Joe Biden has pledged “additional military capabilities” for NATO’s easternmost members, Lithuania’s presidential advisor has revealed after talks between the US president and regional leaders.
The US president held phone talks with the leaders of the Bucharest Nine group on Thursday. The organization brings together eastern European countries, including Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Bulgaria.
During the talks, that lasted some 45 minutes, the US leader pledged “additional military capabilities” for the region’s NATO members, Asta Skaisgiryte, foreign policy adviser for Lithuania’s president, told reporters.
“He said additional reassurance elements are possible in these countries, and additional military capabilities,” the official said, adding that the US leader has not elaborated on a possible location or exact details on the additional NATO military buildup.
“No country was specifically named. However, it can be understood that it is in the eastern flank of NATO,” she stated.
The US president also briefed the Bucharest Nine leaders on his talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, that largely revolved around Ukraine. Biden also assured the region’s leaders that he would never make any deals involving the eastern European countries behind their backs, according to Skaisgiryte.
The US president told the leaders that “nothing has been said about you without you,” the official added.
Dec 09 (IPS) – Plastic waste of all shapes and sizes permeates the world’s oceans. It shows up on beaches, in fish and even in Arctic sea ice. And a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine makes clear that the U.S. is a big part of the problem.
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Dec 09 (IPS) – As a feminist activist and defender of women’s rights in Iraq, I would like to share with you my growing concerns about the assassinations, kidnappings, assaults, threats of assassination against and defamation of feminist activists and human rights defenders, which they have faced especially during the popular protests in October 2019–2020, all of which have occurred with impunity.Read the full story, “A Call to End the Cycle of Discrimination and Exclusion of Iraqi Womenâ€, on globalissues.org →find more fun & mates at SoShow now !
The White House wants to boost global commitments to human rights and fighting corruption. But as the summit convenes, American democracy itself is under pressure.
Scientists from Japan have said that ostrich antibodies allowed them to design glowing masks, which help to tell if a person has contracted the coronavirus.
The unusual detection method was developed by a team from the Kyoto Prefectural University, Kyodo News reported.
Researchers injected ostriches with an inactive and non-threatening form of the coronavirus, and extracted antibodies from the eggs they laid.
They then sprayed fluorescent dye with antibodies onto a special filter that is placed inside the mask. The filter glows under UV light when the virus is present.
After monitoring 32 infected people for 10 days, researchers saw that all the masks they wore were glowing, with the glow fading over time as their viral load decreased.
The university president and the project’s leader, Yasuhiro Tsukamoto, was quoted as saying that he himself found out that he had Covid-19 after wearing one of the experimental masks.
Tsukamoto’s team plans to expand the experiment to 150 participants and receive the government’s approval to sell their masks next year. “We can mass-produce antibodies from ostriches at a low cost. In the future, I want to make this into an easy testing kit that anyone can use,” Tsukamoto said.
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Dec 09 (IPS) – As a feminist activist and defender of women’s rights in Iraq, I would like to share with you my growing concerns about the assassinations, kidnappings, assaults, threats of assassination against and defamation of feminist activists and human rights defenders, which they have faced especially during the popular protests in October 2019–2020, all of which have occurred with impunity.
