreme Court to realize in these polarized times that there’s a danger of the public seeing it as just a political institution — and to strive to counter that perception.

Speaking at the University of Minnesota, Kagan said the high court’s legitimacy depends on public trust and confidence since nobody elected the justices.

“We have to be seen as doing law, which is distinct from politics or public policy, and to be doing it in a good faith way, trying to find the right answers,” she said.

Kagan acknowledged that the justices can be “pretty divided” on how to interpret the Constitution. But she said the view that politics guides their decisions is an oversimplification. The justices decide most of their cases unanimously or by lopsided margins, she said.

The justice didn’t mention a Marquette University Law School poll released earlier Monday in which 64% of respondents said they believe the law, rather than politics, mostly motivates the high court’s decisions. But the findings dovetailed with her remarks.

“It behooves us on the court to realize that this is a danger and make sure it isn’t so,” she said.

Kagan, 59, who was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2010 and is a member of the court’s liberal wing, said she believes none of the justices decide cases for partisan political reasons, but they do have different legal philosophies and approaches to constitutional issues.

Sometimes there’s no way to decide some cases without the results seeming political, she said, “but I think especially in these polarized times, I think we have an obligation to make sure that that happens only when we truly, truly can’t help it.”

Gerrymandering case

Kagan said she took the unusual step, for her, of reading part of her dissent from the bench in a gerrymandering case this summer because it was such an important issue and that she strongly disagreed with the 5-4 decision.

The conservative majority ruled that partisan gerrymandering of congressional and legislative districts was none of its business. The decision freed state officials from federal court challenges to their plans to reshape districts to help their parties.

“I thought that the court had gotten it deeply wrong,” she said.
 
Kagan appeared as part of a lecture series sponsored by the University of Minnesota Law School that, in past years, has brought Justices John Roberts, Sonia Sotomayor, Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg to campus.
 

U.S. oil giant Exxon Mobil goes on trial in New York Tuesday on charges it lied to investors about financial cost of fighting global warming.

The lawsuit, filed by the New York state attorney general, contends Exxon deliberately underestimated the cost to the company if governments implement action to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius.

The lawsuit says the Exxon wanted to avoid having to publically devalue the company’s assets which could have cost it billions of dollars.

It also alleges Exxon’s top executives, including former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, knew they were misleading investors.

“If companies like Exxon accurately account for the necessary degree of regulation to prevent even more dangerous global warming from happening, it will make less and less sense to continue to invest in developing fossil fuel projects,” Colombia University expert in climate change law Michael Burger says.

Exxon denies any wrongdoing and calls the attorney general’s case “misleading” and a deliberate misrepresentation.

“We tell investors through regular disclosures how the company accounts for risks associated with climate change. We are confident in the facts and look forward to seeing our company exonerated in court,” an Exxon spokesman says.  

Iran says it has given the U.S. a list of detained Iranians whom it wants to be freed in a prisoner swap, drawing a vague public response from U.S. officials who have sought to discuss the issue with Tehran.

Speaking to reporters Monday in Tehran, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said Iran had provided the names of the detained Iranians to the U.S. and was ready to do a trade. He did not specify who was on the list or how it was handed to Washington, with whom Tehran has no formal ties.

But Mousavi said the Iranian government believes about 20 Iranians have been detained by the U.S. on what it considers to be “baseless” charges of circumventing U.S. economic sanctions against Iran. He singled out one of them, Iranian scientist Masoud Soleimani, as a cause for concern due to ill health.

U.S. authorities arrested Soleimani, a stem cell researcher, in October 2018 upon his arrival at a Chicago airport. He was charged with trying to export biological materials to Iran in violation of the sanctions.

Asked by VOA Persian to confirm whether it has received Iran’s list for a proposed prisoner swap, a State Department spokesperson declined to comment specifically and only restated U.S. policy, saying: “The recovery of hostages held by the Islamic Republic of Iran is a top priority for the U.S. government.”

Iran has been detaining at least four Americans for security-related offenses that their relatives and supporters have dismissed as trumped-up charges. The detainees include former U.S. soldier Michael R. White, Chinese-American Princeton University researcher Xiyue Wang, and Iranian-American businessman Siamak Namazi and his elderly father Mohammad Bagher Namazi.

A fifth American, retired FBI agent Robert Levinson, went missing in Iran 12 years ago and his family has said they believe he remains in detention there, a contention denied by Tehran.

Previously, Reuters quoted a

Facebook on Monday said it will apply lessons learned from America’s 2016 election to prevent manipulation of its platforms in the 2020 presidential contest.

In a press release, Facebook said it is working to combat “Inauthentic Behavior” on its applications — a phenomenon widely documented in 2016 that has continued in years since.

Facebook defines inauthentic behavior as “using deceptive behaviors to conceal the identity of the organization behind a campaign, make the organization or its activity appear more popular or trustworthy than it is, or evade (Facebook’s) enforcement efforts.”

U.S. intelligence agencies have accused Russia of creating fake accounts on Facebook and other platforms to spread falsehoods and divisive messaging that pitted U.S. voters against each other.

The social media giant will start requiring pages and advertisements to show their “Confirmed Page Owner.” Pages with large U.S. audiences will need to add their owners first.

The press release shared that Facebook had taken down four pages and groups on Facebook and Instagram that were linked to government-sponsored inauthentic behavior the morning of the press release. Three of them were linked to Iran, and one was in Russia.

As part of its policy, Facebook said it will label media outlets that are wholly or partially under their government’s editorial control as state-controlled media.

The company also pledged to remove misinformation from its newsfeeds. Elsewhere on the platform, pop-up messages will warn users of content that had been rated false or partly false by independent fact-checkers.

Fact-checkers are not trusted by all Americans. According to a survey by Pew Research Center, 69% of Democrats say fact-checking efforts by news outlets and other organizations “deal fairly with all sides.” But only 28% of Republicans concur.

Facebook said it has taken down 50 networks that were engaging in “coordinated inauthentic behavior,” many of which were operating ahead of major elections.

A major pharmaceutical company and three of the biggest drug distributors in the U.S. have reached a $260 million settlement with two counties in Ohio to avoid a trial over their role in the deadly opioid addiction crisis gripping America.

The deal, struck Monday, came just hours before the opening arguments in a court in Cleveland, Ohio. The case has been viewed as a harbinger for similar lawsuits filed by more than  2,700 local and state governments across the country in hopes of recouping damages from the crisis.

Drug distributors McKesson, Cardinal Health and AmerisourceBergen will pay $215 million in reparations. Israeli drug manufacturer Teva will pay $20 million in cash and also contribute $25 million worth of Suboxone, used to treat opioid addiction.

“People can’t lose sight of the fact that the counties got a very good deal for themselves, but we also set an important national benchmark for the others,” said Hunter Shkolnik, a lawyer for Cuyahoga County.

Cuyahoga and Summit counties had brought the lawsuit that accused the four companies of fueling a nationwide opioid crisis.

According to U.S. government data, opioids have led to some 400,000 overdose deaths between 1997 and 2017.

Lawyers say the settlement will provide local governments with the finances needed to establish opioid-recovery programs.

Attempts to reach a nationwide settlement broke down last week after cities and counties suing the drug companies rejected an offer of $48 billion in cash, treatment drugs and services.

Hundreds of protesters are defying an emergency decree to confront police in Chile’s capital, continuing disturbances that have left at least 11 dead and led the president to say the country is “at war.”

Police used tear gas and streams of water to break up protests on one of Santiago’s main streets Monday.

Meanwhile, many people lined up before supermarkets that had reopened. Many were still closed after a weekend that saw scores of stores looted or burned.

Only one of the city’s six subway lines was operating because rioters had burned or damaged many of the stations.

President Sebastian Pinera said Sunday that the country is “at war with a powerful, relentless enemy that respects nothing or anyone and is willing to use violence and crime without any limits.”
 

The Duke and the Duchess of Sussex said in a joint interview with ITV news filmed during their tour in Africa earlier this month and aired Sunday, that they would not let British tabloids destroy their life.

Prince Harry told ITV that most of what is published in the British tabloids is not true, adding “I will not be bullied into playing a game that killed my mum.” Harry said the memory of Princess Diana’s death was “still incredibly raw every single day and that is not me being paranoid…”

The former U.S. television star Meghan Markle said that while her friends were happy for her when she met Harry, her British friends warned her not to marry Harry “because the British tabloids will destroy your life.”

Speaking of how she can cope with such intense scrutiny, Meghan replied: “In all honesty I have said for a long time to H – that is what I call him – it’s not enough to just survive something, that’s not the point of life. You have got to thrive.”

Earlier this month the couple sued British tabloid The Mail on Sunday for invasion of privacy, claiming it illegally published a letter she wrote to her father.

At the time, Harry said the treatment of Meghan was reminiscent of the tabloid’s approach to his mother.

India’s rural areas are feeling the pinch as the country’s once booming automobile sector struggles with it worst downturn in two decades and an estimated 350,000 workers employed in auto plants and ancillary industries lose jobs. Anjana Pasricha visited a village near the booming business and auto hub of Gurugram district in Haryana state to find out why plummeting automobile sales are affecting rural areas whose fortunes rose along with the auto industry

The U.S. is considering keeping some troops near oil fields in northeastern Syria to protect them from being captured by Islamic State militants, Defense chief Mark Esper said Monday.

A convoy of more than 100 vehicles with U.S. troops crossed into Iraq  from Syria on Monday, part of the broader withdrawal from northern Syria ordered by President Donald Trump. But Esper said that some American forces were still patrolling near the oil fields alongside Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.

The Pentagon leader said no long-term decision has been made “with regard to numbers or anything like that” and no plan presented to Trump. On Sunday, Trump said on Twitter, “We have secured the oil.”

Esper said, “We presently have troops in a couple of cities that [are] located right near that area. The purpose is to deny access, specifically revenue to ISIS [Islamic State] and any other groups that may want to seek that revenue to enable their own malign activities.”

Trump’s troop withdrawal has angered Kurds in northern Syria, where Kurdish fighters have fought alongside U.S. forces against Islamic State terrorists. But Trump said the U.S. had no stake in Turkey’s offensive against the Kurdish fighters, which Ankara considers as allies with Kurdish separatists fighting for autonomy in southeastern Turkey for the last three decades.

The U.S. last week brokered a five-day cease-fire with Turkey in the region to give the Kurdish fighters a chance to move away from the border where Turkey wants to impose a 32-kilometer-wide “safe zone.”

But Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan reiterated Monday that his offensive against the Kurdish fighters would resume if they have not pulled back from the Turkish border by the time the pause in the conflict ends Tuesday night.

With Trump’s withdrawal of most U.S. troops, Russia, an ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, has stepped into the vacuum in northern Syria. Even though Turkey is a NATO ally of the U.S., Erdogan is meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow to plot their strategy in Syria.

Erdogan, without elaborating, told a forum in Istanbul on Monday, “We will take up this process with Mr. Putin and after that we will take the necessary steps” in northeastern Syria.

As U.S. armored vehicles drove out of Syria through the Kurdish-dominated northeastern city of Qamishli on Monday, residents hurled potatoes at the Americans, shouting in English, “No America,” and “America liar.”

Near the town of Tal Tamr, protesters late Sunday raised banners against departing U.S. troops. One man blocked the path of a U.S. van with a poster reading: “Thanks for U.S. people, but Trump betrayed us.”

Trump has said the troop withdrawal was necessary for the U.S. to “end endless wars” in the Middle East. The Pentagon is moving its Syrian contingent of more than 700 U.S. troops to Iraq, not sending them “home” as Trump had tweeted they would be. Esper said the troops would help defend Iraq and could still conduct antiterrorist raids in Syria on Islamic State insurgents.   

The U.S. currently has about 5,000 troops in Iraq under an agreement between Baghdad and Washington. The U.S. had pulled out in 2011 when combat operations ended there, but went back in three years later when Islamic State took over large parts of the country before later losing what it had gained.

While the Kurdish withdrawal from the border region is occurring, both Kurdish and Turkish leaders accused each other of violating the cease-fire with scattered attacks.

The Kurds said Turkey had shelled one village at dawn Monday and contended that the U.S. had not forced Ankara to adhere to the terms of the cease-fire. Turkey accused the Kurds of 30 live-fire violations during the four days of the purported pause in hostilities, including an attack that killed one Turkish soldier.

Egypt has unveiled the contents of 30 ancient wooden coffins recently discovered in Luxor in what officials call the country’s largest archaeological find in more than a century. Officials say the 3,000-year-old coffins shown to the media Saturday are just a small part of what is yet to come as the archeological excavations resume after years of decline. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports.

As Ukraine and Russia discuss resuming peace talks, thousands of families remain torn apart by conflict. In rebel-controlled areas of eastern Ukraine, hundreds of people have been detained and accused of spying — with widespread evidence of torture and killings. Henry Ridgwell met the family of one man who was seized by rebel forces, who described the pain of separation, and the horror of witnessing his suffering from afar.

In African slums, boxing clubs are seen as a good way to keep young men off the streets, let them take out their frustrations through sport rather than crime, and provide a way out of poverty. In Uganda, though, one woman has stepped into the ring to not only win medals on the continent, but also empower young women to stay off the streets and defend themselves.  Halima Athumani reports from Kampala. 

A committee guiding OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma’s bankruptcy has suggested other drugmakers, distributors and pharmacy chains use Purdue’s bankruptcy proceedings to settle more than 2,000 lawsuits seeking to hold the drug industry accountable for the national opioid crisis.

The committee of unsecured creditors said in a letter sent Sunday to the parties and obtained by The Associated Press that the country “is in the grips of a crisis that must be addressed, and that doing so may require creative approaches.”

It’s calling for all the companies to put money into a fund in exchange for having all their lawsuits resolved.

The committee includes victims of the opioid crisis plus a medical center, a health insurer, a prescription benefit management company, the manufacturer of an addiction treatment drug and a pension insurer. It says that the concept may not be feasible but invited further discussion. It does not give a size of contributions from the company.

The same committee has been aggressive in Purdue’s bankruptcy, saying it would support pausing litigation against members of the Sackler family who own Purdue in exchange for a $200 million fund from the company to help fight the opioid crisis.

Paul Hanly, a lead lawyer for local governments in the lawsuits, said in a text message Sunday evening that he’d heard about the mass settlement idea, calling it “most unlikely.”

The proposal comes as narrower talks have not resulted in a settlement. Opening statements are to be held Monday in the first federal trial over the crisis. The lawsuit deals with claims from the Ohio counties of Cuyahoga and Summit against a half-dozen companies. More than 2,000 other state and local governments plus Native American tribes, hospitals and other groups have made similar claims.

There have been talks aimed at settling all claims against the drugmakers Johnson & Johnson and Teva and the distributors AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson ahead of the trial. One proposal called for resolving claims against them nationally in exchange for cash and addiction treatment drugs valued at a total of $48 billion over time.

The committee’s proposal went to those five companies plus nine others that face lawsuits.

Opioids, including both prescription painkillers and illegal drugs such as heroin and illicitly made fentanyl, have been linked to more than 400,000 deaths in the U.S. since 2000.

At least 12 white supremacists have been arrested on allegations of plotting, threatening or carrying out anti-Semitic attacks in the U.S. since the massacre at a Pittsburgh synagogue nearly one year ago, a Jewish civil rights group reported Sunday.

The Anti-Defamation League also counted at least 50 incidents in which white supremacists are accused of targeting Jewish institutions’ property since a gunman killed 11 worshippers at the Tree of Life synagogue on Oct. 27, 2018. Those incidents include 12 cases of vandalism involving white supremacist symbols and 35 cases in which white supremacist propaganda was distributed.

The ADL said its nationwide count of anti-Semitic incidents remains near record levels. It has counted 780 anti-Semitic incidents in the first six months of 2019, compared to 785 incidents during the same period in 2018.

The ADL’s tally of 12 arrests for white supremacist plots, threats and attacks against Jewish institutions includes the April 2019 capture of John T. Earnest, who is charged with killing one person and wounding three others in a shooting at a synagogue in Poway, California. The group said many of the cases it counted, including the Poway shooting, were inspired by previous white supremist attacks. In online posts, Earnest said he was inspired by the deadly attacks in Pittsburgh and on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, where a gunman killed 51 people in March.

The ADL also counted three additional 2019 cases in which individuals were arrested for targeting Jews but weren’t deemed to be white supremacists. Two were motivated by Islamist extremist ideology, the organization said.

The ADL said its Center on Extremism provided “critical intelligence” to law enforcement in at least three of the 12 cases it counted.

Last December, authorities in Monroe, Washington, arrested a white supremacist after the ADL notified law enforcement about suspicions he threatened on Facebook to kill Jews in a synagogue. The ADL said it also helped authorities in Lehighton, Pennsylvania, identify a white supremacist accused of using aliases to post threatening messages, including a digital image of himself pointing an AR-15 rifle at a group of praying Jewish men.

In August, an FBI-led anti-terrorism task force arrested a Las Vegas man accused of plotting to firebomb a synagogue or other targets, including a bar catering to LGTBQ customers and the ADL’s Las Vegas office. The ADL said it warned law enforcement officials about the man’s online threats.

“We cannot and will not rest easy knowing the threat posed by white supremacists and other extremists against the Jewish community is clear and present,” the group’s CEO, Jonathan Greenblatt, said in a statement.

The ADL said it counted at least 30 additional incidents in which people with an “unknown ideology” targeted Jewish institutions with acts of arson, vandalism or propaganda distribution that the group deemed to be anti-Semitic or “generally hateful,” but not explicitly white supremacist.

“These incidents include the shooting of an elderly man outside a synagogue in Miami, fires set at multiple Jewish institutions in New York and Massachusetts, Molotov cocktails thrown at synagogue windows in Chicago, damaged menorahs in Georgia and New Jersey, as well as a wide range of anti-Semitic graffiti,” an ADL report said.

 The still popular former mayor of Baltimore and brother of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Thomas D’Alesandro III, died Sunday at 90.

The family said he had been suffering from complications from a stroke.

Pelosi, who is leading a congressional delegation in Jordan, issued a statement calling her brother “the finest public servant I have ever known…a leader of dignity, compassion, and extraordinary courage.”

D’Alesandro was known around Baltimore as “Young Tommy,” because his father, “Big Tommy,” was also mayor and a U.S. congressman.

“Young Tommy” was president of the Baltimore City Council and was elected mayor in 1967, leading Baltimore through four of the most tumultuous years in the city’s history. His challenges included a number of labor strikes that paralyzed city services, the push for urban renewal, and the riots that followed the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968 from which Baltimore has never fully recovered.

D’Alesandro was also the first Baltimore mayor to appoint African-Americans to important city positions.

After deciding not to run for a second term in 1971, D’Alesandro went into private law practice and could still be seen dining in Italian restaurants and attending Baltimore Oriole baseball games until just before his death.

Protests and violence in Chile spilled over into a new day Sunday even after the president cancelled a subway fare hike that prompted massive and violent demonstrations.

Officials in the Santiago region said three people died in a fire at a looted supermarket early Sunday — one of 60 Walmart-owned outlets that have been vandalized, and the company said many stores did not open during the day.

At least two airlines cancelled or rescheduled flights into the capital, affecting more than 1,400 passengers Sunday and Monday.

President Sebastián Piñera, facing the worst crisis of his second term as head of the South American country, announced Saturday night he was cancelling a subway fare hike imposed two weeks ago. It had led to major protests that included rioting that caused millions of dollars in damage to burned buses and vandalized subway stops, office buildings and stores.

Troops patrolled the streets and a state of emergency and curfew remained in effect for six Chilean cities, but renewed protests continued after daybreak. Security forces used tear gas and jets of water to try disperse crowds.

Interior Minister Andrés Chadwick reported that 62 police and 11 civilians were injured in the latest disturbances and prosecutors said nearly 1,500 people had been arrested.

With transportation frozen, Cynthia Cordero said she had walked 20 blocks to reach a pharmacy to buy diapers, only to find it had been burned.

“They don’t have the right to do this,” she said, adding it was right to protest “against the abuses, the increases in fares, against bad education and an undignified pension, but not to destroy.”

Long lines formed at gas stations as people tried to fill up for a coming workweek with a public transport system depleted by the destructive protests.

Subway system chief Louis De Grange said workers would try to have at least one line running Monday, but he said it could take weeks or months to have the four others back in service.