Fire-weary southern California was buffeted Monday by dangerous winds, with forecasters warning of an “extremely critical” risk in a region already staggering from the devastation of horrifying blazes.Firefighters continued to make progress snuffing out fires that ravaged 40,000 acres (16,000 hectares) in the Los Angeles area, after erupting on January 7 and killing at least 27 people.But a return of the hurricane-force winds responsible for spreading those initial fires threatened more danger.Winds gusting up to 88 miles (142 kilometers) an hour have been recorded in some spots, where forecasters said they could again combine with exceedingly dry conditions to create the potential for more fast-spreading fires.”We’re expecting this to continue to create extremely critical fire weather conditions across the region,” Ariel Cohen, of the National Weather Service, (NWS) told AFP.”Any fires that form could grow explosively. And so this is a particularly dangerous situation.”Officials said they had pre-deployed engines and firefighters to areas at risk, after facing criticism that they were unprepared earlier this month.”I believe that we will be very, very prepared for what the worst possible case scenario (could be) over the next couple of days, and then hopefully we don’t get there at all,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass told reporters.The largest conflagration, the Palisades Fire, was 59 percent contained by Monday, and the area affected by evacuation orders has now shrunk to effectively match the fire’s footprint.The Eaton Fire, which wrecked a large part of the Altadena area, was 87 percent contained.- No ‘magical spigot’ -As Los Angeles grapples with the scale of the devastation, political bickering has intensified.Donald Trump, who was sworn in as US president on Monday, has said he will be visiting the fire-ravaged areas at the end of the week.That trip could include an awkward encounter with California Governor Gavin Newsom, who has been the target of Trump’s barbs over his handling of the disaster.Moments after being sworn in as the 47th president, Trump again side-swiped California’s Democratic leadership.”We are watching fires still tragically burn from weeks ago without even a token of defense,” he said.”We can’t let this happen. Everyone is unable to do anything about it. That’s going to change,” he added, musing it was “interesting” that some wealthy people had lost their homes.Newsom did not directly address the gibe, but offered an open hand to the newly installed president.”This moment underscores the critical need for partnership, a shared commitment to facts, and mutual respect — values that enable civil discourse, effective governance, and meaningful action,” he wrote on social media.”I look forward to President Trump’s visit to Los Angeles and his mobilization of the full weight of the federal government to help our fellow Americans recover and rebuild.”While the immediate cause of the fires is not yet known, scientists say humanity’s behavior is altering weather patterns, making them more volatile, which can increase the destructiveness of any blaze.Southern California has had no significant rain for around eight months, even though it is well into what is usually the rainy season.Officials have cautioned that if rain does materialize, it could create dangerous debris flows in the disaster zone, and spark mudflows and hill collapses.

Billionaire Elon Musk sparked controversy Monday after making a gesture at an event celebrating US President Donald Trump’s inauguration, with some calling it a “Nazi” or “fascist” movement.The X, SpaceX and Tesla chief appeared on stage at the Capital One Arena in Washington, where supporters of the newly inaugurated president had gathered for a rally.Upon thanking the crowd for returning the 78-year-old Republican to the White House, Musk tapped the left side of his chest with his right hand and then extended his arm with his palm open, repeating the gesture for the crowd seated behind him.Claire Aubin, a historian who specializes in Nazism within the United States, agreed Musk’s gesture was a “sieg heil,” or Nazi salute.”My professional opinion is that you’re all right, you should believe your eyes,” Aubin posted on X, aligning with those who found the gesture was an overt reference to Nazis.Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a historian of fascism, also found the gesture “was a Nazi salute — and a very belligerent one too,” she said on X.Democratic Party members also quickly responded with alarm.Congressman Jimmy Gomez reacted to the moment by posting on X: “Well, that didn’t take long.”Musk, who has posted a dozen times on his social network X since making the gesture, did not immediately react to the swirling controversy.One attendee at the rally told AFP he thought Musk was making the gesture as a joke.”He’s very humorous, and he uses a lot of sarcasm. So when he did that on the stage, I don’t think he meant it,” said Brandon Galambos, a 29-year-old pastor and tech worker.Reports by Wired and Rolling Stone magazines said far-right personalities in the United States were celebrating the move, like the writer Evan Kilgore, who called the salute “incredible.”Musk has also made several statements in recent weeks in support of Germany’s far-right AfD party and British anti-immigration party Reform UK.The Anti Defamation League (ADL), an organization founded to combat anti-Semitism which has criticized Musk in the past, defended his actions this time around.”It seems that Elon Musk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute,” the organization said in a statement posted on X.Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez blasted the ADL’s reaction, saying on X: “Just to be clear, you are defending a Heil Hitler salute that was performed and repeated for emphasis and clarity.”Another historian, Aaron Astor, also rebuffed accusations of Musk’s Nazi emulation.”I have criticized Elon Musk many times for letting neo-Nazis pollute this platform,” he wrote on X, adding: “But this gesture is not a Nazi salute.””This is a socially awkward autistic man’s wave to the crowd where he says ‘my heart goes out to you.'”In 2021, Musk announced he had been diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, a form of autism.

US President Donald Trump signed pardons Monday for some 1,500 participants in the January 6, 2021 riot at the US Capitol by his supporters who attempted to overturn the 2020 election.”These are the hostages — approximately 1,500 people — for a pardon, full pardon,” Trump said at a signing ceremony shortly after arriving at the White House.”We hope they come out tonight frankly,” he said. “They’re expecting it.”More than 1,500 people were charged in connection with the assault on Congress by Trump supporters who were seeking to disrupt certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s election victory.Trump repeatedly pledged during his election campaign to pardon those who took part in the attack, calling them “hostages,” “patriots” and “political prisoners.”Trump, whose first term as president ended under the cloud of the Capitol assault, has repeatedly played down the unprecedented violence of January 6, even going so far as to describe it as a “day of love.”More than 140 police officers were injured in hours of clashes with rioters wielding flagpoles, baseball bats, hockey sticks and other makeshift weapons along with Tasers and canisters of bear spray.The assault on the Capitol followed a fiery speech by then-president Trump to tens of thousands of his supporters near the White House in which he repeated his false claims that he won the 2020 race. He then encouraged the crowd to march on Congress.Trump was charged by special counsel Jack Smith with conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 election.But the case never made it to trial, and was dropped under the Justice Department’s policy of not prosecuting a sitting president.According to the latest figures from the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, 1,583 people have been charged in connection with the Capitol siege, including 608 accused of assaulting, resisting or impeding law enforcement officers.Biden, before leaving office on Monday, issued preemptive pardons to former Covid pandemic advisor Anthony Fauci, retired general Mark Milley and close family members to shield them from “politically motivated prosecutions” by the Trump administration.Biden gave similar pardons to former Republican lawmaker Liz Cheney and other members of the congressional committee that investigated the January 6 attack on the Capitol.Just minutes before Trump was sworn in, Biden announced he was issuing pardons to his brother James Biden, James’s wife Sara Jones Biden, his sister Valerie Biden Owens, Valerie’s husband John Owens, and his brother Francis Biden.”My family has been subjected to unrelenting attacks and threats, motivated solely by a desire to hurt me — the worst kind of partisan politics,” Biden said. “Unfortunately, I have no reason to believe these attacks will end.”

The US Senate unanimously approved Marco Rubio as secretary of state on Monday, putting the fellow senator on the front line of President Donald Trump’s often confrontational diplomacy. Rubio, who is the first Hispanic and first fluent Spanish speaker to assume the position of top US diplomat, is Trump’s first cabinet nominee to be confirmed by the Republican-led Senate, only hours after the inauguration.Unusually in a highly partisan era, Rubio was confirmed 99-0, with several senators from the rival Democratic Party describing Rubio as a friend. One Senate seat was made vacant by the inauguration of Vice President J.D. Vance.”Given the uncertainty around the globe right now, it is in America’s interest not to skip a beat and to fill this role immediately,” said Senator Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.”While we may not always agree, I believe he has the skills, knowledge and qualifications to be secretary of state,” she said on the Senate floor.Shaheen and the Republican chairman of the committee, Jim Risch, agreed to fast-track Rubio’s nomination, which was cleared by the panel barely an hour before heading to the floor.”It’s no secret that hostile powers from China to Russia, from North Korea to Iran, have formed an authoritarian axis bent on weakening the United States,” Risch said.”We need a principled, action-oriented chief diplomat like Marco Rubio to take them on.”- Challenge to represent Trump -Rubio will immediately have the task of executing the potentially erratic foreign policy of Trump, who in an inauguration speech Monday renewed threats to seize the Panama Canal but also pledged to be a “peacemaker.”Trump challenged the two secretaries of state in his first term with a foreign policy that swung rapidly, with Trump in one case shifting from threatening destruction of North Korea to declaring that he “fell in love” with strongman leader Kim Jong Un.Rubio, the working-class son of Cuban immigrants who bitterly opposed Fidel Castro’s communist revolution, is known for his hawkish stance toward Latin American authoritarian states and China.In his confirmation hearing last week, Rubio accused China of cheating its way to superpower status and called the Asian giant “the most potent and dangerous near-peer adversary this nation has ever faced.”Rubio will head to work Tuesday and, according to diplomats, is expected to meet with foreign ministers from the Quad, which groups the United States with Australia, India and Japan.Conceived by late Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe and upgraded by former president Joe Biden, the Quad has been seen by China as a way for the four democracies to encircle and contain it, despite denials from the countries.Rubio is also expected to join Trump in being a stalwart defender of Israel, which a day earlier entered a long-awaited ceasefire with Hamas, something that had been sought exhaustively by Rubio’s Democratic predecessor Antony Blinken.Despite his collegial relations in the Senate, Rubio was once a bitter opponent of Trump, who famously belittled him as “Little Marco” when the senator unsuccessfully sought the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.Rubio has since rallied behind Trump. In his confirmation hearing, he repeatedly stressed that the president would make the policy.Several of Trump’s nominees have yet to have confirmation hearings due to their controversial records, including Tulsi Gabbard for intelligence chief, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for health and human services secretary and Kash Patel for the FBI.Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said that Rubio’s confirmation showed the party would not “reflexively oppose nominees” but would also not “rubber stamp” them.