Tens of migrants stranded at the border state of Nuevo Leon, in Mexico, sewed their mouths shut on Wednesday in protest against state government hurdles to let them move to the United States border.
Despite having a visa that allows them to transit throughout Mexico, migrants haven’t been able to get bus tickets to travel to the Mexico-U.S. border.
Protesters arrived at the Government Palace of Nuevo Leon, in the capital city of Monterrey, weaving their country’s flags and chanting “we want to go”. Some protesters symbolically sewed their mouths shut in an attempt to get someone to listen.
A migrant from Venezuela told Reuters he would rather die in Mexico than be deported to his country.
The protest comes on the heels of the U.S.-hosted Summit of the Americas, where a series of migrant programs supported by various countries across the hemisphere and Spain were disclosed.
Those programs include the United States and Canada committing to taking more guest labourers, providing legal pathways for people to come work, and other countries agreeing to greater protections for migrants.
The United States said on Thursday it has not asked Russia about two U.S. citizens reported missing after travelling to Ukraine to fight against Russian forces and said there are reports of a third missing American.
“As of today, we have not raised this yet with the Russian Federation … (We) haven’t seen anything from the Russians indicating that two such individuals are in their custody,” U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters, describing reports about the two men as unconfirmed.
Alexander Drueke, 39, of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Andy Huynh, 27, of Hartselle, Alabama, went to Ukraine as volunteer fighters against Russian forces, have been missing for a week, and are feared captured, family members have said.
Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, saying it was engaged in a “special military operation” to disarm and “denazify” its neighbour. Ukraine and its allies say Moscow has launched an unprovoked war of aggression, killing thousands of civilians.
Reports that the two had been taken as prisoners of war by Russia are unconfirmed, the families and U.S. officials have said.
“There are reports of one additional American whose whereabouts are unknown… Our understanding was that this individual had travelled to Ukraine,” Price added, saying the third American was identified as missing in recent weeks.
Earlier, the White House said that it’s “working very hard to learn more” about two U.S. citizens who are missing in Ukraine and feared being captured.
A group of SpaceX employees derided flamboyant billionaire Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk as a “distraction and embarrassment” in an internal letter to executives on Thursday.
Musk, also head of electric automaker Tesla Inc, has been in headlines and late-night comedy monologues in recent months for a tumultuous quest to buy social media giant Twitter, a reported allegation of sexual harassment that Musk has denied as well as crude comments online and a foray into political discourse.
“Elon’s behaviour in the public sphere is a frequent source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent weeks,” read the letter, which does not single out any controversy in particular.
“As our CEO and most prominent spokesperson, Elon is seen as the face of SpaceX – every tweet that Elon sends is a de facto public statement by the company,” the letter added.
SpaceX did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The open letter, earlier reported by The Verge, was drafted by SpaceX employees in recent weeks and shared as an attachment in an internal “Morale Boosters” group chat, which contains thousands of employees, according to a person familiar with the matter.
It was not clear who authored the letter or how many employees were involved in its drafting.
Uber is turning to sidewalk robots to deliver meals in California. The ride-sharing service’s food division, Uber Eats, is using a network of autonomous vehicles to drop orders off to customers in a pilot in and around Hollywood.
“It basically is like a self-driving car. If you’ve seen any of them kind of in various cities being tested, it’s the same set of sensors, LIDAR, cameras, you know, GPS, but in a smaller form factor in a way that actually works today”, explains Ali Kashani, CEO of Serve Robotics which makes the units.
Orders are placed by customers using the Uber Eats app which then randomly assigns them a robot or a human-based on factors like proximity and whether the user has opted to meet their driver outside.
The robots, which resemble shopping carts, are given human names like Zoe and Quinn, and human traits like light-up eyes to make them seem more relatable and less intimidating to passers-by as they trundle along the sidewalk. They even utter greetings like ‘Excuse me’ as they pass each other in the street.
“If you look at the robots, they blink. That little blinking behaviour is actually really important for conveying that this has an internal life. It’s a thing that kind of makes decisions and lives”, says Kashani, adding: “We wanted something that belongs on the sidewalk, but something that’s familiar and not frightening, but also kind of fresh and fun. So if people see these robots, they see the eyes, they see the personality, it actually, you know, it adds something to your day.”
Local restauranteurs tell Reuters that the robots are fast becoming local celebrities. “Every time the robot drives by, like.. all the customers just get really excited. You know, people who are just walking by will come out and take a photo” laughs Maximiliano Weschler who runs LALA’s Argentine Grill in Hollywood. The restaurant has been involved in the pilot since the start.
“From day one, I was a big advocate for it. I saw the potential in it. And I still see the potential and I see that this is the direction that we’re heading for the future. So, you know, it’s for me, it’s exciting. I think that it’s going to be way more efficient in the future, but it’s not there just yet. I think that we know, our managers having to package the bag and physically take it out themselves to the robot… That’s a little.. that takes us a little bit longer than, you know, if an Uber eats driver, Postmates driver comes in and picks up the bag from inside themselves”, Weschler adds.
Serve Robotics has been trialling the robots for two years but only recently integrated with Uber Eats. Originally a division of rival delivery service Postmates, which was acquired by Uber in 2020, it’s now spun off into a separate organization, allowing it to also explore other delivery opportunities outside of food:
“If you fast forward a few years, they’re going to move a lot of other things. And if you need groceries or alcohol or pharmacy or basically anything else, in fact. I think it’s a bit of an iPhone moment where we may not know what people are going to move with these once they become so readily available”, Kashani tells Reuters.
“People are still excited about it. They’ll still get close to them. They see them, they try to interact with them. So this is the type of interaction that we’ve had so far. As we start to grow and people get more accustomed to this, this will be just like seeing a regular car anywhere so people get more accustomed to it and we’ll continue to expand”, adds Eduardo Rojas, Manager of Autonomous Mobility & Delivery at Uber Eats.
Although the vehicles are fully autonomous, they’re monitored by human ‘pilots’ at a nearby base in case of any issues.
“I make sure that the robot doesn’t go off course, isn’t going to crash into anything or if there’s anything in its way, I kind of move it out of its way and help the robot” explains pilot, Sarahi Pelayo from behind her desk in the control centre.
Uber’s also working on a second, separate pilot using autonomous cars to deliver food in nearby Santa Monica. That scheme launched last month and is in collaboration with Motional – a partnership between Hyundai and Aptiv. A human is present in the car at all times as a precaution due to regulatory issues, but Uber says the whole interaction is carried out as if they weren’t there.
“We believe that there’s space for human drivers and there’s a space for autonomous vehicles. They coexist very well together, they’re complementary to each other. And together they create what we talk about as the hybrid network. So this hybrid network that has humans and autonomous vehicles in it, we believe is very powerful for the whole marketplace”, says Rojas.m
Foreign ministers from the Association for Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) met in New Delhi on Thursday for talks about regional stability
In opening remarks during the Ministerial Session, Singapore foreign minister Vivian Balakrishnan warned of a growing U.S.-China rivalry that could “threaten” regional stability.
India foreign minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, who also attended the dialogue, reiterated India’s support for a unified Asean, and called for a strengthening of ties between India and Asean.
The leaders of France, Germany, Italy, and Romania walked amid the ruined buildings of the Ukrainian town of Irpin on Thursday in a show of support which the Kyiv government hopes will be followed by concrete action to help it in the war with Russia.
They were shown around by Ukraine’s Minister for Communities and Territories Development, Oleksiy Chernyshov.
Irpin, which had a pre-war population of about 62,000, was one of the main hotspots of fighting with Russian troops before they pulled back from Ukraine’s northern regions to intensify their offensive in the east.
Standing by gutted, burnt-out buildings, France’s Emmanuel Macron, Germany’s Olaf Scholz, Italy’s Mario Draghi, and Romania’s Klaus Iohannis, looked stern as they listened to a Ukrainian official explaining what had happened there.
Ukraine says Russia committed large-scale atrocities in Irpin. Russia denies the allegations.
The leaders, dressed in suits but not wearing any visible protective equipment, were surrounded by heavily armed soldiers.
Kyiv has accused France, Germany, and, to a lesser extent, Italy, of foot-dragging in their support for Ukraine, saying they have been slow to deliver weapons and have put their prosperity ahead of Ukraine’s freedom and security.
Ukraine’s bid to join the 27-nation European Union, and its demand for more weapons to fight off Russia, are expected to be two main themes of the EU leaders’ talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky later in the day. Zelensky did not accompany them to Irpin.
The EU executive is expected to propose on Friday (June 17) that Ukraine become a formal candidate for membership, diplomats and officials say. That would be a significant political gesture to the country as it resists Russia’s invasion but is also something EU leaders are very divided on.
Macron, who had been criticized at home and abroad for not traveling to Ukraine earlier, had repeatedly said he would only go if and when the visit could be “useful” and not be just a symbolic show of support.
Zelenskiy is expected to push his visitors to send more arms to help his hard-pressed army withstand the Russian invaders.
South China Morning Post รายงานว่า ประธานาธิบดี สีจิ้นผิง เผยกับเจ้าหน้าที่ระดับสูงของจีนเมื่อช่วงต้นปีที่ผ่านมาว่า การส่งเสริมประชาธิปไตยของตะวันตกทำให้เกิดสงคราม ความโกลาหล และการพลัดถิ่นของผู้คนทั่วโลก
SootinClaimon.Com 