Members of the US Senate have backed calls for safe haven for an Afghan pilot threatened with deportation to Rwanda, saying he and other veterans should not be left in “legal limbo”. The pilot, who served alongside coalition forces in Afghanistan, said he hoped he might be able to find a new life in the US, but slammed the UK government for failing to offer him refuge. The Afghan Air Force official, who arrived in Britain last year, says he feels abandoned by the UK Home Office who are refusing to process his asylum claim. American senators from across the political divide told The Independent that Afghan allies who supported coalition forces should be supported to new lives in the States. The Independent is campaigning for the pilot and other Afghan veterans to be given asylum in countries for whom they have bravely risked their lives. Dozens of military chiefs, politicians, diplomats and celebrities have backed the call. The Republican senator Thom Tillis, from North Carolina, said that the fact that people who helped US service members are stuck in third countries needed to be fixed. He said initially that many people worried that Afghans coming to the United States would not be properly vetted. “I think many of those things worked themselves out and we still owe them,” he said. “I believe we owe it to those who serve alongside our men and women and our Nato partners and allies, to get them where they want to be.” Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Minnesota Democrat, told The Independent that Afghan veterans should not be left with uncertain immigration status. She said Afghans who “helped our military literally are holding letters from top military people saying that they saved their lives and they should not be in legal limbo”. The pilot, who flew combat missions in support of British and US forces, arrived in the UK via a boat last November and has been waiting to find out his fate ever since, with his young family in hiding in Afghanistan. The threat of deportation to Rwanda has still not been removed despite the UK’s Court of Appeal ruling that the government’s returns agreement is illegal. Without the notice being removed, his application for asylum in the UK cannot progress. He told The Independent: “I don’t know why they haven’t removed the notice. I am scared they are still trying to send people to Rwanda and of course I am worried about what they will do next. Lately, I am completely disappointed in the UK government.” The airman has been forced to turn to the US for help, with the White House pledging to “take care of the folks who helped us during the longest war in this country”. He is being considered for possible sanctuary in the US and has had his initial relocation interview. In order to access the so-called P1 scheme, he had to be personally referred by a US official. Speaking about his disappointment with UK, he said: “At the moment, I feel like it doesn’t matter who you are, or what you did with the allies, troops or partner countries. Right now I hear lots of Afghan diplomats, military generals, and others, they are saying that the government doesn’t care about us, who we are and what we did with them. I think the government is not seeing us as colleagues. “When they came to Afghanistan, they were saying we are your friends and we will help you. Now I think they have completely forgotten us.” The pilot spoke about his hope that the US would accept him: “I am happy that the US government is helping me, but on the other side I am not happy about the instability of not knowing where I should be or where I will be. I don’t know which country I will be in and my family needs comfort and a new life.” Dan Jarvis, a Labour MP and former soldier in Afghanistan, said: “This pilot risked his life on combat missions in support of coalition forces. That he faces the threat of deportation from the UK to Rwanda stands as a mark of shame on No 10 Downing Street, whose policy position is increasingly at odds with the much more decent approach taken by the White House.” He continued: “There is considerable angst amongst the Armed Forces community and beyond that the UK government seems unwilling or unable to honour the commitments made to these men. This isn’t just a point of principle, it’s a matter of honour and a failure to do the right thing in this case will further undermine our international reputation.” Kevan Jones MP, of the defence select committee, added: "We owe a huge debt of gratitude to these individuals and the government dragging its feet on supporting them is a national disgrace." Most Afghans who arrived in the United States were permitted on temporary humanitarian grounds. But a bipartisan group of senators is trying to change the law to adjust their status to permanent resident. The group wanted to add the Afghan Adjustment Act, to a series of must-pass bills during the final year of the 117th Congress. But senators failed to garner enough support to include their legislation in final versions of last year’s National Defense Authorisation Act (NDAA). Ms Klobuchar, the Minnesota senator, is one of the Afghan Adjustment Act’s Democratic sponsors. She told The Independent she hoped the bill would pass in the future and had strong support from senior Republicans on the Senate’s Armed Services, Judiciary and Veterans Affairs committees. “We’re building support and would hope to have a vote on the defense authorisation act,” she said. Another Democratic sponsor of the Adjustment Act, Delaware senator Chris Coons, told The Independent the legislation is about fulfilling America’s commitment to its veterans. "The core objective of this bill is to ensure that every Afghan currently here is vetted and has a pathway towards a legal status in the United States making it possible for additional Afghans who served alongside our troops and the troops of our treasured Nato allies like the United Kingdom, to have a safe path in a safe passage to our country while addressing legitimate security concerns of my colleagues is a valuable core purpose of this bill," he said. Sign The Independent’s petition calling for UK to support Afghan war heroes who served alongside Britain A UK government spokesperson said: “Whilst we don’t comment on individual cases, we remain committed to providing protection for vulnerable and at-risk people fleeing Afghanistan and so far have brought around 24,500 people impacted by the situation back to the UK. “We continue to work with like-minded partners and countries neighbouring Afghanistan on resettlement issues, and to support safe passage for eligible Afghans.” Read More Tobias Ellwood’s call to reopen talks with Taliban sparks backlash: ‘Were Afghan women spoken to?’ Afghan judge who put Taliban members behind bars ‘overjoyed’ to be given sanctuary in UK Biden turns up heat on UK over asylum for Afghan hero pilot

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 21, 2023--

After decades of development and $200 million spent, Procter & Gamble thought they had the perfect snack food additive with olestra. Too bad it caused “rectal urgency.”

By Kanishka Singh (Reuters) -Former U.S. President Donald Trump pleaded not guilty on Thursday to a Georgia criminal indictment accusing

A Louisiana-based nonprofit is calling for future engineers to get more education on past failures and how to avoid repeating them

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(Reuters) -Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday interrupted opening remarks by African leaders seeking to mediate in the Ukraine conflict

National football teams have begun to issue reports around the safety of players and staff, following a shooting in Auckland just hours before the start of the Women’s World Cup. Ahead of the opening match between hosts New Zealand and opponents Norway in Auckland, a gunman was found dead after killing two people and injuring multiple others in the city on Thursday (20 July). The shooting took place at a building site in Auckland city centre. New Zealand Football issued a statement on social media, writing: “New Zealand Football are shocked by the incident in Auckland CBD this morning. We can confirm that all of the Football Ferns team and staff are safe but we will not be able to comment further while details are still emerging. “Please refer to New Zealand Police for further information. Preparations for the game tonight at Eden Park will continue as planned.” Meanwhile, reigning world champions USA issued the following statement: “Regarding the incident in downtown Auckland, all of our USWNT [US Women’s National Team] players and staff are accounted for and safe. Our security team is in communication with local authorities and we are proceeding with our daily schedule.” This is a breaking news story and will be updated with new information. Read More How to watch every Women’s World Cup match on TV Women’s World Cup: Group guides and players to watch for every team ‘That World Cup Guy’ arrives in Australia to back the Lionesses

Former New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio has been ordered to pay nearly half a million dollars after he was found to have misused public funds on a police security detail during his failed presidential bid

The sons of a newly-identified Gilgo Beach murders victim reportedly were not notified by Long Island police before her name was revealed to the public. Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney held a press conference on Friday to announce that the victim known only as Jane Doe 7 had finally been identified as Karen Vergata, more than 26 years after her partial remains were first discovered along the Long Island shores. Vergata, 34, was last seen alive in Manhattan in 1996 while working as an escort. The huge breakthrough in the case comes almost three decades after some of Vergata’s remains were first discovered – and just weeks after Rex Heuermann, a 59-year-old father-of-two architect, was arrested and charged with the murders of three other Gilgo Beach victims. Mr Tierney told reporters that Vergata had been positively identified via DNA in August 2022 but investigators kept the development under wraps due to the ongoing investigation into Mr Heuermann. Officials refused to comment on whether or not her murder may be linked to the suspected serial killer. The district attorney also attributed the delay to the need to contact Vergata’s family members. However, it has since emerged that Vergata’s two biological sons - Eric and Gary Doherty - apparently were not informed before Friday’s announcement. Eric’s girlfriend Michelle Nolan told the New York Post that he only found out after the press conference when they were contacted by the woman who adopted them as young children a few years before Vergata’s death. Ms Nolan said Eric was distraught, having believed that Vergata was only missing. Mr Tierney’s office did not return the Post’s request for comment about family notification, the outlet reported. Ms Nolan said Eric and Gary grew up with little knowledge of their biological mother after having been adopted by Edward and Diane Doherty in 1992. She explained that Vergata had been struck by a truck while she was pregnant with Gary in the late 1980s, which is thought to have led to him being born with cerebral palsy. Shortly after Eric was born in 1990, Vergata “took off”, Ms Nolan said. “She was a drug user and their father took her and helped her,” she said. Ms Nolan said the boys’ father was believed to have died from tuberculosis, but she wasn’t sure when. She said that Gary is now living in an facility for adults with special needs and has not been informed about his mother’s death. Vergata vanished without a trace around 14 February 1996 – Valentine’s Day, according to officials. She lived on West 45th St in Manhattan and is believed to have been working as an escort at the time of her disappearance. Police said that no missing persons report was filed at the time. On 20 April 1996, a woman’s legs were found wrapped in plastic at Davis Park on Fire Island’s Blue Point Beach. Almost exactly 15 years later on 11 April 2011, the woman’s skull was then found off Ocean Parkway during the search for Gilgo Beach victims. The skull was located close to the remains of another unidentified victim – Jane Doe 3, also known as Peaches. The two sets of remains in Fire Island and Ocean Parkway were later found to belong to the same person. Before now, investigators had long been unable to identify Jane Doe 7 – and the victim became known as Fire Island Jane Doe. She was described only as a white woman aged 18 to 50 years old who had several notable scars including evidence of surgery on her left ankle. She was one of 11 victims whose remains were found dumped along the shores of Gilgo Beach back in 2010 and 2011 – several of whom are also yet to be identified. Decades later, investigators were finally able to identify Fire Island Jane Doe using genetic geneaology and her surviving relatives’ DNA. In August 2022 – around six months after the new Gilgo Beach taskforce was launched – a DNA profile suitable for genealogical comparison was developed from the remains of the victim, officials said in a press conference on Friday. The next month, the FBI was able to presumptively identify the victim using genetic genealogy as Vergata. Then, that October, investigators tracked down a relative of Vergata and took a buccal swab. Using this, they were able to definitively identity the victim as Vergata. At Friday’s press conference, Mr Tierney said investigators kept that breakthrough hidden until now due to both the ongoing investigation into Mr Heuermann and the need to contact all of Vergata’s family members. “Prior to disclosing, we needed to contact all Vergata’s family members and around the same time we were beginning the grand jury confidential investigation into the murders of the victims known as the Gilgo 4,” he told reporters. ”So we decided not to make it public... until the results of that investigation became public and we had made notice to Vergata’s family.” He added: “Today we are here to announce that as part of the Gilgo taskforce’s reexamination of all evidence in the case we are able to identify Fire Island Jane Doe as Karen Vergata.” “It is important that we remember and honour not only Ms Vergata but all the vicitms on Gilgo Beach,” he added. While this marks a major breakthrough in the case, many questions still remain. In Friday’s press conference announcing her identity, Suffolk County officials refused to take any questions and would not comment on whether or not Vergata’s murder could be the linked to Mr Heuermann – who has so far been tied to four of the victims found along the Long Island shores. At this time, no one has been charged in connection to her homicide and her cause of death is unknown. DA Tierney said that while there are “no charges at this time”, that the “confidential investigation” is ongoing. He would not confirm or deny any ties to accused killer Rex Heuermann – or say if there was any potential suspects on his radar. “We are going to continue to work this particular case as we did the Gilgo Four investigation,” he said. “We’re not going to comment on what – if any suspects – we developed at this time. This is a confidential investigation so I’m not going to be taking any questions.” This major development comes as prosecutors are seeking to obtain a swab of DNA from Mr Heuermann, the man arrested and charged with the murders of three of the victims and suspected of a fourth killing. In a court filing this week, prosecutors said that the DNA sample would “provide further relevant evidence of the defendant’s identity as the perpetrator of the crime”. Prosecutors have so far obtained hundreds of hours of footage from the suspect’s home in Massapequa Park and his office in Midtown Manhattan, 2,500 pages of documents, crime scene photographs and autopsy reports in the high-profile case. The trove of evidence was turned over to Suffolk County Supreme Court Justice Timothy Mazzei and Mr Heuermann’s attorney Michael Brown on Tuesday as the accused killer appeared in court for a brief preliminary hearing. Suffolk County DA Tierney said last week that a “massive amount of evidence” had been recovered from the home which Mr Heuermann grew up in as a child – and which he went on to share with his family up until his sudden arrest. No human remains were discovered, but a trove of around 270 guns were seized from the home. The DA previously revealed that they believe at least some of the murders may have taken place inside the home. Mr Heuermann’s wife and two adult children were out of town at the time of each of the three murders he is charged with, according to court records. The 59-year-old architect was taken into custody on 13 July, almost 13 years after the bodies of at least 11 victims were discovered along the shores of Gilgo Beach on Long Island. He was charged with the murders of Megan Waterman, Melissa Barthelemy and Amber Costello. He is also the prime suspect in the murder of Maureen Brainard-Barnes – who was last seen alive in early June 2007 in New York City and who, with the three other women, is known as the “Gilgo Four”. All four women worked as sex workers and disappeared after going to meet a client. They were all found in December 2010 within one-quarter mile of each other, bound by belts or tape and some wrapped in burlap – their bodies dumped along Gilgo Beach. They are among 11 victims whose remains were found along the shores of Long Island in 2010 and 2011, sparking fears of one or more serial killers. As well as looking into his connection to the murder of Brainard-Barnes and the other Gilgo Beach victims, law enforcement agencies are now also looking into unsolved murders and missing persons cases all across the country. Police in Las Vegas and South Carolina – where Mr Heuermann owns properties – and Atlantic City – where several sex workers have been found murdered – have confirmed they are eyeing the suspect in cold cases. Court records show that Mr Heuermann was linked to the “Gilgo Four” murders through a tip about his pickup truck, a stash of burner phones, “sadistic” online searches, phone calls taunting victims’ families, his wife’s hair found on the victims’ bodies – and a pizza crust. The first piece of the puzzle came when a witness in the Amber Costello case revealed details about a vehicle that a client was driving when she was last seen alive. Costello, who worked as a sex worker, was seen alive on the evening of 2 September 2010 when she left her home in West Babylon. A witness said she had gone to meet a client who was driving a first-generation Chevrolet Avalanche. Last year, a registration search showed that local man Mr Heuermann owned a first-generation model of the truck at the time of Costello’s disappearance. He also matched the witness’ description of the man believed to be the killer: a large, white “ogre”-like male in his mid-40s, around 6’4’ to 6’6” tall, with “dark bushy hair,” and “big oval style 1970’s type eyeglasses”. The discovery of the car led investigators to hone in on Mr Heuermann including executing 300 subpoenas, search warrants and other legal processes to obtain evidence to determine his potential involvement in the killings. Among this was Mr Heuermann’s alleged use of burner phones, with prosecutors saying that he used burner phones to contact the three women and arrange to meet them at the time when they went missing. He also allegedly took two of the victims’ cellphones – and used one to make taunting phone calls to one of their families where he boasted about her murder, court documents state. Mr Heuermann’s DNA was found on one of the victims, while his wife’s hair was found on three of the four women he is connected to. Following his arrest, his wife Asa Ellerup filed for divorce. She has since told The New York Post that she has been left filled with “anxiety” and their two children “cry themselves to sleep” over the horror. “I woke up in the middle of the night, shivering... anxiety,” she said. “My children cry themselves to sleep. I mean, they’re not children. They’re grown adults but they’re my children, and my son has developmental disabilities and he cried himself to sleep.” Mr Heuermann’s sudden arrest comes after the horrific serial killer case has captured the nation’s attention for more than a decade. The Gilgo Beach murders had long stumped law enforcement officials in Suffolk County who believed it could be the work of one or more serial killers who targeted sex workers and dumped their bodies along the remote beaches on Ocean Parkway. The case began in May 2010 when Shannan Gilbert vanished after leaving a client’s house on foot near Gilgo Beach. She called 911 for help saying she feared for her life and was never seen alive again. During a search for Gilbert in dense thicket close to the beach, police discovered the remains of another woman. Within a matter of days, the remains of three more victims were found close by. By spring 2011, the remains of a total of 10 victims had been found including eight women, a man, and a toddler. Police have long thought that it could be the work of one or more serial killers. Gilbert’s body was then found in December 2011. Her cause of death is widely contested with authorities long claiming that it is not connected to the serial killer or killers but that she died from accidental drowning as she fled from the client’s home. However, an independent autopsy commissioned by her family ruled that she died by strangulation and her mother believes she was murdered. Like Gilbert, most of the victims targeted were sex workers, while some are yet to be identified. Read More Gilgo Beach murders - live: Police identify victim Karen Vergata but won’t comment on Rex Heuermann link Gilgo Beach murders victim Jane Doe 7 identified as Karen Vergata 26 years after remains discovered More families await answers in Gilgo Beach killings – and the names of other victims How the Gilgo Beach serial killer turned the Long Island shore into a graveyard

Hollywood's actors union has reached a tentative deal with studios to end its strike

WASHINGTON President Joe Biden said on Tuesday he has vetoed legislation passed by the U.S. Congress to repeal