Politics

Bloomberg The US has withdrawn from the Open Skies Treaty due to non-compliance by Russia, Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said, making good on a planned move by the outgoing Trump administration. The move was immediately criticised by a top Democrat, who urged President-elect Joe Biden to reverse the decision next year. “Today, pursuant to earlier notice provided, the United ...

Bloomberg A senior US military officer who oversees intelligence gathering for the Indo-Pacific Command made an unannounced visit to Taiwan, Reuters reported, a move that risks further raising tensions between Washington and Beijing. The visiting official was US Navy Rear Admiral Michael Studeman, Reuters said, citing two unidentified sources. In a statement, Taiwan’s Foreign Ministry said it welcomed the visit ...

Bloomberg Prominent Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong was taken into custody on Monday after he pled guilty to inciting and organising an unauthorised assembly for his part in a dramatic siege of police headquarters last year during the city’s mass protests. The activist, however, entered a not guilty plea to the charge of knowingly taking part in an unauthorised assembly, ...

Bloomberg Republican Senator Pat Toomey said President Donald Trump “has exhausted all plausible legal options” in Pennsylvania, and that it was time to concede that Joe Biden won the presidential election. “President Trump should accept the outcome of the election and facilitate the presidential transition process,” Toomey said in a lengthy statement after a Trump campaign lawsuit that challenged the ...

Bloomberg Secretary of State Michael Pompeo met officials from the Taliban and Afghan government as the US seeks to keep peace negotiations on track amid renewed violence and a surprise move by the White House to accelerate the withdrawal of US troops. The Trump administration will “sit on the side and help where we can,” Pompeo said at a meeting ...

Bloomberg Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong and former Demosisto members Agnes Chow and Ivan Lam plan to plead guilty to all charges related to a siege of police headquarters in June last year. Immediate detainment could follow, Wong wrote in a Facebook post, as a trial will be skipped and the hearing set to resume on Monday will proceed straight ...

Bloomberg Voting began in Burkina Faso, where President Roch Marc Christian Kabore has spent most of his five years in office fighting an insurgency that’s forced a million people to flee their homes. He’s likely to win a second term as the insecurity disrupts voting in opposition strongholds. Large swathes of the West African gold producer have become ungovernable since ...

Bloomberg Afghanistan’s government is struggling to maintain its grip on power after President Donald Trump’s decision to accelerate US troop withdrawal from the war-torn nation emboldened the Taliban and other extremists groups. The United Nations has noted a dramatic surge in violence since Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani’s government and the Taliban began peace talks in September, ranging from attacks on ...

Bloomberg Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said he will meet with the three envoys appointed by the African Union, dismissing a move by the regional body to mediate a conflict between the federal government and the northern region of Tigray. The African Union named three former heads of state as envoys. The PM’s office said that news of envoys traveling ...

Bloomberg President Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani described at length to a federal judge in Pennsylvania a vast but vague Democratic conspiracy to steal the election that justified the invalidation of hundreds of thousands of votes — enough to flip the state from President-elect Joe Biden to Trump. But US District Judge Matthew Brann cut straight to the heart of ...