US President-elect Donald Trump claimed on Monday that the country's military is "for some unknown reason" withholding details about unexplained drones flying at night over eastern US states, but the White House later played down data drones.
"Our military knows ... something strange is going on," Mr Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago, Florida residence, in his first wide-ranging press conference since being elected to a term new four-year White House term that begins next month.
For weeks, residents of the state of New Jersey, as well as several other states in the north and south of the country, along the coastline of the Atlantic Ocean, have reported seeing more than 5,000 drones.
But authorities have concluded that the figure is grossly inflated.
These developments have given voice to various conspiracy theories, among them that it is a matter of acts of espionage by the American government, or that the drones were launched by Iran, from a ship located outside territorial waters, east of the United States.
At the White House, Homeland Security spokesman John Kirby told reporters: "Our assessment at this stage is that the activity represents commercial drones, law enforcement drones or drones that are flown by individuals for personal reasons and are all acting legally." " .
During a briefing with reporters before Mr. Trump's press conference began, Air Force Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, a Pentagon spokesman, told reporters that "so far, there is no indication that the reported drone sightings pose a threat to national security or public safety, or may be linked to foreign actors".
"We are aware that there is public concern and a lot of questions," Mr Ryder said. "We are also committed to providing as much information as possible about this as soon as possible," he added.
In the hour-long news conference, Mr Trump touched on a wide range of topics, five weeks before he takes office again and becomes the second president since Grover Cleveland in the 1890s to serve a second term in the White House. not consecutive.
He said that this time he is being received by world leaders much more favorably than in 2017, after his first presidential victory.
"It's actually the opposite of hostility. They're looking for me ," he said. "I've talked to over 100 countries."
Mr Trump said he would not end the use of the long-accepted polio vaccine in the US, but questioned the mandate for a range of vaccines for children in some US states.
"I'm not a very big supporter of mandatory vaccines," he said, and asked rhetorically, " Why is the autism rate so high" in the United States, even though there is no scientifically proven link between autism and vaccines.
He also questioned why Americans "are paying so much more than people in other countries" for drugs.
Mr Trump said he was doing everything he could to stop Russia's nearly three-year war on Ukraine and would have ongoing talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to end the fighting.
The president-elect reiterated his plan to impose tariffs against imports from some of the United States' largest trading partners.
"The tariffs will make our country rich," he said, although importers pay the tariffs and often pass their costs on to customers who buy the goods./VOA (A2 Televizion)
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