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Reuters was reportedly the only news service to be providing video coverage of Donald Trump’s visit to a Detroit church on Saturday, and a mystery voice could be overheard ordering someone to “shut down” the feed before the event had concluded. Bishop Wayne T. Jackson was presenting Trump with a prayer shawl and two Bibles when a hushed voice off camera could be heard saying, “I’m shooting this, I don’t care what…” Moments later, the same voice said “Shut this down?” “Shut it, yeah,” another voice said.

What does a jihadi have to do to get credit these days? If screaming “Allahu akbar” isn’t enough to make his motive clear, what is? Would he have to drop his knife and announce: “I follow Allah. I pledge my allegiance to the Islamic State. That is why I did what I did”? No, a convert to Islam named Edward Archer said that after he shot and seriously wounded police officer Jesse Hartnett, and the Mayor of Philadelphia, Jim Kenney, responded: “In no way shape or form does anyone in this room believe that Islam or the teaching of Islam...

If this poll accurately reflects the US electorate, get ready for the mother of all gender gaps (so to speak) in November if Donald Trump wins the Republican presidential nomination. The frontrunner has a major problem with women, according to this Reuters-Ipsos poll conducted over the first half of March, and it has gotten worse rather than better over the last six months. Half of all women have a “very unfavorable� view of Trump, in an election that could pit him against the first female major-party nominee: Real estate billionaire Donald Trump’s coarse rhetoric has won him some fans,...

Why — and how — Russia won in Syria By Josh Cohen March 15, 2016 Here’s what Russia achieved — and why it was so successful. First — and most importantly — Russian bombing turned the tide of the war in Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s favor. Second, Putin recently achieved an important diplomatic objective by forcing the United States to acknowledge that Russia plays a key role in determining Syria’s future. Third, Putin responded to Turkey’s shoot down of a Russian jet by humiliating Ankara, an emerging rival in the Middle East and Central Asia. Putin also grievously wounded Turkey’s...

Reuters rolling poll (Trump 38.4, Cruz 16.2, Rubio 10.8)

It used to be said of OPEC that it was like a teabag - it only worked in hot water. If that is so, conditions on world oil markets could hardly be more difficult as prices languish at almost seven-year lows near $40 a barrel. Yet, rather than closing ranks, OPEC is finding that an intensifying battle for market share, worsened by deep regional differences between Saudi Arabia and Iran, is driving it further apart. Halfway through last Friday's six-hour meeting, an unexpected dispute erupted over the defining feature of the cartel. In a move sources say was masterminded by...

The Syrian army said on Saturday that Turkey had recently increased supplies of weapons, ammunition and equipment to what it described as terrorists in Syria, and accused its northern neighbor of firing shells at Syrian army positions. "We have certain information that the Turkish government has recently increased its support to the terrorists and the level of their supplies of weapons, ammunition and equipment necessary to continue their criminal acts," an army statement said. The Syrian government describes as terrorists all the groups fighting President Bashar al-Assad in the 4-1/2-year-long war that has moved into a higher gear since Russia...

A steadfast performance by Jeb Bush in Tuesday's Republican debate has halted the sense of desperation around his U.S. presidential campaign and may buy him time to counter the rise of chief rival Marco Rubio. The fourth Republican debate in the search for a 2016 presidential nominee was characterized by a steady stream of attacks against front-runner Donald Trump and mistake-free performances by Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas, two up-and-coming U.S. senators in the race. But the most relieved candidate after the two-hour encounter inside the Milwaukee Theatre was Bush, the former Florida governor who was outclassed...

Thu Sep 24, 2015 11:19am EDT Related: World, Russia, Syria Syrian army uses new Russian jets to strike Islamic State: monitor Syrian government forces used newly arrived Russian warplanes to bombard Islamic State insurgents in Aleppo province in northern Syria, a group monitoring the civil war said on Thursday, in an attempt to break a siege on a nearby air base. Russia is bolstering its ally Damascus against rebels with military aid that U.S. officials say has included fighter jets, helicopter gunships, artillery and ground forces. The air strikes, which began earlier this week, were accompanied by ground attacks near...

Religious groups in the United States have urged the White House to step up its response to the Syrian refugee crisis, with one on Tuesday calling Washington's efforts so far "disappointing."Church World Service, a global humanitarian organization that represents 37 Christian denominations, has called on the government to take in 100,000 Syrians over the next year, said Jen Smyers, who works on the group's immigration and refugee program.The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, and the Jewish refugee assistance agency HIAS along with secular groups have also backed that figure.

Euro zone countries tried in vain to stop the IMF publishing a gloomy analysis of Greece's debt burden which the leftist government says vindicates its call to voters to reject bailout terms, sources familiar with the situation said on Friday. The document released in Washington on Thursday said Greece's public finances will not be sustainable without substantial debt relief, possibly including write-offs by European partners of loans guaranteed by taxpayers. It also said Greece will need at least 50 billion euros in additional aid over the next three years to keep itself afloat. Publication of the draft Debt Sustainability Analysis...

(From Video Transcript:) The World Health Organization says Cuba has reached one of the greatest public health milestones possible. It has ended the mother-to-child transmission of HIV and syphilis. At a news conference in Havana, WHO representative Jose Luis di Fabio praised Cuba’s health system. […] UNICEF Representative Anna Lucia d’Emilio says Cuba’s achievement shows that ending the AIDS epidemic is possible. …

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton promised on Saturday to fight for ordinary Americans who have been left behind as the economy recovers, appealing to working families at the first major rally of her 2016 White House campaign. Speaking on New York's Roosevelt Island, within sight of Manhattan's skyscrapers, Clinton promised would "make the economy work for everyday Americans, not just those at the top" if elected president. The gathering of several thousand people cheered as Clinton said working people are asking why wealth is reserved for chief executives and hedge fund managers. "You have to wonder, when...

(Reuters) - Appealing to working families in her first major campaign speech, U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said on Saturday she would rewrite the U.S. tax code if she is elected so that it rewards hard work, and not quick equities trades or money stashed away overseas. She also pledged to establish a national infrastructure bank financed by bonds, an idea championed by President Barack Obama, a fellow Democrat.

It is hard to describe just how bad things are for the Republican Party. Each day it looks more and more like the Bates Motel from Alfred Hitchcock’s classic film Psycho. More precisely, the GOP is actually most like the central character who owns the motel: Norman Bates and his alter ego, “Mother,” a.k.a. Norma. Norman appears to be a polite, sincere young man, if strongly dominated by Mother. But so what if he’s idiosyncratic, even eccentric, with a mother fixation? As a private individual, he has the right to be odd. Mother, meanwhile, wants absolute control over her son....

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Top Republicans predicted on Sunday that both chambers of Congress would muster the votes to pass the "fast-track" authority sought by President Barack Obama to negotiate major trade deals, despite opposition from Obama's fellow Democrats. "Yes, we’ll pass it. We'll pass it later this week," Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said in an interview with ABC. Republican U.S. Representative Paul Ryan said on CNN's "State of the Union" that he was confident the measure would also pass the House of Representatives. "We will have the votes," said Ryan, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. "We're...

Her campaign barely three weeks old, Hillary Clinton already has been attacked by Republicans on everything from donations to her family’s charitable foundation, to her tenure as secretary of state and her ties to Wall Street. But her rivals, and the political action committees that support them, are treading more carefully on one incendiary subject: her age . If elected in November 2016, Clinton would be, at 69, the second-oldest person to take the presidential oath for the first time, behind only Ronald Reagan, who turned 70 weeks after being sworn into office in 1981. Questions of health and fitness...

ISLAMABAD: Maria Golovnina, the Pakistan and Afghanistan bureau chief of Reuters who was based in Islamabad, was found dead at her office in the capital’s F-8 sector, sources in the police told Dawn. Golovnina had reportedly gone to the toilet, and had not stepped out for a long time when people who were present barged in. Maria Golovnina - Twitter. She was reportedly lying on the floor covered in vomit. The bureau chief was rushed to Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) where she was pronounced dead. Doctors at Pims told Dawn Maria had passed away before she could be...

Turkey has lifted a ban on the Islamic-style headscarf in schools, allowing girls from the fifth grade and up to cover their hair in a further easing of generations-old restrictions on the public expression of faith. The government, whose roots are in political Islam, has already lifted a ban on religious garb for university students and female civil servants, scrapping curbs stemming from the founding of Turkey's secular republic in 1923 on the ashes of Islamic Ottoman Empire. "Our female students have yearned" for the end of the ban, Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said late on Monday after a...

President Barack Obama's push to raise the minimum wage, which has largely found success in liberal-leaning coastal states to date, could make headway in the conservative heartland in the November elections. Voters in the Republican-controlled states of Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota will consider ballot initiatives in November that would raise the minimum wage above the national rate of $7.25 per hour. Activists on both sides of the issue say the proposals stand a good chance of passing.

(Reuters) - Israel has arrested six Jewish suspects in the abduction and killing of a Palestinian teenager whose death sparked violent protests in Jerusalem and Israeli Arab towns, a security source said on Sunday. With tensions high along the Gaza border, Israel said its aircraft attacked 10 sites in the Palestinian enclave in response to persistent rocket strikes on southern Israeli towns. But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signalled that broader Israeli action was not imminent. The security source gave no details about the suspects arrested in the investigation into the abduction and killing of 16-year-old Mohammed Abu Khudair, other than...

WASHINGTON/KABUL (Reuters) - The frantic search for Bowe Bergdahl began the moment his comrades discovered he was no longer inside the fragile outpost in a rock-strewn valley in one of the most hostile corners of Afghanistan. Exactly why Bergdahl left is subject to intense scrutiny. But accounts by two Taliban sources as well as several U.S. officials and fellow soldiers raise doubt over media reports that he had sought to join the Taliban, and over suggestions that the deaths later that year of six soldiers in his battalion were related to the search for him. His dramatic release on May...

JERUSALEM (AP) — Pope Francis delivered a powerful boost of support to the Palestinians during a Holy Land pilgrimage Sunday, repeatedly backing their statehood aspirations, praying solemnly at Israel's controversial separation barrier and calling the stalemate in peace efforts "unacceptable." -snip- Palestinian officials hailed Francis' decision to refer to the "state of Palestine." In its official program, the Vatican referred to President Mahmoud Abbas as the president of the "state of Palestine," and his Bethlehem office as the "presidential palace." He pointedly called Abbas a "man of peace." -snip-

The European Commission has approved new rules aimed at limiting the spread of a virus that has killed millions of piglets in the United States, highlighting the risk of animal feed products as a potential transmission agent. Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus (PEDv) has wiped out more than 10% of the US pig population since it appeared a year ago, and has also struck in Canada, Mexico and Japan. The European Union has not been affected by this strain. In the United States, the world’s biggest pork exporter, losses from PEDv could cut pork production as much as 7% in 2014,...

Among the roughly 300 killed during intense fighting in Aleppo was Molhem Barakat, a Reuters photographer. Barakat's death last Friday, in the indiscriminate barrage on Aleppo that the White House criticized Monday, has raised serious questions about Reuters' hiring practice. Hannah Lucinda Smith, a British freelance photojournalist and acquaintance of Barakat, writes that Barakat tried to join Al Qaeda. According to Smith, Barakat wanted to join the terrorist organization for the 11,000 Syrian lira monthly salary. "It is a pitiful wage for a potential suicide bomber, but enough to tempt an eighteen-year-old stuck in a war zone with no job."...

For the second year in a row, the Human Rights Campaign has awarded us the top rating of 100% on its Corporate Equality Index 2014. This score is based on the HRC’s evaluation of fair and inclusive workplace policies across large U.S. employers. Businesses that achieve this score are recognized as “Best Places to Work for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Equality.” Thomson Reuters is one of 303 companies (out of 934 evaluated) to earn this distinction. “We’re honored to be recognized again by the HRC for our continued efforts,” said Jane Moran, Chief Information Officer for Technology and executive...

Egypt to look beyond U.S. for arms: foreign minister Reuters By Samia Nakhoul and Michael Georgy CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy said on Saturday that Egypt would look beyond the United States to meet its security needs and warned Washington that it could no longer ignore popular demands in a changed Arab world. Speaking ahead of a visit by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Fahmy said the United States must take a long-term view of its relations with Egypt and understand that in the wake of the Arab Spring, "it would have to deal now with...

Reuters is carrying an editorial today on how the DC "government has failed us – again." Knowing Reuters's record on articles like this, you might wonder why I stopped to read it. It was the title of the article, "The Sanity Caucus," that caught my eye. Surprised by the title, I scanned down, wondering if the article would make the point that the Tea Party folks, despite their methods, had the right ideas: Stop the expansion of the US government by any means possible, at least long enough to make a serious point about a serious issue. This wasn't...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Eager to exploit divisions among Republicans, Democrats have hammered the message that the U.S. government shutdown is the work of a small segment of House of Representatives Republicans on the far right. In fact, support for the tactic that led to the shutdown - now in its fourth day - has proven to be far more solid and widespread among House Republicans than the Democratic portrayal. That is because the far right, after the 2010 and 2012 congressional elections, is not a small segment at all - it represents probably 69 percent of the House Republican caucus....

The Reuters news agency is cutting some five percent of its editorial staff, a source close to the company said Wednesday, the latest layoffs in the troubled media industry. Parent company Thomson Reuters announced in a statement it would be making reductions, but offered no figures. -snip- A source familiar with the matter said the cuts would affect some five percent of the global staff of some 2,800.

Senator John McCain lashed out at fellow Republican Ted Cruz on Wednesday over a Nazi appeasement comparison he made during his all-night, anti-Obamacare marathon on the U.S. Senate floor. McCain, a Vietnam veteran and former prisoner of war, said the comparison was inappropriate. He said he had taken Cruz aside privately to tell him, and got a response he did not like: Cruz told him his appeaser reference applied not to distinguished members of the Senate but only media "pundits." "I resoundingly reject" Cruz's comments, said McCain, a senior Republican and former presidential candidate. "I think it's wrong and I...

China warned on Thursday that military intervention in Syria would hurt the world economy and push up oil prices, reinforcing Vladimir Putin's attempts to talk U.S. President Barack Obama out of air strikes. The rift over Syria could overshadow a summit of the Group of 20 (G20) developed and developing economies in St. Petersburg at which global leaders want to forge a united front on growth, trade, banking transparency and fighting tax evasion. The club that accounts for two thirds of the world's population and 90 percent of its output is divided over issues such as turmoil in emerging markets...

OTTAWA - U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, who says he recently discovered he is likely a Canadian, must win security clearance from Canada's spy agency, fill out a four-page form and then wait up to eight months to sever his ties to America's northern neighbor. Cruz, a Texas Republican who has fueled speculation that he may run for president in 2016, was born in Canada, which automatically makes him a citizen. On Monday he offered to renounce that citizenship. ... People giving up Canadian citizenship must prove they are or will become a citizen of another country, do not live in...

The online insurance exchange that Oregon established under President Barack Obama's healthcare law will not allow residents to sign up for coverage on their own when enrollment begins nationwide on Oct. 1, state officials say. The state is the first to say it won't be open for all comers by that date, raising concerns that other states running their own "Obamacare" exchanges might also be struggling. The decision by Oregon, an enthusiastic supporter of the Affordable Care Act, gives ammunition to opponents who have warned of an Obamacare "train wreck." Instead of enrolling in health insurance online themselves, at least...

Cue up the indignant reactions: President Barack Obama and his family are about to go on an eight-day vacation on the Massachusetts island of Martha's Vineyard, an elite playground for the East Coast wealthy set. Often the criticism of a president's vacation is partisan in nature, which is why White House spokesman Jay Carney dismissed a question about it when asked whether Obama's vacation was too extravagant. "I would just check what they said six years ago," he said, referring to a period when a Republican president, George W. Bush, was in office. Bush, who vacationed at his Texas ranch...

BEIRUT — The ouster on Wednesday of Egypt’s elected Muslim Brotherhood government barely a year after it took office represents a significant setback for the Islamist movements that have proved the biggest beneficiaries so far of the Arab Spring revolts. From Tunisia to war-torn Syria, anti-Islamist activists have begun expressing unhappiness with the religious parties empowered by freedoms the turmoil unleashed. That the backlash has crescendoed in Egypt — the Arab world’s political and cultural trendsetter and the birthplace of the Muslim Brotherhood 80 years ago — is likely to resonate far beyond, perhaps most forcefully in Syria. “What happens...

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, fighting to crush a two-year-old uprising against four decades of rule by him and his late father, said on Wednesday the upheaval in Egypt was a defeat for political Islam. "Whoever brings religion to use in politics or in favor of one group at the expense of another will fall anywhere in the world," Assad was quoted as telling the official Thawra newspaper, according to an official Facebook page.

CAIRO (Reuters) - Army concern about the way President Mohamed Mursi was governing Egypt reached tipping point when the head of state attended a rally packed with hardline fellow Islamists calling for holy war in Syria, military sources said. At the June 15 rally, Sunni Muslim clerics used the word "infidels" to denounce both the Shi'ites fighting to protect Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and the non-Islamists that oppose Mursi at home. Mursi himself called for foreign intervention in Syria against Assad, leading to a veiled rebuke from the army, which issued an apparently bland but sharp-edged statement the next day...

Reuters is reporting that the Egyptian Army ousted former President Mohammed Morsi in part over his calls for backing the Syrian rebels against dictator Bashar al-Assad.

A manager from a U.S. Internal Revenue Service office in Cincinnati where staff have been accused of unfairly subjecting conservative groups to extra scrutiny has said his agents were not influenced by any political agenda. John Shafer, who described himself as "a conservative Republican," told congressional investigators he sought advice from his boss on how to handle the first Tea Party application he and a lower-level agent came across in February 2010 because it was a new, high-profile issue. The furor since then has led to the ousting of the IRS chief by President Barack Obama, an FBI investigation and...

Priests and thousands of other Georgians broke through police barricades and forced gay rights activists to flee on Friday, cutting short their rally to mark the international day against homophobia. Holding banners saying "Stop Homosexual Propaganda in Georgia!" and "Not in our city!" the demonstrators swarmed into a square in central Tbilisi where about 50 Georgians were rallying in support of gay rights. Police escorted the gay rights supporters onto buses and drove them away to avoid violence. Several people, including some journalists, received minor injuries, Georgian media said. "We won't allow these sick people to hold gay parades in...

The United States was not given any warning before air strikes in Syria against what Western and Israeli officials say were weapons headed for Hezbollah militants, a U.S. intelligence official said on Sunday.

Boston bands Aerosmith and New Kids on the Block, singer-songwriter James Taylor and country singer Jason Aldean will headline a concert to benefit the victims of last month's Boston Marathon bombing, organizers said on Friday... All proceeds from the concert will go to The One Fund, which was set up by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino. Tickets priced from $35 to $285 go on sale on Monday.

Chechen Group Behind Beslan Claims Attack Kadyrov Vows To Wipe Out Islamic Militants June 29, 2009 MOSCOW (Reuters) -- The Chechen rebel group behind the 2004 Beslan school massacre has claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing last week that badly wounded the president of Russia's southern region of Ingushetia.

Reuters) - George Soros, who died XXX at age XXX, was a predatory and hugely successful financier and investor, who argued paradoxically for years against the same sort of free-wheeling capitalism that made him billions.

President Barack Obama may have made a slow start on gay rights issues, but by the end of his first term his record was such that a news magazine dubbed him the nation's "first gay president." Now activists want more. Fresh from historic Supreme Court arguments over same-sex unions, advocates want Obama to use his executive powers to fight discrimination at businesses, schools, and military bases and stop waiting for action from a reluctant Congress. The Supreme Court is expected to rule in June on big issues: the constitutional right to gay marriage and the right of gay married couples...

North Korea seen moving mid-range missile to east coast: reports SEOUL | Wed Apr 3, 2013 9:13pm EDT (Reuters) - North Korea has moved what appears to be a mid-range Musudan missile to its east coast, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said on Thursday, quoting multiple government sources privy to intelligence from U.S. and South Korean authorities. It was not clear if the missile was mounted with a warhead or whether the North was planning to fire it or was just putting it on display as a show of force, one South Korean government source was quoted as saying.

Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch has held a dinner meeting with Nigel Farage, leader of the anti-European Union UK Independence Party, prompting critics to accuse him of using his clout to interfere in Britain's debate about the European Union. Prime Minister David Cameron promised to try to renegotiate Britain's membership of the EU and to hold a referendum on staying in or leaving by the end of 2017, a pledge which fuelled public debate between supporters and opponents. A spokesman for UKIP, which favours Britain leaving the EU, said the dinner took place at Murdoch's London flat on Tuesday. He declined...

A British exit from the European Union would be a catastrophe despite disagreements over capping banker bonuses that have left London increasingly isolated, German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told an Austrian newspaper. His comments are his strongest so far in trying to avoid a messy split that would send shock waves through politics and financial markets. Britain failed this week to secure backing to water down new EU rules limiting bonuses, a measure that could threaten London's dominance as a financial centre. Schaeuble acknowledged Britain's interest in the subject, given the major role its financial centre plays, but told Der...

House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner ruled out tax increases as a way to address the nation's deficit after talks with President Barack Obama on budget cuts set to take effect later on Friday. "The discussion about revenue, in my view is over. It's about taking on the spending problem," Boehner said