Courtesy: Geo News/AFP

• Trump indicted for paying hush money to adult star. 
• Felony indictment likely be announced in coming days. 
• Trump would become first US president to be charged with a crime.

NEW YORK: A New York grand jury has voted to indict former US president Donald Trump over hush money payments made to a porn star ahead of the 2016 election, multiple US media reported on Thursday.

The felony indictment, filed under seal by the Manhattan district attorney’s office, will likely be announced in the coming days, according to The New York Times which cited four people with knowledge of the matter.

The 76-year-old Republican would become the first former or sitting president to be charged with a crime — upending the 2024 White House race in which Trump is running to regain office.

On March 18 Trump had declared he expected to be arrested within days over the payment to Stormy Daniels — who received $130,000 weeks before the 2016 election to stop her from going public about a sexual encounter she says she had with Trump a decade earlier.

But after days of suspense — setting New York on edge for possible protests — the grand jury panel convened by a Manhattan prosecutor continued to hear witnesses, and the prospect of an immediate indictment appeared to recede.

Trump’s ex-lawyer Michael Cohen, who has testified before the grand jury, told Congress in 2019 that he made the payment to Daniels on Trump’s behalf and was later reimbursed.

The New York investigation is the first to reach a charging decision out of three major probes into the former president.

Trump also faces felony investigations in Georgia relating to the 2020 election and in Washington over the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol by the ex-president’s supporters, who hoped to keep him in office after his election loss.

Trump, who is seeking to be the Republican Party’s presidential nominee again in 2024, has branded all of the investigations “witch hunts” and political persecutions.

1- Header image: Donald Trump photographed on November 15, 2019 during his presidency as he delivered remarks in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington, DC. —AFP/File

Courtesy: Geo News

• Eye specialist breathes his last in city’s Garden area.
• Reason behind shooting still unknown; probe underway.
• Assistant, who was also in car, sustains bullet wounds.

KARACHI: Former Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) senior director of health and eye specialist Dr Birbal Genani was shot dead by unknown assailants in the port city on Thursday.

Dr Genani, according to police, along with his assistant lady doctor was heading to Gulshan-e-Iqbal from Ramswamy when unidentified armed men targeted their car near Garden interchange on the Lyari Expressway.

The ex-KMC director of health died on the spot while his assistant sustained bullet injuries.

After being informed, the police and the rescue officials swung into action and rushed to the scene and shifted the body and the injured to the hospital.

In a closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera footage of the incident, which surfaced on the internet, Dr Genani’s car could be seen moving uncontrollably and smashing into a wall.

The area where Dr Birbal Genani was shot dead in Karachi, on March 30, 2023. — Google Maps

‘One bullet mark on vehicle’

Talking to journalists, SSP City Arif Aziz termed Dr Genani’s murder as a “target killing”, adding that the exact reason behind the murder is not known yet.

The lady doctor — who works with him — was aboard the vehicle when the unidentified assailants attacked the vehicle.

“Firing started suddenly and I could not understand anything,” the police officer said, citing the injured woman.

Apparently, there was only one bullet mark on the vehicle, he added. The police officer further said that they are recording the statement of the lady doctor.

The police have already launched an investigation into the murder, the police personnel added.

Meanwhile, Sindh Governor Kamran Khan Tessori took notice of the incident and sought a report from the additional inspector general of Karachi police. He also expressed deep sorrow over the murder of the eye specialist.

Courtesy: Dawn News/AFP/Reuters

Two US Army helicopters crashed during a nighttime training mission in Kentucky, killing all nine soldiers on board, a general said on Thursday.

The helicopters — variants of the Black Hawk designed for medical evacuation — were taking part in a routine training mission the night before when the crash occurred, Brigadier General John Lubas told a news conference.

It “resulted in the death of all nine service members aboard the aircraft,” all of them members of the 101st Airborne Division, which is based at Fort Campbell in Kentucky, he said.

Five soldiers were on one helicopter and four on another, Lubas said, noting that the military is still working to notify all the families of those killed.

The helicopters — which were flying in formation with the pilots using night vision goggles — were able to land in an open field across from a residential area, avoiding deaths or injuries on the ground, he said.

With an investigative team heading to Fort Campbell from the base where US Army Aviation is headquartered in Alabama, it was still unknown whether the two helicopters collided.

“We have a safety team coming … from Fort Rucker, Alabama who specialise in aircraft safety and specifically these investigations,” Lubas said.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear mourned the lost soldiers and praised those who responded to the crash.

“We are blessed to live in the freest country in the history of planet Earth. But we must remember that that freedom relies on those who are willing to serve, some of which pay the ultimate price,” the governor told the news conference.

‘Just disappeared’

“We’re going to do what we always do. We’re going to wrap our arms around these families. We’re going to be there with them, not just for the days but the weeks and the months and the years to come,” Beshear said.

MSNBC quoted a local resident who witnessed the crash.

“Two helicopters just disappeared out of the sky. There was a large flash,” Nick Tomaszewski said, adding that another helicopter circled the area for about 30 minutes before ambulances arrived.

There have been multiple crashes of US military aircraft in recent years, including another involving a Black Hawk that killed two Tennessee National Guardsmen during a training flight Alabama in February.

Four US Marines were killed during Nato exercises in Norway last year when their V-22B Osprey aircraft went down, possibly after hitting a mountain, investigators said.

And two US Navy pilots were rescued after their T-45C Goshawk jet crashed during a training exercise in a residential neighborhood near Fort Worth, Texas in 2021. The pilots ejected before the plane went down.

The 101st Airborne Division is the US Army’s only air assault division.

Nicknamed the “Screaming Eagles,” it was activated in August 1942 and gained renown during World War II in the D-Day landings and the Battle of the Bulge. More recently the division has seen action in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Courtesy: Dawn News/AFP/Agencies

WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced new funding to bolster democracies around the world amid criticism his administration has made little progress in advancing human rights and democracy as a focus of its foreign policy.

Biden announced he planned $690 million in funding to help fight corruption, support free and fair elections and advance technologies that support democratic governments at a second White House-led Summit for Democracy.

He announced over $400 million for similar programmes in 2021 when he last held such an event.

“We’re turning the tide here. As we often say, we’re at an inflection point in history here, when the decisions we make today are going to affect the course of our world for the next several decades for certain,” Biden said.

US President Joe Biden (left) delivers remarks while hosting the Summit for Democracy Virtual Plenary session with Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington on Wednesday.—AFP

Rights advocates say there is little evidence the countries joining the summit have made progress on improving their democracies, and that there is no formal mechanism to hold participants to the modest commitments made at the first meeting even as Biden and South Korea announced plans to host a future third summit.

Freedom House said this month that global freedom had declined for the 17th consecutive year, but there are signs the tide is turning, said Katie LaRoque, the monitoring group’s deputy director for policy and advocacy, explaining that while 35 countries scores declined in Freedom House’s annual rankings, 34 countries improved.

Out of the countries that participated in the first Summit for Democracy, 77 countries’ scores remained the same in 2022, 17 declined and only 16 improved.

In addressing the summit on Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu voiced confidence that a political compromise could be reached on the judicial reforms, which he argued could be reconciled with civil liberties even as his opponents have accused him of seeking to curb judicial independence.

He called Biden “a friend of 40 years”. “Israel and the United States have had their occasional differences, but I want to assure you that the alliance between the world’s greatest democracy and the strong, proud and independent democracy — Israel — in the heart of the Middle East, is unshakable. Nothing can change that,” Netanyahu said.

Addressing foreign critics, Netanyahu promised that Israel “was, is and will always remain a proud, strong and vibrant democracy as a beacon of liberty and shared prosperity in the heart of the Middle East”.

Biden on Tuesday warned that Israel “cannot continue down this road” and called on Netanyahu to reach a compromise, while calling himself a “strong supporter” of Israel.

The summit is co-hosted by the governments of Costa Rica, the Netherlands, South Korea and Zambia. The event involves 120 countries including Taiwan, civil society groups and technology companies.

1- Header image: US President Joe Biden (left) delivers remarks while hosting the Summit for Democracy Virtual Plenary session with Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington on Wednesday.—AFP

Courtesy: Dawn News/AFP

LONDON: The UK plans to temporarily house asylum seekers in disused military bases and could use ferries and barges in the future in a bid to reduce hotel bills, immigration minister Robert Jenrick announced on Wednesday.

He told MPs that the government planned to house “several thousand” asylum seekers at repurposed barracks buildings and portable buildings at two former Royal Air Force bases in southeast and eastern England.

A separate site on private land in East Sussex in southeast England will also be used, Jenrick added.

The government is also exploring the “possibility of accommodating migrants in vessels” such as ferries and barges as it looks to reduce a $2.8 billion annual bill for hotel accommodation.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has made stopping illegal crossings of the Channel one of his priorities, and Jenrick said the prospect of hotel accommodation was a draw for those making the dangerous journeys.

“These hotels take valuable assets from communities and place pressures on local public services,” he told MPs, adding “we must not elevate the wellbeing of illegal migrants above those of the British people”.

“Accommodation for migrants should meet their essential living needs and nothing more, because we cannot risk becoming a magnet for the millions of people who are displaced and seeking better economic prospects,” the minister said.

But the plans face opposition from charities, who branded the accommodation “grossly inadequate”, and the Labour Party, whose shadow interior minister Yvette Cooper

The government also appears set to encounter legal challenges on using the airfields from local councils run by their own Conservative party.

1- Header image: WETHERSFIELD: A board reads “Stop asylum centre” at the entrance of this village where the British government plans to house asylum seekers at a former air base.—AFP

Courtesy: Geo News/AFP

• Greek police arrested two young Pakistanis of Iranian origin Tuesday.
• Men were allegedly planning attacks on Israelis in Athens.
• Israel accused Tehran of being behind the plot.

ATHENS: Iran’s embassy in Greece on Wednesday denied any connection to an alleged plot for anti-Semitic attacks in Athens using Pakistanis of Iranian origin.

“The embassy of the Republic of Iran strongly denies the rumours spread by Zionist sources and their baseless accusations against Iran,” it said on Twitter.

“It is obvious that their fabricated scenarios are intended to divert the public’s attention from their internal crisis.”

Greek police on Tuesday said they had arrested two young Pakistanis of Iranian origin who were planning attacks on areas frequented by Israelis in central Athens.

The source said that the men had targeted a building which houses a Jewish restaurant and a prayer centre.

Police spokeswoman Constantia Dimoglidou told AFP the “mastermind” of the cell is “a Pakistani who lives outside Europe”.

A police source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the person lived in Iran.

Israel accused Tehran of being behind the plot and said its national intelligence agency Mossad had helped avert an attack.

“After the investigation of the suspects in Greece, the Mossad helped untangle the intelligence of the network, its operational methods and ties to Iran,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said.

“As part of the investigation, it emerged that the infrastructure in Greece was part of a broad Iranian network, operated from Iran toward many countries,” a statement said.

Some Greek reports have cast doubt on the case, noting that the Pakistani suspects were farm labourers detained in February for lacking residency papers.

“Olive grove ‘terrorists’,” read a headline in the leftist daily Efsyn.

The two suspects will be taken before a prosecutor on Friday.

The announcement came as Greece’s under-fire prime minister announced elections would be held on May 21, as popular anger seethes over government failures blamed in last month’s train tragedy that killed 57 people.

Greece’s intelligence agency EYP has also faced pressure in past months over a wiretapping scandal that erupted last year.

Earlier in March, the Greek intelligence agency hailed as a “success” the discovery of an alleged Russian spy after she had already fled the country.

Courtesy: Geo News/CNN

The conviction of Adnan Syed, who spent more than 20 years in prison for the alleged 1999 murder of his ex-girlfriend Hae Min Lee and whose case was covered by the podcast “Serial,” was upheld by a Maryland appellate court on Tuesday.

By a vote of 2-1, the appellate court ruled that the lower court had violated Young Lee, the victim’s brother’s right to be present at a crucial hearing.

The 41-year-old was imprisoned for life when he was 19. The Baltimore man was accused of murdering his ex-girlfriend Hae Min Lee and hiding her body in the woods in 1999.

Adnan Syed spent more than 20 years in prison for the alleged 1999 murder of his ex-girlfriend Hae Min Lee.

This is the same case that was diinscussed in the true-crime podcast “Serial” after which the show became a hit.

In October, the prosecutors requested the court to reject the man’s conviction saying that a year-long review reveal two more suspects, reported the BBC.

1- Header image: Adnan Syed, 41, was imprisoned for life when he was 19.— CNN

Courtesy: Dawn News/AFP/Reuters