WASHINGTON: According to a White House report, President Donald Trump intends to nominate Indian American lawyer Manisha Singh to a key administration post in the State Department. Currently Chief Counsel and Senior Policy Adviser to Senator Dan Sullivan of Alaska, Manisha Singh, if confirmed by the Senate, would replace Charles Rivkin as the assistant secretary of state for economic affairs. The position has been vacant since January after Rivkin resigned following Trump’s swearing-in as the 45th president of the United States. A resident of Florida, Singh, 45, has served as the deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of Economic, Energy and Business Affairs, and as an aide to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Her private sector experience includes, practising law at multinational firms and working in-house at an investment bank.
Indian origin men plead guilty in US call centre scandal
Washington: Four Indian-origin men have pleaded guilty to conspiracy and fraud charges for their roles in a massive telephone impersonation fraud and money laundering scheme in the US perpetrated by a network of India-based call centres, the US Department of Justice said. Nisarg Patel of New Jersey, Dilipkumar Ramanlal Patel of Florida, and Rajesh Kumar of Arizona, each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit fraud and money laundering offences. In a related case, Dipakkumar Sankalchand Patel of Pennsylvania, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering. Nisarg Patel, Dilipkumar Patel, Rajesh Kumar, 53 other individuals and five India-based call centres had been charged for fraud over a money laundering scheme in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Texas on October 19, 2016.
Indian-origin boy of 14 youngest to fly single-engine plane
Sharjah: An Indian-origin teenager based here has become one of the youngest pilots to fly a single-engine aircraft. Mansour Anis, a 14-year-old Grade 9 student at Delhi Private School in Sharjah, received a certificate for his first solo flight from an aviation academy in Canada last week, Gulf News reported. "Let it be known throughout the aviation world that Mansour Anis at the age of 14 years successfully took off and landed from Langley Regional Airport thereby accomplishing his first solo flight," the solo flight certificate issued by AAA Aviation Flight Academy on August 30 stated. Back in the United Arab Emirates after his achievement, Anis claimed that he had also set a record of being the youngest pilot to fly solo with the least number of training hours.
Judge dismisses Indian American Shiva Ayyadurai's libel suit
Massachusetts: A federal judge in Massachusetts dismissed the $15 million libel suit filed by self-proclaimed email inventor Shiva Ayyadurai against California-based technology blog Techdirt. The suit was filed against the corporation that operates Techdirt, the website's chief executive and editor Michael Masnick, and writer Leigh Beadon over 14 articles that disputed the Indian American's claim that he invented email in 1979 when he was 14 years old. Ayyadurai, who is currently campaigning as a Republican for a US Senate seat in Massachusetts in 2018 against Democratic incumbent Elizabeth Warren, said he received copyright protection for software code in 1982 that recognizes him as the inventor of email, the Boston Globe said in a report. Despite the copyright protection, many still are skeptical of his claim, the report added.
Heavy rains kill 164 in Pakistan
Islamabad: Heavy rains have killed 164 people and injured more than 165 others across Pakistan since the monsoon season began in June, according to weather officials. Sindh and Punjab provinces were the worst hit with 38 fatalities in each province since the advent of the monsoon season. The torrential rains have also left hundreds of people homeless. NDMA and provincial government teams are carrying out rescue and relief operation in the affected areas.
Risk of terror financing: Pak on top 50 list
Islamabad: Pakistan is among the top 50 countries with high terrorism financing and money laundering risks, according to a latest report by a Swiss group. The Basel Institute on Governance, in its 2017 edition of the Basel Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Index which has assessed 146 countries regarding money laundering and terrorism financing risks, said that Afghanistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka stand out with particular high risk scores. Pakistan has been placed on the 46th position in the list of 146 countries which have been given marks on a scale of 0 (low risk) to 10 (high risk),.
Malay woman to be Singapore President
Singapore: Halimah Yacob, a former speaker of Parliament, will be formally named to the ceremonial post of Singapore President on Wednesday, media reported, after other candidates fell short of the criteria set for contesting the election. Yacob (63) was born to an Indian Muslim father and a Malay mother. Aiming to strengthen a sense of inclusivity in the multicultural country, Singapore had decreed the presidency would be reserved for candidates from the Malay community this time. Yacob’s experience as house speaker automatically qualified her under the nomination rules. Of the four other applicants, two were not Malays and two were not given certificates of eligibility, the elections department said. The last Malay to hold the presidency was Yusof Ishak, whose image adorns the country’s banknotes.
Merkel coalition seeks to punish social media for hate speech
Berlin: Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government plans to fine social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter if they fail to combat hate speech, as German officials accuse media companies of being too slow to take action. Volker Kauder, chairman of Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union parliamentary caucus, said that he reached a preliminary agreement with Social Democratic Justice Minister Heiko Maas that would require companies to respond to speech complaints within 24 hours. Otherwise they’ll have to pay. “The fines have to hurt, otherwise it won’t work,” Kauder told reporters at a meeting of the CDU’s leadership in the western region of Saarland.
Nikki Haley to appear on Time Magazine cover
California: Nikki Haley, the former Indian American governor of South Carolina and current US ambassador to the United Nations, was selected as one of the 46 women who are changing the world by Time magazine. Haley, along with 45 other women, will be on the cover of the publication as part of a Time special project entitled, "Firsts," which will appear in the Sept. 18 edition. Time tweeted out the cover photo of Haley, and all the “Firsts” women. Haley, whose interview page was simply titled, “The Leader,” was the first Indian American woman to be elected governor. Her initial political aspirations, albeit at a young age, weren’t as lofty, however. In an interview with Time, Haley, who served as the governor of South Carolina from 2011 to 2017, said growing up her dream was to become the mayor of Bamberg, SC, "because that was as high as I could see."
US shuts Pakistan's Habib Bank
NEW YORK: US banking regulators ordered Pakistan's Habib Bank to close its New York office after nearly 40 years, for failing to heed concerns over possible terrorist financing and money laundering, officials said. Habib, Pakistan's largest private bank, neglected to watch for compliance problems and red flags on transactions that potentially could have promoted terrorism, money laundering or other illicit ends, New York banking officials said. The state's Department of Financial Services, which regulates foreign banks, also slapped a $225 million fine on the bank, although that is much smaller than the $629.6 million penalty initially proposed. Habib has operated in the United States since 1978, and in 2006 was ordered to tighten its oversight of potentially illegal transactions but failed to comply.
