AP News in Brief at 6:04 a.m. EDT
In Kenosha, Biden to test his promise to unify the nation
WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Campaigning for more than a year as a calming, unifying figure, Joe Biden faces the most intense test yet of his core pitch when he travels to Kenosha, Wisconsin, a city wrenched by police and protest violence that makes it a microcosm of the nation’s election-year reckoning with systemic racism.
The 77-year-old former vice president, traveling two days after President Donald Trump visited the same city, plans to meet Thursday with family of Jacob Blake, who remains hospitalized after being shot seven times in the back by a white police officer as authorities attempted to arrest him. Biden also plans a community discussion that he indicated would draw business figures, civic leaders and law enforcement officials.
“This is about making sure that we move forward,” Biden told reporters Wednesday. He added that he’s “not going to tell Kenosha what they have to do” but instead encourage a community to “talk about what has to be done.”
Falling exactly two months before Election Day, the trip presents Biden both opportunity and risks as he tests his promise, made again and again for 16 months, that he can “unify the country” and find consensus even where it’s not readily apparent. The approach always has been an intentional contrast with Trump, a president who thrives on conflict. But the distinction has sharpened over a summer of nationwide protests — most peaceful, but some of them, as in Kenosha, turned violent and destructive.
Biden is a white man propelled to the Democratic nomination by Black voters. Since the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man killed by a white Minneapolis police officer, Biden has called for an overhaul of U.S. policing and embraced a national conversation on racism. The significance of the moment was a factor in Biden selecting California Sen. Kamala Harris as the first Black woman to join a major party presidential ticket.
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Video in Black man's suffocation shows cops put hood on him
A Black man who had run naked through the streets of a western New York city died of asphyxiation after a group of police officers put a hood over his head, then pressed his face into the pavement for two minutes, according to video and records released Wednesday by the man's family.
Daniel Prude died March 30 after he was taken off life support, seven days after the encounter with police in Rochester. His death received no public attention until Wednesday, when his family held a news conference and released police body camera video and written reports they obtained through a public records request.
“I placed a phone call for my brother to get help. Not for my brother to get lynched,” Prude’s brother, Joe Prude, said at a news conference. “How did you see him and not directly say, ‘The man is defenseless, buck naked on the ground. He’s cuffed up already. Come on.’ How many more brothers gotta die for society to understand that this needs to stop?"
The videos show Prude, who had taken off his clothes, complying when police ask him to get on the ground and put his hands behind his back. Prude is agitated and shouting as he sits on the pavement in handcuffs for a few moments as a light snow falls. “Give me your gun, I need it,” he shouts.
Then, they put a white “spit hood” over his head, a device intended to protect officers from a detainee's saliva. At the time, New York was in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic.
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In Breonna Taylor's hometown, 90-day protest becomes family
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Amber Brown had climbed into a city bus before dawn, had driven her eight-hour shift, and she was tired. But she knew she couldn’t go home.
Instead she headed down to “Injustice Square” -- a single city block that was until a few months ago an unremarkable Louisville park. Now it is the nucleus of the nation’s rage over the police killing of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor, an emergency medical technician shot dead when police burst into her home in the middle of the night.
“This is where I’ve got to be,” said Brown, part of a group that has kept vigil here every day for three months. “This is my moment, this is my space.”
They were here in this square before Oprah erected billboards all over town, before Taylor graced the cover of Vanity Fair magazine, before her name was proclaimed by the most famous celebrities and athletes and politicians in the world.
They arrived months ago to join the tens of thousands who took to the streets across the country to demand justice for Taylor and George Floyd, whose death under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer was captured on video and shocked the world. They were strangers to each other then, faces in a sea of humanity, unaware that their devotion to this square would soon tether them together.
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CDC tells states: Be ready to distribute vaccines on Nov. 1
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The federal government has told states to prepare for a coronavirus vaccine to be ready to distribute by Nov. 1.
The timeline raised concern among public health experts about an “October surprise" — a vaccine approval driven by political considerations ahead of a presidential election, rather than science.
In a letter to governors dated Aug. 27, Robert Redfield, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said states “in the near future” will receive permit applications from McKesson Corp., which has contracted with CDC to distribute vaccines to places including state and local health departments and hospitals.
“CDC urgently requests your assistance in expediting applications for these distribution facilities and, if necessary, asks that you consider waiving requirements that would prevent these facilities from becoming fully operational by November 1, 2020,” Redfield wrote.
He wrote that any waivers will not compromise the safety or effectiveness of the vaccine. The Associated Press obtained the letter, which was first reported by McClatchy.
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Afghans return to games, parks, weddings despite virus fears
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — When the bowling alley reopened, Zohal Bayat was eager to get back to the lanes. For four long months amid Afghanistan’s coronavirus, it and other recreational facilities had been closed. So that meant Bayat, a member of the country’s national women’s bowling team, had been unable to practice,
On top of that, Bayat was at one point struck with COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. She spent more than 20 days in isolation, with fever, shortness of breath and coughing. Her father was infected as well, but now both are well.
“I am so excited,” the 25-year-old Bayat said, as she practiced at the Friend’s Café, her favorite alley.
Still, she only comes on weekdays. Weekends are too crowded, as young people pack the place, which also features pool tables, music and the café itself. “I will continue to exercise,” said Bayat, who also plays basketball. “But I am afraid of the second wave of the virus.”
Desperate for relief from endless war combined with the pandemic, Afghans are rushing back to public recreation as the government eases the lockdown it imposed to fight the coronavirus. Since mid-July, Afghans can once again frequent parks, swimming pools and gyms, shop in malls and celebrate marriages in wedding halls. Universities and private schools have reopened, and at government schools, the 11th and 12th grades have restarted.
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Hurricane Nana nears Belize as residents brace for landfall
PUNTA GORDA, Belize (AP) — Hurricane Nana brushed past Honduras and barreled toward Belize, where thousands of people were stocking up on food, water and construction materials ahead of its landfall expected early Thursday.
Long lines stretched through supermarkets and hardware store shelves were nearly bare as residents of Belize bought materials to board up windows and doors.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center reported Wednesday night that Nana was located about 60 miles (95 kilometers) southeast of Belize City with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph (120 kph), making it a hurricane. The storm was moving at 16 mph (26 kph).
Belize issued a hurricane warning for its coastline. Heavy rains were expected in Belize, as well as in northern Honduras. Forecasters said Nana would weaken rapidly as it moved inland Thursday, drenching Belize and Guatemala.
Local leaders in rural villages in Belize's southernmost district of Toledo were awaiting word from the National Emergency Management Organization to open hurricane shelters.
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UK public tribunal to probe Uighur 'genocide' claims
LONDON (AP) — A prominent British human rights lawyer is convening an independent tribunal in London to investigate whether the Chinese government’s alleged rights abuses against Uighur Muslims in the far western Xinjiang region constitute genocide or crimes against humanity.
The tribunal is expected to reveal new evidence and testimony over several days’ hearings next year. While the tribunal does not have government backing, it is the latest attempt to hold China accountable for its treatment of the Uighurs and ethnic Turkic minorities, who have been subject to an unprecedented crackdown since 2017.
Barrister Geoffrey Nice, who previously led the prosecution of ex-Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic over the Balkans war and worked with the International Criminal Court, was asked by the World Uighur Congress to investigate “ongoing atrocities and possible genocide” against the Uighur people.
Allegations against China about potential genocide are “questions that should be asked and answered” but such claims have never been legally scrutinized in public, Nice told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Organizers are in the initial stages of gathering evidence, and expect to receive a substantial number of submissions from Uighurs exiled abroad over the next few months. New evidence that may emerge includes testimony from several former security guards who were involved in the Xinjiang detention camps.
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Portland protests set up clash between journalists, police
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — The beam of a police officer’s flashlight swept across a group of 15 people standing on the sidewalk in downtown Portland, Oregon, recording and taking photos of the nightly protests that have roiled the city for three months.
Most in the recent group wore helmets, reflective vests or shirts emblazoned with the word “PRESS” and had media badges dangling from their necks. But some were demonstrators, taking cover behind reporters despite orders to go home or face arrest.
“Hey,” an officer yelled at his colleagues as they cleared streets and arrested people who weren't leaving. “Half this group is not press. ... Purple mask isn’t press. Bicyclist not press. ... If they are not press, take them into custody.”
For nearly 100 days, reporters have been covering protests that often turn violent in Oregon’s largest city, and in the chaos, some journalists have been injured or arrested despite press freedoms laid out in the First Amendment. The clash also led to a lawsuit against federal authorities sent in to help local police in July.
Reporters — whether they're from major media outlets, freelancers or self-proclaimed “citizen journalists" — say they are doing their job and law enforcement is hindering that work. Police say protesters have masqueraded as journalists and then set fires or thrown fireworks, making it a struggle to figure out who is a real reporter during the pandemonium.
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Friends bring businesses to aid needy Bangladeshi people
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — When Bangladeshi authorities prepared to enforce a nationwide lockdown in late March, three friends fretted: How would rickshaw drivers, factory workers and other working poor people survive?
With only 20,000 takas ($236) in hand, their challenge was to channel resources from the generous haves to the desperate have-nots. They started making appeals for money.
The first response came from Bangladeshi cricket star Shakib Al Hasan who donated 2 million takas ($24,000). With that, they began distributing food packs in the impoverished neighborhoods in Dhaka.
Eventually, they succeeded in bringing about 120 organizations and business houses under one umbrella for their aid campaign, Mission Save Bangladesh. Their work has since expanded to helping families fighting cancer and to arranging supplies of masks and sanitizers.
“People are so generous! They responded to our calls from their hearts,” said Imran Kadir, who founded the campaign with friends Tajdin Hasan and Imtiaz Halim. Kadir spoke with The Associated Press as he and other volunteers visited a cancer hospital in Dhaka to distribute food packs.
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Tom Seaver, heart and mighty arm of Miracle Mets, dies at 75
NEW YORK (AP) — Tom Seaver transformed a franchise and captivated a city, setting enduring standards as he whipped his powerful right arm overhead for the Miracle Mets and dirtied his right knee atop major league mounds for two decades.
A consummate pro and pitching icon, he finished fulfilled after a career remembered with awe long after his final strikeout.
“It is the last beautiful flower in the perfect bouquet,” Seaver said on the afternoon he was inducted into baseball’s Hall of Fame.
Seaver, the galvanizing force who steered the New York Mets from National League laughingstock to a stunning World Series title in 1969, has died. He was 75.
The Hall said Wednesday night that Seaver died Monday from complications of Lewy body dementia and COVID-19. Seaver spent his final years in Calistoga, California.