Icetruck

Trump: Japan could shoot down North Korean missiles

US President Donald Trump has said Japan could shoot North Korean missiles "out of the sky" with military equipment bought from the US.

Japan's PM Shinzo Abe followed up by saying his country could intercept missiles "if necessary", and added that he was looking into the deal.

The two leaders were speaking to reporters at the close of Mr Trump's first state visit to Japan.

North Korea has fired missiles over Japan twice in recent months.

• Trump vows to tackle N Korea on Asia trip
• N Korea: Where is the war of words heading?
• North Korea crisis explained in 300 words

On Monday, while answering questions at a press conference, Mr Trump said Mr Abe was "going to purchase massive amounts of military equipment" from the US.

Referencing North Korea's missiles, he said Mr Abe could "shoot them out of the sky" when he completed the purchase, which Mr Trump said would provide jobs to Americans as well as "safety for Japan".

Mr Abe said he was considering such a deal, adding that Japan had to "qualitatively and quantitatively" enhance its defence capability, given the "very tough" North Korea situation.

He stressed that missile defence was based on "legal co-operation" between Japan and the US, and as for shooting down missiles, "if necessary of course we can do that".

It is not clear whether a military deal has been signed during Mr Trump's trip, but the two countries are close military allies with the US maintaining several military bases in Japan.

In September Mr Trump had tweeted that he would allow the sale of high-end military equipment to Japan and South Korea.

Skip Twitter post by @realDonaldTrump

I am allowing Japan & South Korea to buy a substantially increased amount of highly sophisticated military equipment from the United States.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 5, 2017

Report

End of Twitter post by @realDonaldTrump

Japan does not have a standing army, but instead maintains what it calls self-defence forces, under its post-war pacifist constitution which the hawkish Mr Abe has been seeking to revise.

The two leaders also reaffirmed their ties and pledged to "stand against the North Korean menace", said Mr Trump. Mr Abe said Japan was imposing sanctions on several North Korean entities and individuals.

Earlier on Monday, North Korean state media accused Mr Trump of driving tensions "to the extremes" and said that "no-one can predict when the lunatic old man of the White House, lost to senses, will start a nuclear war" against North Korea.

Mr Trump on Monday met families of Japanese people abducted by North Korea – a topic which he later addressed in the press conference, calling it a "very, very sad thing".

He said it would be "a tremendous signal" and "the start of something very special" if North Korean leader Kim Jong-un returned the abductees, something which Mr Abe has constantly pushed for.

The two leaders also said they discussed economic co-operation in the region.

• What does Asia want from Donald Trump?
• Trump in Asia: A beginner's guide

Mr Trump is visiting Japan as part of his first tour of Asia as US president.

He has also visited a US air base near Tokyo, and met American business leaders where he publicly criticised Japan over a trade deficit.

Mr Trump will be going to South Korea, China, Vietnam and the Philippines in the coming week.

Source – bbc.com

Paradise Papers: Tax haven secrets of ultra-rich exposed

A huge new leak of financial documents has revealed how the powerful and ultra-wealthy, including the Queen's private estate, secretly invest vast amounts of cash in offshore tax havens.

Donald Trump's commerce secretary is shown to have a stake in a firm dealing with Russians sanctioned by the US.

The leak, dubbed the Paradise Papers, contains 13.4m documents, mostly from one leading firm in offshore finance.

BBC Panorama is part of nearly 100 media groups investigating the papers.

Follow live updates

As with last year's Panama Papers leak, the documents were obtained by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, which called in the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) to oversee the investigation. The Guardian is also among the organisations investigating the documents.

Sunday's revelations form only a small part of a week of disclosures that will expose the tax and financial affairs of some of the hundreds of people and companies named in the data, some with strong UK connections.

Many of the stories focus on how politicians, multinationals, celebrities and high-net-worth individuals use complex structures of trusts, foundations and shell companies to protect their cash from tax officials or hide their dealings behind a veil of secrecy.

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The vast majority of the transactions involve no legal wrongdoing.

Other key stories released on Sunday were:

• A key aide of Canada's PM has been linked to offshore schemes that may have cost the nation millions of dollars in taxes, threatening to embarrass Justin Trudeau, who has campaigned to shut tax havens. Read the full story here
• Lord Ashcroft, a former Conservative party deputy chairman and a significant donor, may have ignored rules around how his offshore investments were managed. Read the full story here Other papers suggest he retained his non-dom status while in the House of Lords, despite reports he had become a permanent tax resident in the UK. Read the full story here
• How questions were raised about the funding of a major shareholding in Everton FC. Read the full story here
• An oligarch with close links to the Kremlin, Alisher Usmanov, may have secretly taken ownership of a company responsible for anti-money laundering checks on Russian cash. Read the full story here

The other media partners may be covering different stories affecting their regions.

How is the Queen involved?

The Paradise Papers show that about £10m ($13m) of the Queen's private money was invested offshore.

It was put into funds in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda by the Duchy of Lancaster, which provides the Queen with an income and handles investments for her £500m private estate.

There is nothing illegal in the investments and no suggestion that the Queen is avoiding tax, but questions may be asked about whether the monarch should be investing offshore.

There were small investments in the rent-to-buy retailer BrightHouse, which has been accused of exploiting the poor, and the Threshers chain of off-licences, which later went bust owing £17.5m in tax and costing almost 6,000 people their jobs.

The Duchy said it was not involved in decisions made by funds and there is no suggestion the Queen had any knowledge of the specific investments made on her behalf.

The Duchy has in the past said it gives "ongoing consideration regarding any of its acts or omissions that could adversely impact the reputation" of the Queen, who it says takes "a keen interest" in the estate.

The BBC's royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell says it is extraordinary and puzzling that the Queen's advisers could have felt that it was appropriate – for somebody whose reputation is based so much on setting a good example – to invest in these offshore funds.

Questions will now be being asked inside Buckingham Palace about how that decision was made, he added.

Read the full story here

Embarrassment for Ross and Trump?

Wilbur Ross helped stave off bankruptcy for Donald Trump in the 1990s and was later appointed commerce secretary in Mr Trump's administration.

The documents reveal Mr Ross has retained an interest in a shipping company which earns millions of dollars a year transporting oil and gas for a Russian energy firm whose shareholders include Vladimir Putin's son-in-law and two men subject to US sanctions.

It will again raise questions about the Russian connections of Donald Trump's team. His presidency has been dogged by allegations that Russians colluded to try to influence the outcome of last year's US election. He has called the allegations "fake news".

Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal has called for an investigation, telling NBC News that Mr Ross had given Congress the impression he no longer held shares in the shipping company.

"Our committee was misled, the American people were misled by the concealment of those companies."

Read the full story here

Questions for the UK government

Opposition politicians have said the government must stop "dragging its feet" and curb the use of offshore tax havens, and Labour Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell has called for a public inquiry.

But at the CBI conference on Monday, Prime Minister Theresa May did not commit to a public inquiry. She also did not directly answer when asked whether she would insist on British overseas territories publishing a list of who owns companies and trusts registered in crown dependencies.

She said the UK government was working with its dependences "to ensure we're seeing greater transparency."

Where does the leak come from?

Most of the data comes from a company called Appleby, a Bermuda-founded legal services provider at the top end of the offshore industry, helping clients set up in overseas jurisdictions with low or zero tax rates.

Its documents, and others mainly from corporate registries in Caribbean jurisdictions, were obtained by Süddeutsche Zeitung. It has not revealed the source.

The media partners say the investigation is in the public interest because data leaks from the world of offshore have repeatedly exposed wrongdoing.

In response to the leaks, Appleby said it was "satisfied that there is no evidence of any wrongdoing, either on the part of ourselves or our clients", adding: "We do not tolerate illegal behaviour." Read the Appleby story here

What exactly is offshore finance?

Essentially it's about a place outside of your own nation's regulations to which companies or individuals can reroute money, assets or profits to take advantage of lower taxes.

These jurisdictions are known as tax havens to the layman, or the more stately offshore financial centres (OFCs) to the industry. They are generally stable, secretive and reliable, often small islands but not exclusively so, and can vary on how rigorously they carry out checks on wrongdoing.

The UK is a big player here, not simply because so many of its overseas territories and Crown dependencies are OFCs, but many of the lawyers, accountants and bankers working in the offshore industry are in the City of London.

It's also about the mega-rich. Brooke Harrington, author of Capital Without Borders: Wealth Managers and the One Percent, says offshore finance is not for the 1% but the .001%. Assets of around $500,000 (£380,000) would just not meet the offshore fees the schemes would need, she says.

Are we taming offshore?

What is the effect on us and should we care?

Well, it is a lot of cash. The Boston Consulting Group says $10tn is held offshore. That's about the equivalent of the gross domestic products of the UK, Japan and France – combined. It may also be a conservative estimate.

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Critics of offshore say it is mainly about secrecy – which opens the door to wrongdoing – and inequality. They also say the action of governments to curb it has often been slow and ineffective.

Brooke Harrington says if the rich are avoiding tax, the poor pick up the bill: "There's a minimal amount the governments need to function and they recoup what they lose from the rich and from corporations by taking it out of our hides."

Meg Hillier, UK Labour MP and chair of the Public Accounts Committee, told Panorama: "We need to see what's going offshore; if offshore was not secret then some of this stuff just couldn't happen… we need transparency and we need sunlight shone on this."

Your guide to a history of financial leaks

What is the defence of offshore?

The offshore financial centres say that if they did not exist, there would be no constraint on taxes governments might levy. They say they do not sit on hoards of cash, but act as agents that help pump money around the globe.

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Bob Richards, who was Bermuda's finance minister when Panorama interviewed him for its programme, said it was not up to him to collect other nations' taxes and that they should sort themselves out.

Both he and Howard Quayle, the chief minister for the Isle of Man, who was also interviewed for Panorama and whose Crown dependency plays a big part in the leaks, denied their jurisdictions could even be considered tax havens as they were well regulated and fully conformed to international financial reporting rules.

Appleby itself has in the past said OFCs "protect people victimised by crime, corruption, or persecution by shielding them from venal governments".

Find out more about the words and phrases found in the Paradise Papers.

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Your guide to financial jargon

The papers are a huge batch of leaked documents mostly from offshore law firm Appleby, along with corporate registries in 19 tax jurisdictions, which reveal the financial dealings of politicians, celebrities, corporate giants and business leaders.

The 13.4 million records were passed to German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung and then shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). Panorama has led research for the BBC as part of a global investigation involving nearly 100 other media organisations, including the Guardian, in 67 countries. The BBC does not know the identity of the source.

Paradise Papers: Full coverage; follow reaction on Twitter using #ParadisePapers; in the BBC News app, follow the tag "Paradise Papers"

Watch Panorama on the BBC iPlayer (UK viewers only)

Source – bbc.com

Fiji calls for urgency in talks to implement climate accord

Fiji's prime minister called for a sense of urgency in the fight against global warming Monday, telling negotiators "we must not fail our people," as he opened two weeks of talks on implementing the Paris accord on combating climate change, which is already affecting his Pacific island nation.

While diplomats and activists gathered in Bonn, the U.N. weather agency said 2017 is set to become the hottest year on record aside from those impacted by the El Nino phenomenon.

The talks in Germany are the first major global climate conference since President Donald Trump announced that the U.S. will pull out of the 2015 Paris accord unless he can secure a better deal, and the first time that a small island nation is chairing such a conference.

Negotiators will focus on thrashing out some of the technical details of the Paris accord, which aims to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. While Trump has expressed skepticism, a recent U.S. government report concluded there is strong evidence that man-made climate change is taking place.

Fiji Prime Minister Voreqe 'Frank' Bainimarama, the Bonn conference's chairman, offered greetings "from one of the most climate-vulnerable regions on earth," underlining "our collective plea for the world to maintain the course we set in Paris."

"The need for urgency is obvious," he said. "Our world is in distress from the extreme weather events caused by climate change."

"We must not fail our people" and must make the Paris accord work, Bainimarama said, adding that means to "meet our commitments in full, not back away from them."

He didn't refer directly to the Trump administration's position, but appeared to play off Trump's "America first" slogan.

"The only way for every nation to put itself first is to lock arms with all other nations and move forward together," the Fijian leader declared.

In a brief statement toward the end of the opening session Monday, a senior U.S. diplomat told delegates that Washington's position hadn't changed since Trump's announcement in June.

But Trigg Talley, the U.S. deputy special envoy for climate change, said the United States will "continue to participate in international climate change negotiations and meetings, including ongoing negotiations related to guidance for implementing the Paris agreement."

The meeting began with schoolchildren chanting "Save the World" processing into the conference hall and a traditional Fijian welcoming ceremony.

The U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization said this year is already on track to be one of the three hottest years of all time, after 2015 and 2016, which were both affected by a powerful El Nino — a weather phenomenon that can contribute to higher temperatures. .

WMO says key indicators of climate change — such as rising carbon-dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere, rising sea levels and the acidification of oceans — "continue unabated" this year.

It said the global mean temperature from January to September this year was about a half-degree Celsius warmer than the 1981-2010 average, which was estimated to be 14.31 degrees C (57.76 Fahrenheit).

The five-year average temperature from 2013 to 2017 is more than 1 degree Celsius higher than that during the pre-industrial period.

WMO says 2017 has been marked by higher-than-average rainfall in places like western China, southern South America and the contiguous United States; lower-than-average arctic sea-ice extent.

Participants at the Bonn conference include diplomats from 195 nations, as well as scientists, lobbyists and environmentalists. French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leaders are expected to appear near the end of the summit to give the talks a final push.

German Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks called for "significant progress" in Bonn on implementing the Paris accord.

"The Paris agreement is irreversible," she told delegates Monday. "We now have to do everything in our power to implement it and we do not have much time left."

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Moulson reported from Berlin. Jamey Keaten in Geneva and Frank Jordans in Berlin contributed to this report.

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Source – abcnews.go.com

3 guilty in 'Future Pharma' scheme to sell fake drugs online

A third person has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to make and distribute anabolic steroids and fake drugs to treat infertility, acne and erectile dysfunction. They were marketed online under the brand name "Future Pharma."

United States Postal Inspectors found fake ingredients were shipped from China to Alabama and Florida between 2015 and 2017 and manufactured into drugs labeled as Viagra, Cialis, Accutane and Clomid.

The Dothan Eagle reported Sunday that John Joseph Bush II pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess and distribute a controlled substance as well as conspiracy to introduce and or deliver a misbranded drug into interstate commerce. Ryan Anthony Sikora and Ariel Anna Murphy previously pleaded guilty.

All three residents of Chipley, Florida, face up to 15 years, fines and restitution at sentencing in January.

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Information from: The Dothan Eagle, http://www.dothaneagle.com

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Source – abcnews.go.com

2017 'very likely' in top three warmest years on record

The year 2017 is "very likely" to be in the top three warmest years on record, according to provisional figures from the World Meteorological Organization.

The WMO says it will likely be the hottest year in the absence of the El Niño phenomenon.

The scientists argue that the long-term trend of warming driven by human activities continues unabated.

They say many of the "extraordinary" weather events seen this year bear the hallmarks of climate change.

On the opening day of this year's key UN climate talks, researchers from the WMO have presented their annual State of the Global Climate report.

It follows hot on the heels of their greenhouse gases study from last week which found that concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere were the highest on record.

• Record surge in atmospheric CO2 in 2016
• UN: Emissions gap is 'alarmingly high'
• What is climate change?

While the new study only covers January to September, the WMO says the average global temperature was 1.1C above the pre-industrial figure.

This is getting dangerously close to the 1.5 degrees threshold that many island states feel temperatures must be kept under to ensure their survival.

The analysis suggests that 2017 is likely to come in 0.47C warmer than the 1981-2010 average.

This is slightly down on 2016 when the El Niño weather phenomenon saw temperatures that were 0.56C above the average.

According to the WMO, this year vies with 2015 to be the second or third warmest mark yet recorded.

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"The past three years have all been in the top three years in terms of temperature records. This is part of a long-term warming trend," said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas.

"We have witnessed extraordinary weather, including temperatures topping 50C in Asia, record-breaking hurricanes in rapid succession in the Caribbean and Atlantic, (and) reaching as far as Ireland, devastating monsoon flooding affecting many millions of people and a relentless drought in East Africa.

"Many of these events – and detailed scientific studies will determine exactly how many – bear the tell-tale sign of climate change caused by increased greenhouse gas concentrations from human activities," he said.

Scientists will have to do attribution studies to clearly link specific events from 2017 to rising temperatures. But they believe the fingerprints of climate change are to be seen in events such as tropical cyclones, where the warmer seas can transfer more heat to the gathering storms and increased sea levels can make flooding more damaging.

The Accumulated Cyclone Energy Index, which measures the intensity and duration of these events, showed its highest ever monthly values in September this year.

It was also the first time that two Category 4 hurricanes made landfall in the same year in the US.

Hurricane Irma was a Category 5 storm for the longest period on record. Rain gauges in Nederland, Texas, recorded 1,539mm, the largest ever recorded for a single event in the mainland US.

There were also significant flooding events with large loss of life in Sierra Leone, in Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Peru among many others.

In contrast, droughts and heatwaves affected many parts of Africa and South America. In Somalia, more than half of cropland was impacted with herds reduced by 40-60%.

More than 11 million people are experiencing severe food insecurity in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia.

"This year saw a multitude of damaging weather extremes which is not uncommon but many of these events were made more severe by the sustained warming influence of increasing atmospheric greenhouse gas levels due to human activities," said Richard Allan, professor of climate science at the University of Reading, UK.

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"An increased severity of weather extremes is expected in the decades ahead as Earth continues to heat up and it is only with the substantive cuts in greenhouse gas emissions required by the Paris climate agreement that we can avert much more potent and widespread damage to our societies and the ecosystems upon which they depend."

With UN talks on climate change now underway here in Bonn, the report is likely to reinforce a sense of urgency among many delegates.

"These findings underline the rising risks to people, economies and the very fabric of life on Earth if we fail to get on track with the aims and ambitions of the Paris Agreement," said Patricia Espinosa, executive secretary of UN Climate Change, which is hosting the Bonn conference.

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Source – bbc.com

Italy probes deaths of 26 Nigerian women from migrant boats

Italian prosecutors are investigating the deaths of 26 Nigerian women – most of them teenagers – whose bodies were recovered at sea.

There are suspicions that they may have been sexually abused and murdered as they attempted to cross the Mediterranean.

Five migrants are being questioned in the southern port of Salerno.

A Spanish warship, Cantabria, docked there carrying 375 migrants and the dead women, following several rescues.

Twenty-three of the dead women had been on a rubber boat with 64 other people.

Italian media report that the women's bodies are being kept in a refrigerated section of the warship. Most of them were aged 14-18.

Most of the 375 survivors brought to Salerno were sub-Saharan Africans, from Nigeria, Senegal, Ghana, The Gambia and Sudan, the daily La Repubblica reports.

Among them were 90 women – eight of them pregnant – and 52 children.

There were also some Libyan men and women on board.

People-smuggling gangs charge each migrant about $6,000 (£4,578) to get to Italy, $4,000 of which is for the trans-Saharan journey to Libya, according to the Italian aid group L'Abbraccio.

Many migrants have reported violence, including torture and sexual abuse, by the gangs.

Read more on migrant crisis:

• Life in an Italian migrant camp
• Jailed and ransomed in Libya
• Are migrants paying price as EU targets Med smugglers?
• African migrants 'sold in slave markets'

In the year to 1 November, 150,982 migrants arrived in southern Europe by boat from North Africa, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) reports.

Of them, 111,552 (nearly 75%) came via the Central Mediterranean route to Italy. The number who died on that route was 2,639, the IOM says.

The others arrived in Greece, Cyprus or Spain. The total is less than half the 335,158 who arrived in the same period of 2016.

Last year the total for Greece was higher than that for Italy.

A note on terminology: The BBC uses the term migrant to refer to all people on the move who have yet to complete the legal process of claiming asylum. This group includes people fleeing war-torn countries such as Syria, who are likely to be granted refugee status, as well as people who are seeking jobs and better lives, who governments are likely to rule are economic migrants.

Source – bbc.com

Fake WhatsApp app downloaded more than one million times

A fake version of the WhatsApp messenger app was downloaded more than a million times from the Google Play Store before it was removed.

The app, "Update WhatsApp Messenger", appeared to have been developed by the firm behind the real program – WhatsApp Inc.

According to users on web forum Reddit, the fake contained ads and could download software to users' devices.

It has now been removed from the Play Store.

Whoever was behind the app managed to make it look as though its developer was "WhatsApp Inc".

They did this by using that exact name, though replacing the space with a special character that looks like a space.

The subtle difference would have been practically undetectable to the average user.

Users receiving automatic updates via the real WhatsApp would not have been affected.

It is far from the first time that Google has had to clean up fake malicious apps on the Play Store.

In 2015, the firm had to step in and block one program that disguised itself as a battery monitor and sent premium-rate text messages from people's phones.

Source – bbc.com

Astros third baseman says Houston wants to 'win a ton' of World Series like the NY Yankees

WATCH Houston Astros star Alex Bregman talks about winning the World Series

The Houston Astros celebrated their first World Series win in franchise history last week, and third baseman Alex Bregman said everyone in the city was behind the effort.

"It was a complete team effort all year long and I think the World Series really showed what our team was all about," Bregman said today on "GMA."

Bregman, 23, explained that wearing the "Houston Strong" patch on their uniforms was "super special" to the team as they carried the spirit of the city with them through the postseason.

Richard Carson/Reuters

"When [Hurricane Harvey] hit we were on the road for 20 games or so and we got messages from back in Houston and it was tough for us not being able to be there and help people out," he said. "We thought that we had to play for [the city] the rest of the year. The people of Houston were there for us."

'Houston Strong' mantra rings true after Astros' World Series win

Bregman, in just his second year in the major leagues, kept the team's chance of winning alive with his game-winning walk-off home run in the 10th inning of Game 5.

Mike Nelson/EPA

"[This is] something you dream about as a kid," Bregman said of winning the World Series title. "The best part about the whole thing is seeing just your teammates rush the field and the smiles on their faces seeing how happy they are — just special, special day."

Kyodo/Newscom

Although the Astros have a young roster, Bregman thinks this group can formulate a plan to extend their season again next year.

"We gotta figure out the right recipe to keep coming back like the Yankees did and win a ton of them," he said.

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Mattis faces questions from allies on Islamic State strategy

WATCH When former Marine discovered teen son talking to ISIS recruiters: Part 1

As the Islamic State group loses its remaining strongholds in Iraq and Syria, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is facing a growing chorus of questions from NATO allies and partners about what the next steps will be in the region to preserve peace and ensure the militants don't rise again.

Heading into a week of meetings with Nordic countries and allies across Europe, Mattis must begin to articulate what has been a murky American policy on how the future of Syria unfolds.

Speaking to reporters traveling with him to Finland, Mattis said the main question from U.S. allies is: what comes next? And he said the key is to get the peace process on track.

"We're trying to get this into the diplomatic mode so we can get things sorted out," said Mattis, who will meet with NATO defense ministers later this week. "and make certain (that) minorities — whoever they are — are not just subject to more of what we've seen" under Syrian President Bashar Assad until now.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in late October repeated Washington's call for Assad to surrender control, looking past recent battlefield gains by his Russian-backed forces to insist that "the reign of the Assad family is coming to an end."

Tillerson made the comments after meeting with the U.N.'s envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, who later announced plans to resume U.N.-mediated peace talks Nov. 28. It will be the eighth such round under his mediation in Geneva since early 2016.

Mattis said intelligence assessments two to three months ago made it clear that the Islamic State group was "going down." He said information based on the number of IS individuals taken prisoner and the number of fighters who were getting wounded or were deserting the group made it clear that "the whole bottom was dropping out."

But while he said the effort now is to get the diplomatic process shifted to Geneva and the United Nations, he offered few details that suggest the effort is moving forward.

In addition to the diplomatic efforts, Mattis said the U.S. is still working to resolve conflicts with Russia in the increasingly crowded skies over the Iraq and Syria border, where a lot of the fighting has shifted.

On Friday, Assad's military announced the capture of the eastern Syrian city of Deir el-Zour, while Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi proclaimed victory in retaking the town of Qaim on the border, the militants' last significant urban area in Iraq.

Focus has now turned to Boukamal, the last urban center for the militants in both Iraq and Syria where Syrian troops —backed by Russia and Iranian-supported militias — and U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces are vying for control of the strategic border town.

The proximity of forces in the area has raised concerns about potential clashes between them as they approach Boukamal from opposite sides of the Euphrates River, and now from across the border with Iraq.

Mattis said that as forces close in, the fighting is getting "much more complex," and there is a lot of effort on settling air space issues with the Russians.

He also declined to say whether the U.S. will begin to take back weapons provided to Syrian Kurdish fighters, known as the YPG. The U.S. has argued that the YPG has been the most effective fighting group in the battle to oust IS from Raqqa, but Turkey opposed the arming effort because it believes the YPG is linked to a militant group in Turkey.

The U.S. has pledged to carefully monitor the weapons, to insure that they don't make their way to the hands of insurgents in Turkey, known as the PKK. The U.S. also considers the PKK a terrorist organization, and has vowed it would never provide weapons to that group.

Turkish officials have said that Mattis reassured them by letter that arms given to the Syrian Kurds would be taken back and that the U.S. would provide Turkey with a regular list of arms given to the fighters.

While in Finland, Mattis will attend a meeting of a dozen northern European nations, which are primarily concerned about threats from Russia.

"They are focused on the north," said Mattis, adding that he plans to listen to their thoughts on the region and determine how the U.S. can help, including what types of training America could provide.

"It is an opportunity to reiterate where we stand by our friends," said Mattis, "if any nation including Russia seeks to undermine the rules of international order."

During a press briefing later on Monday, Denmark Defense Minister Claus Hjord Frederiksen told reporters that allies must continue to be present in the region because of the risk that IS would rise again.

"We're not so naive that we think that terrorism is removed from this earth, but of course it is very important to have taken geographical areas from them so they can't attack or rob or whatever — using the income from oil production to finance their activities," said Frederiksen. "We foresee therefore years ahead we will have to secure that they cannot gain new ground there."

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Associated Press video journalist David Keyton contributed to this report.

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Source – abcnews.go.com

The Latest: US will continue participation in climate talks

The Latest on global climate change talks in Bonn, Germany (all times local):

4:25 p.m.

A senior U.S. diplomat says Washington will continue to take part in talks about implementing the Paris climate accord, despite President Donald Trump's threat to pull out of the pact.

Trump announced in June that the United States will withdraw from the 2015 Paris agreement unless he can get a better deal for the United States.

Trigg Talley, the U.S. deputy special envoy for climate change, told delegates at the opening of the U.N. climate talks in Bonn, Germany, on Monday that "we will continue to participate in international climate change negotiations and meetings, including ongoing negotiations related to guidance for implementing the Paris agreement."

He added: "We look forward to working with colleagues and partners to advance the work here over these two weeks and beyond."

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12:15 p.m.

Germany's environment minister is declaring that the Paris accord to combat climate change is "irreversible" as negotiators gather to discuss how to implement the agreement.

The two-week meeting that started Monday is the first major conference on climate change since President Donald Trump said that the U.S. will pull out of the Paris accord unless his administration can secure a better deal. Other nations are vowing to press ahead with the accord.

German Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks told negotiators that "we have to make significant progress on implementing the Paris agreement here."

She added: "The Paris agreement is irreversible. We now have to do everything in our power to implement it and we do not have much time left."

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12:05 p.m.

The U.N.'s weather and climate agency says 2017 is set to become the hottest year on record, apart from those impacted by the El Nino phenomenon.

The World Meteorological Organization says this year is already on track to be one of the three hottest years of all time, after 2015 and 2016. Those were both affected by a powerful El Nino, which can contribute to higher temperatures. Last year set a new record for the average global temperature.

The warning was timed for the start on Monday of the latest U.N. climate change conference, in Bonn, Germany.

WMO says key indicators of climate change such as rising carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere, rising sea level and acidification of oceans "continue unabated" this year.

It said the global mean temperature from January to September this year was about a half-degree Celsius warmer than the 1981-2010 average.

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11:45 p.m.

Fiji's prime minister has told climate negotiators that "the need for urgency is obvious" as diplomats opened talks on implementing the Paris agreement to fight climate change.

Prime Minister Voreqe 'Frank' Bainimarama, who is chairing the two-week meeting in the German city of Bonn, offered greetings "from one of the most climate-vulnerable regions on earth" as he addressed the conference Monday.

Bainimarama said nations should "meet our commitments in full, not back away from them."

He didn't refer directly to President Donald Trump's announcement that the U.S. will pull out of the Paris climate accord unless his administration can secure a better deal.

But Bainimarama says "the only way for every nation to put itself first is to lock arms with all other nations and move forward together."

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9:25 a.m.

Diplomats and activists have gathered in Germany for two-week talks on implementing the Paris agreement to fight climate change.

Environmental groups staged protests in the western city of Bonn and at a nearby coal mine ahead of the meeting to highlight Germany's continued use of heavily polluting fossil fuels.

The 23rd conference of the parties, or COP23, will be opened Monday by Fiji's Prime Minister Voreqe 'Frank' Bainimarama. The Pacific island nation is already suffering the impacts of global warming.

Negotiators will focus on thrashing out some of the technical details of the 2015 Paris accord, which aims to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

While President Donald Trump has expressed skepticism, a recent U.S. government report concluded there's strong evidence that man-made climate change is taking place.

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Source – abcnews.go.com