Politics

  Bloomberg French President Emmanuel Macron’s government formally presented its flagship pension reform at a cabinet meeting on Monday, paving the way for parliament to debate it as unions and opposition parties ready further strikes and protests against the plan. The bill, which raises the minimum retirement age to 64 from 62 and aims to erase deficits in the system ...

Bloomberg Joe Biden’s deputy chief of staff, Jen O’Malley Dillon, has ruled out returning as campaign manager for the president’s planned 2024 reelection bid, people familiar with the matter say. O’Malley Dillon, who served as campaign manager for his 2020 effort, will stay at the White House rather than reprise the role, the people said. She’ll still be closely involved ...

Bloomberg Former Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis, who is trailing in his bid to win the nation’s presidency this week, drew criticism for saying during a televised debate that he wouldn’t send troops to aid Nato allies. The billionaire ex-premier, who was voted out of power in 2021 and now leads the largest opposition party, backtracked after saying he wouldn’t ...

  Bloomberg Slovakia took a step closer toward early general elections aimed at ending a year-long political deadlock that triggered the government’s collapse last month. The euro area country of 5.4 million people will probably hold the ballot on Sept. 30, interim Prime Minister Eduard Heger said, after negotiations with his former ruling partners in Bratislava on Sunday evening. Heger’s ...

Bloomberg Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said time is running out to give Ukraine the advanced weapons it needs before an expected Russian offensive in the spring, as both the US and Germany hold out against Kyiv’s requests for their most powerful battle tanks. Austin said allied officials agreed at a meeting in Germany on Friday they would ensure that ...

Bloomberg Germany and France renewed calls for a more closely aligned Europe to counter the imperialist ambitions of Russian President Vladimir Putin and to bolster the democratic values that underpin the EU. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz met with French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris on Sunday to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Elysee Treaty, which was ...

  Bloomberg Ten people were killed and ten wounded in a mass shooting in Monterey Park, a city east of Los Angeles, following a popular Lunar New Year celebration, the Associated Press reported, citing police. Bob Boese, an officer with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said the suspect was a male and is still at large. The shooting was ...

  Bloomberg Brazil President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva dismissed the nation’s top army commander on Saturday, two weeks after rioters stormed public buildings in the capital, Brasilia. Julio Cesar de Arruda will be replaced by Tomas Miguel Ribeiro Paiva, currently chief of the army in the country’s southeast region, Defense Minister Jose Mucio said at a briefing Saturday. The ...

  Bloomberg Venezuela freed the former head of the government’s intelligence agency five years after he was arrested for allegedly instigating a rebellion against President Nicolas Maduro, according to people familiar with the matter. Miguel Rodriguez Torres, a former major general in the army who fell out of Maduro’s favor, was set free Saturday morning and left the country for ...

Bloomberg A retired general pledging unequivocal support for Ukraine is favored to defeat a billionaire former premier in the final round of the Czech presidential election next weekend, opinion polls showed. In the first round of voting last week, Petr Pavel, who once served as Nato’s highest-ranking military official, finished first by a razor-thin margin, ahead of former Prime Minister ...