India was one of the very few countries where applications for US visas saw a major upswing after coronavirus-related travel restrictions were lifted.

China has 'violated the sovereignty' of not just the United States but of countries across five continents, Secretary of State Antony Blinken alleged Wednesday, days after US fighter jets shot down a Chinese surveillance balloon.

Amidst growing tension with China over a suspected surveillance balloon, US President Joe Biden has said that the United States will act to protect if Beijing threatens its sovereignty.

China has operated a fleet of spy balloons targeting several countries including India and Japan, a media report has said, days after the United States military shot down a Chinese surveillance craft floating over sensitive installations in the country.

"I spoke from this chamber one year ago, just days after Vladimir Putin unleashed his brutal war against Ukraine. A murderous assault, evoking images of the death and destruction Europe suffered in World War II," Biden said in his address to a Joint Session of the US Congress on Tuesday night.

The request was made soon after the balloon was shot down on Saturday off the coast of South Carolina in the Atlantic Ocean.

The US military has intensified its efforts to collect the remnants of the high-altitude surveillance balloon from China that floated over the United States over several days last week from Montana to South Carolina.

Natasha Perianayagam scored the highest grades amongst all candidates.

The balloon, which was being used by the People's Republic of China in an attempt to surveil strategic sites in the continental United States, was brought down above US territorial waters.

The detection of the Chinese surveillance balloon transiting Latin America comes a day after the Pentagon found a Chinese surveillance balloon within its territory flying over Montana, leading to US Secretary of State Tony Blinken postponing his planned trip to Beijing.

Blinken was expected to meet with his Chinese counterpart, and potentially with President Xi Jinping.

A suspected Chinese spy balloon, said to be the size of three buses, was spotted over the United States' airspace, the Pentagon has said, a development that has further strained the already tense bilateral ties as Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday abruptly postponed his key visit to Beijing.

The MQ-9B predator armed drones -- 10 each for three services -- is seen to be a key part of India's national security and defense needs.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Tuesday said it is expecting some slowdown in the Indian economy next fiscal year and projected the growth to 6.1 per cent from 6.8 per cent during the current fiscal ending March 31. The IMF on Tuesday released the January update of its World Economic Outlook, according to which the global growth is projected to fall from an estimated 3.4 per cent in 2022 to 2.9 per cent in 2023, then rise to 3.1 per cent in 2024. "Our growth projections actually for India are unchanged from our October Outlook.

Mike Pompeo has said that among the dozens of world leaders he met as the United States Secretary of State he found the 'most unpleasant' was Chinese President Xi Jinping, who threatened to stop sending PPE kits to America if it kept asking for accountability from Beijing on COVID-19.

National Security Advisor Ajit Doval will hold crucial talks with the top US leadership, including his counterpart Jake Sullivan, on the first high-level dialogue on Initiative for Critical and Emerging Technologies (iCET).

Pompeo explains how the Donald Trump administration succeeded in bringing India on board the Quad grouping.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump responded by saying: "FACEBOOK, which has lost Billions of Dollars in value since "deplatforming" your favorite President, me, has just announced that they are reinstating my account. Such a thing should never again happen to a sitting President, or anybody else who is not deserving of retribution."

Pompeo describes Swaraj somewhat disparagingly, using the American slang words "goofball" and "heartland political hack" for her.

'As one might expect, he believed the Indians were preparing their nuclear weapons for deployment. It took us a few hours - and remarkably good work by our teams on the ground in New Delhi and Islamabad - to convince each side that the other was not preparing for nuclear war'