Category: 2. World

WASHINGTON: Democrats and Republicans pushed US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy’s Jr. on his recent vaccine policies and their stark contrast to President Donald Trump’s successful first-term pandemic initiative to speed vaccine development during a combative three-hour Senate hearing on Thursday.

Half a dozen heated exchanges focused on the details of his decision to fire Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Susan Monarez, who had started the job with Kennedy’s support only a month earlier.

Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, a physician who played a critical role in Kennedy’s confirmation, grilled him about the cancelation of $500 million in COVID vaccine contracts, while citing examples of doctors and cancer patients who have been unable to obtain the protection against the potentially deadly disease.

“I would say, effectively, we’re denying people vaccine,” concluded Cassidy.

“Well, you’re wrong,” Kennedy responded.

Cassidy, of Louisiana, praised Trump for having accelerated the development, manufacturing, and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines in 2020.

His line of questioning — mirrored by two other members of his and Trump’s party — underscored the tightrope Republicans critical of Kennedy needed to walk in order to push back against his vaccine policies without criticizing the president.

Cassidy asked Kennedy during the Senate Finance Committee hearing if he agreed with him that Trump deserved a Nobel Peace Prize for the COVID vaccine initiative, known as Operation Warp Speed. Kennedy said he did.

 

Why then had Kennedy said the vaccines killed more people than COVID? Cassidy asked. Kennedy denied making the statement, would not agree that the vaccines saved lives, and in a later exchange acknowledged the shots prevented deaths but not how many.

COVID vaccines in the first year of their use saved some 14.4 million lives globally, according to a study published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal.

Kennedy has also canceled $500 million in funding for research on the mRNA technology that yielded the most widely used COVID vaccines under Trump, which Cassidy characterized as denying people vaccines.

Republicans Thom Tillis of North Carolina and John Barrasso of Wyoming, who like Cassidy is a physician, adopted Cassidy’s tactic, as did Senate Democrats Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, Raphael Warnock of Georgia, where the CDC is headquartered, and Senator Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent who caucuses with Democrats.

The White House backed Kennedy, with Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt and Vice President JD Vance both defending him and Leavitt attacking Democrats in posts on X. Neither mentioned his Republican critics.

“Secretary Kennedy, in your confirmation hearings you promised to uphold the highest standards for vaccines. Since then, I’ve grown deeply concerned,” said Barrasso.

“The public has seen measles outbreaks, leadership in the National Institutes of Health questioning the use of mRNA vaccines, the recently confirmed Director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention fired,” the senator added.

 

Under fiery questioning from most Democrats and some Republicans, Kennedy defended the ousting of Monarez, adding that he might need to fire even more people at the agency.

Trump fired Monarez after she resisted changes to vaccine policy advanced by Kennedy that she believed contradicted scientific evidence, further destabilizing the already embattled agency.

In an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal on Thursday, Monarez said she had been directed to preapprove vaccine recommendations and fire career CDC officials, describing her ouster as part of a broader push to weaken US vaccine standards.

Kennedy said she lied and that he had never told Monarez she needed to preapprove decisions, but that he did order her to fire officials, which she refused to do.

“Secretary Kennedy’s claims are false, and at times, patently ridiculous. Dr. Monarez stands by what she said in her Wall Street Journal op-ed,” her lawyers said in a statement, adding that she was willing to repeat it under oath.

Calls for Kennedy’s resignation

Kennedy said the CDC during the COVID-19 pandemic had lied to Americans about mask wearing, social distancing, school closures and the ability of the vaccine to stop transmission.

“I need to fire some of those people and make sure this doesn’t happen again,” Kennedy said.

 

The CDC’s pandemic recommendations were based on past experience with virus transmission and what was known about the novel coronavirus at the time. By late 2021, with more real-world data, the CDC acknowledged the shots could not stop COVID infection and transmission, but were highly effective in preventing severe cases, hospitalizations and deaths.

Since taking the job, Kennedy has made a series of controversial changes to US vaccine policy, including narrowing who is eligible for COVID shots and firing all 17 expert members of a CDC vaccine advisory panel, choosing some fellow anti-vaccine activists to replace them.

Vaccination rates in the US have been on the decline. Florida on Wednesday said it plans to end all state vaccine mandates, including for students to attend schools. No senators asked Kennedy about the announcement in the hearing.

Criticism of Kennedy has intensified since Monarez’s firing, which triggered resignations of four CDC agency officials who cited anti-vaccine policies and misinformation pushed by him and his team. He revisited several issues after the hearing, posting four times on X to address questions and respond to accusations.

Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, the committee’s top-ranking Democrat, called for Kennedy’s resignation, as have Warnock, Sanders, and over 1,000 current and former health employees.

 

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Hugo Portes

Courtesy of Fernanda Pizol

‘A shining light’

The Asian Tea Group

US to bear the cost?

President Donald Trump will sign an executive order on Friday changing the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War, reverting to a moniker not used since the 1940s in line with his oft-expressed desire to pump up projections of US military might.

The plans to change the department’s name were described by a White House official on condition of anonymity ahead of the signing. The official said changes would include renaming the Pentagon’s briefing room the “Pentagon War Annex” and modifying the department’s website and signage. The plans were first reported by Fox News Digital.

In this photo released by Xinhua News Agency, from left Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto , Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un look out from Tiananmen Gate as they attend a military parade marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II at Tiananmen Square in Beijing on September 3, 2025.
| Photo Credit: AP

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned on Thursday that international recognition of a Palestinian state would create further complications, urging countries to hold back from such a move.

“We told all these countries, we told them all, we said if you guys do this recognition stuff, it’s all fake, it’s not even real, if you do it, you’re going to create problems,” Rubio said from Quito, where he met with President Daniel Noboa and his Ecuadorean counterpart.

“There’s going to be a response, it’s going to make it harder to get a ceasefire, and it may even trigger these sorts of actions that you’ve seen, or at least these attempts at these actions,” Rubio said, adding he would not opine on Israeli discussion of annexation of the West Bank but that it was not final.

“What I am going to tell you is it was wholly predictable,” he said.

“We told all these countries before they went out, and they did this… there wasn’t going to be a Palestinian state, because that’s not the way a Palestinian state is going to happen, because they have a press conference somewhere.

He also repeated his charge that the push to elevate the Palestinian Authority, which is based in the West Bank, emboldened rival Hamas in Gaza.

“The minute — the day — that the French announced the thing they did, that day, Hamas walked away from the negotiating table,” Rubio said.

French President Emmanuel Macron has called a UN summit for September 22, where he will recognise a Palestinian state, voicing exasperation at the dire humanitarian situation and what he sees as Israeli intransigence.

On Wednesday, Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called for annexation of swaths of the West Bank to “bury the idea of a Palestinian state” after countries including Belgium, Canada, and Australia joined the French push on statehood.

The United Arab Emirates — which took the landmark step of normalising relations with Israel in 2020 in the so-called Abraham Accords — quickly warned that annexation was a “red line” that would “severely undermine” the agreement, seen by both US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a legacy-defining achievement.

Trump has been an outspoken supporter of Israel in its relentless assault on Gaza that followed the unprecedented Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

Nepal has ordered internet service providers to block access to major social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and X, after the companies failed to comply with local registration rules — drawing criticism from media rights groups and raising concerns over censorship and free expression.

On Thursday, Nepal’s Ministry of Communication and Information Technology directed the Nepal Telecommunications Authority to instruct internet service providers to restrict access to 26 social media platforms altogether. The move followed a meeting of ministry officials earlier in the day.

Nepal has an internet penetration rate of over 90%, according to data from the Nepal Telecommunications Authority. Among social media users in the country, 87% use Facebook, followed by 6% on X and 5% on YouTube, the latest figures from web analytics firm Statcounter suggest.

The list of affected platforms includes Discord, Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, WeChat, Reddit, Snapchat, YouTube, and X. The decision follows an August 25 directive that gave foreign social media companies just seven days to register their operations in Nepal and assign a local contact person.

Media advocacy groups and civil society organizations have criticized the move. The decision would “seriously hinder journalists’ work and people’s access to news and information,” said the Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based nonprofit. The Federation of Nepali Journalists also condemned the measure, saying it “undermines press freedom and citizens’ right to information.”

Thursday’s decision comes weeks after Nepal’s Supreme Court upheld the government’s local registration requirement last month, ruling that it was aimed at curbing misinformation. However, the court did not explicitly order the government to ban platforms that failed to register, instead directing officials to “make appropriate legal arrangements immediately, within the framework of the law.”

Notably, TikTok and Russia’s Viber are among the social media apps not affected by the latest order; the government said these platforms have already followed the rules and registered themselves in the country.

“It is extremely troubling that Nepal has chosen to block access to entire social media and web services simply because they have not registered with the government,” said Raman Jit Singh Chima, Asia Pacific Policy director and Global Cybersecurity lead at Access Now. He compared the approach to “the architecture of censorship seen in the People’s Republic of China’s Great Firewall model of digital authoritarianism — a path wholly at odds with Nepal’s democratic aspirations and constitutional guarantees.”

Communication and Information Technology Minister Prithvi Subba Gurung told reporters that the government had given platforms ample time to register in Nepal and had made repeated requests, including to Meta, but they did not comply.

Meta, as well as Google and Snap, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Access to the platforms would be restored once they register in the country, according to a public notice (PDF) issued by the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology.

Chima argued that “Nepal should publish all blocking orders, restore access, and shift to a legislative process that narrows vague prohibitions and builds in due process, transparency and meaningful consultation.”

He added that without clear appeal or independent oversight, the directive gives the government “sweeping powers to suspend services, order removals, and deputise local ‘grievance’ and ‘self-regulation’ officers inside companies.”

“That invites over-blocking and pressure on companies to take down lawful content,” he continued.

Earlier this year, Nepal’s government faced public backlash over a proposed social media bill that is still pending approval. The legislation includes provisions for imprisonment and fines for posts “deemed against national sovereignty or interest.” The proposal “threatens to severely undermine press freedom and digital expression,” the International Federation of Journalists said.

Responding to early criticism of the proposed legislation, Minister Gurung said the government had “no intention of curtailing freedom of expression.”

However, the bill would also authorize the government to order social media platforms to remove certain posts, with noncompliance potentially resulting in fines.

A spokesperson for Nepal’s Ministry of Communication and Information Technology did not respond to a request for comment about the blocking decision.

• Rubio says it may trigger new strikes, could harden conflict lines.
• Avoids comment on Israeli annexation plans, calls them not final.
• US Secretary of State makes these remarks during Ecuador visit.

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The United States has told other countries that recognition of a Palestinian state will cause more problems, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Thursday.

“We told all these countries, we told them all, we said if you guys do this recognition stuff, it’s all fake, it’s not even real, if you do it, you’re going to create problems,” Rubio said from Quito, where he met with President Daniel Noboa and his Ecuadorean counterpart.

“There’s going to be a response, it’s going to make it harder to get a ceasefire, and it may even trigger these sorts of actions that you’ve seen, or at least these attempts at these actions,” Rubio said, adding he would not opine on Israeli discussion of annexation of the West Bank but that it was not final.

“What I am going to tell you is it was wholly predictable,” he said.

“We told all these countries before they went out, and they did this… there wasn’t going to be a Palestinian state, because that’s not the way a Palestinian state is going to happen, because they have a press conference somewhere.

He also repeated his charge that the push to elevate the Palestinian Authority, which is based in the West Bank, emboldened rival Hamas in Gaza.

“The minute — the day — that the French announced the thing they did, that day, Hamas walked away from the negotiating table,” Rubio said.

French President Emmanuel Macron has called a UN summit for September 22, where he will recognise a Palestinian state, voicing exasperation at the dire humanitarian situation and what he sees as Israeli intransigence.

On Wednesday, Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called for annexation of swaths of the West Bank to “bury the idea of a Palestinian state” after countries including Belgium, Canada, and Australia joined the French push on statehood.

The United Arab Emirates — which took the landmark step of normalising relations with Israel in 2020 in the so-called Abraham Accords — quickly warned that annexation was a “red line” that would “severely undermine” the agreement, seen by both US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a legacy-defining achievement.

Trump has been an outspoken supporter of Israel in its relentless assault on Gaza that followed the unprecedented Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.