Explore Business Standard
US President Donald Trump confirmed in a phone interview with NewsNation that talks among the US, Iran and Pakistan had begun, though he does not know how successful they could be. When asked how negotiations would go, Trump said: "I have no idea." The US president said he would know shortly if he felt Iran was acting in good faith about resolving the war. Trump added that the US knew where mines had been placed in the Strait of Hormuz and that the military was bringing equipment to remove them.
The Trump administration has revoked the green cards of more long-term Iranian residents of the United States who are related to current or former senior Iranian officials. The State Department said Saturday it had taken action against Seyed Eissa Hashemi, a Los Angeles-area psychology teacher, his wife and son, all of whom were Iranian born lawful permanent residents of the US. The department said in a statement released as talks to end the war with Iran were getting underway in Pakistan that they had been taken into custody by immigration authorities and are slated for deportation. Hashemi, it said, is the son of Masoumeh Ebtekar who served as a spokeswoman for the attackers who took over the US Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and was later promoted to be Iran's first female vice president. Just last week, the State Department revoked the green cards of the niece and grand-niece of former Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps chief Qasem Soleimani, who was killed in a US airstrike in Baghd
Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Thursday said India is looking at preferential market access for its products in the US and asserted that the country's relations with America are "very robust" with a deep strategic partnership across technology, defence, trade and investment. He said that India's trade pact with the US is "best" as compared to its competitor countries. "Our relations are very robust. We have a deep strategic partnership on several aspects, on technology, on defence, on trade and on investments, and our approach is that India should get preferential market access," Goyal told reporters here. The country, he said, is sitting on a "very sweet spot" in promoting trade with the US. "Being the world's fastest growing economy, India holds huge promise for investors who will continue to look at the India opportunity in greater numbers and greater value in the future," he added. On March 27, the minister held a meeting with the US Trade Representative Jamies
Hundreds of thousands of people were left without power Saturday after high winds raked eastward from the Great Lakes region, leaving trees down and substantial property damage in their wake. Nearly 600,000 customers were still affected at midday in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan, according to PowerOutage.us, which tracks outages nationwide. A 66 mph (106 kph) gust at Pittsburgh International Airport on Friday was deemed its fourth-strongest on record that was not caused by a thunderstorm, according to the National Weather Service. Cleveland Burke Lakefront Airport saw winds hit 85 mph (137 km) Friday afternoon. Winds took down a gas station canopy in New Franklin, Ohio, and an auto parts store sign in Baldwin, Pennsylvania. Trees and tree limbs fell into or onto homes and cars from Cleveland to Pittsburgh. The roof of a school building in the Chicago suburb of Niles, Illinois, was severely damaged by wind. High winds fuelled multiple wildfires across a broad swath of Nebraska's .