Politics

Bloomberg Vice President Mike Pence signalled he’ll spurn demands to immediately oust Donald Trump over a deadly riot by the president’s supporters as the two met and agreed to work together for the remainder of the term, according to a senior administration official. The discussion adds to indications that Trump has no plans to resign before Joe Biden’s January 20 ...

Bloomberg President Xi Jinping issued an unusually upbeat assessment about China’s future, noting that “time and the situation” were on the country’s side in a new year marked by domestic turmoil in the US. The Chinese leader told a gathering of provincial and ministerial-level officials that he saw “opportunities in general outweighing challenges,” a marked shift from his sometimes dire-sounding ...

Bloomberg The Trump administration put Cuba back on the list of state sponsors of terrorism, reversing an Obama-era decision and making it harder for President-elect Joe Biden to quickly revive diplomatic ties with Havana. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said he’s designating Cuba because the country continues to harbour American fugitives including Joanne Chesimard, convicted of killing a New Jersey ...

Bloomberg Malaysia’s king declared a nationwide state of emergency for the first time in more than half a century, suspending parliament in a move that allows embattled Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin to avoid facing an election until the pandemic is over. The emergency decree gives Muhyiddin’s administration more power to tackle a surge in Covid-19 cases, including over the operations ...

Bloomberg UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson set himself on a collision course with the Chinese government with a thinly veiled attack on traditional medicine, which he said was to blame for the coronavirus pandemic. The practice of using scales from the endangered pangolin to aid virility is “demented,” Johnson said at a meeting of world leaders focused on protecting nature. ...

Bloomberg India’s Supreme Court put on hold the implementation of three controversial farm laws, a setback for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration. A three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice of India Sharad A. Bobde also formed a panel to facilitate talks with tens of thousands of farmers staging protests on the outskirts of the national capital for nearly two months. ...

Bloomberg The Trump administration’s final days are proving as confounding as ever for companies and investors stuck in the middle of an increasingly contentious US-China relationship. After a week of widespread confusion over the scope of a US ban on investments in businesses linked to China’s military, both Washington and Beijing took steps over the weekend that threaten to further ...

Bloomberg The US has classified Yemen’s Houthis as a foreign terrorist organisation following a series of attacks on oil tankers in the Red Sea and as Washington seeks to increase pressure on Iran in the final days of Donald Trump’s presidency. The move will give the US “additional tools” with which to counter security threats in the Persian Gulf, according ...

Bloomberg First lady Melania Trump said on Monday she was “disappointed and disheartened” by the violent attack on the US Capitol last week and called for healing. “Make no mistake about it, I absolutely condemn the violence that has occurred on our Nation’s Capitol. Violence is never acceptable,” she said in a statement released by the White House. Trump called ...

Bloomberg North Korea appeared to stage a military parade as part of a grand party congress that laid out the scale of the challenge US President-elect Joe Biden faces to rein in Kim Jong Un’s nuclear program. There were signs that North Korea held a parade late Sunday evening, the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said Monday, in what ...