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I'm VOA's Joe Ramsey with your worldwide news update.
A top White House official said Wednesday at least eight U.S. telecommunications firms in dozens of nations had been impacted by a Chinese hacking campaign. AP correspondent Haya Panjwani reports. Deputy national security adviser Anne Neuberger offered the new details about the breadth of the sprawling Chinese hacking campaign that gave officials in Beijing access to private texts and phone conversations of an unknown number of Americans. Neuberger shared the scope of the hack a day after officials issued guidance intended to help root out the hackers and prevent similar cyberespionage in the future. White House officials cautioned that the number of telecommunication firms and countries impacted could still grow. Haya Panjwani, Washington. Neuberger said the U.S. believes the hackers were able to gain access to communications of senior government officials and prominent political figures through the hack. The Chinese embassy in Washington on Tuesday rejected accusations that it was responsible. White House officials believe the hacking was regionally targeted and the focus was on very senior government officials. South Korea's opposition parties moved Wednesday to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol over the shocking and short-lived declaration of martial law that drew heavily armed troops to encircle parliament. AP correspondent Charles De Ledesma reports. Impeaching Yoon would require the support of two-thirds of parliament and at least six justices of the nine-member Constitutional Court would have to support it to remove him from office. The motion, submitted jointly by the main opposition Democratic Party and five smaller opposition parties, could be put to the vote as early as Friday. I'm Charles De Ledesma. This is VOA News. Conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices signaled on Wednesday their willingness to uphold a Republican-backed ban on the state of Tennessee on gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors in a major case that could affect other state laws. Reuters correspondent Jillian Kitchener reports. "... correcting court." Activists both supporting and opposing the rights of minors to receive gender-affirming medical care faced off outside the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday, while inside, the court heard a challenge to a Tennessee law banning the use of treatments such as puberty blockers and hormone therapy for patients under the age of 18 experiencing gender dysphoria. But some justices seemed unconvinced the law constituted a ban or that the court should weigh in. Here's conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh. "(It) seems that there are risks and benefits both ways here, so it's very hard to weigh those at least as the briefing has set out the issues." Tennessee's law is one of 24 such policies enacted by conservative state lawmakers across the country. Reuters correspondent Jillian Kitchener. New York City police officials say an American health care executive was fatally shot in the chest on Wednesday outside a hotel in New York. Reuters correspondent Alex Cohen has more. Police said the shooting happened in front of the Hilton in midtown Manhattan and Thompson was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital. "In midtown Manhattan early this morning, 50-year-old Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, was shot and killed in what appears, at this early stage of our investigation, to be a brazen targeted attack. This does not appear to be a random act of violence." The suspect fled on foot wearing a black face mask and a gray backpack. Reuters correspondent Alex Cohen. Cubans woke up to darkness on Wednesday as the Caribbean island's electrical grid collapsed, the latest in a string of nationwide blackouts. Reuters correspondent Olivia Zollino reports. The failure underscores the increasingly frail state of the country's grid, one that has fallen into disarray amid fuel shortages, natural disasters and economic crisis. Shortages in the country, including food, medicine, water and electricity, have made life increasingly unbearable and Cubans have fled in record-breaking numbers in the past three years. Cuba blames U.S. sanctions, which complicate financial transactions and the purchase of fuel for the crisis. Reuters correspondent Olivia Zollino. That wraps up this update, but the world and news never stop. For additional updates, visit our website, voanews.com. I'm Joe Ramsey, VOA News. |