Politics

Bloomberg France remains committed to fighting militants in West Africa, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said, two days after French troops killed a prominent extremist leader. Philippe spoke during a visit to Mali, where France has deployed about 3,000 soldiers to hunt militants following a 2012 insurgency that almost led to the collapse of the state. Despite the deployment of more ...

Bloomberg Kim Jong-un’s arrival in Vietnam this week for a second meeting with US President Donald Trump may be most remarkable for how normal it’s becoming. Since opening talks with South Korea last year, the once-reclusive North Korean leader has turned into one of the most sought-after guests in Asia. At each stop — from Beijing to Singapore and now ...

Bloomberg Special Counsel Robert Mueller told the judge who’ll sentence President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman that Paul Manafort “brazenly violated the law” for a decade and presents a “grave risk” of committing new crimes. Manafort, 69, is set to be sentenced on March 13 in Washington, where he pleaded guilty to two conspiracy counts and faces as much as ...

Bloomberg Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched an income support program for small farmers in a bid to woo a key voter base ahead of the general election due by May. The government started distributing the first installment of 2,000 rupees ($28) to farmers who hold as much as 2 hectares (4.9 acres) of land. Under the program, it proposes ...

Bloomberg Venezuelan security forces skirmished with protesters along the Colombian border in clashes over aid shipments between President Nicolas Maduro’s government and US-backed opponents trying to drive him out of power. National Guard soldiers on Saturday fired volleys of tear gas and plastic pellets at supporters of opposition leader Juan Guaido, who were trying to persuade them to defect and ...

Bloomberg Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir declared a state of emergency for one year and called a national dialogue amid political crisis in the north African country. “It’s better for all Sudanese to solve any problems through dialogue,” al-Bashir said in a televised address from the capital, Khartoum. “Civil and armed opposition” should come to the dialogue, he said. The president ...

Bloomberg Nigerians began voting in Africa’s biggest democracy in a tight presidential race between incumbent Muhammadu Buhari and pro-market multimillionaire Atiku Abubakar. While the polls officially opened at 8 am on Saturday, some balloting stations suffered delays while election monitors reported violence in some areas. The presidential front-runners are Buhari, who’s campaigned on an anti-corruption platform, and Abubakar, who’s promised ...

Bloomberg Theresa May must resign as British prime minister and Conservative leader later this year after delivering Brexit, according to politicians at the highest levels of her own government. May has promised her party she will stand down before the next general election, slated for 2022, but she’s likely to face pressure to go within the next three months. Once ...

Bloomberg A Chinese military plane entered South Korea’s Air Defense Identification Zone three times on Saturday, prompting the foreign ministry to summon a Chinese embassy official, Yonhap reported. The aircraft entered the defense zone from southwest of the Korean Peninsula at around 8:03 a.m local time before exiting to the east around 8:27 am, Yonhap said, citing Korea’s Joint Chiefs ...

Bloomberg President Vladimir Putin signaled Russia will aim new weapons at the US if it stations missiles in Europe after quitting a landmark Cold-War-era treaty, amid growing fears of a new arms race. Still, the tone of Putin’s annual state-of-the-nation speech was less belligerent than a year ago, when he showed computer-graphics demonstrations of a series of new missiles and ...