While You Were Sleeping: 5 stories you might have missed, May 2
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Philippines president Ferdinand Marcos Jr and wife Louise Araneta-Marcos are welcomed to the White House by US President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden.
PHOTO: BLOOMBERG
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US commitment for defence of Philippines ‘ironclad’
President Joe Biden told Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr at the White House on Monday that the US commitment to the defence of its ally was “ironclad,” including in the South China Sea where Manila is under pressure from China.
Mr Marcos, on the first White House visit by a Philippines leader in 10 years, stressed the importance of the United States as his country’s sole treaty ally in a region with “arguably the most complicated geopolitical situation in the world right now.”
US officials said the leaders would agree new guidelines for stronger military cooperation, as well as stepped up economic cooperation, underscoring a dramatic turnaround in US-Philippine relations over the past year.
“The United States remains ironclad in our commitment to the defence of the Philippines, including the South China Sea,” Mr Biden told Mr Marcos in the Oval Office, reaffirming a 1951 Mutual Defence Treaty that calls for the United States to act in the event of an armed attack on the Philippine military.
Biden calls debt meeting, as US to run short of cash June 1
NYT
The US Treasury warned on Monday that it could run short of cash to pay all of the government’s bills as soon as June without a debt limit increase, prompting President Joe Biden to summon the top four congressional leaders to the White House to try to avert a fiscal crisis.
A person familiar with the plans told Reuters that Mr Biden called Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in Jerusalem, as well as House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican leader Mitch McConnell and invited them to a meeting on May 9 to talk about the debt ceiling and federal spending.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in a letter to Congress that the agency will be unlikely to meet all US government payment obligations “by early June, and potentially as early as June 1“ without action by Congress.
US intel says 100,000 Russian dead, wounded in Bakhmut
REUTERS
More than 20,000 Russian combatants have died and another 80,000 were wounded in five months of fighting to capture the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, a White House official said on Monday.
“We estimate that Russia has suffered more than 100,000 casualties, including over 20,000 killed in action,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters.
Mr Kirby, saying he was citing newly declassified intelligence, said that about half of those killed were soldiers recruited by the private military company Wagner, which draws much of its ranks from prison populations in Russia.
Highway pileup in dust storm causes multiple fatalities
A dust storm that cut visibility to near zero on Monday triggered a series of chain-reaction crashes involving dozens of vehicles on an Illinois highway, injuring at least 30 people and killing an unspecified number, state police said.
Roughly 40 to 60 passenger cars and about 20 commercial vehicles, including numerous tractor-trailer rigs, were involved in the pileup around 11am CT on Interstate 55 in southern Illinois, a state police official said at an afternoon press conference.
More than 30 people were transported to area hospitals with injuries, and there were “multiple fatalities,” the official said.
Sabalenka ends teenager Andreeva’s adventure
World number two Aryna Sabalenka made light work of 16-year-old Mirra Andreeva on Monday with a 6-3, 6-1 win to reach the Madrid Open quarter-finals.
Russian youngster Andreeva, a wildcard, became only the third 15-year-old to win a WTA 1000 main draw match when she beat 2021 US Open finalist Leylah Fernandez last week.
She went on to beat two top 20 players in Beatriz Haddad Maia and, on her 16th birthday, Magda Linette, but overcoming 2021 Madrid winner Sabalenka was a bridge too far.
