Türkiye and Syria Discuss defence and security issues in Damascus
On Friday, a delegation from the Turkish National Defence Ministry paid an official visit to Damascus, the capital of Syria....
President-elect Donald Trump has urged the U.S. Supreme Court to pause implementation of a law that would ban popular social media app TikTok or force its sale, arguing he should have time after taking office to pursue a "political resolution" to the issue.
The court is set to hear arguments in the case on Jan. 10.
The law would require TikTok's Chinese owner, ByteDance, to sell the platform to an American company or face a ban. The U.S. Congress voted in April to ban it unless ByteDance sells the app by Jan. 19.
TikTok, which has over 170 million U.S. users, and its parent have sought to have the law struck down. But if the court does not rule in their favor and no divestment occurs, the app could be effectively banned in the United States on Jan. 19, one day before Trump takes office.
Trump's support for TikTok is a reversal from 2020, when he tried to block the app in the United States and force its sale to American companies because of its Chinese ownership.
It also shows the significant effort by the company to forge inroads with Trump and his team during the presidential campaign.
"President Trump takes no position on the underlying merits of this dispute," said D. John Sauer, Trump's lawyer who is also the president-elect's pick for U.S. solicitor general.
"Instead, he respectfully requests that the Court consider staying the Act's deadline for divestment of January 19, 2025, while it considers the merits of this case, thus permitting President Trump's incoming administration the opportunity to pursue a political resolution of the questions at issue in the case," he added.
Trump previously met with TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew in December, hours after the president-elect expressed he had a "warm spot" for the app and that he favored allowing TikTok to keep operating in the United States for at least a little while.
The president-elect also said he had received billions of views on the social media platform during his presidential campaign.
TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The company has previously said the Justice Department has misstated its ties to China, arguing its content recommendation engine and user data are stored in the United States on cloud servers operated by Oracle Corp (ORCL.N), opens new tab while content moderation decisions that affect U.S. users are made in the United States as well.
Free speech advocates separately told the Supreme Court on Friday the U.S. law against TikTok evokes the censorship regimes put in place by the United States' authoritarian enemies.
The U.S. Justice Department has argued Chinese control of TikTok poses a continuing threat to national security, a position supported by most U.S. lawmakers.
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen led a coalition of 22 attorneys general on Friday in filing an amicus brief asking the Supreme Court to uphold the national TikTok divest-or-ban legislation.
Video from the USGS (United States Geological Survey) showed on Friday (19 September) the Kilauea volcano in Hawaii erupting and spewing lava.
At least 69 people have died and almost 150 injured following a powerful 6.9-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Cebu City in the central Visayas region of the Philippines, officials said, making it one of the country’s deadliest disasters this year.
Authorities in California have identified the dismembered body discovered in a Tesla registered to singer D4vd as 15-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, who had been missing from Lake Elsinore since April 2024.
A tsunami threat was issued in Chile after a magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck the Drake Passage on Friday. The epicenter was located 135 miles south of Puerto Williams on the north coast of Navarino Island.
The war in Ukraine has reached a strategic impasse, and it seems that the conflict will not be solved by military means. This creates a path toward one of two alternatives: either a “frozen” phase that can last indefinitely or a quest for a durable political regulation.
The UN on Friday said humanitarian operations are continuing in the Gaza Strip, with aid convoys moving through multiple crossings and thousands of people recorded travelling across the territory.
The Kremlin on Friday confirmed that a meeting in Hungary between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump could take place within the next two weeks.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House to discuss military support for Ukraine amid its ongoing war with Russia.
Pakistan and Afghanistan have agreed to extend their 48-hour ceasefire until the conclusion of peace talks expected to begin on Saturday in Doha, Qatar, following days of border clashes.
Admiral Alvin Holsey, head of U.S. military forces in Latin America, will step down at the end of the year, two years earlier than expected, amid rising friction with Venezuela.
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