Tag Archives: United States

Britain cautions Russia not to use detained ex-U.S. marine as pawn

FILE PHOTO: Britain's Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt arrives in Downing Street, London, Britain, December 18, 2018. REUTERS/Hannah McKay

By Kate Holton and Gabrielle T’trault-Farber

LONDON/MOSCOW (Reuters) – Britain cautioned Russia on Friday that individuals should not be used as diplomatic pawns after a former U.S. marine who also holds a British passport was detained in Moscow on espionage charges.

Paul Whelan was arrested by the FSB state security service on Dec. 28. His family has said he is innocent and that he was in Moscow to attend a wedding.

“Individuals should not be used as pawns of diplomatic leverage,” British foreign minister Jeremy Hunt said.

“We are extremely worried about Paul Whelan. We have offered consular assistance,” Hunt said. “The U.S. are leading on this because he is a British and American citizen.”

Since leaving the U.S. military, Whelan had worked as a global security executive with U.S. companies, had visited Russia and had developed a network of Russian acquaintances.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said this week that Washington had asked Moscow to explain Whelan’s arrest and would demand his immediate return if it determined his detention is inappropriate.

The FSB has opened a criminal case against Whelan but given no details of his alleged activities. In Russia, an espionage conviction carries a sentence of between 10 and 20 years in prison.

Whelan’s detention further complicates a strained relationship between Moscow and Washington, despite the professed desire of the two presidents, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, to build a personal rapport.

U.S. intelligence officials accuse Russia of meddling in U.S. elections – a charge Russia denies.

Putin has previously stated he would rein in Russian retaliatory measures against U.S. interests in the hope relations would improve, but Whelan’s detention indicates the Kremlin’s calculations may now have changed.

SWAP SPECULATION

A Russian national, Maria Butina, admitted last month to U.S. prosecutors that she had tried to infiltrate American conservative groups as an agent for Moscow.

David Hoffman, a former CIA Moscow station chief, said it was “possible, even likely”, that Russia had detained Whelan to set up an exchange for Butina.

Dmitry Novikov, a first deputy head of the international affairs committee in Russia’s lower house of parliament, commenting on a possible swap, said Russian intelligence first needed to finish their investigations. “Then we’ll see,” Interfax news agency quoted him as saying.

Whelan’s British citizenship introduces a new political dimension – relations between London and Moscow have been toxic since the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the English city of Salisbury in March last year.

Britain alleges Skripal was poisoned by Russian intelligence agents posing as tourists, while Russia denies any involvement.

RUSSIAN TIES

Paul Whelan is 48 and lives in Novi, Michigan, according to public records. Whelan is director of global security at BorgWarner, a U.S. auto parts maker based in Michigan.

The company said Whelan was “responsible for overseeing security at our facilities in Auburn Hills, Michigan, and at other company locations around the world”. Its website lists no facilities in Russia.

U.S. media said he had previously worked in security and investigations for the global staffing firm Kelly Services, which is headquartered in Michigan and has operations in Russia.

Whelan’s military record, provided by the Pentagon, showed that he served in the U.S. Marine Corps for 14 years. The highest rank he attained was staff sergeant. He was discharged in 2008 after being convicted on charges related to larceny, according to his records.

Whelan has for years maintained an account in VKontakte, a Russian social media network, which showed that he had a circle of Russian acquaintances.

Out of the more than 50 people tagged as Whelan’s friends on VKontakte, a significant number were software engineers or worked in the IT sector, and a significant proportion had ties to the fields of defense and security.

One of these people served in the Russian navy’s Black Sea fleet, a photo of that person posted on his own account indicated, and a second friend had on his VKontakte page photos of people in the uniform of Russian paratroop forces.

Whelan used the account to send out congratulations on Russian public holidays. In 2015, he posted the words in Russian: “In Moscow…” and accompanied it with a Russian mobile phone number. The number was not answering this week.

According to his brother David, Whelan was in Moscow to attend the wedding of a fellow retired marine. When he was detained he was staying with the rest of the wedding party at Moscow’s upmarket Metropol hotel, the brother said. He did not specify where the wedding itself took place.

An employee at the hotel, who spoke on condition, said on Friday they could not access the hotel’s database to check, but could not recall any weddings being scheduled at the hotel in the second half of December.

(Additional reporting by Polina Devitt in Moscow; Writing by Christian Lowe; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Strong U.S. jobs data boosts stocks, soothes economic fears

FILE PHOTO: Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., December 27, 2018. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

By April Joyner

NEW YORK (Reuters) – World stock markets rallied on Friday while bond yields rose after sharply declining earlier in the week as Beijing announced a new round of trade talks with Washington and U.S. employment data pointed to economic strength.

Equities around the globe were buoyed by the news that China and the United States will hold trade talks in Beijing on Monday and Tuesday.

In the United States, stocks got another boost as stronger-than-expected U.S. employment data soothed some concerns of slowing economic growth. That was welcome news to investors after sharp declines on Thursday following Apple Inc’s cut in its revenue forecast.

“As nervous as we all were yesterday on this Apple news, this does help to soften that a bit, that maybe the consumer or the average person still is more confident than we are giving them credit for,” said J.J. Kinahan, chief market strategist at TD Ameritrade in Chicago.

The strong U.S. jobs report raised questions among some market watchers about the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy, which has been scrutinized in recent weeks as economic worries have mounted. However, Wall Street surged further after Fed Chair Jerome Powell spoke at a meeting of the American Economic Association and said he would not resign if asked to by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Conversely, safe-haven assets that had climbed this week as equity markets were roiled came down substantially. Treasury yields rose sharply after the release of U.S. employment data, and the dollar gained 0.6 percent against the yen. Spot gold prices, which reached a six-month peak on Thursday, dropped 0.8 percent.

In U.S. equities, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 681.9 points, or 3.01 percent, to 23,368.12, the S&P 500  gained 66.58 points, or 2.72 percent, to 2,514.47 and the Nasdaq Composite added 218.87 points, or 3.39 percent, to 6,682.37.

The pan-European STOXX 600 index jumped 2.67 percent, while MSCI’s gauge of stocks across the globe gained 2.16 percent.

Benchmark 10-year Treasury notes last fell 32/32 in price to yield 2.6641 percent, from 2.553 percent late on Thursday.

Earlier, an announcement from China’s central bank that it would cut the amount of cash that banks must hold as reserves for the fifth time in the past year lifted Asian and European stocks. The move frees $116 billion for new lending as Beijing tries to reduce the risk of a sharper economic slowdown.

Japanese equity markets, which opened for their first session of the new year, were the main exception, weighed down by the sharp rise in the yen in the past few days.

The news of the U.S.-China trade talks boosted oil prices, with both Brent and U.S. crude futures around 4 percent higher.

 

(Reporting by April Joyner; Additional reporting by Virginia Furness, Swati Pande, Wayne Cole and Chuck Mikolajczak; editing by Jon Boyle, Larry King and Dan Grebler)

U.S. private payrolls surge in December; weekly jobless claims rise

By Lucia Mutikani

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. private payrolls increased by the most in nearly two years in December, suggesting sustained strength in the labor market despite ongoing financial market volatility.

While other data on Thursday showed the number of Americans filing applications for unemployment benefits increased more than expected last week, the underlying trend in claims remained low. Claims data tend to be volatile around year-end holidays.

Labor market data is being closely watched for signs of whether tightening financial conditions could be impacting on companies’ hiring decisions. A sharp stock market sell-off has stoked fears about the economy’s health.

The ADP National Employment Report showed private payrolls rose by 271,000 jobs last month after a downwardly revised 157,000 increase in November. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast private payrolls advancing 178,000 last month following a previously reported 179,000 increase in November.

The ADP report, which is jointly developed with Moody’s Analytics, was published ahead of the government’s more comprehensive employment report for December scheduled for release on Friday.

The ADP report has a spotty record predicting the private-payrolls component of the government’s employment report and last month’s jump probably exaggerates the strength of the labor market.

“The December ADP data have been especially unreliable because of the challenge of adjusting for ‘purging’ effects,” said Jim O’Sullivan, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics in White Plains, New York.

“December is typically when employers drop from their listings all individuals who have left their firms permanently,” he said. “Such workers are dropped from the government data when they are no longer being paid, but some employers keep former employees on their lists for ADP until year-end tax documents have been filed.”

According to a Reuters survey of economists, nonfarm payrolls likely increased by 177,000 jobs last month after rising 155,000 in November. The unemployment rate is forecast steady near a 49-year low of 3.7 percent, not too far from the Federal Reserve’s forecast of 3.5 percent by the end of 2019.

With the labor market viewed at being at or beyond full employment, the pace of job growth is slowing as employers struggle to find workers. Some of the moderation in employment gains has been attributed to the stock market rout.

The Fed raised interest rates last month for the fourth time in 2018, but forecast fewer rate hikes this year and signaled its tightening cycle is nearing an end in the face of financial market volatility and slowing global growth.

U.S. financial markets were little moved by the data.

In a separate report on Thursday, the Labor Department said initial claims for state unemployment benefits rose 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 231,000 for the week ended Dec. 29. Data for the prior week was revised higher to show 5,000 more applications received than previously reported.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast claims increasing to 220,000 in the latest week.

The Labor Department said claims for California and Virginia were estimated last week. Unadjusted claims for both of those states declined last week.

A Labor Department official said there was no indication of an increase in filings last week from federal workers furloughed because of a partial shutdown of the government that is now in its second week.

Data on claims filed by federal employees is released with a one-week lag. The shutdown, which started on Dec. 22, was triggered by President Donald Trump’s demand for $5 billion in border wall funding.

Some 800,000 employees from the Departments of Homeland Security, Transportation, Commerce and others have been furloughed or are working without pay.

Claims data tends to be noisy around year-end holidays. The four-week moving average of initial claims, considered a better measure of labor market trends as it irons out week-to-week volatility, slipped 500 to 218,750 last week.

(Reporting By Lucia Mutikani; Editing by Andrea Ricci)

FEMA reverses decision to stop issuing new flood insurance policies

A mailbox is partially submerged by flood waters in the aftermath of Hurricane Florence in Conway, South Carolina, September 19, 2018. REUTERS/Randall Hill. REUTERS/Randall Hill

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said on Friday it will resume issuing new flood insurance policies during the partial U.S. government shutdown, reversing a decision announced two days ago.

FEMA, which oversees the National Flood Insurance Program, said it was rescinding guidance issued on Wednesday that it would not be able to sell new policies during the shutdown unless Congress passes legislation reauthorizing the program.

“As of this evening, all NFIP insurers have been directed to resume normal operations immediately and advised that the program will be considered operational since December 21, 2018, without interruption,” FEMA said on its website.

The National Association of Realtors estimated the decision not to issue new policies could have disrupted up to 40,000 home sales each month.

The flood insurance program insures about 5 million homes and businesses.

The federal government has been partially shut down since Dec. 22 because of an impasse over President Donald Trump’s demand for $5 billion in taxpayer funding for a proposed border wall.

(Reporting by Eric Beech, editing by G Crosse)

U.S. demands immediate return of ex-Marine detained in Russia on spy charges

Paul Whelan, a U.S. citizen detained in Russia for suspected spying, appears in a photo provided by the Whelan family on January 1, 2019. Courtesy Whelan Family/Handout via REUTERS

By Mary Milliken and Gabrielle Teacutetrault-Farber

BRASILIA/MOSCOW (Reuters) – The United States is demanding the immediate return of a retired U.S. Marine detained by Russia on spying charges, and wants an explanation of why he was arrested, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Wednesday.

Pompeo, in Brasilia for the inauguration of Brazil’s new president, said the U.S. government hoped to gain consular access to Paul Whelan within hours.

“We’ve made clear to the Russians our expectation that we will learn more about the charges, come to understand what it is he’s been accused of and if the detention is not appropriate, we will demand his immediate return,” Pompeo said.

In Moscow, RIA news agency cited a foreign ministry spokesman as saying Russia has allowed consular access to Whelan. Russia’s FSB state security service detained Whelan on Friday and opened a criminal case against him.

The State Department did not immediately confirm that Moscow had provided consular access.

Whelan was visiting Moscow for the wedding of a former fellow Marine and is innocent of the espionage charges against him, his family said on Tuesday.

He had been staying with the wedding party at Moscow’s Metropol hotel when he went missing, his brother, David, said.

“His innocence is undoubted and we trust that his rights will be respected,” Whelan’s family said in a statement released on Twitter on Tuesday.

Russia’s FSB state security service said Whelan had been detained on Friday, but it gave no details of his alleged espionage activities. Under Russian law, espionage can carry a prison sentence of between 10 and 20 years.

David Whelan told CNN that his brother, who had served in Iraq, has been to Russia many times in the past for both work and personal trips, and had been serving as a tour guide for some of the wedding guests. His friends filed a missing person report in Moscow after his disappearance, his brother said.

He declined to comment on his brother’s work status at the time of his arrest and whether his brother lived in Novi, Michigan, as address records indicate.

BorgWarner, a Michigan-based automotive parts supplier, said Whelan is the company’s director, global security. He is responsible for overseeing security at our facilities in Auburn Hills, Michigan, and at other company locations around the world.”

BUTINA CASE

Daniel Hoffman, a former CIA Moscow station chief, said it was “possible, even likely” that Russian President Vladimir Putin had ordered Whelan’s arrest to set up an exchange for Maria Butina, a Russian citizen who pleaded guilty on Dec. 13 to acting as an agent tasked with influencing U.S. conservative groups.

Russia says Butina was forced to make a false confession about being a Russian agent.

Putin told U.S. President Donald Trump in a letter on Sunday that Moscow was ready for dialogue on a “wide-ranging agenda,” the Kremlin said following a series of failed attempts to hold a new summit.

At the end of November, Trump canceled a planned meeting with Putin on the sidelines of a G20 summit in Argentina, citing tensions about Russian forces opening fire on Ukrainian navy boats and then seizing them.

Trump’s relations with Putin have been under a microscope as a result of U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and possible collusion with the Trump campaign.

Moscow has denied intervening in the election. Trump has said there was no collusion and characterized Mueller’s probe as a witch hunt.

Russia’s relations with the United States plummeted when Moscow annexed the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine in 2014. Washington and Western allies have imposed a broad range of sanctions on Russian officials, companies and banks.

(Additional reporting by Vladimir Soldatkin in Moscow and Barbara Goldberg in New York; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Putin tells Trump that Moscow is open for dialogue

FILE PHOTO - Russia's President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with officials and representatives of Russian business community at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia December 26, 2018. Alexander Nemenov/Pool via REUTERS

By Vladimir Soldatkin

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin told his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump in a New Year letter on Sunday that Moscow was ready for dialogue on a “wide-ranging agenda”, the Kremlin said following a series of failed attempts to hold a new summit.

At the end of November, Trump abruptly canceled a planned meeting with Putin on the sidelines of a G20 summit in Argentina, citing tensions about Russian forces opening fire on Ukrainian navy boats and then seizing them.

Trump and Putin also failed to hold a full-fledged meeting in Paris on the sidelines of the centenary commemoration of the Armistice. The two leaders held their one and only summit in Helsinki in July.

“Vladimir Putin stressed that the (Russia – United States) relations are the most important factor for providing strategic stability and international security,” a Kremlin statement said.

“He confirmed that Russia is open for dialogue with the USA on the most wide-ranging agenda.”

Moscow has said one of the key issues it wanted to discuss with the United States is Washington’s plans to withdraw from a Cold War era nuclear arms pact.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was quoted as saying that now it was up to the United States whether to hold a new meeting in 2019.

“The issue should be addressed to Washington. Both our president and his representatives have said that we are ready for the talks when Washington is ready for it,” TASS news agency quoted Lavrov as saying in televised remarks.

In a separate letter to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Putin pledged a continuation of aid to the Syrian government and people in the “fight against terrorism, in defense of state sovereignty and territorial integrity”.

Putin also sent New Year greetings to other world leaders including prime ministers Theresa May of Britain and Shinzo Abe of Japan, as well as Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Putin wished “well-being and prosperity to the British people”, the Kremlin said.

Russia’s embassy in London said on Friday Moscow and London had agreed to return some staff to their respective embassies after they expelled dozens of diplomats early this year.

Britain expelled 23 Russian diplomats over accusations the Kremlin was behind a nerve toxin attack in March on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the English city of Salisbury.

Russia, which denies any involvement in the poisoning, sent home the same number of British embassy workers in retaliation.

(Reporting by Vladimir Soldatkin, Editing by William Maclean and David Stamp)

Taliban dismiss Afghanistan’s peace talks offer

By Jibran Ahmad

KABUL/PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – The Taliban have rejected Kabul’s offer of talks next month in Saudi Arabia where the militants, fighting to restore strict Islamic law in Afghanistan, will meet U.S. officials to further peace efforts, a Taliban leader said on Sunday.

Representatives from the Taliban, the United States and regional countries met this month in the United Arab Emirates for talks to end the 17-year war in Afghanistan.

But the Taliban have refused to hold formal talks with the Western-backed Afghan government.

“We will meet the U.S. officials in Saudi Arabia in January next year and we will start our talks that remained incomplete in Abu Dhabi,” a member of the Taliban’s decision-making Leadership Council told Reuters. “However, we have made it clear to all the stakeholders that we will not talk to the Afghan government.”

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid also said the leaders of the group would not talk to the Afghan government.

The militants have insisted on first reaching an agreement with the United States, which the group sees as the main force in Afghanistan since U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban government in 2001.

Diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict have intensified after Taliban representatives started meeting U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad this year. Officials from the warring sides have met at least three times to discuss the withdrawal of international forces and a ceasefire in 2019.

But the United States has insisted that any final settlement must be led by the Afghans.

According to data from the NATO-led Resolute Support mission published in November, the government of President Ashraf Ghani has control or influence over 65 percent of the population but only 55.5 percent of Afghanistan’s 407 districts, less than at any time since 2001. The Taliban say they control 70 percent of the country.

A close aide to Ghani said the government would keep trying to establish a direct line of diplomatic communication with the Taliban.

“Talks should be Afghan-led and Afghan-owned,” the aide said on condition of anonymity. “It is important that the Taliban acknowledge this fact.”

U.S. President Donald Trump has announced a pullout of American troops from Syria, a decision that prompted the resignation of Defense Secretary James Mattis, and there have been reports that he is considering a partial pullout from Afghanistan.

(Additional reporting by Rupam Jain in Kabul, Editing by Nick Macfie)

China allows first-ever U.S. rice imports in ‘goodwill gesture’ ahead of trade talks

FILE PHOTO: Shipping containers are seen at a port in Shanghai, China July 10, 2018. REUTERS/Aly Song

BEIJING (Reuters) – China has opened the door to imports of rice from the United States for the first time ever in what analysts took to signal a warming of relations between the world’s two biggest economies after a frosty year marked by tensions and tit-for-tat tariffs.

The green light from Chinese customs, indicated in a statement posted on the customs authority’s website on Friday, comes in the run-up to talks between the countries in January after U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to a moratorium on higher tariffs that would affect trade worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

It wasn’t immediately clear how much rice China, which sources rice imports from within Asia, might seek to buy from the United States. But the move, which comes after years of talks on the matter, follows pledges from China’s commerce ministry of further U.S. trade openings earlier this week.

As of Dec. 27, imports of brown rice, polished rice and crushed rice from the United States are now permitted, as long as cargoes meet China’s inspection standards and are registered with the United States Department of Agriculture.

“The permission for U.S. rice suggests an improving U.S. and China relationship,” said Cherry Zhang, an agriculture analyst with consultancy JCI. Zhang said she expected any imports would likely be ordered by state-owned companies.

Officials at a government-affiliated think-tank in Beijing said the price of U.S. rice is not competitive, compared with imports from South Asia, and said the move to formally permit import should be interpreted as a goodwill gesture.

China opened its rice market when it joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, but a lack of phytosanitary protocol between China and the United States effectively banned imports, according to trade group USA Rice.

Nonetheless, in July, China formally imposed additional tariffs of 25 percent on U.S. rice, even though imports were not permitted at the time.

(Reporting by Meng Meng and Ryan Woo; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell)

Bereaved Guatemalan mother recalls hopes son would ease U.S. entry

Catarina Perez (C), grandmother of Felipe Gomez Alonzo, a 8-year-old boy detained alongside his father for illegally entering the U.S., who fell ill and died in the custody of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), gestures at an altar in memory of Felipe at the family's home in the village of Yalambojoch, Guatemala December 27, 2018. REUTERS/Luis Echeverria

By Sofia Menchu

YALAMBOJOCH, Guatemala (Reuters) – Between heavy sobs, Catarina Alonzo explained that when her husband left Guatemala to try to reach the United States, they hoped taking their 8-year-old son would make it easier for the pair to get in. Instead, the boy fell ill and died.

Detained on the U.S. border, Felipe Gomez Alonzo died late on Christmas Eve in a New Mexico hospital a few weeks after setting off with his father, becoming the second Guatemalan child to die this month while in U.S. custody.

The two deaths have led to increased criticism of the Trump administration’s hardline stance on illegal immigration, as well as fresh scrutiny of why some migrants from Central America travel with children on the long, dangerous road north.

Speaking at her home in a mountainous region of western Guatemala, Catarina Alonzo said neighbors had told the family that taking a child would provide her husband with a way in.

“Lots of them have gone with children and managed to cross, even if they’re held for a month or two. But they always manage to get across easily,” she told Reuters in an interview.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has yet to give an official cause of death for the boy, prompting Democratic lawmakers to intensify calls for an investigation.

The Department of Homeland Security, which says that Felipe Gomez Alonzo and 7-year-old Jakelin Caal, who died on Dec. 8, were the first children to die in CBP custody in a decade, this week said it would step up medical checks of migrant children to try to prevent any more deaths.

Alonzo, an indigenous Maya and native speaker of Chuj, has little Spanish and communicated through a translator. Wearing a sweatshirt and a purple dress, she spoke outside her hut in Yalambojoch, a village of about 1,000 people near the Mexican border.

She related how her son and his father, Agustin, an agricultural worker, had left in early December to find work in the United States to pay off debts. The two also hoped the boy would get a better education in the United States, she said.

Still, Alonzo said her husband had doubts and at one point decided he did not want to take the boy. But that upset the boy, so they resolved he should go.

Alonzo’s sobs could be heard for minutes outside the house before she came out to be interviewed. Afterward she went back inside to a tiny altar she had adorned with three photos of the boy that a local schoolteacher had printed out for her.

The altar stood to one side of a room with cement walls that serves as a bedroom and living area for Alonzo and her three surviving children. Adjoining it was a kitchen with a dirt floor and wooden walls.

Her husband remains in U.S. custody.

“NOW OR NEVER”

Marta Larra, a spokeswoman for Guatemala’s Foreign Ministry, said smugglers known as “coyotes” often encourage migrants to take children as a form of “visa.” Many coyotes, she noted, are trusted by migrant families, so their word carries weight.

But Lucas Perez, the mayor of Yalambojoch, said some coyotes are only interested in ripping off people. Still, for many migrants trying to cross the U.S. border, taking a child along was the “only option,” he told Reuters.

Describing migration from the area as “constant,” Perez estimated about 200 people from the tiny village live in the United States.

Agustin Gomez, the boy’s father, has two brothers in the United States he hoped to meet, his wife said.

Next to her hut, laborers worked on a two-story concrete house with a twin-gabled, tiled roof – evidence of the money coming back from the United States, the mayor said.

Under U.S. law, families from countries that do not border the United States cannot be immediately deported, and because of a longstanding legal settlement, there are restrictions on how long U.S. authorities can detain migrant children.

As a result, families with children are often released to await an immigration court hearing, which can be scheduled well into the future due to ballooning backlogs.

U.S. President Donald Trump has tried to reverse the policy, which he calls “catch and release,” but has been blocked by lawsuits in federal court.

His Democratic opponents have seized on the deaths of the two Guatemalan children to attack his policies. On Thursday, Senator Dianne Feinstein urged the Senate to hold a hearing in the new year on how children are treated in U.S. custody.

In the meantime, Trump’s insistence on building a southern border wall has given coyotes a fresh argument to promote migration, Larra said.

“According to interviews (with migrants), the coyotes are saying ‘it’s now or never’ because the wall is going to be built, and it won’t be possible to cross,” she said.

(Reporting by Sofia Menchu; Additional reporting by Stefanie Eschenbacher in Mexico City and Mica Rosenberg in New York; Editing by Dave Graham, Rosalba O’Brien and Leslie Adler)

Suspect in California shooting in U.S. illegally, prompting Trump tweet

A still photo taken from surveillance video of an unidentified alleged gunman involved in the shooting death of 33-year-old police officer Ronil Singh, in Newman, California, U.S., December 26, 2018. Stanislaus County Sheriff's Department/Handout via REUTERS

By Alex Dobuzinskis

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A suspect wanted in the shooting death of a California police officer was believed to be in the United States illegally, a county sheriff said on Thursday as President Donald Trump cited the manhunt in his push for a wall on the border with Mexico.

Trump tweeted about the shooting on the sixth day of a shutdown of the federal government, which was triggered by his $5 billion demand, largely opposed by Democrats and some lawmakers in Trump’s own Republican party, for the wall he wants to build.

A police officer for the city of Newman, a small Northern California town, was shot and killed there on Wednesday, after pulling over a suspect on suspicion of driving under the influence, authorities said.

The suspect, whose name has not been released, exchanged gunfire with the officer before fleeing, Stanislaus County Sheriff Adam Christianson told reporters. The officer, identified as 33-year-old Ronil Singh, was struck by gunfire and taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.

“This suspect is in our country illegally,” Christianson said at a news conference. “He doesn’t belong here, he’s a criminal. We will find him we will arrest him and we will bring him to justice.”

Trump, during his campaign for president and in the White House, has often highlighted crimes by people who came to the United States without authorization as he has pushed for tougher enforcement of immigration laws.

“There is right now a full scale manhunt going on in California for an illegal immigrant accused of shooting and killing a police officer during a traffic stop,” Trump tweeted on Thursday. “Time to get tough on Border Security. Build the Wall!”

Christianson did not give the nationality of the suspect or say how long he was believed to have been in the United States without authorization.

A Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Office spokesman could not be reached for further comment.

The suspect is believed to still be in Stanislaus County, a largely agricultural area less than 50 miles (80 km) east of San Jose, Christianson said.

Singh was a native of Fiji who immigrated to the United States to become a police officer, Newman Police Chief Randy Richardson told reporters.

“He was never in a bad mood, it was unreal, he loved what he did,” Richardson said at the news conference, breaking down in tears at times.

During the traffic stop, Singh told emergency dispatchers shots had been fired, authorities said, but the suspect fled in a Dodge Ram pickup truck before other officers could arrive.

 

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis; editing by Grant McCool)