China Calls on U.S. to 'Clarify' Rumor of Alleged Biological Weapons – Newstrends
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China Calls on U.S. to ‘Clarify’ Rumor of Alleged Biological Weapons

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Getty Images Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian urged American leaders to provide "thorough clarification" regarding the nation's biological military activities.

Following Russia’s claims that the U.S. is financing biological weapons labs in Ukraine—an allegation the U.S. calls “disinformation”—China is adding more fuel to the fire by repeating the same talking points and calling on the U.S. to prove the rumors are false.

In Chinese state-run media, a spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry urged American leaders to provide “thorough clarification” regarding any biological military activities.

“This will help restore the international community’s confidence in the U.S. fulfillment of its international obligations and strengthen global biosecurity,” the spokesperson, Zhao Lijian, said.

The United Nations has said it is not aware of any biological weapons programs in Ukraine.

“There are no Ukrainian biological weapons laboratories supported by the United States—not near Russia’s border or anywhere,” said UN Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield.

The U.S. has always claimed to be “open and transparent,” the Foreign Ministry said. “If the concerns are truly ‘disinformation,’ why doesn’t the United States release detailed materials to prove its innocence?”

Zhao claims that the U.S. spent $200 million funding bio-labs and questioned what kind of research was being conducted.

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The U.S. has partnered with Ukraine through the Biological Threat Reduction Program (BTRP), part of the Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) initiative that aims to “support peaceful and safe biological detection and diagnostic capabilities and to reduce the threats posed by pathogens,” according to the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD). The Ukraine Embassy says the BTRP is designed to counter outbreaks of the world’s most dangerous infections.

Through the BTRP, the U.S. has invested approximately $200 million in Ukraine since 2005, supporting over 40 Ukrainian labs, health facilities and diagnostic sites, according to the DOD.

“DoD’s CTR Program began its biological work with Ukraine to reduce the risk posed by the former Soviet Union’s illegal biological weapons program, which left Soviet successor states with unsecured biological materials after the fall of the USSR,” the DOD states in a fact sheet about the CTR program.

The DOD claims it has partnered with many countries for its CTR program, stating even working within Russian-owned laboratories until 2014.

Zhao questioned why U.S. officials refuse to open the Ukrainian labs for independent research by international experts. He then accused the U.S. of being self-contradictory, saying the nation “points fingers” at other countries stating noncompliance but then refuses to verify its own actions.

“This is typical double standard. Moreover, given the credibility of the United States, it is very difficult for it to win the trust of the international community,” Zhao said.

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The U.S. Department of State says Russia and China’s conspiracy theories are only attempting to justify Moscow’s hostility towards Ukraine.

“The Kremlin is intentionally spreading outright lies that the United States and Ukraine are conducting chemical and biological weapons activities in Ukraine,” said U.S. Department of State spokesperson Ned Price. “We have also seen PRC [People’s Republic of China] officials echo these conspiracy theories.”

However, U.S. officials say given Russia’s history of falsely accusing other nations of the same violations it commits, they suspect Russia may be planning to use chemical or biological agents against the Ukrainian people.

“Russia has a track record of accusing the West of the very crimes that Russia itself is perpetrating,” Price continued. “These tactics are an obvious ploy by Russia to try to justify further premeditated, unprovoked, and unjustified attacks on Ukraine. We fully expect Russia to continue to double down on these sorts of claims with further unfounded allegations.”

Newsweek reached out to the U.S. Department of State and the Chinese Embassy for comment.

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Google blocks 5.5 billion adverts, suspends 12.7 million accounts

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Google blocks 5.5 billion adverts, suspends 12.7 million accounts

Google says it has blocked over 5.5 billion adverts and suspended 12.7 million others for violating its policies.

The search engine giant also said in a statement on Wednesday that it had removed adverts from over 2.1 billion pages.

“Billions of people around the world rely on Google products to provide relevant and trustworthy information, including ads. That’s why we have thousands of people working around the clock to safeguard the digital advertising ecosystem.

“Today, we are releasing our annual Ads Safety Report to share the progress we’ve made in enforcing our advertiser and publisher policies and to hold ourselves accountable in our work of maintaining a healthy ad-supported internet,” it said.

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In 2023, it said scams and fraud across all online platforms were on the rise.

It added, “Bad actors are constantly evolving their tactics to manipulate digital advertising in order to scam people and legitimate businesses alike. To counter these ever-shifting threats, we quickly updated policies, deployed rapid-response enforcement teams and sharpened our detection techniques.”

Google blocks 5.5 billion adverts, suspends 12.7 million accounts

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Mother kills daughters, commits suicide amid in-laws’ torture for not bearing son

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Sangita Yadav

Mother kills daughters, commits suicide amid in-laws’ torture for not bearing son

Two minor girls lost their lives after their mother killed them and hanged herself to death on Tuesday, as her her in-laws tortured her mentally due to her inability to bear a son in Bhopal. Tragically, the woman and two of her daughters have succumbed to the ordeal, while her three-year-old daughter fights for her life in the hospital.

The woman, identified as Sangita Yadav, was 28 years old, her daughters Aradhya was 5 years old, and Shristi was 2. The incident occurred in Roadiya village, located 35 kilometers from Bhopal in the Gunaga police station area. The matter came to light on Tuesday afternoon. The bodies of the victims were taken to Hamidia Hospital. According to Gunaga police station in-charge Arun Sharma, initial investigations suggest that the woman committed suicide and murdered her three daughters. However, further investigation is underway to confirm the circumstances.

According to Dainik Bhaskar, the deceased woman’s brother, Neeraj Yadav, has accused the in-laws of harassing his sister. Neeraj revealed that Sangita had sent distressing messages to him at night. In one of the messages, she stated that she was feeling unwell. She mentioned that she was taking poison as nobody would survive, and everyone would die.

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“Neeraj said, “After that, I tried calling her on her mobile phone, but I didn’t get any response. I also called Sangita’s brother-in-law, but he didn’t pick up the phone twice. When he finally answered the third time, I asked him if everything was fine at home. He said yes, everything was fine. I didn’t trust him.” Then, he asked his relatives, who stayed nearby, to go and check once. Thet reached and confirmed, that the bodies of all three kept inside.

Neeraj revealed that his sister was troubled by her in-laws. Whenever she visited her maternal home, Sangita’s husband, Rajat Yadav, would threaten her, saying, ‘If you don’t come back, I will die in an accident. I will electrocute myself.’ On March 4th, there was a wedding in the family, where they drank alcohol and created a ruckus. They took his sister back with them that night. After the wedding, everyone collectively harassed her, which left her distraught, leading her to hang herself along with her daughters.

The authenticity of the suicide note is questionable. Relatives alleged that when Sangita was found hanging, there was a letter stuck to her back, presumed to be a suicide note. In it, she purportedly wrote about a lump in her stomach preventing her from bearing more children and not being able to give birth to a son for her family. However, some family members directly denied the existence of any such letter. Nevertheless, according to the present police officers, a letter has been recovered from the scene.”

Mother kills daughters, commits suicide amid in-laws’ torture for not bearing son

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‘Fake pastor’ with at least 10 wives jailed for marrying two at same time

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Orlando Coleman

‘Fake pastor’ with at least 10 wives jailed for marrying two at same time

A fake pastor who had at least 10 wives has been thrown in jail after marrying two women.

Orlando Coleman trawled black churches across the US under the guise of a travelling bishop, collecting spouses as he went. The 51-year-old would introduce himself to new congregations as a member of the clergy, and was able to dupe at least 10 different women into exchanging vows with him.

Coleman from Houston had presented himself as the founder of several churches as well as a Pentecostal preacher on social media. Despite pleading guilty to bigamy in July 2023 and being placed on probation for marrying two women simultaneously, he wedded another woman two months later.

Now, he has been put behind bars for three years for marrying multiple women since 2019.

Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said: “At the heart of this repeat offender’s schemes was a plan to defraud women and take advantage of them for financial gain.

“This man used the church to camouflage his scams and hide from any accountability or responsibility.”

Coleman’s web of deceit started to unravel in 2021 when he married a woman in Houston, but his new wife saw he was receiving money from another woman in Virginia.

When his then current wife contacted the woman from Virginia it was revealed that she too was married to Coleman.

Coleman’s Houston wife then contacted the Harris County Sheriff’s Office with the revelation, who in turn launched an investigation and filed bigamy charges.

In July 2023, Coleman pleaded guilty to bigamy in exchange for three years of deferred adjudication probation.

However, just two months later, while still married to the woman in Virginia, Coleman tied the knot again with another woman in Kentucky, committing another offense of bigamy.

Upon learning about Coleman’s new marriage, prosecutors from the Harris County District Attorney’s Office moved to revoke his probation. In a hearing on March 11, a judge sentenced Coleman to three years in prison.

Prosecutors say Coleman married the women for housing and financial security.

After introducing himself as a Protestant pastor or bishop, Coleman would propose marriage.

If a woman accepted, he would move in with her and allow her to foot the cost of his housing and food.

“That’s the only thing he had to offer and to validate his word – the proposal to marry – that was something big,” Assistant District Attorney Vanessa Goussen told The New York Times.

“Getting proposed to was a big gesture for these women, and that corroborated his guise that he’s a godly person.”

Some of the women filed for divorce after Coleman fled to another state.

Coleman is currently being held at the Harris County Jail.

‘Fake pastor’ with at least 10 wives jailed for marrying two at same time

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