Houston, Sep 12 (IANS) The Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) will be hosting a series of events - with headline authors as participants - in three cities across the United States, starting September 14 and ending on September 23.

The annual festival with its home in Jaipur will be hosting smaller editions in Houston and New York, apart from Boulder, where it has a presence for the last three year.

"With internationally acclaimed authors and thinkers taking part in a range of provocative panels and debates, at the core of programming are thoughts and issues that resonate with our times," the organisers, Teamwork Arts, said about the Houston leg of the festival that opens on Friday evening, with events concluding on Saturday.

After a gap of five days, the festival will be held in New York on September 20.

The highlights include a musical performance by Indian Sufi singer Zila Khan; vigorous panel discussions revolving around the history, culture, religion, foreign policy and the great passion for cricket in India; talks around the Bard of Avon and Shakespearea?s greatest and most evocative work and a session engaging with bilingual writers, mother languages, and the joy of communicating the "Babylonian bedlama of New York City.

On September 21, the festival will return for its fourth edition at Boulder. It will feature more than 60 authors "to explore today's hot topics while engaging the community in essential dialogue".

It will feature 40 sessions on indigenous cultures worldwide; global warming, water and climate change; the geopolitical jigsaws, culture and identity of the trans-Himalayan belt; immigration, ethno-cultural politics and race; biographies and biographers; feminism, poetry, and the craft of storytelling, among others - across three days, the organisers said.

Participating writers, apart from organisers, Sanjoy Roy of Teamwork Arts, authors Namita Gokhale and William Dalrymple, includes Shashi Tharoor, Kiran Desai, Sonal Mansingh, Sharmila Sen, Margo Jefferson, Navtej Sarna, Preti Taneja, Kurt Heinzelman, Lacy M. Johnson, McKenna Jordan, Rich Levy and Ruben Martinez, among others.
Jaipur Literature Festival is an annual literary event held in Jaipur in January and is widely attended.

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Paris, July 16 (IANS) French President Emmanuel Macron will hold a reception ceremony on Monday for the national football team at his Elysee Palace official residence to celebrate their victory against Croatia at the 2018 FIFA World Cup.

The world cup champions, also known among fans as "Les Bleus", will arrive at Charles de Gaulle Airport north of Paris at around 3.30 p.m., reports Efe news.

The group will then move along the Champs-Elysees on a bus before meeting Macron at the Elysee Palacer.

The French president and his wife Brigitte Macron, who watched the world cup final on Sunday at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow, will hold a reception ceremony in honour of the team in the gardens of their residence.

Families of the players will be invited to the ceremony along with more than 1,000 children, 300 athletes and members of the football clubs for which the teammates play, according to a statement from the presidential office.

To guarantee the security of the parade on the Champs Elysees, the police announced a special deployment of 2,000 officers and armed security guards in the capital, and added that more details on the security protocols will be provided on Monday morning.

Over the weekend, authorities deployed over 4,000 security officers in the Compo de Marte area in Paris, where more than 90,000 fan gathered to watch to game, and another 12,000 officers across the capital.

France beat Croatia 4-2 at the finals on Sunday. This is the second World Cup win for the French team.

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By Sugandha Rawal

Paris, July 11 (IANS) There was dance, music, spectacular fireworks and "Ole, ole, ole" at the the iconic Arc de Triomphe -- all to celebrate the entry of France in FIFA World Cup finals after 12 years.

France edged past Belgium 1-0 to book their place in the final of the FIFA World Cup in a rip-roaring semi-final clash in St. Petersburg on Tuesday. And soon after the match got over, people from all age groups thronged the streets of Paris dancing their way to the iconic monument to celebrate the moment together.

As the time for the match came close, one could see the cafes near the cobbled street of the city getting filled up with excitement, and soon after, one could hear the sighs and cheers with every goal as the team played on the field.

The match began at a breakneck pace with Belgium dominating possession initially as the French sought to catch up. France, which will play the World Cup final for the first time since 2006, will either take on England or Croatia in the summit clash on Sunday.

It was a moment for victory for one and all. People got together on the streets cheering with the country's flag, getting to the rooftops, dancing with one another, climbing the street lights, and bursting crackers. They were lighting up the sky with fireworks, and colour smoke bombs -- what was so different about it? They were in the hues of blue, white and red, the same as the colours in the country's flag.

Some expressed their excitement by jumping with a cycle, clapping and chanting "Ole, ole, ole". There were some who took out their cars and circled around the city cheering and some getting on bikes with the country's flag to express their happiness about the win.

What does "Ole, ole, ole" mean?

"It is our way of saying 'yay'," said one football fan, who added: "We all are happy with our country getting into the world cup final after so many years."

The stores at the Avenue des Champs Elysees were empty, and cafes were brimming with an infectious excitement. The celebration of the victory moment made tourists become a part of the city as people invited them to join the big party without any hesitation.

In terms of security, police officers were employed at every nook and corner of the area. And though they were on duty, they were all smiling and living the moment of the revelry.

An officer told IANS that he was not in a position to comment on the security arrangements, but he smiled heart-warmingly when asked about the victory.

He said it was a big moment for them, and another officer said they knew it was going to be a long night, but one truly worth it.

It was a time when the city made people, who are visiting the city for work or leisure, feel good about being able to soak in the spirit of merrymaking. Even if it meant circling the same area for four hours trying to find a way back to the hotel, and getting lost amid the festivities.

But sometimes getting lost is the real way of finding the heart of the city -- and that's what happened.

(The writer is in Paris at the invitation of Viacom18 Motion Pictures. She can be contacted at sugandha.r@ians.in)

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Washington, June 28 (IANS) US President Donald Trump cracked a joke about Portuguese soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo running for president against incumbent Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, who responded by saying that Portugal "is nothing like the US".

What started off as a casual conversation on Wednesday about the World Cup between Trump and Rebelo de Sousa, who is on an official visit in Washington, revealed the stark contrast between their political cultures, Efe news reported.

In his first bilateral meeting with Trump, Rebelo de Sousa bantered that when Trump would talk World Cup in his upcoming summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, he should not forget to mention that "Portugal is still there and hopes to win..."

"Don't forget that Portugal has the best player in the world who is called Cristiano Ronaldo," Rebelo de Sousa told Trump in the White House.

Trump recognised that Portugal indeed was "doing very well" and asked his counterpart "how good a player" Ronaldo was.

When Rebelo de Sousa said Ronaldo was "the best player in the world", Trump asked "so will Cristiano ever run for President against you?"

As his Portuguese counterpart pondered on a response, Trump assured him that "Cristiano wouldn't win, you know he won't".

At this Rebelo de Sousa turned and said "President, you know -- you know something -- I must tell you, Portugal is not like the US. It's a little different."

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Moscow, June 21 (IANS) Fast food company Burger King Russia has been forced to apologise after an advertisement offered Russian women the chance to win $47,000 and free Whoppers for life if they got impregnated by a player of the FIFA World Cup.

The short-lived campaign was promoted in Russia on June 19 via social media platform VK -- Russia's equivalent of Facebook -- before being pulled down after a flurry of angry responses from the public, CNN reported on Wednesday.

Burger King Russia then released an apology on VK, saying they had removed all materials related to the campaign as it was insulting.

Burger King Russia's master franchisee is Burger Rus LLC, according to Russian news agency Interfax. Neither Burger Rus nor Burger King was immediately available for comment when contacted by CNN.

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Julieth Gonzalez Theran -- a Colombian reporter -- was reporting from Saransk for German broadcaster Deutsche Welle's Spanish news channel on June 15 when a man grabbed her breast, kissed her cheek and quickly ran off, CNN reported on Wednesday.

The reporter, who was talking on camera when the incident took place, maintained her composure and finished her report.

"I had been at the scene for two hours to prepare for the broadcast and there had been no interruptions. When we went live, this fan took advantage of the situation. But afterward, when I checked to see if he was still there, he was gone," she told Deutsche Welle.

After posting the video on her Instagram account, Theran called for more respect for female journalists.

"We do not deserve this treatment. We are equally as professional and deserving. I share the joy of football but we must identify the limits between affection and harassment," she wrote.

The man who harassed Theran has not been identified yet.

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Based in Moscow for the last 27 years, Prodyut and Sumana run two Indian eateries, "Talk Of The Town" and "Fusion Plaza".

Both restaurants serve popular Indian dishes like butter chicken, kebabs and a varied vegetarian spread.

During the World Cup, there will be 25 per cent discount for those who will possess a Fan ID (required to watch World Cup games).

There will also be gifts and contests on offers during matches in both the restaurants to celebrate the event.

The Mukherjees, hailing from Kolkata, are diehard fans of Argentina. Despite Albiceleste drawing 1-1 with Iceland in their group opener with Lionel Messi failing to sparkle, they believe Jorge Sampaoli's team can go the distance.

"I am an Argentina fan. I have booked tickets for a quarterfinal match, a semifinal and of course the final. If Argentina goes on to lift the trophy, I will invite all Indians who have come here to watch the World Cup for free dinner at both my restaurants," Prodyut told IANS.

"We have been waiting for this World Cup. Indians come in large numbers during the World Cup and we wanted these eateries to be a melting point," he added.

According to Cutting Edge Events, FIFA's official sales agency in India for the 2018 World Cup, India is amongst the top 10 countries in terms of number of match tickets bought.

Prodyut came to Moscow to study engineering and later started working for a pharmaceutical company here before trying his hand in business. Besides running the two restaurants with the help of his wife, he was into the distribution of pharmaceutical products.

"After Russia won the first match of the World Cup, the footfall has gone up considerably. The Indians are also flooding in after the 6-9 p.m. game. That is the time both my restaurants remain full," Prodyut said.

There are also plans to rope in registered fan clubs of Latin American countries, who will throng the restaurants during matches and then follow it up with after-game parties till the wee hours.

"I did get in touch with some of the fan clubs I had prior idea about. They agreed to come over and celebrate the games at our joints. Those will be gala nights when both eateries will remain open all night for them to enjoy," Prodyut said.

Watching the World Cup is a dream come true for the couple, Sumana said.

"We want to make the Indians who have come here to witness the spectacle and feel at home too. We always extend a helping hand and since we are Bengalees, we make special dishes for those who come from Bengal," she added.

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"Large-scale international events such as the World Cup present an attractive target for terrorists," Efe news reported quoting the State Department as saying in the advisory on Friday.

"Although security for the World Cup will be extensive, terrorists may seek to attack event locations such as stadiums and Fan Fest viewing areas, tourist sites, transportation hubs and other public venues," it added.

The World Cup aside, "terrorist groups continue plotting possible attacks in Russia".

"Terrorists may attack with little or no warning, targeting tourist locations, transportation hubs, markets or shopping malls, and the local government facilities," the statement added.

For all the cited reasons, the US maintained the alert level for Russia at 3, on a scale of 4, which also applies to countries such as Cuba, Pakistan, Turkey, Honduras and Nicaragua, for which Washington recommends its citizens to "reconsider" their plans for travel.

Besides potential attacks, the US observed that in Russia "US citizens are often victims of harassment, mistreatment and extortion by law-enforcement and other officials".

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By Arul Louis

United Nations, June 15 (IANS) The angry rhetoric and the blame-throwing gave way to the thump of a bouncing soccer ball and deft dribbling as the spirit of sportsmanship from the 2018 FIFA World Cup tournament overwhelmed the UN Security Council.

Council members on Thursday showed up in their countries' jerseys between consultations on Yemen and a report on Sudan and South Sudan to celebrate the start of the World Cup in Russia, while Secretary-General Antonio Guterres came in as a "referee" with a whistle and flashing a yellow card as if to enforce sportsman-like decency.

Russia's Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzia, who is the Council President this month, shot a "goal" through the table's opening.

He kept a football in front of him on the table as he presided over the rest of the day's sessions.

US Permanent Nikki Haley received a round of applause as she came into the chamber wearing a red-and-blue-striped white jersey and greeted Nebenzia with a smile, often her nemesis at the Council.

Some envoys dribbled, kicked and passed the ball on the Council floor where weighty matters of war, peace and security are determined.

And then they went back to work.

The spirit of sportsmanship prevailed in the Council even later in the day when it took up the situation in Mali where the run-up to the presidential election has been marred by some violent clashes.

Council members showed near-unanimity in expressing concern about the security situation in the West African nation and calling for implementing the country's peace agreement.

(Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in)

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A new research from Russia-based cybersecurity company Kaspersky Lab on Tuesday warned that more than 20 per cent of Wi-Fi hot-spots in the host cities do not use traffic encryption, making them potentially unsafe for use by football fans visiting the cities.

The results suggest that football fans should take care of their personal data, especially while using open Wi-Fi connections around the FIFA World Cup games.

"The lack of traffic encryption, coupled with large-scale events -- like the FIFA World Cup -- make wireless Wi-Fi networks a target for criminals who want easy access to user data," Denis Legezo, Senior Security Researcher at Kaspersky Lab, said in a statement.

Global events always result in a concentration of people connecting to networks to upload posts, stay in touch with loved ones, and share the fun with others.

However, at the same time, these networks can be used to transfer financial and other valuable information across the Internet.

And it is this information that third parties -- not necessarily criminals -- can intercept and use for their own purposes.

Kaspersky Lab said its findings are based on an analysis of public Wi-Fi spots in 11 FIFA World Cup 2018 host cities, including Saransk, Samara, Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan, Volgograd, Moscow, Ekaterinburg, Sochi, Rostov, Kaliningrad, and St Petersburg.

The results showed that so far not all wireless access points have encryption and authentication algorithms - aspects that are essential for Wi-Fi networks to remain secure.

This means that hackers only need to be located near an access point to intercept network traffic and get confidential information from unwitting or unprepared users, Kaspersky Lab said in the statement.

The three cities with the highest percentage of unreliable Wi-Fi networks are St Petersburg (37 per cent), Kaliningrad (35 per cent), and Rostov (32 per cent), the report said.

In contrast, the safest places were relatively small towns - including Saransk where only 10 per cent of Wi-Fi spots are open, and Samara where 17 per cent of Wi-Fi spots are open.

Almost two-thirds of all public Wi-Fi networks in these locations use the Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA/WPA2) protocol family for traffic encryption, a protocol which is considered to be one of the most secure for Wi-Fi use, the statement added.

"Our research shows, once again, that cybersecurity involves addressing not just certain aspects, but the entire infrastructure. FIFA World Cup 2018 has confirmed that the event itself is secure -- but users should be aware that clearly its host cities' public Wi-Fi hot-spots are often not," Legezo added.

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The researchers found no significant difference in the accuracy of a referee's decision regarding whether a foul had occurred or not, with slow-motion videos (63 per cent accurate) compared to the real-time videos (61 per cent accurate).

However, the judgement of intention or force behind a foul differed.

More red cards were given by referees watching in slow motion compared to those watching real time video playbacks, showed the findings published in the journal Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications.

"Slow motion video may make it clearer who initiated a foul, whether there actually was contact and whether a foul occurred either inside or outside the penalty area," said one of the study authors Jochim Spitz from University of Leuven (KU Leuven) in Belgium.

"However, judging human emotion, like intentionality is quite another story. It is also the reason why slow motion footage cannot be used anymore in the court room as it increases the perceived intent," Spitz added.

For the study, the researchers studied the response of 88 elite football referees to video clips of a foul warranting a yellow card.

"Our results suggest that slow motion can increase the severity of a judgement of intention, making the difference between perceiving an action as careless (no card), reckless (yellow card) or with excessive force (red card).

"The finding that referees were more likely to make more severe decisions following slow motion replays, is an important consideration for developing guidelines for the implementation of VAR in football leagues worldwide," Spitz added.

The authors concluded that although slow motion playback could be a useful tool in assessing some decisions, such as off-side and determining the exact impact of a contact, it may not be the best tool for decisions that involve judging human behaviour and intention.

At a press conference on Saturday, Massimo Busacca, head of FIFA's refereeing department, said the VAR would be important at the World Cup but stressed that the officials on the field would still be tasked with managing the games.

"This is the first time that the impact of slow motion video on decision making has been studied in sports referees and it is timely given the current debate on video assistant refereeing (VAR), which will be used in the World Cup," Spitz added.

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"Looking forward to the updated Search experience for soccer, just in time for the World Cup," Google CEO Sundar Pichai tweeted late on Friday.

Google said Search will show video recaps from select broadcasters featuring goals and highlights of major match moments within 30 minutes of the end of each game.

"For each match, you can tap to watch live or follow along with score updates on your phone. You'll also find a detailed timeline with updates including in-game moments, live images, stats, tweets and more," Yoav Schwartzberg, Product Manager for Google Search said in a blog post.

"To keep track of all the matches, even when you're not searching, you can pin real-time scores on your Android phone screen from Search on mobile browsers or from the Android Google App. Find the match you're looking for, tap and drag to pin the match anywhere on your screen," Schwartzberg added.

Google has also created a World Cup Tracker on Google News app on Android.

"The tracker will include a special 'spotlight' feature that provides an easy way to visualise live scores, highlights, results, and schedules all in one place," Schwartzberg said.

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To provide a superior mobile broadband experience for hundreds of thousands of football fans attending the tournament, Russian mobile operator company MTS has teamed up with Ericsson for deployments of Massive MIMO (Multiple Input, Multiple Output) technology.

Through the intelligent reuse of system resources, Massive MIMO improves capacity by transmitting data to multiple user devices using the same time and frequency resources with coordinated beam forming and beam steering, Ericsson said in a statement on Friday.

"This launch is one of Europe's largest Massive MIMO deployments, covering seven Russian cities, and is a major contribution by MTS in the preparation of the country's infrastructure for the global sporting event of the year," said Andrei Ushatsky, Vice President, Technology and IT, MTS.

"Our Massive MIMO technology, using Ericsson equipment, significantly increases network capacity, allowing tens of thousands of fans together in one place to enjoy high-speed mobile Internet without any loss in speed or quality," Ushatsky added.

With the deployment of this technology, football fans will be able to enjoy higher data speeds in seven of the 11 tournament cities -- whether in the stadiums, in fan zones, selected transportation hot spots, or at some of Russia's most famous landmarks, the statement added.

In Moscow alone, the deployment covers two stadiums and fan zones, Sheremetyevo airport, Red Square, Tverskaya Street and Gorky Central Park.

Saint Petersburg coverage includes stadium and fan zones, Dvortsovaya Square, and Moskovsky railway station.

The other covered cities are Yekaterinburg, Kazan, Niznny Novgorod, Samara and Rostov-on-Don.

"Hundreds of thousands of football-loving fans are about to experience ultra-high data speeds thanks to our Massive MIMO deployment for MTS across seven tournament cities," said Arun Bansal, Senior Vice President and Head of Market Area Europe and Latin America, Ericsson.

The month-long tournament gets underway on June 14 and ends on July 15.

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Washington, Nov 14 (AFP) President Donald Trump's son has released a series of messages he had with WikiLeaks after a report suggested he had secretly liaised with the group that published Hillary Clinton's emails during last year's election.

Donald Trump, Jr revealed what he said was the "entire" chain of Twitter direct messages with WikiLeaks between September 2016 and July this year, in which the anti-secrecy group sought to feed information to the Trump campaign and enhance the impact of its Clinton releases.

Trump Jr's release, also done on Twitter, shows about a dozen messages from WikiLeaks to him, and what he called "my whopping 3 responses."

WikiLeaks is shown informing Trump Jr of a new anti-Trump website, urging his father to tweet about WikiLeaks's Clinton files and advising that, if he loses the election, Trump should challenge the result.

The group also asks Trump Jr to provide his father's tax returns because "it will dramatically improve the perception of out impartiality" while boosting the impact of its Clinton materials.

And in April, WikiLeaks suggested Trump Jr hand over emails regarding a meeting he had with a Russian lawyer that has become a focus of the federal investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

Trump Jr only replied to three early messages, thanking WikiLeaks for the information on the new website, making a slighting comment about Clinton, and, on October 3 last year, just before WikiLeaks published a trove of files on Clinton, asking "What's behind this Wednesday leak I keep reading about?"

Trump Jr clearly sought to downplay Atlantic magazine's article earlier in the day that first made the messages public.

Although the exchanges were mostly one-sided and mostly ignored by Trump Jr, the president's son did not push back against the website even though it had already released data that benefited Russian interests.

In his own tweets, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said the group's messages were all part of its promotional efforts.

"WikiLeaks can be very effective at convincing even high-profile people that it is their interest to promote links to its publications," he said.

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Washington, Nov 13 (AP) Former Vice President Joe Biden said he is uncertain about a run for president in 2020, but indicated he's looking for fresh blood to lead the Democratic Party back to the White House.

"I've done it a long time," said Biden, who previously ran for president in 1988 and 2008, "and I'm just not sure it's the appropriate thing for me to do."

His comments came in an interview with Snapchat's 'Good Luck America' set to be released Tuesday morning, in one of Biden's first on-camera interviews since leaving office in January. The Associated Press was provided with an exclusive preview of the interview.

Biden suggested that if "no one steps up," he'd be open to giving it another try. "I'm not doing anything to run," he said. "I'm not taking names, I'm not raising money, I'm not talking to anybody, but something's got to happen."

Biden has launched a handful of outside political and policy organisations since leaving the Obama administration, including the Biden Foundation, formed to advocate for his domestic priorities.

The roster of Democrats considering a White House run has swelled well into the double-digits, with potential candidates emboldened by President Donald Trump's historically low poll numbers.

Biden was interviewed alongside Ohio Gov John Kasich, a Republican, at the University of Delaware last month.

"We're both hoping that both our parties generate some real energetic people who have the depth and the capacity to do it," Biden said of the pair.

Biden, 74, considered a run for the Oval Office in 2016, but decided against it, later citing the trauma of his son Beau's death to cancer in May 2015 for keeping him from the race. The painful subject forms the story of his new memoir, 'Promise Me, Dad,' set for release this week. Biden is launching a month-long tour to promote the book's publication.

He's become a vocal critic of Trump's administration in public appearances in recent months.

"We gotta turn this ship around," Biden said of the country. "And I'd much prefer to be helping someone turn it around than being the guy trying to turn it around."

In an interview with Oprah Winfrey released Sunday, Biden said he regrets not being in the White House, but not his decision to stay on the sidelines last year. "I don't regret the decision I made because it's the right decision for my family," he said.

Kasich, who has been an outspoken opponent of Trump's since he challenged him for the Republican nomination in 2016, declined to address his own 2020 plans. "You hold the pen and the Lord will write the sentence," he said.

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Washington, Nov 6 (IANS) As the US Congress investigates Russia's interference in the 2016 US election by using social media giants, a new trove of confidential documents has revealed that Facebook and Twitter received major investments from firms with ties to Kremlin-owned corporations.

The documents called "Paradise Papers", were obtained by German newspaper SUddeutsche Zeitung and reviewed by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and several media outlets across the globe.

According to the ICIJ, the records show that one of the Kremlin-owned firms, VTB Bank, quietly directed $191 million into an investment fund, DST Global, which is owned by billionaire Yuri Milner, that used the money to buy a large stake in Twitter in 2011.

"They also show that a subsidiary of the Kremlin-controlled energy giant Gazprom heavily funded an offshore company that partnered with DST Global in a large investment in Facebook," the ICIJ said in a statement on Monday.

Milner and other partners in the deals reaped large gains when they sold their stakes shortly after Facebook's initial public offering in 2012 and Twitter's in 2013.

The disclosure shows that years before Russia meddled in the 2016 US presidential election, the Kremlin had a financial interest in the US social media.

Facebook and Twitter, however, said they had properly reviewed Milner's investments.

In response to questions from the ICIJ and its partners, Milner said the investments his firm makes, including the Twitter and Facebook deals, have always been based on business merits and have nothing to do with politics.

VTB also confirmed that it had invested in Twitter through Milner's firm DST Global.

The documents also revealed that Apple was seeking out a new tax shelter around Europe and the Caribbean, ReCode reported.

In an email obtained by the ICIJ, an Apple lawyer inquired about whether moving to one of the six tax havens would allow its Irish subsidiary to "conduct management activities ... without being subject to taxation in these jurisdictions".

In August, Apple had come under fire for striking a deal with the Irish government that allowed it to avoid paying virtually any taxes in many of its global markets.

The European Commission ordered Apple to pay $13 billion in back taxes.

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San Francisco, Nov 4 (IANS) Princeton University, one of its students and Microsoft have filed a lawsuit against federal governments decision to terminate the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) programme that shields undocumented immigrants and allows them to continue their studies or work in the country.

The complaint, filed in federal court in Washington, DC after US President Donald Trump ruled out allowing Congress to include any legislation to provide a solution for so-called "DREAMers" in the spending bill this year -- alleges that DACA's termination violated both the United States Constitution and federal law.

"In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs claim that the government's actions violated the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment of the US Constitution, including its guarantee of equal protection under the law, as well as the Administrative Procedure Act," a statement from the university read late on Friday.

In September, Trump announced that he was ending the programme, implemented in 2012 by then-President Barack Obama, which shielded some 800,000 young undocumented immigrants who were brought to this country by their parents as children, known as "DREAMers".

Maria De La Cruz Perales Sanchez, the Princeton undergraduate bringing the legal challenge, has been a beneficiary of the DACA programme.

The complaint explained that the termination of DACA severely harms her and other DACA-enrolled young people and "the employers and educational institutions that rely on and benefit from their contributions."

It asks for a declaration that the DACA programme is lawful and constitutional, and for an injunction that both stops the administration from terminating DACA and prevents the government from using the information provided by Dreamers against them or for purposes of immigration enforcement.

According to the complaint, Princeton "will suffer the loss of critical members of its community" if DACA's rescission is left to stand.

The presence of the Dreamers on campus "helps fulfill Princeton's educational mission," in which "diversity and inclusion" play a central role, the university said.

Soon after it was reported that Trump might roll back the programme, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella had criticised the move.

Nadella said he was product of the enlightened immigration policy that allowed him to pursue his dreams.

He added that the priority must be to create more jobs and opportunity for every American citizen and "on top of this, smart immigration can help our economic growth and global competitiveness".

Microsoft and its subsidiary LinkedIn currently employs at least 45 DACA recipients.

Apart from Microsoft, tech giants like Apple, Facebook, Google, Amazon, AT&T, Lyft, Tesla, Uber and hundreds of other companies have extended their support to DACA and the Dreamers.

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San Francisco, Nov 3 (IANS) A Twitter employee on his last day in office brought down Donald Trump's account for 11 minutes on Friday, leading to the US President retorting: "I guess the word must finally be getting out-and having an impact".

"My Twitter account was taken down for 11 minutes by a rogue employee. I guess the word must finally be getting out-and having an impact," Trump tweeted.

The micro-blogging platform confirmed that Trump's Twitter account @realdonaldtrump disappeared from the site for around 11 minutes shortly before 7 p.m.

A series of tweets issued by Twitter's Government and Elections team later attributed this to a rogue employee.

"Earlier today @realdonaldtrump's account was inadvertently deactivated due to human error by a Twitter employee.

"The account was down for 11 minutes and has since been restored. We are continuing to investigate and are taking steps to prevent this from happening again," the team said.

"Through our investigation we have learned that this was done by a Twitter customer support employee who did this on the employee's last day. We are conducting a full internal review," they added.

Twitterati hailed it as "great" and "historic" in some hilarious tweets.

Twitter user Cabel Sasser said the time during which "Trump's twitter account went away" were "the happiest" of his year.

"I don't want Trump's Twitter taken down. Every tweet is evidence. Keep tweeting, Trump. No one tell him Mueller can see them???" a user tweeted.

"Dear Twitter employee who shut down Trump's Twitter: You made America feel better for 11 minutes. DM me and I will buy you a Pizza Hut pizza," another one said.

"If the next tweet from Trump's Twitter account is politically, mathematically, scientifically or grammatically correct...He was hacked," a user posted.

Apparently Trump lost 41 million followers in a span of 15 minutes.

Another Twitter user approved the move: "Trump's account 'accidentally deactivated' for 15 minutes, Trump's account loses 41 million followers,... Twitter begging to be nationalized."

However, the number of followers were restored and the account now shows 41.7 million.

According to The Verge, there have been ongoing calls for Twitter to ban Trump over tweets that critics said could be interpreted as calls to violence.

Twitter replied, saying it would enforce the same rules for Trump as it does for other accounts.

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San Francisco, Oct 31 (IANS) As Facebook, Google and Twitter prepared to face questioning on November 1 into Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election, the tech giants were planning to tell the lawmakers that the Russian content on their respective platforms reached more users than reported earlier.

According to a report in The Washington Post late on Monday, Facebook was planning to tell lawmakers that 126 million of its users might have seen content produced and circulated by Russian operatives -- many times more than the company had previously disclosed about their reach.

Facebook had previously reported that nearly 10 million users had seen those ads.

Similarly, Google also acknowledged that it had found evidence that Russian operatives used the company's platforms to influence American voters.

Google said in a blog post that it had found 1,108 videos with 43 hours of content related to the Russian effort on YouTube. It also found $4,700 worth of Russian search and display ads.

"Further, Twitter would also tell Congressional investigators that it has identified 2,752 accounts controlled by Russian operatives and more than 36,000 bots that tweeted 1.4 million times during the election. The company previously reported 201 accounts linked to Russia," the report added.

After scrutiny by the Congressional investigators, the tech giants have been working hard to make political ads more transparent.

Facebook has vowed to make political ads more transparent, allowing users of the social network to know more about the advertisers which may include their identity and location.

"We're going to require more thorough documentation from advertisers who want to run election-related ads," Rob Goldman, Facebook's Vice President of Ads said in a statement last week.

"We are starting with federal elections in the US, and will progress from there to additional contests and elections in other countries and jurisdictions," Goldman added.

As part of the documentation process, advertisers may be required to identify that they are running election-related advertising and verify both their entity and location.

To help protect integrity of user experience on Twitter, the microblogging site has banned advertising from all accounts owned by Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik with immediate effect.

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The ban comes a week ahead of Twitter testifying before a US House Committee regarding its role in the supposed Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential polls.

"This decision was based on the retrospective work we've been doing around the 2016 US election and the US intelligence community's conclusion that both RT and Sputnik attempted to interfere with the election on behalf of the Russian government," Twitter said in a statement on Thursday.

The company said that this decision was restricted to these two entities based on its internal investigation of the behaviour media houses as well as their inclusion in the January 2017 DNI report.

"This decision does not apply to any other advertisers. RT and Sputnik may remain organic users on our platform, in accordance with the Twitter Rules," the company said.

Twitter also decided to take the $1.9 million they are projected to have earned from RT global advertising since they became an advertiser in 2011, which includes the $274,100 in 2016 US-based advertising and donate those funds to support external research into the use of Twitter in civic engagement and elections, including use of malicious automation and misinformation, with an initial focus on elections and automation.

Meanwhile, RT's editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan has said the move will spark retaliation from Moscow, and has revealed that Twitter pushed RT to spend ad money during the presidential campaign.

Simonyan said the decision was "highly regrettable" and could serve as a precursor to retaliatory measures towards the US media.

"I never thought that Twitter is under the control of the US security services - it seemed like a conspiracy theory. But now Twitter appears to have admitted it," Simonyan was quoted as saying.

"This is highly regrettable. It is particularly regrettable that now the US media operating in Russia will feel the tender response of the Russian authorities."

According to a report in RT, Simonyan posted the social network's own pitch for an RT advertising campaign ahead of last year's election, in which Twitter said that the news site would provide an "unbiased point view of the US Elections with an edge."

"Hope Jack Dorsey (Twitter CEO) won't forget to tell Congress how Twitter pitched RT to spend big $$s on US election ad campaign," tweeted Simonyan.

The report also said that RT turned down Twitter's advertising pitch and spent only $274,100 on all US Twitter ads in 2016.

The Russian Foreign Ministry later confirmed that Moscow would take countermeasures in response to a "violation of freedom of speech".

"We consider this an aggressive step that intends to suppress the work of Russian channel RT, which has come about as a result of pressure from the US establishment and security services.

"Retaliatory measures will naturally follow," Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova was quoted as saying.

"We emphasise that preventing Russian media from doing their job, including with the help of security services, is a testament to a crude violation by the US of international and internal laws that guarantee the freedom of speech," Zakharova added.

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Priebus was "voluntarily interviewed" by Mueller's team, his lawyer William Burck, Xinhua quoted US news outlet Politico as saying.

"He was happy to answer all of their questions," Burck said.

The interview was part of Mueller's investigation into alleged Russian meddling in the US presidential election 2016, as well as any ties between Moscow and Trump campaign associates.

Trump has, however, not been accused of any wrongdoing so far.

According to Politico, Priebus had been preparing for several weeks for the interview. It also revealed on Thursday that Trump's attorneys were mulling an interview between Mueller and the President.

Previously working as chairman of the Republican National Committee, Priebus served as Trump's first Chief of Staff before being pushed out late July for failure to rein in a freewheeling White House and advance the administration's legislative agenda.

He is viewed as a key figure in understanding some of the most controversial Russia-related incidents, including Trump's firing of former FBI Director James Comey who at that time led the Russian probe and White House's meetings with Russian officials.

Reports said investigators are expected to interview a spate of other former and current White House aides, including former Press Secretary Sean Spicer, current chief counsel Don McGahn and Communications Director Hope Hicks.

Mueller has convened a grand jury to assist his probe and his team consists of seasoned lawyers.

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The handover of the Twitter details took place this week, Xinhua quoted US media reports saying on Friday. It was part of the social networking service's effort to aid in the Russian probe.

Those handles were previously not submitted partly due to legal privacy issues.

According to The Politico, the platform's strict privacy policy led to deletion of Russian information of interest to investigators.

The move has attracted criticism from the investigators looking into Moscow's suspected manipulation of the social media service during the 2016 election.

"The investigators also believe that their best hope for identifying who was behind these operations, how they collaborated with one another and their suspected links to the Kremlin lie buried within the data accumulated in recent years by Twitter," the report said.

By analysing Twitter data, the investigators could have established a "pattern of life behaviour", determining the Russian influence on the elections.

"But a substantial amount of valuable information held by Twitter is lost for good. The data was of potentially irreplaceable value to investigators," cybersecurity analysts and other current and former US officials, were quoted as saying.

Federal investigators now believe Twitter was one of Russia's most potent weapons in its efforts to promote Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton, the officials who spoke on condition of anonymity, were quoted as saying.

The officials said that by creating and deploying armies of automated bots, fake users, catchy hashtags and bogus ad campaigns, unidentified operatives launched recurring waves of pro-Trump and anti-Clinton story lines via Twitter that were either false or greatly exaggerated.

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg has said that Facebook owes American people an apology for the way it handled Russia's interference in last year's presidential election.

"It's not just that we apologize. We're angry, we're upset. But what we really owe the American people is determination" to do a better job of preventing foreign meddling, Sandberg told the Axios news website during an interview in Washington.

The Senate has invited Twitter, along with Facebook and Google, to a public hearing set for November 1.

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The handover took place this week, Xinhua quoted US media reports saying on Friday. It was part of the social networking service's effort to aid in the Russian probe.

Those handles were previously not submitted partly due to legal privacy issues, the reports said.

The move came after critics said that the tech giant was not taking the congressional probe seriously enough.

Twitter was also criticised for reportedly deleting tweets and other user data useful to investigators looking into Moscow's suspected manipulation of the social media service during the 2016 election.

The Senate has invited Twitter, along with Facebook and Google, to a public hearing set for November 1.

The post Twitter hands over 201 Russia-linked accounts to investigators appeared first on Social News XYZ.

San Francisco, Oct 13 (IANS) As people debate Facebook's role in influencing people during the US presidential elections by Russian ads and fake news on the platform, the company's COO Sheryl Sandberg has stressed that the social media giant is not a media organisation, and therefore does not hire journalists.

Sandberg said that Facebook is run by technical workers and engineers and according to her, the company does not produce news content, therefore it can't be a media company.

In an interview with US-based news website Axios on Thursday, she said, "At our heart we are a tech company. We hire engineers. We don't hire reporters. No one is a journalist."

"We don't cover the news. But when we say that, we're not saying we don't have a responsibility. In fact we're a new kind of platform... as our size grows, we think we have more responsibility," the executive was quoted as saying.

Business Insider said a firm that is a major source of news and information for people, generates billions in ad revenue and is producing its own original television shows is classified as a media company and Facebook does all of that.

Contrary to her claim, Facebook hired former NBC anchor Campbell Brown in January to head up the company's news division and work with other journalists to maximise their use of Facebook's platform.

Reportedly, Facebook does not want to harm its $500 billion valuation by admitting it is a media company. If the company accepts that it is a media firm, it would open the platform up to regulatory rules in the US and other countries which Facebook would rather avoid.

Business Insider said Britain was already considering regulations that would treat Facebook more like a media company.

Meanwhile, on the Russian ad issue, Sandberg said the election meddling on the Facebook platform "shouldn't have happened" and she wouldn't discuss Russia or Trump.

"We know we have a responsibility to prevent everything we can from this happening on our platforms... and so we told Congress and the Intelligence committees that when they are ready to release the ads, we are ready to help them," she said.

Sandberg said that if the Russian-linked ads were posted by "real people" and not fake accounts, Facebook would have let their content remain on the site. "When you allow free expression, you allow free expression."

"Facebook owes the American people an apology. Not just an apology, but determination for our role in enabling Russian interference during the election," she said.

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San Francisco, Oct 13 (IANS) Keeping up with its promise to help the US Congress to probe misinformation spread on its platform via Russian ads during the US presidential poll, Facebook has blocked a researcher from viewing the ads on its social media site.

A report in The Washington Post late on Thursday said that the researcher had looked at the information to study the reach of ads associated with an alleged Kremlin-backed campaign and was still combing through Facebook posts when the social networking giant deleted them from the public record.

"Analyst Jonathan Albright had downloaded posts from six of the Facebook pages before learning information from all 470 accounts was no longer publicly available," the report said.

According to Albright, Facebook said the information was not meant to be public and the company considered it a "bug" that he was able to find and download the data through the Facebook-owned social media analysis tool CrowdTangle.

Facebook confirmed it fixed the flaw in CrowdTangle that allowed Albright to see information from inactive Facebook pages, CNet reported.

The flaw had exposed the content that was already deleted from Facebook pages.

"Across all our platforms we have privacy commitments to make inactive content, that is no longer available, inaccessible," a Facebook representative was quoted as saying.

On Wednesday, the US House Intelligence Committee leaders announced to make some of the 3,000 Russian ads public that appeared on Facebook during the 2016 US presidential election.

The decision was taken after US Congress leaders met Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg late on Wednesday.

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The decision was taken after US Congress leaders met Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg late on Wednesday, Politico reported.

"The decision to release the ads for the public will draw scrutiny as more details emerge about Moscow's role in attempting to sway the election for Donald Trump," the report added.

The Senate Intelligence Committee has joined intelligence officials to confirm that Russia used Facebook platform to foment political division in the US.

Facebook, along with Twitter and Google, are scheduled to testify before the House and Senate Intelligence Committees on November 1.

After Facebook and Twitter admitting the presence of Russian operatives on their platforms to influence the US election, Google has reportedly discovered that millions were spent on ads by Russian agents who aimed to spread misinformation across Google's platforms, including YouTube.

An estimated 10 million people in the US saw the Russian ads that were present on Facebook during the 2016 presidential election, the social media giant has revealed, while handing over nearly 3,000 Russian political ads worth $100,000 to the US Congress.

Twitter has also announced that it deleted over 200 fake Russian accounts and identified Russia Today for buying ads targeted at American users' accounts.

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According to a report in The Washington Post on Monday, "the ads by Russian agents aimed to spread disinformation across Google's many products, which include YouTube, as well as advertising associated with Google search, Gmail, and the company's DoubleClick ad network".

Google was yet to comment on this, the report added.

The advertisements, said the report, do not appear to be from the same troll groups that bought ads on Facebook and could be part of a much broader effort to meddle with the US election.

Facebook and Twitter will appear before the US Congress to testify to Russian interference during the 2016 US election while Google was yet to confirm its appearance.

The three companies have been asked to testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on November 1.

An estimated 10 million people in the US saw the Russian ads that were present on Facebook during the 2016 presidential election, the social media giant has revealed, while handing over nearly 3,000 Russian political ads worth $100,000 to the US Congress.

Twitter has also announced that it deleted over 200 fake Russian accounts and identified Russia Today of buying ads targeted at American users' accounts.

"Google is conducting a broad internal investigation to determine whether Russian-linked entities used its ads or services to try to manipulate voters ahead of the US election," media reports said.

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In an interview given to CBSNews, Trump campaign digital director Brad Parscale said he used carefully-curated political advertisements on Facebook to directly reach voters with messages they cared most about.

The majority of the digital ad budget was spent on Facebook ads, particularly in reaching the rural voters, where infrastructure was a key issue, he added in the report on Saturday.

"I started making ads that showed the bridge crumbling -- that's micro targeting -- I can find the 1,500 people in one town that care about infrastructure. Now, that might be a voter that normally votes Democrat," Parscale told CBSNews host Lesley Stahl.

Parscale said the campaign would average 50,000 to 60,000 different ad versions every day, some days peaking at 100,000 separate iterations -- changing design, colours, backgrounds and words -- all in an effort to refine ads and engage users.

Both campaigns -- Republican and Democrat -- used Facebook's advertising technology extensively to reach voters, but Parscale claimed that the Clinton campaign didn't go as far as using "embeds".

According to Parscale, certain Facebook employees, who he called "embeds", showed up for work in his office multiple days a week to teach him every aspect of the technology.

Facebook is currently facing intense scrutiny over the presence of Russian ads on its platform during the 2016 American presidential election and along with Twitter, is set to appear before the US Congress on November 1 to testify.

An estimated 10 million people in the US saw the Russian ads that were present on Facebook during the 2016 presidential election, the social media giant said while finally handing over nearly 3,000 Russian political ads worth $100,000 to the US Congress.

"Twitter is how Trump talked to the people, Facebook was going to be how he won," Parscale was quoted as saying.

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San Francisco, Oct 3 (IANS) An estimated 10 million people in the US saw the Russian ads that were present on Facebook during the 2016 presidential election, the social media giant said while finally handing over nearly 3,000 Russian political ads worth $100,000 to the US Congress.

Facebook said that 44 per cent of total ad impressions (number of times ads were displayed) were before the election on November 8, 2016, while 56 per cent were shown after the election.

"Roughly 25 per cent of the ads were never shown to anyone," Elliot Schrage, Vice President of Policy and Communications at Facebook wrote in a blog on Monday.

This, Schrage wrote, is due to the fact that most of the ads appear to focus on divisive social and political messages across the ideological spectrum, touching on topics from LGBT matters to race issues to immigration to gun rights.

"For 50 per cent of the ads, less than $3 was spent; for 99 per cent of the ads, less than $1,000 was spent," the executive said.

Facebook said that some of the ads were paid for in Russian currency and "currency alone isn't a good way of identifying suspicious activity, because the overwhelming majority of advertisers who pay in Russian currency, like the overwhelming majority of people who access Facebook from Russia, aren't doing anything wrong".

Schrage wrote that it is possible that Facebook might find more than that they have found.

"We're still looking for abuse and bad actors on our platform - our internal investigation continues. We hope that by cooperating with Congress, the Special Counsel and our industry partners, we will help keep bad actors off our platform."

The company said it was continuing to refine their techniques for identifying the ads in question but would not disclose more details because they do not want to give bad actors a roadmap for avoiding future detection.

In order to do better at catching abuse on the platform, Facebook also announced a number of improvements, including making advertising more transparent, strengthening enforcement against improper ads and tightening restrictions on advertiser content.

Facebook would also increase requirements for authenticity and establish industry standards and best practices.

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Washington, Sep 15 (IANS) US President Donald Trump said his former Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, "blames everybody but herself for her election loss" last November.

Trump's tweets came as CNN broadcast an interview on Wednesday with Clinton regarding the release of her new book, "What Happened", in which the former Secretary of State rehashes her defeat.

Minutes after the interview aired, Trump tweeted: "Crooked Hillary Clinton blames everybody (and every thing) but herself for her election loss. She lost the debates and lost her direction!"

As in the book, Clinton used the interview to blame, among others, former FBI Director James Comey; Russian President Vladimir Putin; former Democratic rival Senator Bernie Sanders; and the US electoral system for her defeat, Efe news reported.

Clinton said she lost the presidential election a week before Election Day when Comey told Congress he was reopening part of the investigation into the former First Lady's emails.

"That was the determinative day because it stopped my momentum," the 69-year-old Clinton said. "I don't blame voters for wondering what the heck was going on."

Regarding Sanders, Clinton said the Vermont senator committed the "political sin" of not unifying the party by withdrawing from the race earlier in the primaries, doing "lasting damage" to her campaign.

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San Francisco, Sep 7 (IANS) An internal investigation at Facebook has revealed that fake Russian accounts bought nearly $100,000 of political ads during the 2016 US election campaign.

The ads and accounts appeared to focus on amplifying divisive social and political messages across the ideological spectrum -- touching on topics from LGBT matters to race issues to immigration to gun rights, the social networking giant said on Thursday.

"There have been a lot of questions since the 2016 US election about Russian interference in the electoral process," said Alex Stamos, Chief Security Officer at Facebook, in a blog post.

"In reviewing the ad buys, we have found approximately $100,000 in ad spending from June of 2015 to May of 2017 -- associated with roughly 3,000 ads -- that was connected to about 470 inauthentic accounts and Pages in violation of our policies," he posted.

The Facebook analysis suggests these accounts and Pages were affiliated with one another and likely operated out of Russia.

"We don't allow inauthentic accounts on Facebook, and as a result, we have since shut down the accounts and Pages we identified that were still active," Stamos said.

The vast majority of ads run by these accounts didn't specifically refer to the US presidential election, voting or a particular candidate.

"The behaviour displayed by these accounts to amplify divisive messages was consistent with the techniques mentioned in the white paper we released in April about information operations," the Facebook executive noted.

Facebook has shared its findings with the US authorities investigating these issues.

The company is also exploring several new improvements to its systems for keeping inauthentic accounts and activity off its platform.

"For example, we are looking at how we can apply the techniques we developed for detecting fake accounts to better detect inauthentic Pages and the ads they may run," the post said.

Facebook is also experimenting with changes to help it more efficiently detect and stop inauthentic accounts at the time they are being created.

It has applied machine learning to help limit spam and reduce the posts people see that link to low-quality web pages.

Facebook has also reduced stories from sources that consistently post clickbait headlines that withhold and exaggerate information.

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Washington, July 25 (IANS) US President Donald Trump took to social media to ask why congressional committees and Attorney General Jeff Sessions are not investigating the links between the Russian government and "dishonest" Hillary Clinton, his Democratic rival in the 2016 presidential election.

Trump on Monday resorted once again to Twitter to lambaste Clinton and lash out at the investigations being pursued by several congressional committees to determine if his election campaign coordinated with the Kremlin to influence the result of the election and hurt Clinton's chances at the polls, Efe news reported.

"So why aren't the Committees and investigators, and of course our beleaguered A.G., looking into Crooked Hillarys crimes and Russia relations?" tweeted Trump.

The President's comment comes a few hours after his son-in-law Jared Kushner denied having "improper contacts" with Russian officials.

Kushner released a statement outlining the testimony he intends to provide on Monday behind closed doors before the Senate Intelligence Committee, one of the congressional bodies pursuing the Russia investigation.

The president feels that the Russia investigation is an excuse by Democrats to justify their unexpected defeat in the November presidential election, when Republicans surprisingly won the White House, kept control of both houses of Congress and reaped numerous victories in local elections.

"After 1 year of investigation with Zero evidence being found, Chuck Schumer just stated that 'Democrats should blame ourselves, not Russia,'" Trump tweeted.

Democratic congressional leaders, including Schumer, on Monday are presenting a new economic plan to get back into the good graces of their voter base after the 2016 election defeat with the aim of regaining control of Congress in the 2018 midterm elections.

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Washington, July 24 (IANS) Jared Kushner, the senior adviser and son-in-law of US President Donald Trump, has, in a statement sent to the Senate and House Intelligence Committees and published by local media, denied having colluded with Russia during the 2016 presidential election campaign.

"I did not collude, nor know of anyone else in the campaign who colluded, with any foreign government," Kushner said in a written statement issued hours before testifying behind closed doors to the Senate Intelligence Committee about his contacts with Russia during the 2016 electoral campaign, Efe news reported.

"I had no improper contacts. I have not relied on Russian funds to finance my business activities in the private sector. I have tried to be fully transparent," Kushner said in the 11-page statement.

Kushner said he had no inappropriate contacts with anyone who had been or was at that time a representative of the Russian government.

In his testimony, Kushner mentions a meeting unknown up to now with the Russian ambassador to Washington, Sergei Kislyak, at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington.

According to Kushner, he met Kislyak and three other ambassadors a few months before Trump was designated the Republican candidate for President.

He said they "shook hands, exchanged brief pleasantries" and "each exchange lasted less than a minute".

Recently Trump's son-in-law has been at the centre of a controversy for a meeting with a Russian lawyer who was expected to provide damaging information against then-Democratic candidate and Trump rival Hillary Clinton.

But Kushner said the meeting "was a waste of our time".

Kushner will be questioned on Monday by the Senate Intelligence Committee and on Tuesday by the House Intelligence Committee, both currently investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 elections and the possible collusion of members of the Trump campaign with the Kremlin.

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Washington, July 24 (IANS) US President Donald Trump's son-in-law and senior White House adviser Jared Kushner said on Monday that neither he nor any member of the Trump campaign team colluded with Russian officials over the 2016 US presidential election.

In an 11-page statement released ahead of his closed-door interview with Senate intelligence committee staff, Kushner offered his first public account of what he said were his four meetings with Russians during the 2016 campaign and transition, offering previously undisclosed details of those meetings, CNN reported.

Kushner insisted in the letter that he discussed nothing improper during those meetings, which included two encounters with the Russian Ambassador in Washington, a meeting with the head of a Russian state-owned bank, and the June 2016 meeting with a Russian lawyer and others that was set up by Kushner's brother-in-law, Donald Trump Jr.

"I did not collude, nor know of anyone else in the campaign who colluded, with any foreign government," Kushner said in the statement.

"I had no improper contacts. I have not relied on Russian funds to finance my business activities in the private sector. I have tried to be fully transparent with regard to the filing of my SF-86 form, above and beyond what is required. Hopefully, this puts these matters to rest."

Kushner also disputed a media report that claimed that he had two phone calls between April and November 2016 with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, explaining that he has no recollection of those calls.

The previously undisclosed detail was just one of several that Kushner revealed in the letter in an effort to clear himself of any suspicions stemming from the congressional and federal investigations into contacts between Trump campaign officials and Russia.

The June 2016 meeting set up by Trump Jr, which was only publicly revealed for the first time this month, became a target of scrutiny in the investigations after emails revealed that Trump Jr believed he would obtain damaging information about Hillary Clinton from the Russian government.

Trump had repeatedly decried the investigations as a "witch hunt", but the meeting offered the most concrete evidence that Trump campaign officials were open to collaborating with the Russian government, the CNN report said.

The Senate panel, which is one of several congressional committees investigating Russian efforts to influence the 2016 presidential election, had interviewed dozens of individuals as part of its Russia meddling probe.

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Washington, July 23 (IANS) A majority of US voters say that it was not appropriate for one of US President Donald Trump's sons to accept an offer to meet with a Russian lawyer who promised "damaging information" about Hillary Clinton during the 2016 election.

According to the Politico/Morning Consult poll released this week, 52 per cent voters say meeting between Donald Trump Jr. and the Russian lawyer was inappropriate, compared to 23 per cent who say the meeting was appropriate.

The remaining 25 per cent have no opinion, the poll said.

Opinions about how the meeting differ largely by party, the poll also found.

While Republicans are less troubled by the meeting, with 44 per cent saying the meeting was appropriate, four in five Democrats regard the meeting as inappropriate.

Trump Jr., together with Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner and former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, had been repeatedly linked for attending a meeting with a Russian lawyer in the hope of getting hands on previously-promised "damaging information" about Trump's then-opponent Democratic presidential candidate Clinton.

The meeting -- which took place on June 9, 2016 at Trump Tower in New York -- also involved a Russian-born American lobbyist, a senior executive of a Russian real estate developer, an interpreter, and a British music publicist who proposed and later arranged the meeting via emails with Trump Jr.

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