Skip to main content

Pakistani man says Iran forced him into plot to kill Trump, media say

A Pakistani man accused of planning to kill US President Donald Trump told jurors on Wednesday that he did not willingly work with Iran's elite ​Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps to devise the plot, media said. The Justice ‌Department accused Asif Merchant of trying to recruit people in the United States in the plan targeting Trump and other US politicians in retaliation for Washington's killing of the ​Corps' top commander, Qassem Soleimani. The Corps has a central role in Iran, with ​its combination of military and economic power and an intelligence ⁠network. "I was not wanting to do this so willingly," the New York ​Times quoted Merchant as telling a court during his trial for terrorism and ​murder-for-hire charges, adding that he participated to protect his family in Tehran. Prosecutors rejected Merchant's claim, citing a "lack of evidentiary support for a true duress or coercion," according to a ​letter sent on Tuesday to the judge in the ca...
Post a Comment

Justice Department releases missing FBI interviews in Epstein files with woman who made claims against Trump

The US Justice Department released FBI records on Thursday that summarise interviews of an unidentified woman in ‌which she made accusations against President Donald Trump related to an alleged sexual encounter. FBI agents interviewed the woman four times in 2019 as part of their investigation into accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. The Justice Department had previously released a log confirming that the interviews took ​place but released a summary of only one of those four meetings, in which she accused Epstein of ​molesting her when she was a teenager. The newly disclosed records, which were posted on the department's website on ⁠Thursday, show she also claimed Trump attempted to force her to perform oral sex after Epstein introduced her to ​the future president in New York or New Jersey in the 1980s when she was between 13 and 15 years old. Read: Trump urges Zelensky to strike deal, says Putin ready The ​White House did not immediately respond to questions about the disclosures. Politico, which first reported the disclosures, said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the woman's claims "completely baseless accusations, backed by zero credible evidence." The Justice Department has cautioned that some of the documents include "untrue and ​sensationalist claims made against President Trump." Reuters could not independently confirm the accuracy of the woman's allegations, and FBI records ​suggest agents stopped speaking with her in 2019. The Justice Department said in a post on the social media platform X that the records ‌it ⁠released Thursday were among 15 documents that it had “incorrectly coded as duplicative” and not published as a result. As we said a week ago, the Department of Justice reviewed public allegations that 302 documents originally produced to Ghislaine Maxwell in discovery of her criminal case were missing from the EFTA library. As we have consistently done, if any member of the public reported… https://t.co/y7snlxbT0K — DOJ Rapid Response (@DOJRR47) March 5, 2026 The disclosure comes as the Justice Department faces scrutiny in Congress over its handling of documents from the Epstein investigation, which it is required to make public. Democrats have accused Trump's administration of concealing records related to Trump, and a committee in the House of Representatives ​voted to subpoena Attorney General ​Pam Bondi so lawmakers ⁠can question her about how the government is handling the disclosures. Trump has said his association with Epstein ended in the mid-2000s and that he was never aware of the financier's sexual ​abuse. Records previously released by the department show Trump flew several times on Epstein's plane in ​the 1990s, ⁠which Trump has denied. After the financier was first accused of sexual misconduct, Trump called the police chief in Palm Beach to say that "everyone has known he's been doing this," according to an FBI interview record. In the report of the woman's final, interview, conducted in October 2019, ⁠during Trump's ​first presidency, agents asked whether she would be willing to provide more ​information about Trump. In response, the agent wrote, she "asked what the point would be of providing the information at this point in her life when ​there was a strong possibility nothing could be done about it."

from Latest World News, International News | Breaking World News https://ift.tt/I97vXiR
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

At least 32 miners dead after bridge fails at cobalt site in southeast DR Congo

A bridge collapsed at a cobalt mine in southeast Democratic Republic of Congo killing at least 32 wildcat miners, a regional government official said Sunday. The bridge came down Saturday onto a flooded zone at the mine in Lualaba province, Roy Kaumba Mayonde, the provincial interior minister, told reporters. He said 32 bodies had been recovered and more were being searched for. The DRC produces more than 70 percent of the world supply of cobalt, which is essential for batteries used in electric cars, many laptop computers and mobile phones. More than 200,000 people are estimated to be working in giant illegal cobalt mines in the giant central African country. Local authorities said the bridge collapsed at the Kalando mine, about 42 kilometres (26 miles) southeast of the Lualaba provincial capital, Kolwezi. "Despite a formal ban on access to the site because of the heavy rain and the risk of a landslide, wildcat miners forced their way into the quarry," said Mayonde. He said ...
Post a Comment
Read more

US, Philippines kick off joint military drills in South China Sea with 16,000 troops

Some 16,000 US and Philippine troops kicked off the annual joint military drills on Monday in the West Philippine Sea (WPS), local media reported. WPS is the official designation by Philippines to the parts of the South China Sea that are included in the country's exclusive economic zone. The 19-day exercises, dubbed "Balikatan 2024," will involve around 5,000 Philippine and 11,000 US troops, making it the largest joint military drills between the two allies conducted in decades, local English daily Manila Times reported citing the military. A total of 14 nations, including Japan and India, will take part in the drills as observers amid mounting maritime tensions in the South China Sea. Contingents from the Australian Defence Force and the French Navy will also join the exercise as participants. Read also: China urges US to stop using Philippines as a pawn to destabilise South China Sea France will join the group sail but will only navigate on the edge of the Philippine E...
Post a Comment
Read more

Indian devotees splurge on jets, gold idols as Hindu temple opens

The private jet parking lots at airports near the Indian city of Ayodhya are full and the shops have run out of gold-plated idols, as wealthy devotees prepare for the invite-only opening ceremony of one of Hinduism's holiest temples. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Asia's richest man Mukesh Ambani are among the 8,000 or so attendees at Monday's inauguration event for the Ram Temple, which devotees believe is built on the birthplace of Lord Ram, a sacred Hindu deity. The construction of the temple, which began after the Supreme Court awarded the site to Hindus in 2019 more than two decades after a Hindu mob razed a mosque there, triggering deadly riots, fulfils a key campaign promise of Modi and his Hindu nationalist party. Read BJP-promised temple transforms Ayodhya: Muslims, locals feel neglected The opening ceremony, organised by the trust that built the temple, comes months before a national election which the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party is widely expected to w...
Post a Comment
Read more