| |  |  | The Reuters Daily Briefing | Wednesday, September 22, 2021 by Linda Noakes | Hello Here's what you need to know. Taliban envoy asks to speak to world leaders, German auto giants place their bets on hydrogen cars, and Lithuania tells people to throw away their Chinese phones | | | | | Today's biggest stories  FILE PHOTO: A supporter of U.S. President Donald Trump arrives by bus ahead of a protest against the election of President-elect Joe Biden, in Phoenix, Arizona, January 17, 2021. REUTERS/Caitlin O'Hara U.S.
A group of Republican secretary-of-state contenders in America’s swing states have embraced former President Donald Trump's false claims that he lost a “rigged” election. Their candidacies have alarmed Democrats and voting-rights groups, who fear that the politicians who tried hardest to undermine Americans’ faith in elections last year may soon be the ones running them - or deciding them, in future contested votes.
President Joe Biden will push world leaders today to do more to curb the COVID-19 pandemic, and announce a U.S. pledge to buy 500 million more vaccine doses to donate to other countries.
Angry scenes broke out at Haiti's main airport among migrants sent home from a squalid Texas border camp, as Biden faced mounting pressure to stop an expulsions policy the U.N. refugee chief said may be illegal.
Democrats in the House of Representatives passed a bill to fund the U.S. government through December 3 and suspend the nation's borrowing limit until the end of 2022, sending it to the Senate where Republicans have vowed to block it. We look at how splits among Democrats are plaguing efforts to pass Biden's domestic agenda.
Police and FBI agents planned to resume their search of a swampy Florida wilderness for Gabby Petito's fiance, one day after the local coroner in Wyoming identified a body found there as the missing 22-year-old travel blogger.
|  FILE PHOTO: Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen leaves after a news conference in Moscow, Russia, July 9, 2021. REUTERS/Tatyana Makeyeva WORLD The Taliban have asked to address world leaders at the United Nations in New York this week and nominated their Doha-based spokesman Suhail Shaheen as Afghanistan's U.N. ambassador, according to a letter seen by Reuters. The move sets up a showdown with Ghulam Isaczai, the U.N. ambassador in New York representing Afghanistan's government ousted last month by the Taliban.
A volley of shots was fired at a car carrying Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's principal aide in what a senior official called an assassination attempt. Zelenskiy, who came to power on a promise to take on the country's oligarchs and fight corruption, is currently in the United States at the U.N. General Assembly.
Germany's Social Democrats have seen their lead over Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives narrow in a poll, pointing to a tightening race just five days before a federal election.
Lithuania's Defense Ministry recommended that consumers avoid buying Chinese mobile phones and advised people to throw away the ones they have now after a government report found the devices had built-in censorship capabilities. Flagship phones sold in Europe by China's smartphone giant Xiaomi have a built-in ability to detect and censor terms such as 'Free Tibet' and 'Long live Taiwan independence', Lithuania's state-run cybersecurity body said.
Lava poured from an erupting volcano on the Spanish island of La Palma for a fourth day, blanketing houses and fields, a day after people with homes on the path of the molten rock were allowed back briefly to recover belongings.
| BUSINESS China Evergrande Group's main unit said it has negotiated a deal with bondholders to settle interest payments on a domestic bond, which has helped calm fears of an imminent default that could unleash global financial chaos.
The U.S. Justice Department and six states filed an antitrust lawsuit against American Airlines and JetBlue Airways seeking to stop a partnership the government said could lead to higher fares in busy Northeastern U.S. airports.
U.S. delivery firm FedEx Corp posted a 7% drop in quarterly profit and cut its full-year forecast, after labor shortages crimped earnings, slowed packages and drove up costs ahead of the all-important holiday peak season.
Britain warned its food producers to prepare for a 500% rise in carbon dioxide prices after extending emergency state support to avert a shortage of poultry and meat triggered by soaring costs of wholesale natural gas. CO2 is a by-product of the fertilizer industry where natural gas is the biggest input cost.
Battery power may be the frontrunner to become the car technology of the future, but don't rule out the underdog hydrogen. That's the view of some major automakers, including BMW and Audi, which are developing hydrogen fuel-cell passenger vehicle prototypes alongside their fleets of battery cars as part of preparations to abandon fossil fuels.
| | | | | | | | | Video of the day  Magnitude 6.0 earthquake strikes near Melbourne The quake was one of Australia's biggest on record, causing damage to buildings and sending tremors throughout neighboring states. | | | Thanks for spending part of your day with us. | | | | | |
