Germany’s health ministry Wednesday said its coronavirus smartphone app has been downloaded more than 18 million times and transmitted 1.2 million test results from labs to users during the first 100 days of use.Health Minister Jens Spahn told reporters in Berlin that while the “Corona Warn App” is far from perfect, it should be considered a success. He said almost 5,000 users have activated the app to warn their contacts and called it a key tool in the country’s effort to contain the spread of the virus, which causes the COVID-19 disease.He said, “This shows that the corona tracing app works, it is in demand…it helps to prevent infections and it is one of the most successful apps worldwide.”Spahn noted in particular the fact that most users can get their test results sent directly to their smartphones, without having to wait for their doctor to inform them.German Health Minister Jens Spahn attends a news conference to give an update on a smartphone app that allows users to evaluate their risk of being exposed to the coronavirus in Berlin, Germany, Sept. 23, 2020.Germany’s strict privacy rules mean that the app stores all data on phones and not on a central server. Observers, however, say there is no precise data on the number of people alerted about possible exposure.Should an app user get a positive test result, the app has a button the person can press to warn his or her contacts. Spahn says one problem is not everyone is doing that. “Only about half of the app users who get a positive result inform their contacts afterwards.”Spahn says the app is not a cure-all, but one of a number of important tools the government is using to control the spread of the virus.German tech company Deutsche Telekom, working with software company SAP, developed the app. Deutsche Telekom Chief Executive Tim Hoettges said more than 90% of labs in Germany are now connected to it.Hoettges said efforts are under way to establish a European “gateway” that will allow the German app to communicate with those in 10 other European countries, including Italy, Poland and Spain, that use the same decentralized, Bluetooth-based system.
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Immigration authorities have stopped sending detained women to a rural Georgia gynecologist accused of performing surgeries without consent, a government spokesman said Tuesday.
Dr. Mahendra Amin faces allegations that he administered hysterectomies and other procedures that women held at the Irwin County Detention Center didn’t seek or fully understand. Amin has seen at least 60 detained women, said Andrew Free, a lawyer working with other attorneys to investigate medical care at Irwin County, on Tuesday.  
Bryan Cox, a spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, confirmed that Amin would no longer see patients from the detention center, but declined to comment further, citing an ongoing investigation by the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general.
 
The Irwin County Hospital issued a statement defending Amin, saying he “is a long-time member of the Irwin County Hospital medical staff and has been in good standing for the entirety of his service to the Irwin County community.”
The statement did not address Amin’s role as chief executive of MGA Health Management, a company that began managing the Irwin County Hospital in 1996, according to the hospital’s website.
According to the statement, Amin operated on two detained women who were referred to the hospital for hysterectomies. Heath Clark, the hospital’s general counsel, did not respond to questions about whether Amin performed hysterectomies in cases where the women had a different initial referral. Clark also did not say how many other procedures he had performed that could jeopardize a woman’s ability to have children, including the removal of fallopian tubes or ovaries.  
Scott Grubman, a lawyer for Amin, did not respond to a request for comment.
The allegations against the doctor were first revealed in a complaint filed last week by a nurse at Irwin County Detention Center. The nurse, Dawn Wooten, alleged that many detained women were taken to an unnamed gynecologist whom she labeled the “uterus collector” because of how many hysterectomies he performed.
The Associated Press on Friday reported that at least eight women since 2017 had been taken to see Amin for gynecological treatment, though it did not find evidence of mass hysterectomies as alleged in the complaint. Free said Tuesday that a team of lawyers had heard from dozens of more women raising concerns about the doctor.
“It’s long past time to stop sending women to this physician and to companies that provide services on his behalf,” he said, adding that he was concerned women detained at the facility could potentially face retaliation for coming forward about the doctor.  
Scott Sutterfield, an executive at LaSalle Corrections, which operates the detention center, said the company would not “take or threaten any action” against detainees who report information “in good faith.”
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Rescuers are trying to save scores of whales beached in the Australian state of Tasmania. Earlier this week, a pod of 270 pilot whales were found washed ashore.  Two hundred more were discovered a short distance away Wednesday.  The stranding of about 470 pilot whales on the west coast of Tasmania is the largest ever recorded in the state’s history.   Two hundred seventy animals were found washed up on sandbars Monday, prompting a rescue operation involving wildlife experts, the police and volunteers. They have managed to return some of the whales into deeper water and coax them back out to sea. It is a challenging task. Pilot whales can grow up to seven meters long and weight three tons.  But dozens of the pod discovered Monday have died, and Australian wildlife experts believe that most of the 200 whales found beached 10 kilometers away Wednesday have not survived.    Yet rescue efforts continue. Wildlife biologist Kris Carlyon says they are focusing on those animals with a realistic chance of survival. “We are going to basically take the animals with the best chance to start with and the ones that we (are) able to deal with.  So, some animals may be simply too big or in an unsuitable location to actually deal with,” Carlyon said.The coastline near Macquarie Harbor, near the town of Strahan, Tasmania, is a known whale-stranding hotspot. In 2011, about 20 sperm whales were beached there, and most died.    Experts have yet to understand why the mammals become marooned.  There are various scientific suppositions.  The whales use echo location to navigate, and one theory is that the whales may have been drawn in too close to the coast in search of food. Other theories have asserted that the Moon’s gravitational pull or perhaps military sonar could be responsible.   There is no definitive answer, and some marine experts believe that mass strandings of whales and dolphins in different countries could all have different causes.  The rescue mission in Tasmania could take days.  Experts say cool and wet weather will help keep the surviving whales alive, but they concede it is a race against time.  
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Australia’s internal borders are to gradually reopen as COVID-19 infections continue to fall. South Australia and Queensland are easing restrictions with the neighboring state, New South Wales, for the first time in months. Australia has recorded about 27,000 coronavirus cases since the pandemic began, and more than 850 people have died.    South Australia has taken a very cautious approach to curbing the spread of the novel coronavirus. Most people are forbidden from entering the state from neighboring Victoria, which has had most of the nation’s coronavirus cases and fatalities. Those restrictions remain firmly in place, but starting Thursday, South Australia is reopening its border with New South Wales because that state has recorded no cases of community transmission of the virus for 14 days. Travelers will no longer have to go into quarantine. South Australian Premier Steven Marshall says the eased restrictions will be a relief to residents.A COVID-19 signage is seen at a vehicle checkpoint on the Pacific Highway on the Queensland – New South Wales border in Brisbane on April 15, 2020.“People from New South Wales wanting to come into South Australia from Thursday onwards will be able to do that without doing the 14-days of self-isolation.  So, this will be a massive, massive relief to people who have been dislocated from friends, from family, from business opportunities.  This will be a huge relief,” Marshall said.From October 1, border restrictions between some northern districts in New South Wales and Queensland will be relaxed.  The measures will allow more residents in border communities to travel freely between the two eastern states.  However, the majority of people in New South Wales are still not allowed to travel to Queensland because of fears they could spread the virus.  People in Victoria cannot visit other Australian states and territories unless they hold an exemption, are an essential worker or live along a state border.   The Victorian state government has said it was hopeful that falling infection rates will allow it to ease a strict lockdown measures in Melbourne.   Western Australia has no immediate plans to reopen to the rest of the country.  Arrivals from other Australian jurisdictions must go into quarantine for 14 days before they are allowed to move freely about the state.  The federal government has long agitated for all internal borders to be reopened to help revive an economy that is in recession for the first time since 1991.As parts of Australia begin to open up ahead of summer, the Northern Territory government is offering cash incentives to attract domestic tourists.  Australia is a country comprising six states, two principal mainland territories and a population of 25 million people. Its international borders, which were closed to foreign nationals in March, are not expected to reopen until next year. 
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In a sweeping bipartisan vote that takes a government shutdown off the table, the House passed a temporary governmentwide funding bill Tuesday night, shortly after President Donald Trump prevailed in a behind-the-scenes fight over his farm bailout. The stopgap measure will keep federal agencies fully up and running into December, giving lawmakers in the post-election congressional session time to digest the election and decide whether to pass the annual government funding bills by then or kick them to the next administration. The budget year ends Sept. 30. The 359-57 vote came after considerable behind-the-scenes battling over proposed add-ons. The final agreement gives the administration continued immediate authority to dole out Agriculture Department subsidies in the run-up to Election Day. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., retreated from an initial draft that sparked a furor with Republicans and farm-state Democrats. FILE – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill, Sept. 18, 2020.Instead, in talks Tuesday, Pelosi restored a farm aid funding patch sought by the administration, which has sparked the ire of Democrats who said it plays political favorites as it gives out bailout money to farmers and ranchers. In return, Pelosi won coronavirus-related food aid for the poor, including a higher food benefit for families whose children are unable to receive free or reduced-price lunches because schools are closed over the coronavirus. Another add-on would permit states to remove hurdles to food stamps and nutrition aid to low-income mothers that are more difficult to clear during the pandemic. The deal permitted the measure to speed through the House after a swift debate that should ensure smooth sailing in the GOP-held Senate before next Wednesday’s deadline. There’s no appetite on either side for a government shutdown. On Monday, Democrats released a version of the stopgap measure that did not contain the farm bailout provision, enraging Republicans and putting passage of the measure in doubt. It became apparent that Pelosi did not have the votes to pass it — Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., dismissed it as a “rough draft” — and negotiations continued. FILE – Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., speaks at the Capitol in Washington, Sept. 21, 2020.Democrats complain that the Trump administration has favored Southern states such as Georgia — a key swing state and home of Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue — and larger producers in distributing bailout funds. Farmers are suffering from low commodity prices and the effects of higher tariffs imposed by Trump. Trump announced a new $13 billion allotment of bailout funding at a political rally in Wisconsin last week. The legislation — called a continuing resolution, or CR, in Washington-speak — would keep every federal agency running at current funding levels through Dec. 11, which will keep the government afloat past an election that could reshuffle Washington’s balance of power. The measure also extends many programs whose funding or authorizations lapse on Sept. 30, including the federal flood insurance program, highway and transit programs, and a long set of extensions of various health programs, such as a provision to prevent Medicaid cuts to hospitals that serve many poor people.   It also finances the possible transition to a new administration if Joe Biden wins the White House and would stave off an unwelcome COVID-19-caused increase in Medicare Part B premiums for outpatient doctor visits. 
 
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As local authorities in northeastern Syria announce the discovery of new mass graves belonging to the victims of Islamic State in Raqqa, families whose loved ones disappeared during the group’s control over the region hope they might finally get some answers.  The First Responders, a rescue and recovery team in northeastern Syria, earlier this month announced finding a mass grave in the western outskirt of Raqqa’s Farusiya, raising the number of discovered sites to five this year. Raqqa SyriaFollowing the announcement and the recovery of 16 bodies from the grave, the families of the victims are calling on authorities to prioritize a speedy identification process of the remains.   “The coalition and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) must support The First Responders team with technical support so they would be able to verify the identities of the bodies found in mass graves and under the rubble of buildings that were destroyed during the battle to defeat IS in the city of Raqqa,” said Ensaf Nasser who has been looking for her husband since IS kidnapped him in 2014.  Nasser’s husband, Foad Ahmed el-Mohamed, was a local journalist taking pictures of wounded civilians at Aisha Hospital in Deir el-Zour city when IS militants broke in and took him away. She has since relentlessly perused threads leading to the whereabouts of her husband, without much luck.Foad Ahmed el-Mohamed, was a local journalist in Deir el-Zour. Here holding a twin born in the hospital he used to work at in 2014. (Photo courtesy Ensaf Nasser)Nasser told VOA she has learned that the extremist group accused her husband of infidelity because he advocated for a secular and democratic state instead of a caliphate. He was also accused of breaking their strict Sunni codes by marrying Nasser, who was a follower of Syria’s Druze sect, and naming his son after the Argentinian Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara.  “I have knocked at every door and followed every lead through official channels or personal connections, but I still have no evidence of what happened to him,” Nasser said. While still hoping to find him alive, she added that if he is found dead, she can at least find closure and honor his memory.  Islamic State kidnapped thousands of civilians, mainly activists, to hush any opposing voice as it prepared to impose its control in 2013, Human Rights Watch said in a report earlier this year. The watchdog said that many victims have vanished during IS expansion in 2014.   The Syrian Network for Human Rights has registered 8,648 cases of kidnapped people, including 319 children and 225 women. Local authorities suspect that many of the missing have likely been killed by IS and buried in graves across the mostly desert terrain of eastern Syria.   Raqqa Civil Council said it has found 28 mass graves since defeating IS’s physical caliphate in 2019. The sites allegedly contain about 6,300 bodies and belong mostly to people executed by IS. A member of The First Responders team in Raqqa seals a bag containing a body recovered from a mass graves. The exhuming operation use primitive means, as the team lacks technology to analyze the remains. (Photo: Osama al-Khalaf)Location and recoveryThe First Responders told VOA they have found some of the graves after receiving information from local residents about human remains. The team will begin exhuming the remains following an investigation and verification process.The First Responders was established in September 2018 by Raqqa Civil Council to exhume the mass graves and as an emergency response team. In 2020 alone, the team found five mass graves and exhumed about 300 bodies.   “Once a body is found, the team will record the basic information on the date and location of the recovery, sex, apparent cause of death and any personal belongings. The recovered human body will be assigned an ID number and preserved in another location,” said Osama al-Khalaf, a spokesperson for Raqqa Civil Council.  Al-Khalaf said that if a body is identified, it will be handed over to its family for a proper burial. For those not identified, local authorities have dedicated two graveyards outside Raqqa, he added.    “The work to exhume and identify the human remains is done by primitive tools like shovels, and they lack equipment to analyze the bodies’ DNA,” he said.  Local authorities say they need international support and technical assistance to properly identify victims and preserve the bodies as evidence of IS crimes. Families’ pleasActivists supporting relatives of the victims say the families are growing weary over officials’ reluctance to share with them any information on the fate of the discovered graves. They say families deserve to know if IS prisoners have been interrogated about the fate of the disappeared, especially as some of the detained foreign jihadists are repatriated to their countries while others flee northeast Syria.  Laila Kiki, executive director of the Syria Campaign and an advocate of the families, told VOA that local authorities are yet to establish a formal system to communicate with the victims’ families. She said the authorities needed to make information-sharing a priority.  “One of the main demands of our campaign is to create a mechanism of communication between the families and the authorities on the ground. Currently, there is no two-way communication between the families and local authorities in northeastern Syria,” said Kiki, adding that the international community also needed to step in to help in the process.    “It is important for the families to get the answers they need. And it is important for the international community and the U.S.-led coalition to take the demands of the families seriously and to interrogate IS fighters. IS has impacted every Syrian family, and we need answers from those involved,” she said.
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Local officials say so far, they have exhumed 16 bodies of women and men executed by Islamic State during the terror group’s rule of large swaths of Syria and Iraq between 2014 and 2019
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As the U.N. General Assembly annual debate got under way Tuesday, combating and eliminating the coronavirus pandemic was the foremost preoccupation of the world’s major powers.  Global leaders are meeting virtually this year due to COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. Confirmed coronavirus cases worldwide have surpassed 31 million, with more than 960,000 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, which tracks the data.   A reporter with the Xinhua Press Agency watches as President Xi Jinping is seen on a video screen remotely addressing the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly, Sept. 22, 2020, at U.N. headquarters.From China, the country where the virus is believed to have originated, President Xi Jinping promised it would be defeated. He announced that Beijing would provide an additional $50 million to the U.N.’s COVID-19 global humanitarian response plan and said his country is making progress on a vaccine.   “At the moment, several COVID-19 vaccines developed by China are in active Phase 3 clinical trials,” Xi said in his video message to the virtual gathering. “When their development is completed and they are ready for use, these vaccines will be made a global public good and will be provided to other developing countries on a priority basis.”  He also denounced efforts to politicize or stigmatize the virus.  Touting progress on vaccine In his UNGA address, U.S. President Donald Trump slammed China, referring to COVID-19 as the “China virus,” and saying Beijing must be held accountable for having “unleashed” it on the world. He said the United States is also making strides on a potential vaccine.  U.S. President Donald Trump is seen on a video screen remotely addressing the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly, at U.N. headquarters, Sept. 22, 2020.”We will distribute a vaccine. We will defeat the virus. We will end the pandemic, and we will enter a new era of unprecedented prosperity, cooperation and peace,” Trump pledged Tuesday in a brief video message.   Russia’s president also touted his nation’s progress on a vaccine.   “We are ready to share our experience and continue cooperating with all states and international entities, including supplying the Russian vaccine — which has proved reliable, safe and effective — to other countries,” Vladimir Putin said in his video address.   Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is seen during his video address to the United Nation’s General Assembly in Moscow, Russia, Sept. 22, 2020.In August, Russia became the first country to approve a COVID-19 vaccine, called Sputnik V. But international scientists have been skeptical of its safety and effectiveness, as it had not started Phase 3 trials when it was approved.   Putin also said Moscow is ready to provide its vaccine free to the United Nations so it could inoculate its staff.  Humanitarian pause  Since March, the U.N. secretary-general has been calling for a global humanitarian truce to help facilitate an effective coronavirus response. The initiative has received an outpouring of verbal support from nations and even some armed groups, but there has been little real implementation on the ground.    Speaking from the General Assembly podium to a limited audience of mostly U.N. ambassadors, Antonio Guterres urged conflict actors and those with influence to implement the pause by the end of this year.  United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks during the 75th annual U.N. General Assembly, which is being held mostly virtually due to the coronavirus pandemic, in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, Sept. 22, 2020.”The world needs a global cease-fire to stop all ‘hot’ conflicts,” Guterres said Tuesday. Acknowledging escalating tensions between the U.S. and China, he added, “At the same time, we must do everything to avoid a new Cold War.” French President Emmanuel Macron expressed frustration that getting the U.N. Security Council to adopt a resolution supporting the COVID-19 cease-fire was so difficult.  “Imagine that, to have so much trouble in agreeing on so little,” Macron said in his UNGA address. “But our permanent members were not able to — even with the exceptional circumstances — come together as we would have liked to have seen them do, because several have chosen to showcase their rivalry over the importance of collective effectiveness.”  This U.N. handout photo shows French President Emmanuel Macron as he virtually addresses the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, Sept. 22, 2020.The council finally adopted a resolution on July 1 — 100 days after the U.N. chief’s appeal — primarily because of the deterioration of relations between Washington and Beijing over the origin and spread of the virus.”This crisis no doubt, more than any other, demands that we cooperate. Demands that we invent new international solutions first,” Macron added.   Iran sanctions  Another issue that has sparked strong reactions in recent weeks from the world’s major powers has been Washington’s move to reimpose U.N. sanctions on Iran for its lack of compliance under the 2015 nuclear deal.  In May 2018, Trump announced his administration’s withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as the deal is formally known. The other members of the agreement — Britain, France, China and Russia, plus Germany and Iran — say the U.S. gave up its right to initiate what is known as a “snapback” of international sanctions when it pulled out of the deal. Washington disagreed, saying the U.N. Security Council resolution enshrining the 2015 nuclear agreement in international law still names the U.S. as a participant.   After notifying the U.N. in August that it planned to snap back sanctions, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared Sept. 19 that snapback had occurred. The U.N Security Council has said it will take no action on reinstating the sanctions regime. President of Islamic Republic of Iran Hassan Rouhani speaks virtually during the 75th annual U.N. General Assembly in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, Sept. 22, 2020. (United Nations/Handout)U.S. presidential elections are just over one month away, and Rouhani linked Washington’s effort to snap back sanctions to its domestic politics.  “We are not a bargaining chip in U.S. elections and domestic policy,” he said. “Any U.S. administration after the upcoming elections will have no choice but to surrender to the resilience of the Iranian nation.”  In his Tuesday address, Trump noted that his administration withdrew from “the terrible Iran” deal and “imposed crippling sanctions on the world’s leading state sponsor of terror.”  
 
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Scientists with the U.S. space agency NASA say satellite data show Arctic sea ice cover this year shrank to the second-lowest level since modern record keeping began in the late 1970s.  NASA scientists and researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder’s National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) reported Monday that analysis of satellite data shows the 2020 minimum extent of ocean covered in ice, 3.74 million square kilometers, was likely reached Sept. 15. The data shows the minimum extent of Arctic sea ice in the summer has dropped markedly in the last two decades. The lowest extent on record was set in 2012. Last year’s extent was tied for second — until this year. NASA sea ice scientist Nathan Kurtz said 2020 was “a really warm year in the Arctic.” A Siberian heat wave in spring 2020 began this year’s Arctic sea ice melt season early. With Arctic temperatures being 8 to 10 degrees Celsius warmer than average, the ice extent kept declining. Kurtz said the earlier the melt starts, the more that is generally lost. In addition, NASA says a recent study showed that warmer water from the Atlantic Ocean, which is typically deep below the colder Arctic waters, is creeping closer to the bottom of the sea ice and warming it from below. NSIDC Director Mark Serreze said the amount of summer sea ice in the Arctic can impact local ecosystems, regional and global weather patterns, and ocean circulation. Warmer ocean temperatures eat away at the thicker multiyear ice, and also result in thinner ice to start the spring melt season.  Melt early in the season results in more open water, which absorbs heat from the sun and increases water temperatures. Serreze said this second-lowest extent of sea ice on record is just one of many signs of a warming climate in the north. He also noted that signs of a warming climate include the Siberian heat waves, forest fires, hotter-than-average temperatures over the Central Arctic, and the thawing permafrost that led to a Russian fuel spill earlier this year. 
 
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As the Northern Hemisphere prepares for colder months ahead, in the Southern Hemisphere spring is beginning to blossom.  Indigenous Bolivians in the Andes Mountains believe a centuries-old celebration of burnt offerings brings them closer to the goddess of earth and fertility.  In 2020, the ceremony includes asking the goddess to rid them of COVID-19.  VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more.
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Doctors and public health experts are telling people in the Northern Hemisphere to prepare for the worst in the coming months, when both the coronavirus and the flu virus will be circulating at the same time. It’s a one-two punch that could cause even more deaths and has the potential to overwhelm health care systems. More from VOA’s Carol Pearson.PRODUCER: Jon Spier 
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U.S. President Donald Trump’s turn to address the U.N. General Assembly comes Tuesday with prerecorded remarks that he says include “a strong message on China.”Speaking to reporters Monday, Trump did not specify any of the topics he focused on with regard to China, but excerpts released Tuesday morning included his renewed criticism of China’s handling of the coronavirus and Trump’s accusation that the World Health Organization is too close to China.Trump, who cut U.S. funding to the WHO, faults the U.N. agency and China for not doing enough to stop the outbreak in its early stages.“The United Nations must hold China accountable for their actions,” Trump said, according to the White House.Trump’s administration has received sharp criticism for its own handling of the coronavirus, with the United States leading the world with about 6.9 million confirmed infections and 200,000 deaths.Trump’s speech includes a defense of the U.S. response, calling it “the most aggressive mobilization since the Second World War.”“We will distribute a vaccine, we will defeat the virus, we will end the pandemic, and we will enter a new era of unprecedented prosperity, cooperation and peace,” he said.The coronavirus pandemic has altered the annual event during which world leaders typically gather in New York and await their turn to address the assembly.  Trump said he recorded his address Monday afternoon.The speech excerpts also include references to the recent U.S. brokering of economic cooperation between Serbia and Kosovo, and the deals his administration helped negotiate to normalize Israeli relations with Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.Trump also discusses the efforts to wind down the war in Afghanistan, where U.S. forces have been deployed since 2001.  Plans are place to reduce the troop level there to 4,500 by November.“As we speak, the United States is also working to end the war in Afghanistan, and we are bringing our troops home.  America is fulfilling our destiny as peacemaker,” Trump said in the excerpted remarks.WATCH: UN General Assembly Speeches LIVE Sanctions against IranAnother topic is Iran, after the United States, in defiance of other U.N. Security Council members, declared it reimposed sanctions against Iran related to the 2015 international agreement on the country’s nuclear program.Other signatories of the Iran nuclear deal have dismissed the U.S. action, arguing that since the Trump administration withdrew from the pact in 2018 it does not have the standing to utilize the snapback sanctions mechanism the Security Council approved.More broadly, Trump’s address also includes the promotion of his preference to prioritize U.S. interests over multilateral efforts.“For decades, the same tired voices proposed the same failed solutions, pursuing global ambitions at the expense of their own people. But only when you take care of your own citizens, will you find a true basis for cooperation,” he said. 
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