Trump proposes green cards for foreign grads of US colleges, departing from anti-immigrant rhetoric

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks during a rally at Festival Park on June 18, 2024 in Racine, Wisconsin. (AFP)
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Updated 21 June 2024
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Trump proposes green cards for foreign grads of US colleges, departing from anti-immigrant rhetoric

  • A green card, also known as a permanent resident card, allows individuals to live and work permanently in the United States and is a path to citizenship

MIAMI: Former President Donald Trump said in an interview posted on Thursday he wants to give automatic green cards to foreign students who graduate from US colleges, a sharp departure from the anti-immigrant rhetoric he typically uses on the campaign trail.
Trump was asked about plans for companies to be able to import the “best and brightest” in a podcast taped Wednesday with venture capitalists and tech investors called the “All-In.”
“What I want to do and what I will do is you graduate from a college, I think you should get automatically as part of your diploma a green card to be able to stay in this country. And that includes junior colleges too, anybody graduates from a college. You go there for two years or four years,” he said, vowing to address this concern on day one.
Immigration has been Trump’s signature issue during his 2024 bid to return to the White House. His suggestion that he would offer green cards — documents that confer a pathway to US citizenship — to potentially hundreds of thousands of foreign graduates would represent a sweeping expansion of America’s immigration system that sharply diverges from his most common messages on foreigners.
Trump has blamed immigrants who are in the country illegally for committing crimes, stealing jobs and government resources, and suggested that they are “poisoning the blood of our country.” He has promised to carry out the largest deportation operation in US history if elected.
Trump and his allies often say they distinguish between people entering illegally versus legally. But during his administration, Trump also proposed curbs on legal immigration such as family-based visas and the visa lottery program.
Right after taking office in 2017, he issued his “Buy American and Hire American” executive order, directing Cabinet members to suggest reforms to ensure that business visas were only awarded to the highest-paid or most-skilled applicants to protect American workers.
He has previously said the H1-B program commonly used by companies to hire foreign workers temporarily — a program he has used in the past — was “very bad” and used by tech companies to get foreign workers for lower pay.
During the conversation with “All-In,” Trump blamed the coronavirus pandemic for being unable to implement these measures while he was president. He said he knows of stories of people who graduate from top colleges and want to stay in the US but can’t secure visas to do so, forcing them to return to their native countries, specifically naming India and China. He said they go on and become multibillionaires, employing thousands of workers.
“You need a pool of people to work for your company,” Trump said. “And they have to be smart people. Not everybody can be less than smart. You need brilliant people.”

 


Saudi doctors provide free eye surgery to hundreds of Sri Lankan patients

Updated 9 sec ago
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Saudi doctors provide free eye surgery to hundreds of Sri Lankan patients

  • Doctors conduct 500 cataract removal procedures in Walasmulla on the southeastern coast of Sri Lanka
  • Campaign will then move to the eastern city of Kattankudy, where another 500 patients will be treated

COLOMBO: Hundreds of Sri Lankan patients are set to receive eye surgery and specialist care this week under a blindness prevention program launched by the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center.

The Saudi Noor Volunteer Program, running between Nov. 4 and 9, is organized by KSrelief in the town of Walasmulla on the southeastern coast of Sri Lanka, hundreds of kilometers away from the capital Colombo. On Nov. 10-17, the campaign will move to the city of Kattakundy, further east.

Cataracts are the most common cause of blindness in Sri Lanka. Patients often have to wait for years to have them removed under government programs. At private clinics, the cheapest lens replacement procedure is too expensive for many patients in poorer parts of the country.

“There is big demand since poor people can’t afford surgery privately, which costs 100,000 rupees ($340) per person. There are many cataract patients in Sri Lanka but the facilities are few. There are long waiting lists for surgery,” M.S.M. Thassim, chairman of the Association of Muslim Youths — KSrelief’s local partner — told Arab News.

Patients wait for KSrelief-funded eye surgery in Kattankudy, Sri Lanka, on Nov. 5, 2024. (Association of Muslim Youths)

“We are doing it in two places; the first part is Walasmulla, which is finishing on Nov. 9, and we have already completed 400 surgeries and 100 more to go. Then at Kattankudy, which begins on Nov. 10, where another 500 will be performed.”

Some of the patients were already blind before the intervention of the KSrelief medical team, whose members have been praised for being “people friendly” and “committed” to their mission.

“The patients are full of gratitude to the Saudi government and the King Salman center for the noble intervention that restored their eyesight,” Thassim said.

The two-week eye care campaign in Walasmulla and Kattakundy is part of the Saudi government’s long-standing efforts to combat blindness in developing countries.

In Sri Lanka alone, 31,000 patients have undergone Saudi-sponsored surgery since 2001.


World must better adapt to ‘climate calamity’: UN chief Guterres

Updated 29 min 37 sec ago
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World must better adapt to ‘climate calamity’: UN chief Guterres

  • Global efforts to adapt to climate change have not kept pace as global warming accelerates the frequency and intensity of disasters
  • Antonio Guterres: ‘Climate calamity is the new reality. And we’re not keeping up’

PARIS: The world is nowhere near ready for the “calamity” being caused by climate change and must urgently prepare for even worse in the future, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said Thursday.
Global efforts to adapt to climate change – from building defensive sea walls to planting drought-resistant crops – have not kept pace as global warming accelerates the frequency and intensity of disasters.
Floods, fires and other climate shocks have affected nearly every continent in a year the EU climate monitor says is almost certain to be the hottest ever recorded.
The amount of money going to poorer countries for adaptation measures was barely one-tenth of what they needed to disaster-proof their vulnerable economies, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) said in a new assessment looking at 2022, the latest year for which data is available.
“Climate calamity is the new reality. And we’re not keeping up,” said Guterres at the launch of UNEP’s annual Adaptation Gap Report.
Rich nations are under pressure at this month’s UN COP29 summit to substantially increase the $100 billion they pledged for climate action in developing countries, including for adaptation.
But some donor governments are under fiscal and political pressure, and major new commitments of public money are not expected at the conference in Azerbaijan.
A UN biodiversity meeting this month failed to reach a funding agreement and the election of Donald Trump – who opposes global climate cooperation – hangs over COP29.
Most of the public money committed to climate change goes to reducing planet-warming emissions, not adapting to its long-term consequences.
Some $28 billion in public finance was paid to developing countries for climate adaptation in 2022.
This was an increase on the year prior, but still a drop in the ocean: UNEP estimates between $215 billion and $387 billion is needed annually for adaptation in developing countries.
Rich countries had pledged to double the amount by 2025 to roughly $40 billion a year but even this would leave an “extremely large” adaptation funding gap, UNEP said.
Climate disasters hit poorest communities hardest but the cost of inaction was no longer borne by them alone, said Patrick Verkooijen, CEO of the Global Center on Adaptation.
“From rising seas and extreme heat waves to relentless droughts and floods, the impacts of climate change now reach every corner of the globe. No nation, no community is immune,” he said in a statement.
Spanish authorities were accused of being inadequately prepared when a major storm brought flooding that killed over 200 people last month.
Climate scientists say that global warming is fueling more frequent and severe extreme weather.
“We can’t postpone protection. We must adapt – now,” Guterres said.


Vatican hopes for ‘wisdom’ from Trump

Updated 07 November 2024
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Vatican hopes for ‘wisdom’ from Trump

  • Parolin’s comments were the first diplomatic reaction from the Holy See to Trump’s win for the White House against Democrat Kamala Harris

VATICAN CITY: The Vatican’s secretary of state congratulated US president-elect Donald Trump Thursday, while expressing doubt that the Republican had a “magic wand” to end conflicts quickly as promised during the campaign.
“We wish him a lot of wisdom because that is the main virtue of leaders according to the Bible,” Italian Cardinal Pietro Parolin told reporters on the sidelines of a conference in Rome.
Asked about Trump’s promise to end the war in Ukraine “within 24 hours,” Parolin replied: “Let’s hope, let’s hope. I believe that not even he has a magic wand.”
“To end wars, a lot of humility is needed, a lot of willingness is needed, it really is necessary to seek the general interests of humanity rather than concentrate on particular interests,” he said.
To overcome divisions in American society, Parolin said he hoped Trump would be “the president of the whole country.”
He also hoped he would be “a factor that reduces tension... in the current conflicts that are bloodying the world.”
Parolin’s comments were the first diplomatic reaction from the Holy See to Trump’s win for the White House against Democrat Kamala Harris.
Pope Francis has not reacted.
In September, the Argentine pope criticized both candidates, accusing them of being “against life” in different ways: for Harris’ support of abortion, and for Trump’s anti-migrant policies.
During his first term in the White House, in May 2017, Trump was received by the Pope at the Vatican for a half-hour meeting.


NATO chief hopes to tackle North Korea-Russia threat with Trump

Updated 07 November 2024
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NATO chief hopes to tackle North Korea-Russia threat with Trump

  • ‘What we see more and more is that North Korea, Iran, China, and of course Russia are working together, working together against Ukraine’

BUDAPEST: NATO chief Mark Rutte said Thursday he aimed to work jointly with returning US leader Donald Trump in confronting the “dangerous new developments” linked to North Korea’s entry into the Russian war on Ukraine.
“What we see more and more is that North Korea, Iran, China, and of course Russia are working together, working together against Ukraine,” Rutte told reporters at a European leaders’ meeting in Budapest.
“This is more and more a threat, not only to the European part of NATO, but also to the United States — because Russia is delivering the latest technology into North Korea,” he warned.
“I look forward to sit down with Donald Trump to discuss how we can face these threats collectively,” Rutte said.
North Korea has become one of the strongest backers of Russia’s full-scale offensive in Ukraine, and the West has long accused Pyongyang of supplying artillery shells and missiles to Moscow.
Based on intelligence reports, Western powers now believe Pyongyang has deployed around 10,000 troops to Russia, suggesting deeper involvement in the conflict.
Iran meanwhile stands accused of supplying Russia with missiles and drones, while China is suspected of helping Moscow to circumvent Western sanctions on technologies for use in the war against Ukraine.


Kyiv targeted in massive Russian drone barrage overnight

Updated 07 November 2024
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Kyiv targeted in massive Russian drone barrage overnight

  • Russia has systematically targeted the Ukrainian capital with drone and missile barrages
  • Kyiv was targeted by drone attacks on six days in the first week of November and 20 days in October

KYIV: Kyiv was targeted by another “massive” Russian drone attack that wounded two people, damaged buildings and sparked fires in several districts, Ukrainian authorities said Thursday.
Officials meanwhile in the south and east of the country said Russian attacks had killed two Ukrainian civilians in Kherson and Sumy.
Russia has systematically targeted the capital with drone and missile barrages since the first day of its invasion launched nearly three years ago on Febr. 24, 2022.
The capital was targeted by drone attacks on six days in the first week of November and 20 days in October, officials said.
“The attack took place in waves, from different directions, with drones entering the city at different altitudes — both very low and high,” the city administration said.
It added that more than 36 drones had been downed over the capital and the surrounding area and that falling debris had fallen on six districts of Kyiv and wounded two people.
AFP journalists heard air raid sirens ring out over the capital beginning shortly after midnight Kyiv time and the alert lasted some eight hours.
The reporters also heard drones buzzing over the city and air defense systems working to shoot down the drones.
The attack caused a fire in a 30-story residential building in the city center, and residents had to be evacuated, the mayor’s office said.
The head of the Kherson region meanwhile said the body of a deceased man was recovered from the rubble of a house destroyed by the attack in a Russian attack overnight.
In the eastern Sumy region, the body of another killed person was recovered following a Russian airstrike hours earlier, the interior ministry said.