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VOA NEWSOctober 12, 2020This is VOA news. Via remote, I'm Marissa Melton.U.S. Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett is set to tell U.S. senators at her confirmation hearing starting Monday that courts "should not try" to make policy and should leave that to American presidents and Congress.The 48-year-old conservative, President Donald Trump's third nominee to the nine-member court, is facing four days of hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee this week.The Republican-controlled Senate, over vocal opposition from Democrats, is pushing to confirm her lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court by the end of October, just days before the presidential election.Republicans say they have the votes to confirm Barrett. If so, it would be one of the shortest approval processes on record and the closest ever to a presidential election.Democrats oppose Barrett's nomination to the court for several reasons, including the futures of the Obama era health care, or the Affordable Care Act, and the future of legalized abortion that they fear could be reversed.More than a week after testing positive for coronavirus, President Donald Trump described himself Sunday as being "in very good shape" and said he was no longer taking any medication.He said in a telephone interview on Fox News Channel, "I beat this crazy, horrible China virus." He said, "It seems like I'm immune."Mr. Trump also said he had a "protective glow" after being treated with several medications during a four-day hospital stay and after returning to the White House last week.But he did not say and was not asked whether he has definitively tested negative for the virus that has now killed around [four...] 214,600 people in the United States and infected more than 7.7 million United States residents.You can find more on this and other stories at our website . From Washington, you're listening to VOA news.Azerbaijan says Armenian forces shelled the city of Ganja overnight.The Azerbaijani Foreign Affairs Ministry described the fighting on Twitter, saying the attack killed seven civilians and injured 39 others, including children.The Defense Ministry in Nagorno-Karabakh said the charge of [Armenian forces had shell] that Armenian forces had shelled Ganja was an absolute lie.The incident has not been independently confirmed.A cease-fire between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces went into effect on Saturday at noon local time. It was meant to halt at least temporarily the deadly hostilities over the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region, which is claimed by both countries.The truce is intended to allow both sides to exchange prisoners and recover the dead.The United Nations human rights office said it had received unconfirmed reports that more than 50 civilians, including children, have been killed since the fighting erupted on September 27.Dozens of protesters in Belarus were arrested Sunday during the 10th straight weekend of demonstrations against long-term (longtime) authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko.Since the president claimed victory in a disputed August 9 election, protesters have regularly taken to the streets demanding his resignation and the release of political prisoners.Videos from the latest demonstration show security forces using water cannon and batons to disperse crowds. Minsk police said they detained "several dozen" people.The clashes follow an unusual meeting between Lukashenko and jailed opposition leaders on Saturday. His office said, "The goal of the president was to hear everyone's opinion."Lukashenko's main opposition candidate in the election, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, is now based in Lithuania after fleeing Belarus for the safety of herself and her children.Lukashenko maintains he won the poll in a landslide, [gaiting] getting 80 percent of all ballots, despite [wine] widespread claims at home and abroad that the vote was heavily rigged to keep him in power where he has been for 26 years.Residents of the U.S. state of Louisiana are struggling to recover from Hurricane Delta, which made landfall in their state Friday night. It was the second hurricane this season to hit the area.Cars were overturned. Some homes were flooded with water up to knee-high.No deaths from Delta have been reported so far. But from the previous Hurricane Laura, 32 deaths are attributed, many caused by carbon monoxide poisoning from generators used in buildings without electricity.Since Friday, Delta has weakened into a tropical depression but forecasters warned flash floods and storm surges could hit areas from Texas to [minessi...] Mississippi over the next few days.Via remote, I'm Marissa Melton. From Washington, this is VOA news. ................
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