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Indian PM Modi to meet CEOs as Washington visit concludes

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Indian PM Modi to meet CEOs as Washington visit concludes


WASHINGTON, June 23 (Reuters) – Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will meet U.S. and Indian business leaders in Washington on Friday, the final day of a state visit marked by pledges of deeper U.S.-India cooperation on areas including space, artificial intelligence and quantum computing.

President Joe Biden rolled out the red carpet for Modi on Thursday, declaring after about 2 -1/2 hours of talks that their countries’ economic relationship was “booming.” Trade has more than doubled over the past decade.

Modi will continue talks with top U.S. officials during a lunch at the State Department with Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Asian American to hold the No. 2 position in the White House, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

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The Indian leader, who has appealed to global companies to “Make in India,” will then address business leaders at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts.

The CEOs of top American companies, including FedEx (FDX.N), MasterCard (MA.N) and Adobe (ADBE.O), and representatives of Indian companies such as Tech Mahindra (TEML.NS) and Mastek (MAST.NS) are expected to be among the 1,200 participants.

Modi, who touted “a new chapter” in the countries’ “strategic partnership” at the White House on Thursday, is seeking to position India, the world’s most populous country at 1.4 billion and its fifth-largest economy, as a manufacturing and diplomatic powerhouse.

Washington wants Delhi to be a strategic counterweight to China, and deals announced this week included several investments from U.S.-firms aimed at spurring semiconductor manufacturing in India and lowering its dependence on China for electronics.

The White House also announced plans to cooperate on quantum computing, scientific research and technological innovation, alongside plans to manufacture weapons in India.

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Some political analysts question India’s willingness to stand up to Beijing over Taiwan and other issues, however. Washington has also been frustrated by India’s close ties with Russia while Moscow wages war in Ukraine.

Addressing the U.S. Congress on Thursday, Modi repeated his statement that “this is not an era of war” and called for “dialogue and diplomacy” to end the conflict.

On Friday evening, Modi will address members of the Indian diaspora, many of whom have turned out at events during the visit to enthusiastically fete him, at times chanting “Modi! Modi! Modi!” despite protests from others.

Activists have called for the Biden administration to publicly call out what they describe as a deteriorating human rights situation in India under Modi, citing allegations of abuse of Indian dissidents and minorities, especially Muslims.

Biden said he had a “straightforward” discussion with Modi about issues including human rights, but U.S. officials emphasize that it is vital for Washington’s national security and economic prosperity to engage with a rising India.

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Asked during a rare press conference on Thursday what he would do to improve the rights of minorities including Muslims, Modi insisted “there is no scope for any discrimination” in his government.

Reporting by Simon Lewis; Editing by Don Durfee and Grant McCool

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.



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Dispatches from history: Western Washington County May 15, 1924 – Banks Post

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Dispatches from history: Western Washington County May 15, 1924 – Banks Post


In this column, we take a look back one hundred years ago in western Washington County. This week, the clips come from the Washington County News-Times and the Hillsboro Argus, published May 15, 1924.

We also have a very special feature this week: A Sanborn Fire Insurance Map, hand lettered with the names of businesses and buildings in and around Banks in September 1921. View the images below, but the absolute best way to view them is to scroll down and click on the link below each map, which will take you to a zoomable image hosted at the Library of Congress. Their website is clearly more robust than mine, which refused to host the original size file, so I had to shrink the size a bit.


These news clips are selected for relevancy for the geographic area our newspaper covers, and occasionally include areas in Forest Grove (a shopping, business, and transportation hub at the time) and Hillsboro (the county seat) for news events that I believe would have been of significance to rural readers of the time. They are presented as-is, and without comment. At the time, the newspapers of the day often expressed viewpoints that today would be considered racist, xenophobic, and sexist, frequently using slurs to describe ethnic groups and often stepping outside the norms of what we consider to be ethical journalism today.

Want more local history? Visit the Banks Historical Society online at www.bankshistory.org for Banks-area history, and Friends of Historic Forest Grove, which often works in the Gales Creek area, online at www.fhfg.org.

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View the full size map here.

View the full size map here.

View the full size map here.

View the full size map here.



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Chas Hundley is the editor of the Banks Post and sister news publications the Gales Creek Journal and the Salmonberry Magazine. He grew up in Gales Creek and has a cat.

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San Antonio one step closer to possible direct flight to Washington, DC

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San Antonio one step closer to possible direct flight to Washington, DC


SAN ANTONIO – It’s been a long time coming, but it appears that San Antonio may finally get a nonstop flight to the nation’s capital.

The US House on Wednesday approved the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) bill, which will create five new roundtrip flights to Reagan National Airport (DCA). The US Senate approved the bill last week.

Once President Joe Biden signs the bill into law, American Airlines will submit an application to the U.S. Department of Transportation to initiate service from SAT to DCA. The awarding of those five flight slots will be made 60 days after the signing of the bill.

“We have been working for more than a decade to give residents of America’s seventh-largest city the same access to our nation’s leaders as nearly every other major city in the country,” San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg said. “I am grateful for the hard work of Senator Cruz and our entire congressional delegation and look forward to Secretary Buttigieg’s approval of America’s application to initiate nonstop service from Military City USA to DCA.”

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A nonstop flight between San Antonio and Reagan National will save the military and its partners more than 500,000 man-hours annually, a news release said. Additionally, San Antonio is home to the largest concentration of intelligence and cybersecurity professionals outside of the national capital region.

Currently, there are no direct flights from SAT to DCA, requiring San Antonio travelers to make connections through other airports or take ground transportation from Dulles International Airport or Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport to Washington, D.C., adding both time and costs to their itineraries. San Antonio has repeatedly been blocked in its efforts to get direct flights from DCA, putting it at a competitive disadvantage, a news release said.

American Airlines’ nonstop service would increase competition for Texas consumers by adding a fourth carrier flying from SAT to a third different airport in the DC/Maryland/Virginia region and providing connectivity to numerous other airports in the Northeast United States via American’s hub at DCA. Based on the number of daily passengers currently traveling each way between the two airports, DCA is one of the largest unserved markets from SAT.

“I am thrilled that the City of San Antonio is now positioned to directly access our nation’s capital with a non-stop flight into Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport,” said US Sen. Ted Cruz, who worked with the chair of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee to get the bill passed. “By working together, we overcame fierce opposition to my bipartisan provision expanding long-haul flights to Reagan National. “I will be pressing the U.S. Department of Transportation to swiftly approve applications for the five long-haul flights that I successfully included in this year’s FAA reauthorization bill and look forward to being on the first direct San Antonio-Reagan National flight later this year.”

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Copyright 2024 by KSAT – All rights reserved.



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Delays across George Washington Bridge as NYPD monitors bridges for protests

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Delays across George Washington Bridge as NYPD monitors bridges for protests


NEW YORK (WABC) — There are major delays on the George Washington Bridge on Wednesday morning as police are monitoring what is expected to be a heavy protest day.

Port Authority has one lane closed in both directions, leading to delays up to an hour inbound.

This is breaking news. This story will be updated as more information becomes available.

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