2025

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Commerce Department said on Thursday it is considering new rules that would impose restrictions on Chinese drones that would restrict or ban them in the United States citing national security concerns.

The department said it was seeking public comments by March 4 on potential rules to safeguard the supply chain for drones, saying threats from China and Russia “may offer our adversaries the ability to remotely access and manipulate these devices, exposing sensitive U.S. data.”

China accounts for the vast majority of U.S. commercial drone sales.

In September, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said the department could impose restrictions similar to those that would effectively ban Chinese vehicles from the United States and the focus will be on drones with Chinese and Russian equipment, chips and software.

She told Reuters in November she hopes to finalize the rules on Chinese vehicles by Jan. 20.

A decision to write new rules restricting or banning Chinese drones will be made by the administration of President-elect Donald Trump, who takes over on Jan. 20.

Washington has taken a series of steps to crack down on Chinese drones over the last year.

Last month, President Joe Biden signed legislation that could ban China-based DJI and Autel Robotics from selling new drone models in the U.S. A unspecified U.S. agency must determine within one year if drones from DJI or Autel Robotics pose unacceptable national security risks.

DJI, the world’s largest drone manufacturer that sells more than half of all U.S. commercial drones, said if no agency completes the study it would prevent the company from launching new products in the U.S.

In September, the House of Representatives voted to bar new drones from DJI from operating in the U.S.

In October, DJI sued the Defense Department for adding it to a list of companies allegedly working with Beijing’s military, saying the designation is wrong and has caused the company financial harm.

DJI told Reuters in October that Customs and Border Protection was stopping imports of some DJI drones from entering the United States, citing the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. No forced labor is involved at any stage of its manufacturing, DJI said.

U.S. lawmakers have repeatedly raised concerns that DJI drones pose data transmission, surveillance and national security risks, which the company rejects. Congress in 2019 banned the Pentagon from buying or using drones and components manufactured in China.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)

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DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — A court in southeastern Bangladesh on Thursday rejected a plea for bail by a jailed Hindu leader who led large rallies in the Muslim-majority country demanding better security for minority groups.

Krishna Das Prabhu, 39, faces sedition charges after he led huge rallies in the southeastern city of Chattogram. Hindu groups say there have been thousands of attacks against Hindus since early August, when the secular government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was overthrown.

Prabhu didn’t appear at the hearing, during which Chattogram Metropolitan Sessions Judge Saiful Islam rejected the bail plea, according to Public Prosecutor Mofizul Haque Bhuiyan. Security was tight, with police and soldiers guarding the court.

“He faces serious charges like sedition and others involving the security and sovereignty of our country,” Bhuiyan told The Associated Press by phone. “We argued in the court that if he gets bail it could create anarchy as we saw in the past that he triggered violence on the court premises by calling thousands of his supporters to protest.

“So, we moved against his bail plea as we believed that he could misuse his bail.”

Apurba Kumar Bhattacharjee, a lawyer representing Prabhu, said that they would appeal the decision.

The court rejected an earlier request for bail made while Prabhu didn’t have lawyers. Lawyers who sought to represent him at that hearing said they were threatened or intimidated, and many of them are facing charges related to the death of a Muslim lawyer during clashes outside the court when Prabhu appeared there shortly after being arrested in Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, in November.

For Thursday’s hearing, 11 lawyers traveled from Dhaka, arriving and leaving with a security escort.

Hindu groups and other minority groups in Bangladesh and abroad have criticized the interim government led by Nobel peace laureate Muhammad Yunus for undermining their security. Yunus and his supporters said that reports of attacks on Hindus and other groups since August have been exaggerated.

Prabhu’s arrest came as tensions spiked following reports of the desecration of the Indian flag in Bangladesh, with some burning it and others laying it on the floor for people to step on. Protesters in India responded in kind.

Prabhu is a spokesman for the Bangladesh Sammilito Sanatan Jagaran Jote group. He was also associated with the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, widely known as the Hare Krishna movement.

Radharamn Das, vice president and spokesman of the group in Kolkata, the capital of India’s West Bengal state, told the television station India Today that Prabhu’s health is deteriorating.

Das said that the jailed Hindu leader “has become a face of minorities in Bangladesh. The minorities see him as a ray of hope. He represents their voice.”

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(Reuters) -Ten people were injured in a mass shooting in the New York City borough of Queens late on New Year’s Day, the New York Police Department said in a news briefing early on Thursday.

The injured in the incident outside a private events club late on Wednesday evening included six females and four males and all were expected to recover, police said.

The incident occurred when 3-4 males opened fire toward a crowd outside the club, the NYPD said. Users took to social media expressing shock at the incident and sharing pictures of police deployment at the site.

Police ruled out the possibility of a terrorist attack.

The incident came hours after two other acts of violence elsewhere in the U.S. on New Year’s Day. In New Orleans, a truck plowed into a street crowded with New Year’s revelers, killing 15 people, and in Las Vegas a Tesla truck exploded outside a Trump hotel in Las Vegas, killing one person and injuring seven.

U.S. authorities were scrambling to track down suspects related to the New Orleans and Las Vegas incidents and also investigating possible terrorism angles.

(Reporting by Kanjyik Ghosh and Devika Nair; editing by Mark Heinrich)

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