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This is VOA news. I'm David Byrd in Washington.
After nearly two years of investigation, special counsel Robert Mueller has handed in his report on Russian interference in the 2016 election and any connection to President Donald Trump. AP's Ed Donahue has details. Before leaving the White House for Florida, President Trump used familiar words to try to discredit the report. "There was no collusion. There was no obstruction. Everybody knows it. It's all a big hoax. It's - I call it the witch hunt." And the president told Fox Business channel he doesn't even like the creation of the Mueller team. "I have a deputy, appoints a man to write a report on me, to make a determination on my presidency. People will not stand for it." The president called Robert Mueller a best friend to James Comey, who succeeded Mueller as FBI director. There is no evidence the two are close friends. Ed Donahue, Washington. The White House says that all Islamic State-held territory in Syria has been "100 percent" eliminated. But as AP correspondent Ben Thomas tells us, a few Islamic State fighters continue to battle [U.S. forces] U.S.-backed forces in the village of Baghuz. Linda Robinson at the RAND Corporation says it is a significant victory. "There has never been a terrorist organization that has claimed and held such a large swath of territory and effectively ruled." But U.S. officials say the Syrian Democratic Forces continue to battle a few remaining IS fighters holed up in tunnels and Robinson adds the group has already made the transition to an insurgency. "Well, we don't know is how violent it will be and whether the right measures will be taken to keep it from coming back." Tops among those measures, the creation of a ???whole force made up of locals and the political conditions to allow them to be effective. Ben Thomas, Washington. For more on these stories and the rest of the day's news, be sure to log on to our website voanews.com. This is VOA news. The United States hit Iran with some new sanctions on Friday. AP's Warren Levinson tells us what they were. The new American sanctions target 31 Iranian scientists, technicians and companies affiliated with the country's nuclear weapons program. They also subject anyone outside Iran doing business with the 31 to U.S. sanctions. Tehran agreed in 2015 to give up atomic weapons research and the International Atomic Energy Agency says it's abiding by their promise. But the U.S. pulled out of the accord and Washington claims a secret Iranian archive shows it preserved the results of its nuclear weapons research. The announcement comes with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on a visit to Lebanon where he is warning against the influence of the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah. I'm Warren Levinson. The United States also imposed sanctions on Venezuela's development bank, Bandes, one day after the Trump administration warned there would be consequences for the arrest of opposition leader Juan Guaidó's top aide. The U.S. Treasury said it was slapping the sanctions on the Banco de Desarrollo Económico y Social de Venezuela, including its subsidiaries in Uruguay and Bolivia. The sanctions freeze assets belonging to the bank and its subsidiaries and prevent U.S. citizens from any dealings with the Bandes. Guaidó, who invokes the constitution to assume the interim presidency in January, has accused the bank of being used by officials of embattled President Nicholás Maduro's government to steal funds. The announcement comes after Venezuelan authorities detained Guaidó's chief of staff, Roberto Marrero, on Thursday in a pre-dawn raid that sparked vows of reprisals from the United States. Aid agencies are scrambling to get life-saving aid to hundreds of thousands of survivors of Cyclone Idai in Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe. Lisa Schlein reports. WHO spokesman Christian Lindmeier says conditions in the temporary camps sheltering the displaced are squalid and ripe for disease outbreaks. "So, there is lack of safe drinking water and sanitation. (That) means there is a high risk of a cholera outbreak or other infectious diseases." The WHO has sent a team of experts to oversee the operation in Mozambique. It also has sent emergency medical supplies, including malaria treatments to cover the primary health care needs for 10,000 people for three months. Lisa Schlein, for VOA news, Geneva. A down day on Wall Street, with all three major indices finishing Friday's trading in negative territory. A Treasury Department report that the U.S. government posted a $234 billion deficit in February, its largest monthly deficit on record and a cooling in the manufacturing sector sent prices lower. For more, be sure to visit our website voanews.com. I'm David Byrd, VOA news. |