Ethiopia’s water minister denied that his country has started filling up Africa’s largest dam on Wednesday, a day after talks with Sudan and Egypt on the issue came to a deadlock. Following reports on his remarks, the minister said that higher water levels were due to recent heavy rainfall — and not due to the conscious efforts to fill the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD).
Unidentified hackers broke into the Twitter accounts of technology moguls, politicians, celebrities and major companies Wednesday in an apparent Bitcoin scam. The ruse included bogus tweets from former President Barack Obama, Democratic presidential front-runner Joe Biden, Mike Bloomberg and a number of tech billionaires including Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
Dr. Anthony Fauci called attempts by the White House to discredit him “bizarre,” claiming the move would ultimately hurt President Trump. The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases made the comments in an interview with The Atlantic after White House officials criticized him — most notably trade adviser Peter Navarro, who accused him of being “wrong” on the coronavirus at every step.
China’s economy has recovered from a record contraction to post 3.2% growth in the second quarter compared to the same time last year. The first quarter had seen the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) slump by 6.8% – the worst performance for decades. The growth surprised analysts, who had expected the figure to be around 2.5%, following a quarter during which lockdown measures ended and stimulus was boosted to help the economy recover.
Facing a tough re-election battle, US President Donald Trump has replaced his campaign manager. Mr Trump said Bill Stepien, a field director for his 2016 campaign, would take the place of Brad Parscale. Mr Parscale – who was reportedly blamed by Mr Trump’s inner circle for a poorly attended rally in Oklahoma last month – will stay on as senior adviser.