Politics

Bloomberg UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is battling a mounting backlash over his attempt to protect a Conservative lawmaker found to have broken lobbying rules, with Parliament set to hold an emergency debate. Johnson was forced to perform a U-turn following widespread condemnation — including from fellow Tories — of his decision to try to tear up Parliament rules rather ...

Bloomberg The African Union’s special envoy held talks with a top Tigray official on the civil war engulfing Ethiopia. The discussions, which took place at an undisclosed location, were “fruitful,” Tigray People’s Liberation Front official Getachew Reda said on Twitter. African Union Special Envoy Olusegun Obasanjo, a former Nigerian president, travelled to Ethiopia last week to help mediate an end ...

Bloomberg Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega is on course for a landslide in Sunday’s presidential election after he jailed his main opponents. With nearly half of ballots tallied, the 75-year-old former guerrilla had 75% of the votes, according to a partial count by the electoral authority published in state-run-newspaper El 19. The US, the European Parliament and Human Rights Watch have ...

Bloomberg Polish officials warned of intensified tensions at its eastern border as hundreds of migrants gathering at the Belarusian side are expected to try to enter European Union country in one group. “We’re now seeing the largest attempt of mass forced entry into Poland,” Stanislaw Zaryn, the spokesman for the country’s secret services chief, said on Twitter on Monday. He ...

Bloomberg Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD) nominated one of the main architects of their victory in September’s election to take over as party co-leader, and played down suggestions that their goal of forming a new government by early December is at risk. Top SPD officials meeting in Berlin on Monday proposed Lars Klingbeil, general secretary since 2017 and a close ally of ...

Bloomberg UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is facing growing criticism over his party’s conduct, as a former Conservative prime minister and opposition members speak out against him following a lobbying scandal. Johnson is “trashing the reputation of our democracy,” opposition leader Keir Starmer said in a BBC interview, after the prime minister outlined plans to overhaul rules on politicians’ behavior ...

Bloomberg North Korea conducted an artillery fire drill that could target its rival Korea’s heavily populated capital, after Washington and Seoul kicked off joint military aerial exercises despite Pyongyang’s rebuke. North Korea’s mechanised troops held an “artillery fire competition” to boost the country’s “mobile artillery combat capabilities,” state-run Korean Central News Agency said on Sunday. The country’s leader, Kim Jong-un, ...

Bloomberg PM Jacinda Ardern said there is a “maturity” in New Zealand’s relationship with China, its biggest trading partner, which her government believes enables it to raise issues of concern, amid simmering tensions between Beijing and the West. “New Zealand has always been very consistent in saying regardless of that economic relationship, we do still believe that we have the ...

Bloomberg Thousands of opposition protesters in Georgia rallied outside the prison holding former president Mikheil Saakashvili, on a hunger strike for more than a month. They demanded he be moved to a hospital. The activists set up tents and makeshift huts outside the prison, vowing to continue rallies until their demand for his move, within 24 hours, was met. Saakashvili, ...

Bloomberg As the world’s powers wrestle over the future of the planet in Glasgow, another politically fractious issue will play out on the sidelines of the COP26 summit — Taiwan’s exclusion from international organisations. Two weeks after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called for Taiwan to have a greater role at the United Nations, a delegation from Taipei, led ...