Indonesia's top diplomat insists that members of the Group of Seven still need to tackle the root issues causing a widening COVID-19 vaccination gap.

A plan to upgrade Russian-Indonesian ties would put Moscow on par with the United States, which signed its own strategic partnership with Indonesia in 2015.

The figure is greater than the entire population of several states, including North Dakota and Alaska. 

Some of Indonesia's biggest expected gains from the United States remained elusive, as Jakarta sought assurances that the US would deliver on a regional comprehensive economic cooperation framework.

With the new pledges, Harris has secured private sector investments in the region worth over $1.2 billion, senior White House officials said. This follows a similar round worth $750 million announced by companies such as Microsoft and Mastercard in May.

United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Jakarta on Monday to kick off his Southeast Asian charm offensive.

Biden's appearance on NBC's "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon" is the first by a sitting president since Barack Obama, and comes as the White House seeks to highlight the recently passed bill for upgrading the nation's tattered transport networks.

"It's a tragedy. And we still don't know how many lives are lost and the full extent of the damage," he said in televised comments, quoted by AFP.

"It's a tragedy," a shaken Biden said in televised comments. "And we still don't know how many lives are lost and the full extent of the damage."

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo touted the recently concluded Bali Democracy Forum as evidence of Indonesia's commitment to promoting democracy “beyond borders”.

The former US Secretary of State and first lady read chunks of the speech as part of a MasterClass she is giving on the power of resilience, the streaming platform said in a press release on Thursday.

The appeals court agreed with a lower court ruling that President Joe Biden could waive executive privilege on the records, so that they could be handed over to a Congressional panel investigating the violence by Trump supporters.

China has increased military and political pressure on Taiwan to accept its sovereignty claims, drawing anger from the democratically ruled island, which has repeatedly said it would not be bullied and has the right to international participation.

Biden, who took office in January amid the biggest US political crisis in decades, said trends are "largely pointing in the wrong direction" and that "more than ever, democracy needs champions."

The event, held by video link because of the coronavirus pandemic, is billed by the White House as US leadership in an existential struggle between democracies and powerful autocracies or dictatorships.

Speaking to AFP, President Joe Biden's chief medical advisor broke down the knowns and unknowns about Omicron into three major areas: transmissibility, how well it evades immunity from prior infection and vaccines, and severity of illness.

This sum would be in addition to $293 million that Digital World Acquisition Corp raised in an initial public offering in September, the companies said in a statement.

California, Colorado and Minnesota have found cases of the coronavirus variant among patients who were fully vaccinated and developed mild symptoms, while Hawaii reported a case with an unvaccinated person, who had moderate symptoms.

The first known US was a fully vaccinated person in California who returned to the United States from South Africa on Nov. 22 and tested positive seven days later.

Overall, the US contributed around 42 million metric tons (MMT) in plastic waste in 2016 -- more than twice as much as China and more than the countries of the European Union combined, according to the analysis. 

"Prior in vitro analyses and structural modeling regarding the individual mutations present in the Omicron variant indicate that there may be reduced neutralization activity of both vaccine-induced and monoclonal antibody-conveyed immunity, including the current REGEN-COV antibodies," the company said in a statement.

Currently, vaccinated international air travelers can present a negative test result obtained within three days from their point of departure. Nearly all foreign nationals must be vaccinated to enter the United States. Unvaccinated travelers currently must get a negative COVID-19 test within one day of arrival.

Eight others, including one teacher, were wounded in the attack, which took place shortly after noon while classes were in session at Oxford High School, the Oakland County Sheriff's Office said.

Barbados had already conferred the title of ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary on the billionaire multiple Grammy-winning singer and businesswoman in 2018 and tasked her with encouraging education and tourism.

Calling the US plan "an evident product of its Cold-War mentality," ambassadors Anatoly Antonov of Russia and Qin Gang of China said the December 9-10 event would "stoke up ideological confrontation and a rift in the world, creating new 'dividing lines.'"

Australia and Japan led the growing list of countries imposing fresh travel restrictions or slamming shut their borders as the new strain identified last week spreads rapidly to Europe, Asia and North America.

The towering atrium features a huge skylight that dapples the lobby bar in winter sun as the nation's power brokers savor $140 glasses of wine served in Hungarian crystal, or $10,000 tumblers of vintage Macallan scotch. 

Famed for its beaches and love of cricket, Barbados will this week replace its head of state, Queen Elizabeth II, with her current representative, Governor General Sandra Mason.

Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks, working with the US director of national intelligence, ordered the new investigatory body to be established in the US Defense Department's intelligence and security office, the Pentagon said late Tuesday.

Brian Laundrie's body was found on October 20 in a nature reserve in northern Florida. The 23-year-old had disappeared in September, shortly after police described him as a "person of interest" in the investigation into Petito's death.