Politics

Bloomberg President Joe Biden said the US is committed to its partnership with Afghanistan, even as American and other foreign troops withdraw from the country despite a surge of violence. “The senseless violence — it has to stop,” Biden told Afghan President Ashraf Ghani at the start of a meeting in the Oval Office. “It’s going to be very difficult ...

Bloomberg Vice President Kamala Harris shot back at Republicans who’ve criticised her efforts to curb Central American migration, after she visited migrant children on her first trip to the US southern border since taking office. “This issue cannot be reduced to a political issue,” Harris said at a US Customs and Border Protection station in El Paso, Texas. “We’re talking ...

Bloomberg The US, European Union and Canada said they are “willing to review sanctions policies” against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his regime provided there are “substantive, credible advancements” in negotiations to restore the democratic process in the South American country. “A time-bound and comprehensive negotiation process should restore the country’s institutions and allow for all Venezuelans to express themselves ...

Bloomberg The United Nations condemned the killing of three Medicins Sans Frontieres employees in Ethiopia’s Tigray region as a breach of international law. “This is totally unacceptable and an appalling violation of International Humanitarian Law,” UN Secretary General António Guterres said in a statement. “The perpetrators must be found and severely punished.” The three staffers — Maria Hernandez, MSF’s emergency ...

Bloomberg Russia said it used bombs and gunfire in “warning shots” to force a British Navy destroyer to leave waters it claims in the Black Sea, but the UK rejected that, saying it was likely a “gunnery exercise” that didn’t affect the ship’s planned voyage. The episode, which the Russian Defense Ministry said took place off Cape Fiolent, south of ...

Bloomberg China has profoundly changed how it deals with the outside world under President Xi Jinping, a top Australian diplomat says, describing the Asian nation as “dogged by insecurity.” “The clock has been wound back in terms of the priority accorded to ideology, quashing voices of civil society, and erecting new barriers to external connections and the free flow of ...

Bloomberg Justin Trudeau had harsh words for China after Beijing called for a United Nations probe into crimes against Indigenous children in Canada. The prime minister slammed the “systemic abuse and human rights violations” against Uyghur Muslims, as well as the situations in Hong Kong and Tibet. Chinese diplomats raised Canada’s treatment of its First Nations in an apparent response ...

Bloomberg During one of Angela Merkel’s final appearances in German parliament on Wednesday, an opposition lawmaker tried to lure the chancellor into a trap. But as happened so often during her 16-year reign, she managed to sidestep it. “Ever since you became chancellor, young girls can imagine themselves as chancellor one day,” Ulle Schauws, of the Green party, told Merkel ...

Bloomberg Swedish PM Stefan Lofven moved closer to resolving a political crisis that threatened to bring down his fragile ruling coalition in the biggest Nordic economy. After losing a confidence vote in parliament this week over easing rent controls, the 63-year-old Social Democrat leader has until midnight on Monday to forge a new deal that can save his government, or ...

Bloomberg Civilians in Afghanistan have taken up arms to push back against the Taliban as the militants fight for control of a crucial northern city and make deeper territorial inroads with the US set to withdraw all troops by September. The insurgents are battling to take control of strategic cities in the country’s north, including its regional hub Mazar-e-Sharif, after ...