Updated 9 hours ago - World Blinken: Escalation with Iran is not in U.S. or Israel's interests

 

Blinken: Escalation with Iran is not in U.S. or Israel's interests

Secretary of State Antony Blinken told a group of American Jewish leaders on Tuesday that further escalation with Iran is not in the interests of either the U.S. or Israel, three people who attended the meeting told Axios.

Why it matters: The Biden administration and several other Western countries allied with Israel are urging Benjamin Netanyahu's government not to rush into a retaliation against Iran that could lead to a regional war.

🔸The U.S. assessment is that Iran would respond to any significant, overt Israeli strike     on Iranian soil with a new round of missile and drone attacks, a senior U.S. official told     Axios.

🔸"We think it will be very hard to replicate the huge success we had on Saturday with defeating the attack if Iran launches hundreds of missiles and drones again — and the Israelis know it," another U.S. official said.

Behind the scenes: A person who attended the meeting said Blinken did not say that Israel should refrain from responding to Iran, stressing it was Israel's decision to make.

🔸"But his message was: be smart, strategic and limited as possible," the attendee said.

🔸"Strength and wisdom are two sides of the same coin," Blinken told the Jewish leaders.

🔸Blinken said that "we would never tell Israel what to do," and that the Biden administration was simply giving Israel the best advice it can, according to two people who attended the meeting.

The intrigue: Blinken told the group that the fact that Jordan and Saudi Arabia were part of the defensive effort to repel Iran's attack was very important and opens opportunities for the future, according to one attendee.

🔸Blinken also claimed that Hamas may have rejected the most recent hostage deal because it thought the Iranian attack might lead to a regional conflict, two attendees said.

🔸He added that if Hamas sees there is no regional war, the militant group will once again be under pressure to cut a hostage deal.

🔸The State Department declined to comment.

Zoom in: Blinken spoke on Monday with Benny Gantz, a minister in Israel's war cabinet, and conveyed a similar message regarding Israel's possible retaliation, two sources with knowledge of the call said.

🔸Gantz said on Tuesday that he's spoken to senior U.S. officials over the last 24 hours about the need for the international community to take action against Iran, including imposing more sanctions in order to stop its aggression.

🔸"Israel will work with its allies around the world to make it happen. A regional normalization process will serve this goal. Israel will act with strategic wisdom and respond in the time and place of its choosing," Gantz said at a policy conference.

🔸The call between Blinken and Gantz, which hasn't been disclosed publicly, is one of a series of calls between senior U.S. and Israeli officials in recent days focused on Israel's plans for retaliation.

🔸Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin spoke on Monday with his Israeli counterpart Yoav Gallant. It was their fourth call since the Iranian attack on Saturday.

The other side: Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi told Russian President Vladimir Putin in a phone call Tuesday that Iran doesn't seek further escalation, according to Iranian state news agency IRNA.

🔸"We will respond to any action against Iran's interests more fiercely, extensively and painfully than before," Raisi stressed, according to IRNA.

🔸The Kremlin said Putin "expressed hope that all sides would show reasonable restraint and prevent a new round of confrontation fraught with catastrophic consequences for the entire region."

70 million Americans under severe weather threat from Northeast to Midwest

 70 million Americans under severe weather threat from Northeast to Midwest

From Sunday through Tuesday, hail, winds and a few tornados are possible.

Andrew Spear/Getty ImagesThe aftermath of tornados that came through the region in Indian Lake

Severe weather is projected to impact 70 million Americans from the Northeast Sunday through to Tuesday in the Midwest.

NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has issued an enhanced risk outlook for the multi-region storm system, designating it a level 3 out of 5 risk for severe weather.

In the Northeast, intense thunderstorms are likely to develop late Sunday afternoon in a corridor across the upper Ohio Valley into the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania and the Catskill region in Upstate New York.

Damaging wind, some hail and tornadoes are possible as the storm spreads slowly southward into Sunday evening.

ABC NewsSevere risk forecast for Sunday evening.

A line of these strong to potentially severe storms is projected to impact cities from Pittsburgh to New York Sunday night from 10:00 p.m. ET to 11:00 p.m. ET.

In the Midwest, a dynamic weather system across the Rockies and into the Great Plains from the Dakotas to Texas has the potential to form storms capable of becoming supercells and produce very large hail, damaging winds, and tornadoes on Monday.

ABC NewsSevere weather outbreak forecast for Monday and Tuesday.

Scattered severe thunderstorms are likely across the southern to central Great Plains, mainly Monday evening when large hail, damaging wind and a few tornadoes are possible.

Storms may begin as early as 5:00 p.m. CT from Central Texas to Nebraska and then continue to develop overnight across the region.

By Tuesday morning, storms are projected to impact regions from eastern Nebraska to Kansas City, Missouri, and parts of Iowa. These storms may still be strong and possibly severe.

The strongest storms are anticipated in areas from Des Moines, Iowa, to Columbia, Missouri, on Tuesday afternoon.

Scattered severe thunderstorms are likely on Tuesday into the evening from Chicago to east of Dallas.

On Wednesday morning, there may be lingering strong to severe storms in the Ohio River Valley.

‘Pick your battles’: CJI Chandrachud tells probe agencies; lauds new criminal laws

 ‘Pick your battles’: CJI Chandrachud tells probe agencies; lauds new criminal laws

CJI DY Chandrachud also stressed on need to strike a balance between exercising search and seizure powers and the individual’s privacy rights.

NEW DELHI: Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud on Monday said the premier probe agencies such as the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) must concentrate on those cases of importance that threaten the security, public order and economic health of the country rather than taking up petty cases while praising the three new criminal laws brought by the Centre.

Chief Justice of India Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud frowned at incidents of unwarranted confiscation of personal devices

CJI Chandrachud also emphasised the need to “uphold due process” in the functioning of law enforcement agencies and striking a delicate balance between “search and seizure powers” and “individual privacy rights” to create a fair and just society, alluding to the unwarranted seizure of personal devices during raids.

“It is important for us, both in the context of not just streamlining the courts but also promoting the efficiency of CBI and the investigative agencies to pick our battles. I think we have perhaps been spreading our investigative agencies too thin over the years, despite a rapid change in the environment. Our premier investigative agencies must concentrate their attention and efforts on that class of crime which truly threatens the security of the nation, public order or economic health of the nation,” the CJI said while delivering the 20th DP Kohli Memorial Lecture, organised by CBI in the memory of its founding director. “Allowing our investigative agencies to spread themselves too thin would really pose a serious challenge to the personnel who man the agencies because the number of personnel is obviously limited,” CJI Chandrachud said as he cited the example of CBI, which consists largely of officers who come on deputation.

The CJI was referring to instances of CBI investigating cases involving bribes as low as ₹300.

Lauding the three new criminal laws – Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) and Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam (BSA), which will replace the colonial era Indian Penal Code (IPC), Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) and Indian Evidence Act from July 1 -- the CJI noted that “the new criminal laws enacted by Parliament encompass substantive crime, procedure and evidence”.

“These laws aim at digitising various aspects of criminal procedure. This is a significant step towards modernising the justice system. From the initial registration of a first information report to the final delivery of judgment, every stage of a criminal investigation is slated to be recorded digitally under the purview of the proposed legislation. This comprehensive approach ensures a seamless flow of information and is intended to facilitate better coordination and collaboration among stakeholders involved in the investigative and adjudicatory processes,” he said.

“Summons can now be issued electronically, and testimonies from witnesses, experts, accused individuals, and other parties may also be presented virtually,” the CJI said, Underscoring how the new laws will integrate technology with the criminal justice system.

“This innovation eliminates the need for physical documentation and enables swift communication between law enforcement agencies, courts, and individuals involved in legal proceedings. It will obviate the delay in bail orders reaching the jail authorities and in recording witness depositions. Similarly, the authorisation for presenting testimonies virtually opens up new avenues for participation in legal proceedings, allowing contributions to the process from remote locations”, he added.

CJI Chandrachud also advocated for striking a balance between investigative imperatives and individual privacy rights in his address.

“In the realm of criminal justice, the delicate balance between search and seizure powers and individual privacy rights stands at the cornerstone of a fair and just society. At the heart of this balance lies the need to uphold due process while ensuring the effective functioning of law enforcement agencies,” he said.

The CJI noted that Section 94 of the newly enacted BNSS and Section 185 of BSA grant courts and law enforcement the authority to summon documents and materials, including digital evidence deemed necessary for investigation.

“Instances of raids conducted and incidents of unwarranted confiscation of personal devices highlight the pressing need to strike a balance between investigative imperatives and individual privacy rights,” he said.

The CJI further highlighted there was a need to rethink our investigative framework to deal with the innovations in criminal activities and called for having “multidisciplinary teams” consisting of officers and domain experts.

“The practice of allocating a case to an investigative officer (IO) and his local team for investigation must be re-looked to meet the challenges of sophisticated criminal networks. We can do this by completely re-engineering the national response to crime and our approach to criminal investigation by forming multidisciplinary teams consisting of law enforcement officers and domain experts including data analysts. These teams would draw from the expertise of their members and refine their investigative work. Multidisciplinary investigative teams can deploy unique approaches and pattern recognition in a seamless manner over a fluid investigative landscape,” he said.

While recommending the use of technology such as AI by agencies to bolster the criminal justice system, CJI asked to prioritise “ethical considerations” in utilising such technologies and have clear guidelines and safeguards to prevent misuse.

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SBI filed ‘false affidavit’, recorded electoral bond numbers ‘illegally’: Former finance secy Subhash Garg

 SBI filed ‘false affidavit’, recorded electoral bond numbers ‘illegally’: Former finance secy Subhash Garg

Electoral bonds were brought in to increase transparency in political funding, but it turned into a “sorry chapter in India’s history”, former finance secretary Subhash Chandra Garg said.

A day after the State Bank of India (SBI) provided all details of electoral bonds purchased and redeemed, including the alphanumeric codes of each bond that enabled donors to be matched with the recipients, former finance secretary Subhash Chandra Garg on Friday said the bank was not supposed to record the bond numbers and in doing so it had violated the anonymity promised to donors under the Electoral Bond Scheme, 2018. He also pointed out that the earlier affidavit filed by the bank on the matter was “ostensibly false”.

The SBI had done something “completely unlawful and unexpected”, Garg told The Indian Express. By recording the alphanumeric codes of the bonds sold to donors and encashed by political parties, the bank had hit at the basic feature of the scheme that was brought in by the government in 2018 to enable anonymous political donations, he said.

“The SBI said in its first affidavit that the information of donors and parties was kept in physical form in two silos and that it would take three months to match. But subsequent events have shown that they recorded the information in a digital form. Their first affidavit appears to be motivated by the desire to push the disclosure of the data beyond the Lok Sabha elections. Why did they file the ostensibly false affidavit,” asked Garg.

He said the electoral bond scheme was brought in to increase transparency in political funding by moving from cash to white money, with a feature of anonymity for the donors. But it had become a “sorry chapter in India’s history”. The aims were “frustrated by SBI’s patently illegal act,” he said.

The bank had provided all the details to the Election Commission (EC) on Thursday on the orders of the Supreme Court, which struck down the scheme on February 15. Also on court orders, the EC published the data on its website on Thursday evening. The court had instructed SBI to provide the data to the EC by March 6, but the bank moved the court on March 4 seeking time till June 30 to do so. It argued that matching the donations to the parties was a “time-consuming exercise”.

The court, however, rejected the plea and told the bank to provide the data by March 12 and the EC to publish it by March 15. The SBI provided the names and amounts of the donors and parties, but not the alphanumeric codes. Once again, the court cracked down on the bank and on Monday directed it to provide all details, including the alphanumeric codes, by 5 pm on Thursday.