U.S. President Joe Biden faces physical and political isolation as he deals with COVID and as more Democrats urge him to step aside as the party’s nominee. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara reports.
…

Though America has seen a number of political parties throughout its history, the two-party system of Democrats and Republicans still dominates the political process.
…

LOS ANGELES — Bob Newhart, who fled the tedium of an accounting job to become a master of stammering, deadpan humor as a standup comedian and later as a U.S. television sitcom star, died on Thursday at the age of 94, his publicist said.

Newhart died at his home in Los Angeles after a series of short illnesses, said his longtime publicist, Jerry Digney.

Newhart had two hit shows — first playing a psychologist on “The Bob Newhart Show” from 1972 to 1978, and then portraying a Vermont innkeeper on “Newhart” from 1982 through 1990. In both shows he relied on a bland, cardigan-clad everyman character who is confounded by the oddball people around him.

Newhart was nominated for Emmy Awards nine times, beginning in 1962 for writing on his short-lived variety show, but he did not win until 2013 when he was given the award for a guest appearance on “The Big Bang Theory.”

Newhart’s career began in the late 1950s, with a comedy routine in which he played straight man to an unheard voice on the other end of a telephone call. Tommy Smothers of the Smothers Brothers duo called Newhart “a one-man comedy team” because of his dialogues with invisible partners.

His 1960 live album, “The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart,” was a big hit that was also highly influential. It became the first comedy album to top the charts and earned him three Grammy awards.

Newhart’s characters had a trademark stammer, which he said was not an act but the way he really talked. He said a TV producer once asked him to cut down on the stammer because it was making the shows run too long.

“‘No,’ I told him. ‘That stammer bought me a house in Beverly Hills,'” Newhart wrote in his memoir, “I Shouldn’t Even Be Doing This!”

He ended his “Newhart” show in 1990 with an episode regarded as one of the most unique in the annals of U.S. television. In the last scene of the series, he awakens in bed with his wife from the first series after “dreaming” his life in the second series.

Newhart sprung from an era of angry, edgy standup comics such as Lenny Bruce, Shelley Berman and Mort Sahl, but his act was subtly subversive, without the profanity or shock used by his contemporaries.

He exploited his hesitant, bashful ordinariness to skewer society in his own fashion — including sketches about how a publicity agent would “handle” Abraham Lincoln or one featuring an inept official on the phone with a frantic man trying to defuse a bomb.

In the late 1950s, Newhart had a boring accounting job — in which he claimed that his credo was “that’s close enough” — and began writing comedy sketches with a colleague as a diversion.

Those led to radio performances and eventually a record deal with Warner Bros.

“Probably the best advice I ever got in my life was from the head of the accounting department, Mr. Hutchinson, I believe, at the Glidden Company in Chicago, and he told me, ‘You really aren’t cut out for accounting,'” Newhart told an interviewer.

Before winning an Emmy in 2013, Newhart had been nominated three times for his acting on “Newhart,” once for writing on his 1961 variety show and twice for appearances on other shows. He also was a frequent guest on variety shows and talk shows.

He appeared in several movies, including “On a Clear Day You Can See Forever,” “Catch-22” and “Elf.”

In 2002, he was awarded the Kennedy Center’s Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. Asked by the New York Times in 2019 whether he felt 90 years old, Newhart said, “My mind doesn’t. I can’t turn it off.”

Newhart was introduced by comedian Buddy Hackett to his future wife, Virginia, whom he married in 1964. The Newharts had four children.
…

WASHINGTON — The United States issued Yemen-related counterterrorism sanctions on Thursday targeting individuals and entities linked to Houthi financial facilitator Sa’id al-Jamal.

The Treasury Department said the actions affected a dozen people and vessels, including Indonesia-based Malaysian and Singaporean national Mohammad Roslan Bin Ahmad and China-based Chinese national Zhuang Liang, “who have facilitated illicit shipments and engaged in money laundering for the network.”
…

…

ROME — The U.S. military is celebrating a little-known part of World War II history, honoring the Japanese-American U.S. Army unit that was key to liberating parts of Italy and France even while the troops’ relatives were interned at home as enemies of the state following Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. 

Descendants of the second-generation “Nisei” soldiers traveled to Italy from around the United States – California, Hawaii and Colorado – to tour the sites where their relatives fought and attend a commemoration at the U.S. military base in Camp Darby ahead of the 80th anniversary Friday of the liberation of nearby Livorno, in Tuscany. 

Among those taking part were cousins Yoko and Leslie Sakato, whose fathers each served in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, which went onto become the most decorated unit in the history of the U.S. military for its size and length of service. 

“We wanted to kind of follow his footsteps, find out where he fought, where he was, maybe see the territories that he never ever talked about,” said Yoko Sakato, whose father Staff Sgt. Henry Sakato was in the 100th Battalion, Company B that helped liberate Tuscany from Nazi-Fascist rule. 

The 442nd Infantry Regiment, including the 100th Infantry Battalion, was composed almost entirely of second-generation American soldiers of Japanese ancestry, who fought in Italy and southern France. Known for its motto “Go For Broke,” 21 of its members were awarded the Medal of Honor. 

The regiment was organized in 1943, in response to the War Department’s call for volunteers to form a segregated Japanese American army combat unit. Thousands of Nisei — second-generation Japanese Americans — answered the call. 

Some of them fought as their relatives were interned at home in camps that were established in 1942, after Pearl Harbor, to house Japanese Americans who were considered to pose a “public danger” to the United States. In all, some 112,000 people, 70,000 of them American citizens, were held in these “relocation centers” through the end of the war. 

The Nisei commemoration at Camp Darby was held one week before the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Livorno, or Leghorn, on July 19, 1944. Local residents were also commemorating the anniversary this week. 

In front of family members, military officials and civilians, Yoko Sakato placed flowers at the monument in memory of Pvt. Masato Nakae, one of the 21 Nisei members awarded the Medal of Honor. 

“I was feeling close to my father, I was feeling close to the other men that I knew growing up, the other veterans, because they had served, and I felt really like a kinship with the military who are here,” she said. 

Sakato recalled her father naming some of the areas and towns in Tuscany where he had fought as a soldier, but always in a very “naive” way, as he was talking to kids. 

“They were young, it must have been scary, but they never talked about it, neither him nor his friends,” Sakato said of her father, who died in 1999. 

Her cousin Leslie Sakato’s father fought in France and won a Medal of Honor for his service. “It was like coming home,” she said of the commemoration.
…

…

Republican Vice Presidential candidate J.D. Vance took center stage at the third night of the Republican National Convention Wednesday. Donald Trump’s running mate embraced an “America First” approach to foreign policy and security. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more from Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
…

MILWAUKEE — Introducing himself to the nation after being tapped as Donald Trump’s running mate, JD Vance is planning to use his Wednesday night address to the Republican National Convention to share the story of his hardscrabble upbringing and make the case that his party best understands the challenges facing struggling Americans.

The 39-year-old Ohio senator is a relative political unknown. In his first primetime speech since becoming the nominee for vice president, Vance is expected to talk about growing up poor in Kentucky and Ohio, his mother addicted to drugs and his father absent, and how he later went on to the highest levels of U.S. politics.

Vance, who rapidly morphed in recent years from a bitter critic of the former president to an aggressive defender, is positioned to become the future leader of the party and the torch-bearer of Trump’s “Make America Great Again” political movement, which has reshaped the Republican Party and broken longtime political norms. The first millennial to join the top of a major party ticket, he enters the race as questions about the age of the men at the top — 78-year-old Trump and 81-year-old Biden — have been high on the list of voters’ concerns.

Speaking earlier Wednesday, at his first fundraiser as Trump’s running mate, Vance said he will use the speech to highlight the contrast between Trump and Biden.

“The guy who actually connects with working people in this country is not Fake Scranton Joe, it’s Real President Donald Trump,” he said.

Vance was introduced at the fundraiser by Indiana Rep. Jim Banks, who said Trump’s decision to choose Vance wasn’t about picking a running mate or the next vice president.

“Donald Trump’s decision this week in picking JD Vance was about the future,” he said. “Donald Trump picked a man in JD Vance that is the future of the country, the future of the Republican Party, the future of the America First movement.”

Along with his relative youth, Vance is new to some of the hallmarks of Republican presidential politics: This year’s gathering is the first RNC that Vance has attended, according to a Trump campaign official who was not authorized to speak publicly.

Trump, who entered the arena to a version of the song “It’s a Man’s World” by James Brown and Luciano Pavarotti, will be watching from his family box.

Convention organizers had stressed a theme of unity, even before Trump survived an attempted assassination at a rally in Pennsylvania Saturday. Trump’s refusal to accept the results of the 2020 election and the subsequent attack on the U.S. Capitol, officials said, would be absent from the stage.

But that changed with former White House official Peter Navarro, who was greeted with enthusiastic cheers and a standing ovation hours after he was released from a Miami prison where he served four months for defying a subpoena from the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of the former president’s supporter.

“If they can come for me, if they can come for Donald Trump, be careful. They will come for you,” he said in a fiery speech. He compared his legal troubles to those faced by Trump, who earlier this year was convicted on 34 felony charges in his criminal hush money trial. Trump is also facing two indictments for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

“They did not break me,” Navarro said, “and they will never break Donald Trump.”

Also spotted on the floor of the convention: Paul Manafort, Trump’s 2016 campaign chair, who was convicted as part of the investigation into Russia’s meddling in that election.

Vance is an Ivy League graduate and former businessman, but gained prominence following the publication of his bestselling 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” which tells the story of his blue-collar roots. The book became a must-read for those seeking to understand the cultural forces that propelled Trump to the White House that year.

Still, most Americans — and Republicans — don’t know much about Vance. According to a new poll from the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, which was conducted before Trump selected the freshman senator as his choice, 6 in 10 Americans don’t know enough about him to have formed an opinion.

About 2 in 10 U.S. adults have a favorable view of him, and 22% view him negatively. Among Republicans, 61% don’t know enough to have an opinion of Vance. About one-quarter have a positive view of him, and roughly 1 in 10 have a negative one.

Vance will be introduced Wednesday night by his wife, Usha Chilukuri Vance. Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., who is a close friend of Vance, will also speak.

Beyond Vance’s prime-time speech, the Republican Party focused Wednesday on a theme of American global strength. Speakers were to include family members of service members killed during the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and someone taken hostage during the Oct. 7 attack in Israel, according to a person familiar with the program.

Republicans contend that the country has become a “global laughingstock” under Biden’s watch. The party that was once home to defense hawks and neoconservatives has fully embraced Trump’s “America First” foreign policy that redefined relationships with allies and adversaries.

Democrats have sharply criticized Trump — and Vance — for their positions, including their questioning of U.S. support for Ukraine in its defense against Russia’s invasion.

In a video released Wednesday by Biden’s reelection campaign, Vice President Kamala Harris dismissed Vance as someone Trump “knew would be a rubber stamp for his extreme agenda.”

“Make no mistake: JD Vance will be loyal only to Trump, not to our country,” Harris says in a video.
…

LOS ANGELES — A former Syrian military official who oversaw a prison where human rights officials say torture and abuse routinely took place has been arrested, authorities said Wednesday.

U.S. Department of Homeland Security agents took Samir Ousman al-Sheikh into custody last week at Los Angeles International Airport, said agency spokesperson Greg Hoegner.

The 72-year-old has been charged with immigration fraud, specifically that he denied on his U.S. visa and citizenship applications that he had ever persecuted anyone in Syria, according to a criminal complaint filed on July 9 and reviewed by The Associated Press. Investigators are considering additional charges against al-Sheikh, the complaint shows.

He was in charge of Syria’s infamous Adra Prison from 2005 to 2008 under President Bashar Assad. Human rights groups and United Nations officials have accused the Syrian government of widespread abuses in its detention facilities, including torture and arbitrary detention of thousands of people, in many cases without informing their families about their fate. Many remain missing and are presumed to have died or been executed.

“This is the highest-level Assad regime official arrested anywhere in the world. … This is a really big deal,” said Mouaz Moustafa, executive director of the Syrian Emergency Task Force, a U.S.-based opposition organization.

Moustafa said Wednesday that one of his staff members, a former Syrian detainee, was first tipped off in 2022 by a refugee that there was “potentially a war criminal” in the United States. His organization alerted several federal agencies and began working with them to build a case against al-Sheikh.

Al-Sheikh’s attorney, Peter Hardin, called it a “simple misunderstanding of immigration forms” that has been politicized and said al-Sheikh “finds himself being made a pawn caught up in a larger international struggle.”

“He vigorously denies these abhorrent accusations,” Hardin said.

Investigators interviewed five former inmates at the Syrian prison, who described being hanged by their arms from the ceiling, severely beaten with electrical cables, and witnessing other prisoners being branded by hot rods, according to court documents. One inmate described how guards broke his back.

According to the complaint, al-Sheikh, a resident of Los Angeles since 2020, stated in his citizenship application that he had “never persecuted (either directly or indirectly) any person because of race, religion, national origin, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion” and “never been involved in killing or trying to kill someone.” This was false, as al-Sheikh persecuted political dissidents and ordered the execution of prisoners while he was head of Adra, the complaint states.

He began his career working police command posts before transferring to Syria’s domestic intelligence agency, which focused on countering political dissent, the complaint says. He later became head of Adra Prison and brigadier general in 2005. He also served for one year as the governor of Deir Ez-Zour, a region northeast of the Syrian capital of Damascus, where there were violent crackdowns against protesters.

He had purchased a one-way plane ticket to depart LAX on July 10, en route to Beirut, Lebanon, which shares a border with Syria, according to the complaint. After his arrest, al-Sheikh made his first appearance in Los Angeles federal court last Friday. He has family in the United States, including a daughter living in the Los Angeles area, according to the Syrian Emergency Task Force.

Syria’s civil war, which has left nearly half a million people dead and displaced half the country’s prewar population of 23 million, began as peaceful protests against Assad’s government in March 2011.

Other players in the war, now in its 14th year, have also been accused of abuse of detainees, including insurgent groups and the U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, which guard suspected and convicted Islamic State members imprisoned in northeastern Syria.

In May, a French court sentenced three high-ranking Syrian officials in absentia to life in prison for complicity in war crimes in a landmark case against Assad’s regime and the first such case in Europe.

The court proceedings came as Assad had begun to shed his longtime status as a pariah because of the violence unleashed on his opponents. Human rights groups involved in the case hoped it would refocus attention on alleged atrocities.
…

washington — American businessman and former diplomat Stephen Biegun says that while China is carefully and quietly watching the U.S. presidential election to avoid the appearance of taking sides, most of the Chinese counterparts that he speaks with say they want former President Donald Trump to be re-elected.  

“There is a certain fascination about him in China and a sense that unpredictability can also deliver outcomes that the Chinese want,” Biegun said in remarks at an Aspen Security Forum discussion Tuesday. “President Trump was not afraid to engage with the Chinese and he did so.”  

Biegun served as the U.S. deputy secretary of state and special representative for North Korea during the Trump administration. He is currently senior vice president of global public policy at Boeing Company.  

He was asked about what a second Trump presidency versus a second term for Joe Biden would look like on China policy. 

Both President Joe Biden and Trump have been tough on China. Trump has proposed that if elected, he would impose a general tariff of 10% on all foreign goods and increasing tariffs on goods from China to 60%.  

Biegun said that a bigger concern of a second Trump presidency in his view would be managing relations beyond China’s borders.  

Across-the-board tariffs are going to make it very difficult for “us to turn around and enlist those countries in a set of sensible policies on a coordinated basis that addresses our national concerns,” he said. 

Asked about the current U.S.-China relationship, Anja Manuel, former diplomat and executive director of the Aspen Strategy Group and the Aspen Security Forum,  said that regardless of who is elected, “no one is under any illusions that you’re going to have a positive upward swing” in U.S.-China relations. 

Manuel, who has worked for Democratic and Republican administrations, said Biden’s summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Woodside, California, late last year set a baseline for U.S.-China relations. 

“If there is a second Biden administration, I think you’ll have a lot of continuity,” Manuel said. “They’ve talked about managed competition and they’re handling it the way they are handling it. I think you’re going to see steady as she goes.” 

If Trump is re-elected, she said, U.S.-China relations will be a wild ride, noting that right now there seem to be widely different views from former members of the Trump administration and the former president. 

She said that on the one hand, people who once worked for Trump, such as his deputy national security adviser, Matt Pottinger, and former House Select Committee on China Chairman Mike Gallagher, have written that the United States must defeat China, not just manage competition with it. They made the argument in an article titled “No Substitute for Victory” in Foreign Affairs magazine. 

“And then you have Trump saying things like 60% tariffs. That’s probably not good for his base,” she said. 

Referring to an interview with the former president released Tuesday by Bloomberg Businessweek, she added that Trump’s comments on Taiwan also raise questions. 

“You have Trump, on the other hand, saying, well, Taiwan, they stole business and the semiconductor business from America, why should we protect them?” Manuel said. 

“If I were the Chinese, that would leave me to believe that he wouldn’t be as strong on the protection of Taiwan or, because he’s so unpredictable, that he might do something even more rash, so I don’t know if that’s a positive or negative. But boy, it’s going to be a wild ride.” 

In his response, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt focused on Trump’s campaign promise to impose a 60% tariff on products from China and a general tariff on all products from all other countries. 

“This would ultimately result in higher costs for those of you who shop at Walmart and those of you who shop at everywhere else,” Schmidt said.

Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.
…

Washington — Russia and China are edging ever closer to unleashing space-based weapons, a decision that could have far-reaching implications for America’s ability to defend itself, U.S. military and intelligence agencies warn.

Adding to the concern, they say, is what appears to be a growing willingness by both countries to set aside long-running suspicions and animosity in order to gain an edge over the United States.

“I would highlight … the increasing amount in intent to use counterspace capabilities,” said Lieutenant General Jeff Kruse, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency.

“Both Russia and China view the use of space early on, even ahead of conflict, as important capabilities to deter or to compel behaviors,” Kruse told the annual Aspen Security Forum on Wednesday. “We just need to be ready.”

Concerns about the safety of space surged earlier this year when House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner called for the declassification of “all information” related to what was described as a new Russian anti-satellite capability involving nuclear weapons.

More recently, Turner has warned that the U.S. is “sleepwalking” into a disaster, saying that Russia is on the verge of being able to detonate a nuclear weapon in space, which would impose high costs on the U.S. military and economy.

The White House has responded repeatedly that U.S. officials have been aware of the Russian plans, and that Moscow has not yet deployed a space-based nuclear capability.

It is a stance that Kruse reaffirmed Wednesday, with added caution.

“We have been tracking for almost a decade Russia’s intent to design the ability to put a nuclear weapon in space,” he said. “They have progressed down to a point where we think they’re getting close.”

The Russians “don’t intend to slow down, and until there’s repercussions, will not slow down,” he said.

Russian and Chinese officials have yet to respond to VOA’s requests for reaction to the latest U.S. accusations, but both countries have repeatedly denied U.S. criticisms of their space policies.

In May, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov dismissed U.S. concerns about Moscow trying to put nuclear weapons in space as “fake news.”

But the Chinese Embassy in Washington, while admitting there are some “difficulties” when it comes to China-U.S. relations in space, rejected any suggestion Beijing is acting belligerently in space.

“China always advocates the peaceful use of outer space, opposes weaponizing space or an arms race in space and works actively toward the vision of building a community with a shared future for mankind in space,” spokesperson Liu Pengyu told VOA in an email.

“The U.S. has been weaving a narrative about the so-called threat posed by China in outer space in an attempt to justify its own military buildup to seek space hegemony,” Liu said. “It is just another illustration of how the U.S. clings on to the Cold War mentality and deflects responsibility.”

Despite Beijing’s public posture, the Defense Intelligence Agency’s Kruse suggested Wednesday that China’s rapid expansion into the space domain is just as worrisome.

“They’re in multiple orbits that they did not used to be before,” he told the audience in Aspen, Colorado, warning that Beijing has already invested heavily in directed energy weapons, electronic warfare capabilities and anti-satellite technology.

“China is the one country that more so even than the United States has a space doctrine, a space strategy, and they train and exercise the use of space and counterspace capabilities in a way that we just don’t see elsewhere,” he said.

The general in charge of U.S. Space Command described the Chinese threat in even starker terms.

“China is building a kill web, if you will, in space,” said General Stephen Whiting, speaking alongside Kruse at the Aspen conference. 

“In the last six years, they’ve tripled the number of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance satellites they have on orbit — hundreds and hundreds of satellites, again, purpose built and designed to find, fix, track target and, yes, potentially engage U.S. and allied forces across the Indo-Pacific,” he said.

Whiting also raised concerns about the lack of clear military communication with China about space.

“We want to have a way to talk to them about space safety as they put more satellites on orbit,” he said, “so that we can operate effectively and don’t have any miscommunication or unintended actions that cause a misunderstanding.”
…

…

…

…

…

Milwaukee —  On the floor of the Republican National Convention Tuesday evening, vice presidential candidate JD Vance greeted and shook hands with excited delegates as he walked toward his seat.

It was a marked contrast from former President Donald Trump, who entered the hall a few minutes later and was separated from supporters by a column of Secret Service agents. His ear still bandaged after an attempted assassination, Trump closely hugged the wall. Instead of handshakes or hellos for those gathered, he offered fist pumps to the cameras.

The contrast underscores the new reality facing Trump after a gunman opened fire at his rally in Pennsylvania Saturday, raising serious questions about the agency that is tasked with protecting the president, former presidents and major-party candidates. Trump’s campaign must also adjust to a new reality after he came millimeters from death or serious injury — and as law enforcement warns of the potential for more political violence.

Trump campaign officials declined to comment on the stepped-up security and how it might impact his interactions going forward.

“We do not comment on President Trump’s security detail. All questions should be directed to the United States Secret Service,” said Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, whose agency oversees the Secret Service, said Monday that he could not discuss “specifics of the protection or the enhancements made, as they involve sensitive tactics and procedures. I can say, however, that personnel and other protective resources, technology, and capabilities have been added.”

The Secret Service had already stepped up Trump’s protection in the days before the attack following an unrelated threat from Iran, two U.S. officials said Tuesday. But that extra security didn’t stop the gunman, who fired from an adjacent roof, from killing one audience member and injuring two others along with Trump.

The FBI and Homeland Security officials remain “concerned about the potential for follow-on or retaliatory acts of violence following this attack,” according to a joint intelligence bulletin by Homeland Security and the FBI and obtained by The Associated Press. The bulletin warned that lone actors and small groups will “continue to see rallies and campaign events as attractive targets.”

Underscoring the security risks, a man armed with an AK-47 pistol, wearing a ski mask and carrying a tactical backpack was taken into custody Monday near the Fiserv Forum, where the convention is being held.

The attack has led to stepped-up security not only for Trump. President Joe Biden’s security has also been bolstered, with more agents surrounding him as he boarded Air Force One to Las Vegas on Monday night. Independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. also received Secret Service protection in the shooting’s wake.

Trump’s campaign has also responded in other ways, including placing armed security at all hours outside their offices in Florida and Washington, D.C.

Trump has already scheduled his next rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday. That’s where he will appear with Vance for their first event as a presidential ticket.

But the new posture complicates, at least for now, the interactions Trump regularly has with supporters as he signs autographs, shakes hands and poses for selfies at events and on airplane tarmacs.
…

The U.S. Republican Party put some of Donald Trump’s intra-party former foes briefly back in the spotlight on the second night of its nominating convention. VOA’s chief national correspondent Steve Herman was on the convention floor Tuesday and has details from Milwaukee.
…

WASHINGTON — A high-ranking U.S. official stressed Tuesday that the U.S.-South Korea alliance is a “nuclear alliance,” reinforcing the South Korean government’s description of the two allies, after the United States and South Korea signed new deterrence guidelines last week. 

Vipin Narang, U.S. acting assistant secretary of defense for Space Policy, told VOA’s Korean Service in an exclusive interview that “when we formally extend nuclear deterrence to our allies, it is a nuclear alliance, and South Korea is an example of that.”

Narang explained that it would be similar to what the United States has with the European allies through NATO. 

“NATO publicly says, for example, that so long as nuclear weapons exist, NATO will be a nuclear alliance. And the relationship with ROK, similarly, is a formal extension of U.S. nuclear,” he said, referring to South Korea with the abbreviated form of its official name, the Republic of Korea. “We commit to defend South Korea with all capabilities.” 

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said earlier on Tuesday in a Cabinet meeting that South Korea’s alliance with the United States has been upgraded to a “nuclear-based alliance,” adding that the U.S nuclear assets will now be “specially assigned to missions on the Korean Peninsula” under the newly agreed guidelines between the two allies. 

On Thursday, Yoon met U.S. President Joe Biden on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington, reaffirming their commitments to the Washington Declaration unveiled in 2023, which outlines the two countries’ commitment to engage in deeper dialogue and information sharing to strengthen nuclear deterrence efforts on the Korean Peninsula.

According to the joint statement released after the two leaders’ latest meeting, Biden reiterated that the U.S. commitment to extended deterrence to South Korea is backed by “the full range of U.S. capabilities, including nuclear.” 

In line with such a move, Narang, who co-chairs the Nuclear Consultative Group, a bilateral body set up by the United States and South Korea under the Washington Declaration, met his South Korean counterpart, Cho Chang Lae, in Washington last week and signed “the United States and Republic of Korea Guidelines for Nuclear Deterrence and Nuclear Operations on the Korean Peninsula.” 

The guidelines, according to the Department of Defense, provide principles and procedures to assist policymakers and military officials of both countries “in maintaining an effective nuclear deterrence policy and posture.”

Narang emphasized that the guidelines would help the Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG) evolve in accordance with the threats by the U.S.-South Korea alliance.

“The guidelines document is the not the end, it’s the beginning, and sort of sets up the NCG as an enduring body,” he said. “The NCG is a living body, and the work streams evolve with the threat environment and the capabilities, just as North Korea’s capabilities continue to expand and diversify.” 

However, he made it clear that only the U.S. president will be able to authorize the use and employment of U.S. nuclear weapons, while underscoring Washington and Seoul will be approaching the extended deterrence “as equal partners.”  

“We have extended deterrence relationships. We need conventional support from our allies,” he stressed. 

His remarks come amid growing skepticism in South Korea over the U.S. extended deterrence, especially after Russia and North Korea signed a defense pact, which indicated Moscow’s willingness to engage in full-fledged military cooperation with Pyongyang. 

An increasing number of South Korean people are calling for South Korea’s own nuclear weapons, arguing that the U.S.-ROK alliance’s existing deterrence strategy would not be enough to protect South Korea from the possible attacks from North Korea, if it joins hands with Russia. 

The acting assistant secretary of defense gave a strong warning against South Korea having its own nuclear weapons.

“It would be in violation of the NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty),” Narang said, adding that South Korea would probably face international sanctions. 

He also suggested that Seoul would be “an international pariah” and would become vulnerable to North Korea’s nuclear attacks during the time it is pursuing nuclear weapons. 

Experts in Washington remained cautious about what the new guidelines could mean for the extended deterrence for South Korea. 

“It shows that the United States is taking seriously South Korea as a partner in all aspects of defense,” said Scott Snyder, president of Korea Economic Institute of America.

Snyder told VOA’s Korean Service on Tuesday that the decision to employ a nuclear weapon should be made in a closely integrated manner between Seoul and Washington. 

“If it’s not integrated, the alliance will fail,” he said. 

He added that the decision will heavily depend on the U.S. inclination.  

Bruce Bennett, a senior defense analyst at the Rand Corporation, told VOA’s Korean Service on Tuesday that it is difficult to see the U.S.-South Korea alliance as a “nuclear alliance.” 

“If South Korea has been given a role in planning the nuclear options, yes, but the U.S. has been implying that that hasn’t occurred,” Bennett said. 

“If they are a nuclear alliance, then it ought to describe in what way it’s a nuclear alliance – is South Korea being included in planning how nuclear weapons will be used? That’s what President Yoon asked for. It’s not clear to me.” 
…

The corruption trial of U.S. Senator Robert Menendez ends with guilty verdicts on all charges against him. Aron Ranen reports from New York City.
…

…

Dubai, United Arab Emirates — Tehran remains open to resuming negotiations with Washington on restoring their participation in a nuclear agreement, Iran’s acting foreign minister told Newsweek magazine in an interview published on Tuesday.

Ali Bagheri Kani’s remarks come as he prepares to address the United Nations Security Council in New York.

The United States under President Donald Trump withdrew from in 2018 from the nuclear accord between Iran and six world powers, which restricted Tehran’s nuclear programs.

Indirect talks between the U.S. and Tehran to revive the deal have stalled. Iran is still part of the agreement, but it has decreased its commitments because of U.S. sanctions imposed on it.

Newsweek reported: “On the foreign policy front, he [Bagheri Kani] said that Tehran remained open to resuming negotiations with Washington toward restoring mutual participation in a nuclear deal.”

However, Iran also intended to foster its deepening ties with China, Russia and neighboring nations, it quoted him as saying. Iran will also call for greater action against Israel in view of the Gaza war, he said.

The Biden administration said last week the United States was not ready to resume nuclear talks with Iran under its new president.

Bagheri Kani became the acting foreign minister after foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian died in a helicopter crash along with Iran’s president Ebrahim Raisi in May.

Iranians then elected Masoud Pezeshkian as president, a moderate who said he will promote a pragmatic foreign policy and ease tensions with the powers involved in the 2015 nuclear pact.
…

WASHINGTON — The problems of rising poverty and decreasing productivity in Latin America will be on the agenda when the foreign ministers of 12 regional countries convene in Washington on Wednesday, a U.S. State Department official said. 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken aims during the talks to “tackle” those challenges and work toward making the Americas “the world’s most economically competitive region,” said Brian Nichols, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs. 

The ministers represent members of the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity, established two years ago to “achieve concrete results for the middle class, workers, and historically marginalized groups” by deepening economic integration and creating good paying jobs, Nichols said, speaking at a briefing this week. 

“Through this partnership, we will work together to build resilient supply chains, reinvigorate our region’s economic institutions, and invest in our workers, our infrastructure, and our strategic industries – whether through semiconductors or clean energy, or medical supplies or the critical minerals needed for our modern economy.” 

Nichols pointed out that the United States is Latin America’s largest trading partner and its largest source of foreign direct investment. In 2023, U.S. trade with Latin America and the Caribbean totaled over $1.1 trillion, and Mexico displaced China as America’s top trading partner.  

Nevertheless, he said “poverty rates are rising in Latin America, productivity has lagged, and income inequality remains a serious problem. The pandemic demonstrated to us and to our regional partners the importance of developing more diversified and reliable supply chains closer to home.” 

Lisa Kubiske, a former U.S. ambassador to Honduras and former deputy assistant secretary of state, said that in the past two years, the member nations have been able to close gaps in their free trade agreements and address structural issues that thwart broad-based economic growth. 

At a summit in November, she said, the leaders of the 12 countries directed their ministers to develop three tracks: trade, finance and foreign affairs. On the foreign affairs front, the group has engaged “on clean hydrogen, entrepreneurship, rule of law and transparency, smart agriculture, peaceful uses of space” and other issues, she told journalists at a briefing.  

The president of the Inter-American Development Bank and the deputy CEO of the Development Finance Corporation have been invited to a lunch with the ministers. There will also be two side events, one hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and another hosted by the Council of the Americas. 

The founding members of the group are Barbados, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, Peru, the United States, and Uruguay. Their leaders will meet again next year in Costa Rica.
…

…