Category: Світ

You may have heard the term “think tank,” which usually refers to a policy or research institute where scholars provide insight and advice on political, social or economic issues. Such institutions have been criticized in the past for their outsized influence on U.S. policy formulation. But there’s new research showing that, compared to previous administrations, …

In early January, Roy Jones was making $14 an hour, $5 above Nebraska’s minimum wage as a representative dealing with customers on social media for Marriott International Group, the international hotelier. For Jones, a 49-year-old Omaha resident, it was a dream job despite the bot-generated tweets that flowed unceasingly onto what he described as the …

Chef Rob Morasco didn’t set out to make a planet-friendly burger. But the 25 percent mushroom burger he created at food service company Sodexo not only has a lower carbon footprint, it’s also lower in calories, fat and salt. It’s juicier, too. “When you bite into it, it’s kind of like a flavor explosion,” Morasco …

A Mormon conference this weekend in Utah will usher in a new era of church leadership that comes as the faith grapples with heightened scrutiny about its handling of sexual abuse reports and one-on-one interviews between local lay leaders and youth. Church President Russell M. Nelson will preside over the twice-annual gathering for the first …

As part of the global coalition against Islamic State, the United States this week increased its special operations troops in the flashpoint town of Manbij in northern Syria. In an email Thursday to VOA, Col. Thomas F. Veale, a U.S. military spokesperson and public affairs director for the coalition, said the recent deployment is a …

Upon learning that New York taxicab veteran Nicanor Ochisor had hanged himself in his garage, Nigerian-native driver Emanuel Agbai was hardly at a loss for words. “I’m even surprised that there are no more drivers committing suicide or going on some sort of rampage at this time,” Agbai told VOA. “This business has been so …

An Orlando jury on Friday cleared the widow of the Pulse nightclub gunman of all charges in the massacre that killed 49 people, finding her not guilty of federal counts that she tried to mislead investigators and aided her husband in the attack. Noor Salman, 31, could have faced up to life in prison had …

The United States is on track to meet the targets of the Paris climate agreement despite President Donald Trump’s plan to withdraw from the accord, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Thursday. Guterres said emissions-cutting plans put in motion by American businesses, regional governments and cities meant that the goals set by the former U.S. administration, …

A committee of British lawmakers published written evidence on Thursday provided by a whistleblower who says information about 50 million Facebook users ended up in the hands of political consultancy Cambridge Analytica. Cambridge Analytica said the documents did not support whistleblower Christopher Wylie’s testimony to the committee this week. Wylie, who formerly worked for Cambridge …

A Los Angeles judge Thursday ordered coffee companies to abide by California state law and put cancer warning labels on their products. A nonprofit group called the Council for Education and Research on Toxics is suing such popular coffee roasters and retailers as Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts and McDonald’s. They say the companies fail to warn …

The White House has welcomed a meeting between North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and China’s Xi Jinping as a positive prelude to potential talks between Washington and Pyongyang. U.S. President Donald Trump however maintains that a maximum pressure campaign against North Korea will continue. Speaking with VOA’s Korean Service, an East-Asia expert says the visit …

It’s a double cosmic conundrum: Lots of stuff that was already invisible has gone missing. Astronomers have found a distant galaxy where there is no dark matter. Dark matter is called “dark” because it can’t be seen. It is the mysterious and invisible skeleton of the universe that scientists figure makes up about 27 percent …

The U.S. Justice Department has charged a former Minnesota FBI agent with leaking classified information to the online news site The Intercept, Minnesota Public Radio reported Wednesday. It said Terry Albury was charged this week by the department’s National Security Division with two counts including “knowingly and willfully” transmitting documents and information relating to national …

Current and former U.S. and British intelligence officers say the West’s collective banishment this week of 115 Russian “diplomats” will be far less damaging to Russian espionage operations than British Prime Minister Theresa May and American officials have argued. And they warn tit-for-tat expulsions the Kremlin is expected to order shortly will have much greater …

Last year, the United States lifted long-standing economic sanctions against Sudan. The sanctions included a trade embargo, a freeze on some government assets, and restrictions on Sudanese banks and the ability of foreign banks to do business with Sudan. But instead of revitalizing the economy, lifting the sanctions has highlighted a range of additional steps …

In the wake of the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland Florida, students launch the Never Again movement, demanding far stronger gun laws in the US. Just five weeks after the shooting, they organized the March for Our Lives, attended by an estimated one million people across the globe. As Sama …

When letters from the U.S. government last month summoned more than 1,000 Burmese refugees in the United States for official interviews, chatter spread across the immigrant community: Were the letters real? Did the refugees have to attend? What was the government trying to glean from meeting with refugees who were already in the country, in …

Authorities in the southern U.S. state of Louisiana on Tuesday cleared two white policemen of wrongdoing in the shooting death of a black man at close range after it was determined he was armed, as the officers said they had believed, as they struggled to arrest him. Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry said the facts …

The attorney general’s office in the western U.S. state of California is joining an investigation into the deadly police shooting of an unarmed African-American man to provide independent oversight. The announcement was made by the police chief of Sacramento, the capital city of California, where the shooting occurred. Chief Daniel Hahn said the partnership is …

Mexico and the United States have signed three accords to improve bilateral customs procedures and expedite the flow of agricultural produce across their almost 2,000-mile (3,220-kilometers) border, the two governments said on Monday. In a joint news conference with U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, Mexico’s Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray said the first agreement aimed …

Linda Brown, who as a young girl was at the center of the lawsuit that ended racial segregation in American schools, has died. Brown died Sunday in Topeka, Kansas. She was 76. Brown was 9 years old when her father, the Rev. Oliver Brown, sued the Topeka school board to allow his daughter to attend …

In her widely watched “60 Minutes” interview, porn star Stormy Daniels explained why she accepted a $130,000 payment she says was intended to keep her silent about her sexual encounter with Donald Trump in 2006.   Trump has denied the affair, through his representatives. But his lawyer, Michael Cohen, has said he paid Daniels $130,000 …

Washington is watching President Donald Trump’s makeover of his national security team to include more outspoken hardliners when it comes to America’s posture on the world stage. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports, days after nominating CIA director Mike Pompeo to become his new secretary of state, Trump tapped John Bolton, a former Bush administration diplomat known …

U.S. firearms and ammunition manufacturer Remington has filed for bankruptcy protection in order to reorganize its operations and put in place a debt reduction deal with its creditors. The company filed its petition for the so-called Chapter 11 bankruptcy Sunday, six weeks after announcing an agreement to reduce its $950 million in debts while transferring …

Music is changing lives in some American prisons, where guitars and songwriting are sparking creativity in inmates. Mike O’Sullivan reports from a state prison in Norco, California, about the music program Jail Guitar Doors. …

The 23-year-old Texan blamed for a deadly Austin bombing spree described himself as a psychopath and showed no remorse in a confession he taped before blowing himself up as police closed in to arrest him, a U.S. congressman said Saturday. Authorities had not previously disclosed details of the cellphone video in which Mark Conditt admitted …