MercoPress https://en.mercopress.com/ South Atlantic News Agency en Copyright 2026, MercoPress. https://en.mercopress.com/web/img/en/mercopress-logo.gif MercoPress http://en.mercopress.com/ <![CDATA[US resumes flights after a four-and-a-half-hour shutdown caused by obsolete equipment]]> Photo: AP / Ross Franklin The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Friday night lifted the nationwide ground stop it had ordered in the afternoon, after some four and a half hours of airspace closure that left thousands of flights cancelled. Donald Trump’s administration blamed the failure on overloaded, outdated analogue telecommunications equipment at air traffic control centres, ruled out a cyberattack for now and warned that the return to normal would be slow.

]]> Sat, 14 Nov 2026 05:24:00 GMT <![CDATA[US grounds all departing flights over an air traffic control communications failure]]> Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the failure affects the 22 regional centres that guide aircraft en route between airports and that FAA technicians are investigating The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Friday ordered a halt to all flights departing from the country’s airports “due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety”, following a communications failure affecting air traffic control centres. Thousands of flights were cancelled or delayed and hundreds of thousands of passengers were stranded. The government has so far ruled out an attack.

]]> Sat, 14 Nov 2026 00:53:00 GMT <![CDATA[Nvidia investigates founder Jensen Huang over his relationship with an alleged Chinese agent]]> The company announced on Sunday that it was starting the investigation “in light of recent reporting that founder and CEO Jensen Huang has been the target of a foreign intelligence effort” Nvidia’s board has opened an independent investigation into founder and chief executive Jensen Huang after it emerged that he had an extramarital relationship with a businesswoman of Chinese origin whom US intelligence services link to Beijing’s espionage. President Donald Trump said on Monday that the FBI is investigating the case. No one has been charged.

]]> Wed, 11 Nov 2026 03:30:00 GMT <![CDATA[Venezuela signs a memorandum with ExxonMobil for the oil major’s return after leaving in 2007]]> The signing took place in Caracas in the presence of acting President Delcy Rodríguez and ExxonMobil Upstream President Dan Ammann Venezuela on Monday signed a memorandum of understanding with US oil company ExxonMobil with a view to its return to the country, which it left in 2007 after the nationalisation of the last privately held oilfields under Hugo Chávez’s government. The document is not a contract, and no investment figures or timelines have been disclosed.º

]]> Tue, 10 Nov 2026 14:52:00 GMT <![CDATA[Big Tech loses a trillion dollars in a day after the Democratic win]]> Trump blamed the opposition. “The Stock Market suffered one of the Worst Days in History based on the results of the Election. Remember, it wasn’t Republicans,” he wrote on social media Shares in major technology companies plunged on Wall Street on Thursday and in Asian markets on Friday, in a sell-off that wiped hundreds of billions of dollars of market value, on fears that the Democratic victory in the US midterm elections will slow the expansion of data centres and artificial intelligence. The so-called magnificent seven, including Apple, Nvidia and Tesla, together lost a trillion dollars in a single session, according to the BBC.

]]> Fri, 06 Nov 2026 00:51:00 GMT <![CDATA[Republicans look for culprits after defeat: Speaker of Congress steps aside and Vance points to Iran]]> Johnson, 54, a congressman from Louisiana, has been Speaker since October 2023, when his colleagues chose him as a consensus candidate after the ousting of his predecessor Speaker of the US House of Representatives Mike Johnson, a Republican, said he will not seek to continue leading his party in the new Congress, while Vice President JD Vance blamed the Iran war for the Republican defeat in Tuesday’s midterm elections, an explanation President Donald Trump called “largely true” even as he defended the conflict.

]]> Thu, 05 Nov 2026 07:05:00 GMT <![CDATA[Democrats retake control of the US Congress in a heavy blow to Trump]]> CBS News projected a Democratic majority in the House shortly after 10 p.m. Eastern time on Tuesday; with dozens of seats still to be decided, Democrats had passed the 218 needed The Democratic Party on Tuesday regained control of both the US House of Representatives and the Senate in the midterm elections, winning in Republican strongholds such as Texas, Ohio and Kansas in a heavy blow to President Donald Trump, who will govern for the remaining two years of his term with Congress in opposition hands.

]]> Wed, 04 Nov 2026 09:09:00 GMT <![CDATA[Trump accepts midterm defeat but says Republicans would have won “in a landslide” had he been on the ballot]]> “We’ll work with the Democrats, and we’ll, you know, look forward to working with them. We’ll probably work something out,” he said US President Donald Trump said he accepts the results of the midterm elections, in which Democrats regained control of both chambers of Congress, and signalled willingness to negotiate with the opposition, but blamed the Republican defeat on his absence from the ballot and threatened to veto the new Congress’s legislation.

]]> Wed, 04 Nov 2026 08:16:00 GMT <![CDATA[Markets react to the US midterms: the dollar falls and gold rises]]> The dollar index, which measures its value against a basket of currencies, remained in negative territory near 101.50 The US dollar weakened against major currencies on Wednesday morning and gold rose more than 2% to above US$4,000 an ounce as markets assessed the Democratic victory in the midterm elections, which will give the opposition control of both chambers of Congress for the final two years of Donald Trump’s presidency.

]]> Wed, 04 Nov 2026 08:00:00 GMT <![CDATA[Corruption joins the cost of living as a top concern for US voters]]> A Fox News poll published in October found that 88% of voters say they are “extremely” or “very” concerned about corruption in government The United States votes on Tuesday in midterm elections in which corruption has emerged in the final stretch as one of voters’ main concerns, second only to the cost of living, according to several polls. At stake are all 435 seats in the House of Representatives, 35 of the 100 Senate seats and numerous governorships and state legislatures.

]]> Tue, 03 Nov 2026 00:31:00 GMT