US Secretary of State Antony Blinken hosted the foreign ministers of the rival nations.

“The United States is committed to the peace negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan,” Blinken said before the meeting. “Direct dialogue is the best way to a truly durable peace, and we are very pleased to support that.”

An American official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the meeting was less about peace negotiations in the full sense of the term, and more about providing an opportunity for the warring parties to meet and talk.

A week ago, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev “agreed not to use force” to resolve their dispute over the Nagorno-Karabakh territory, during a summit in Russia hosted by President Vladimir Putin.

However, in the early hours of Monday, Azerbaijani forces opened fire on Armenian positions in the eastern sector of the Armenian-Azerbaijani border, the defence ministry in Erevan said in a statement, adding there had been no casualties.

Meanwhile, Azerbaijan’s defense ministry accused Armenian forces of shooting at the positions of Azerbaijani troops stationed at several locations on the frontier.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Monday called on both parties to “refrain from the actions and steps that could lead to an escalation of tensions.”

Erevan and Baku fought two wars over the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh — in autumn of 2020 and in the 1990s.

Six weeks of fighting in 2020 claimed more than 6,500 lives before a Russian-brokered truce ended the hostilities.

Under the 2020 deal, Armenia ceded swathes of territory it had controlled for decades, and Russia stationed peacekeepers to oversee the fragile ceasefire.

There have been frequent exchanges of fire at the Caucasus neighbors’ border since the 2020 war.

In September, more than 280 people from both sides were killed in new clashes.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, ethnic Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh broke away from Azerbaijan. The ensuing conflict claimed around 30,000 lives.

One short-range ballistic missile crossed the Northern Limit Line, the de facto maritime border between the two countries, prompting a rare warning for residents on the island of Ulleungdo to seek shelter in bunkers.

The military said it was the “first time since the peninsula was divided” at the end of Korean War hostilities in 1953 that a North Korean missile had landed so close to the South’s territorial waters.

“President Yoon pointed out today that North Korea’s provocation is an effective territorial invasion by a missile that crossed the Northern Limit Line for the first time since the division,” his office said in a statement.

The missile closest to South Korea landed in waters just 57 kilometers (35 miles) east of the mainland, the military said.

The military released a statement describing the launch near the South’s territorial waters as “very rare and intolerable”.

“Our military vowed to respond firmly to this (provocation),” it added.

Soon after, the South Korean military said it had fired three air-to-ground missiles at the same spot on the maritime border where the North Korean one had landed.

An air raid warning was issued for Ulleungdo after the North Korean missile launch. The alert was flashed on national television and told residents to “evacuate to the nearest underground shelter”.

The South Korean military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff initially said it detected the launch of three short-range ballistic missiles.

But it later announced North Korea had fired more than 10 missiles “of various types today towards the east and west”.

Yoon Suk-yeol called a meeting of the National Security Council over the launches, ordering “swift and stern measures so that North Korea’s provocations pay a clear price.”

Japan also confirmed the North Korean missile launches, with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida telling reporters he planned to call a “national security meeting as soon as possible.”

South Korea closed some air routes over the East Sea, also known as the Sea of Japan, advising local airlines to detour to “ensure passenger safety in the routes to the United States and Japan”.

Vigilant Storm

Pyongyang’s latest test-firing came as Seoul and Washington staged their largest-ever joint air drills, dubbed “Vigilant Storm”, which involve hundreds of warplanes from both sides.

Pak Jong Chon, a high-ranking North Korean official, said the drills were aggressive and provocative, according to a report in state media Wednesday.

Pak said the name of the exercises harked back to Operation Desert Storm, the US-led military assault on Iraq in 1990-1991 after it invaded Kuwait.

“If the US and South Korea attempt to use armed forces against the (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) without any fear, the special means of the DPRK’s armed forces will carry out their strategic mission without delay,” he said.

“The US and South Korea will have to … pay the most horrible price in history.”

Close to S Korea 

North Korea’s missile launches on Wednesday appeared to be “the most aggressive and threatening armed demonstration against the South since 2010,” Cheong Seong-chang, a researcher at the Sejong Institute, told AFP.

“It is now a dangerous and unstable situation that could lead to armed conflict,” he added.

In March 2010, a North Korean submarine torpedoed the South Korean naval vessel Cheonan, killing 46 sailors including 16 who were on their mandatory military service.

In November the same year, the North shelled a South Korean border island, killing two marines — both of them young conscripts.

Wednesday’s missile tests follow a recent blitz of launches, including what the North said were tactical nuke drills.

Washington and Seoul have repeatedly warned the launches could culminate in another nuclear test — which would be Pyongyang’s seventh.

“As far as I can remember, North Korea has never made such a provocation when South Korea and the US were holding their joint drills,” Park Won-gon, a professor at Ewha University, told AFP.

“Pyongyang seems to have completed its most powerful deterrent. This is a serious threat. The North also seems confident in their nuclear capabilities.”

Haitian gangs have for a month prevented the distribution of diesel and gasoline, crippling businesses and hospitals and creating shortages of basic goods including water just as the country is struggling with a new outbreak of cholera.

The State Department has created a new visa restriction policy targeting those who support the gangs and has sent a Coast Guard vessel to patrol Haitian waters.

US officials who briefed reporters on Washington’s response stopped short of offering to send troops to the island nation despite appeals from the Haitian government for an international armed force.

“We are … working to increase and deploy in the coming days security assistance to the Haitian National Police to strengthen their capacity to counter gangs and re-establish a stable security environment,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said.

“We will accelerate the delivery of additional humanitarian relief to the people of Haiti.”

Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian Nichols on Wednesday traveled to Port-au-Prince with a delegation that includes Lieutenant General Andrew Croft of the US Southern Command, the State Department said.

During an earlier phone briefing with reporters, a senior Biden administration official said it was “premature to talk about just a US security presence” when asked whether Washington had ruled out sending troops.

Sporadic looting and gun battles between gangs and police have become increasingly common in recent weeks as the shortages have led to mounting desperation. Protests to demand interim Prime Minister Ariel Henry’s resignation have at times devolved into looting.

The Pan American Health Organization on Wednesday said civil unrest is making it harder to contain the outbreak of cholera, adding that 18 deaths have been confirmed as of Oct. 9 and hundreds of potential cases are being studied.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has proposed that one or several countries send “a rapid action force” to help Haiti’s police, according to a letter to the UN Security Council, without suggesting that the force be deployed by the United Nations.

Another Biden administration official during the phone briefing said the travel bans were meant to hold accountable those who are linked to the gangs.

“Our intent in doing so is to demonstrate that there are consequences for those who fund and foment violence in Haiti,” the official said.

The verdict, which came after three weeks of testimony in a state court in Waterbury, Connecticut, far outstripped the $49 million Jones was ordered to pay in August by a Texas jury in a similar case brought by two other Sandy Hook parents.

The Connecticut verdict applies to both Jones and his company, Free Speech Systems LLC, the owner of Jones’ Infowars website. FSS filed for bankruptcy in July.

The plaintiffs in the Connecticut case included more than a dozen relatives of 20 children and six staff members who were gunned down at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December 2012.

Jones claimed for years that the massacre was staged as part of a government plot to take away Americans’ guns.

Jurors said the plaintiffs should also be awarded attorney’s fees, which are set to be determined in November.

During a live broadcast as the verdict was read, Jones vowed to appeal and said his company’s ongoing bankruptcy will protect Infowars in the meantime.

“We’re fighting Goliath,” he said.

Jones’ lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Christopher Mattei, a lawyer for the families, said outside the courthouse that the verdict was “against Alex Jones, his lies and their poisonous spread, and a verdict for truth and for our common humanity.”

Outside the courthouse, Robbie Parker, one of the plaintiffs in the case, thanked the jury for its verdict. “Everybody who took the stand told the truth,” Parker said. “Except for one. The one who proclaims that that’s what he does. But while the truth was being said in the courtroom, he was standing right here, lying.”

Jones was found liable in a default judgment last year after he failed to comply with court orders.

During closing arguments last week, Mattei said Jones cashed in for years on lies about the shooting, which drove traffic to his Infowars website and boosted sales of its various products.

Infowars’ finances are not public, but according to trial testimony the site brought in revenue of $165 million between 2016 and 2018. An economist in the Texas case estimated that Jones is personally worth between $135 million and $270 million.

FSS’s bankruptcy will limit the total money available to Sandy Hook families, but they could seek other assets from Jones if a judge rules his company deliberately harmed them, according to Brian Kabateck, a plaintiffs’ attorney who was not involved in the case.

“The underlying conduct was egregious, and that’s the kind of thing that could get you beyond the limits of the bankruptcy,” Kabateck told Reuters.

Jones has not personally filed for bankruptcy but the same principle would apply if he does, Kabateck said.

Anguished Testimony

The families suffered a decade-long campaign of harassment and death threats by Jones’ followers, Mattei said.

“Every single one of these families (was) drowning in grief, and Alex Jones put his foot right on top of them,” Mattei told jurors.

Jones’ lawyer countered during closing arguments that the plaintiffs had shown scant evidence of quantifiable losses. The attorney, Norman Pattis, urged jurors to ignore the political undercurrents in the case.

“This is not a case about politics,” Pattis said. “It’s about how much to compensate the plaintiffs.”

Douglas E. Mirell, a lawyer and defamation expert who was not involved in the case, said the sizable verdict sent a clear message of “revulsion” from the jury.

“His refusal to own up to the mendacity and lies that he promulgated time and time again over many years has now caught up with him,” Mirell said of Jones.

The trial was marked by weeks of anguished testimony from the families, who filled the gallery each day and took turns recounting how Jones’ lies about Sandy Hook compounded their grief.

An FBI agent who responded to the shooting was also a plaintiff in the case.

Jones, who has since acknowledged that the shooting occurred, also testified and briefly threw the trial into chaos as he railed against his “liberal” critics and refused to apologise to the families.

In August, another jury found that Jones and his company must pay $49.3 million to Sandy Hook parents in a similar case in Austin, Texas, where the headquarters of Jones’ Infowars conspiracy theory website is located.

Jones’ lawyers have said they hope to void most of the payout in the Texas case before it is approved by a judge, calling it excessive under state law.

Connecticut does not place caps on damages, though Jones could appeal the verdict on other legal grounds.

Mattei said the families would go to any court necessary to enforce the verdict “for as long as it takes, because that’s what justice requires.”

The Chinese Communist Party Congress opens in Beijing on October 16, a week after Washington imposed tight restrictions on exports of invaluable semiconductor technology to China in a bid to stop it from surpassing the US economically and militarily. As semiconductors emerge as a key battleground, FRANCE 24 spoke to the author of a new bestseller on these all-important pieces of silicon.

For years, semiconductors have been crucial to everything from refrigerators to ballistic missiles. But only recently have they captured public attention.

Washington demonstrated the US semiconductor industry’s almighty power in 2018 when Donald Trump’s Commerce Department banned Chinese telecoms firm ZTE from buying chips designed in the US. These measures nearly drove the company to collapse before the erratic then-president reversed the measure.

But semiconductors only came to dominate the headlines in early 2021. A constellation of factors – notably Covid lockdowns warping consumer demand – sparked a chip shortage crisis, which pushed up inflation and caused shortages of goods from cars to mobile phones.

Now the spotlight is on semiconductors once more ahead of the Chinese Communist Party Congress, after President Joe Biden’s Commerce Department unveiled on October 7 sweeping new measures curtailing US exports of semiconductor technology to China. This was part of Biden’s response to President Xi Jinping’s plans to wean China off US-designed chips and make it a world leader in the sector.

To look more closely at how semiconductors rose to the forefront of international economics and politics, FRANCE 24 spoke to Chris Miller, author of the recently published bestseller “Chip War” and associate professor of international history at Tufts University, visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and Eurasia Director at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

What are semiconductor chips and how did they become so central to the world economy and daily life?

Semiconductors are small pieces of silicon with millions and billions of tiny circuits carved into them. These circuits provide the computing power inside almost any device with an on-off switch: smartphones, computers, datacentres, automobiles and dishwashers.

The typical person will interact with dozens if not hundreds of semiconductors each day, though we almost never see them.

How important was the US’s advantage in semiconductors to its victory in the Cold War?

The US advantage in computing was crucial. From the earliest days of the missile race, the Pentagon was fixated on applying computing power to defence systems. The first major application of chips was in missile guidance systems, but today they are used in everything from communications to sensors to electronic warfare.

Just as the typical person will interact with dozens of chips each day, militaries are crucially reliant on chips’ processing power and signals processing capability. What’s more, as militaries begin to experiment with increasingly autonomous systems, they’ll be even more reliant on advanced chips.

How did Taiwan – specifically the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) – come to nearly dominate chip manufacturing? And what would happen to the world economy if TSMC’s facilities in Taiwan are damaged in war?

TSMC is the world’s most advanced maker of processor chips, thanks to its enormous scale and extraordinary manufacturing precision. Today, TSMC produces 90 percent of the most advanced processor chips, which go into everything from smartphones to PCs to datacentres.

If a war were to knock their production offline, the cost to the global economy would be measured in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

In Europe there’s this perception that we are behind when it comes to high-tech industries, but Dutch company ASML is the big exception to this. How did it come to play an invaluable role in chip manufacturing?

ASML produces the machines without which advanced chips can’t be made.

ASML’s specialisation is in lithography, and it has 100 percent market share in the production of the most advanced lithography machines. It has honed these capabilities over many years and today is a critical supplier to companies like Samsung, TSMC and Intel.

For several years now, Washington has been worried about the national security implications of China catching up in the semiconductor business, especially in light of Xi Jinping’s Made in China 2025 initiative making chips a top priority.

Do you think China has what it takes to match or supersede the US when it comes to semiconductors?

China has been investing many tens of billions of dollars into government chip-development programs. These programmes have delivered substantial progress in some spheres, notably chip design.

However, across the board, China remains far behind capabilities in the US, South Korea or Taiwan in terms of fabricating chips. In addition, all chip fabrication in China today relies on machine tools imported from abroad, largely from the US, the Netherlands and Japan.

Do you think President Joe Biden’s plans to bring more chip production back to the US are a good idea, given the security implications of the overwhelming majority of manufacturing of advanced processor chips being based in Taiwan?

Today 90 percent of the world’s most advanced processor chips are produced in Taiwan. Given China’s growing military might and Xi Jinping’s aggressive nationalism, this is a risk to the global economy that has grown too large.

Efforts to diversify the geography of advanced chipmaking are a smart move from this perspective. This explains why the US, Japan and Europe are all trying to bolster their countries’ position in the semiconductor supply chain.

 

Raleigh Mayor Mary-Ann Baldwin said the shooting occurred near the Neuse River Greenway, a popular trail in the area.

“This is a sad and tragic day for the city of Raleigh. Just after 5:00 pm today, multiple people were shot,” she told a press conference.

The Raleigh Police Department “has confirmed five fatalities. One of them was an off-duty Raleigh police officer.”

The shooter, a “white male juvenile,” was taken into custody shortly after 9:30 pm, Raleigh Police Lieutenant Jason Borneo said in a follow-up press conference.

The mayor had earlier reported that the shooter was being “contained in a residence in the area” by police.

One victim, Borneo said, remained in critical condition.

Also among the wounded was a canine officer who had been taken to the hospital, although Borneo reported that an injured police officer had been released.

When asked about a motive for the shooting, he said it would likely “come to bear” in the coming days.

North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, who attended the evening press conference, told journalists that: “Tonight terror has reached our doorstep.”

“The nightmare of every community has come to Raleigh. This is a senseless, horrific, and infuriating act of violence that has been committed.”

Gun violence is a major problem in the United States where more than 34,000 people have died in shootings so far in 2022 alone, more than half of which were from suicide, according to the Gun Violence Archive website.

“We must do more,” Baldwin told the press conference.

“We must stop this mindless violence in America. We must address gun violence. We have much to do, and tonight we have much to mourn.”

The North Carolina shooting occurred after a jury earlier in the day rejected the death penalty and backed life imprisonment for Nikolas Cruz, who shot and killed 17 people at a Florida high school in 2018.

Mass shootings have repeatedly stunned the nation, reigniting debate on gun control, a hot-button cultural issue that has made little headway in Congress.

However, several of the most recent gun rampages, including a shooting at a school in Texas and a supermarket frequented by African-Americans in New York state, caused particular shock across the country, prompting lawmakers to agree in June, for the first time in 30 years, to pass modest reform of gun control laws.

Nearly 400 million guns were in circulation among the civilian population in the United States in 2017, or 120 guns for every 100 people, according to the Small Arms Survey project.

The space agency attempted the first test of its kind two weeks ago to see if in the future a killer rock could be nudged out of Earth’s way.

“This mission shows that NASA is trying to be ready for whatever the universe throws at us,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said during a briefing at NASA headquarters in Washington.

The Dart spacecraft carved a crater into the asteroid Dimorphos on Sept. 26, hurling debris out into space and creating a cometlike trail of dust and rubble stretching several thousand miles (kilometers). It took days of telescope observations from Chile and South Africa to determine how much the impact altered the path of the 525-foot (160-meter) asteroid around its companion, a much bigger space rock.

Before the impact, the moonlet took 11 hours and 55 minutes to circle its parent asteroid. Scientists had hoped to shave off 10 minutes but Nelson said the impact shortened the asteroid’s orbit by about 32 minutes.

Neither asteroid posed a threat to Earth — and still don’t as they continue their journey around the sun. That’s why scientists picked the pair for the world’s first attempt to alter the position of a celestial body.

“We’ve been imagining this for years and to have it finally be real is really quite a thrill,” said NASA program scientist Tom Statler.

Launched last year, the vending machine-size Dart — short for Double Asteroid Redirection Test — was destroyed when it slammed into the asteroid 7 million miles (11 million kilometers) away at 14,000 mph (22,500 kph).

Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland built the spacecraft and managed the $325 million mission.

“This is a very exciting and promising result for planetary defense,” said the lab’s Nancy Chabot.

(AP)