New York

(AP) --- The top executive at Pfizer, a leading producer of COVID-19 vaccines, has tested positive for the virus and says he is experiencing very mild symptoms.

Chairman and CEO Albert Bourla said Monday that he started taking Pfizer’s Paxlovid pill treatment and is isolating while he recovers.

Bourla has received four shots of Comirnaty, the COVID-19 vaccine developed by the New York drugmaker along with BioNTech. He said in a brief statement issued by the company that he is confident of a quick recovery.

NEW YORK, Aug 14 (APP): Pakistan’s 75th Independence Day was celebrated with fervour and enthusiasm in New York on Sunday, with the hoisting of the national flag at the Pakistan House by Consul General Ayesha Ali, as the national anthem was played.

The joint ceremony, held by the Permanent Mission of Pakistan to the UN and the Consulate General, started with recitation from the Holy Quran.

It was attended by officers and staff of the Pakistan Mission and the Consulate General.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 14 (APP): The world community must step up efforts to urge the Taliban, who are ruling Afghanistan, to adhere to basic human rights principles, a group of rights have said .

The future is immensely bleak for Afghans if more is not done by the international community to ensure the Taliban changes its modus operandi and complies with its human rights obligations, they said in a joint statement issued in Geneva.

MAYVILLE, N.Y. (AP) — Salman Rushdie is “on the road to recovery,” his agent confirmed Sunday, two days after the author of “The Satanic Verses” suffered serious injuries in a stabbing at a lecture in upstate New York.

NEW YORK, Aug 13 (APP): Pakistan’s green-crescent-and star was raised for the first time today to mark the country’s 75th Independence Day at Bowling Green, a historic spot in New York City where the British colonial flag was lowered and America’s Stars and Stripes raised in 1783.

Slogans of “Pakistan Zinda Bad” rang out as New York City Mayor Eric Adams personally raised the Pakistan flag, alongside with the US flag, on the mast. National Anthems of the two countries were played.

NEW YORK, August 13. /TASS/: Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger believes that Washington is currently on the brink of war with Moscow and Beijing, he said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.

"We are at the edge of war with Russia and China on issues which we partly created, without any concept of how this is going to end or what it’s supposed to lead to," he said.

MAYVILLE, N.Y. (AP) — Salman Rushdie remained hospitalized Saturday after suffering serious injuries in a stabbing attack, which was met with shock and outrage from much of the world, along with tributes and praise for the award-winning author who for more than 30 years has faced death threats for his novel “The Satanic Verses.”

Rushdie, 75, suffered a damaged liver, severed nerves in an arm and an eye, and was on a ventilator and unable to speak, his agent Andrew Wylie said Friday evening. Rushdie was likely to lose the injured eye.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug. 12 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Thursday that he is "gravely concerned" about the unfolding situation in and around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine.

"I have appealed to all concerned to exercise common sense and reason and not to undertake any actions that might endanger the physical integrity, safety or security of the nuclear plant," he said in a statement.

NEW YORK (AP) — The virus that causes polio has been found in New York City’s wastewater in another sign that the disease, which hadn’t been seen in the U.S. in a decade, is quietly spreading among unvaccinated people, health officials said Friday.

The presence of the poliovirus in the city’s wastewater suggests likely local circulation of the virus, health authorities from the city, New York state and the federal government said.

The authorities urged parents to get their children vaccinated against the potentially deadly disease.

CHAUTAUQUA, N.Y. (AP) — Salman Rushdie, the author whose writing led to death threats from Iran in the 1980s, was attacked and apparently stabbed in the neck Friday by a man who rushed the stage as he was about to give a lecture in western New York.

An Associated Press reporter witnessed a man confront Rushdie on stage at the Chautauqua Institution and punch or stab him 10 to 15 times as he was being introduced. The 75-year-old author was pushed or fell to the floor, and the man was arrested.