Politics

Bloomberg As South Africa’s ruling party battles to bounce back from a succession of scandals and extend its quarter-century monopoly on power in next year’s elections, it has a key advantage: a wounded opposition. By forcing the unpopular Jacob Zuma to stand down as president in February, the African National Congress deprived the Democratic Alliance (DA) and Economic Freedom Fighters ...

Bloomberg President Donald Trump said Robert Mueller is behaving “viciously,” a day after the special counsel accused Trump’s former campaign chairman of lying in breach of an agreement to cooperate with authorities. In one of his most sustained and rambling attacks yet, Trump said on Twitter that Mueller is “ruining lives” as punishment against witnesses who he said refuse to ...

Bloomberg Ukraine imposed martial law in some regions a day after its navy was fired on by Russia in a major re-escalation of hostilities that drew condemnations of the Kremlin from the US and the European Union. President Petro Poroshenko said martial law was needed to ready Ukraine for potential further Russian aggression amid fears Sunday’s incident near Crimea would ...

Bloomberg As Theresa May flies into Northern Ireland to sell her Brexit plan, the Democratic Unionist Party is uniting behind leader Arlene Foster’s opposition to the deal. May was in Belfast to drum up support for her accord, which the DUP say imperils Northern Ireland’s place in the UK by potentially tying the region to European Union rules indefinitely. “The ...

Bloomberg The party linked to ousted former premier Thaksin Shinawatra remains a “dominant force” in Thailand and leads in polling by an opposition party ahead of a general election expected next year. About 17 percent of 9,000 people surveyed across Thailand last month said they would vote for the Thaksin-linked Pheu Thai party that was overthrown in a military coup ...

Bloomberg Russia fired on Ukrainian warships and injured some of their crew members, marking a dramatic renewal of tensions between the ex-Soviet neighbours near the peninsula of Crimea that President Vladimir Putin annexed four years ago. Ukraine said Russian warships opened fire on Sunday on a group of its military vessels in neutral waters that had previously tried to enter ...

Bloomberg President Donald Trump said the US will close its southern border with Mexico if needed, a day after US agents shot several rounds of tear gas at migrants after some tried to breach a border fence. “Mexico should move the flag waving Migrants, many of whom are stone cold criminals, back to their countries,” Trump said on Monday on ...

Bloomberg Theresa May was expected to begin selling her Brexit agreement to skeptical politicians and the British public on Monday with a warning that “there is not a better deal available.” The UK prime minister will appeal to members of Parliament to vote for the contract she finalised over the weekend with the European Union and avoid the turmoil of ...

Bloomberg Taiwan’s pro-independence leader, Tsai Ing-wen, has just over a year to win back public support if she wants to avoid going down in history as the island’s first one-term president. Her Democratic Progressive Party suffered a resounding loss to the China-friendly Kuomintang in local elections. The scale of the defeat was far greater than forecast, with the DPP losing ...

Bloomberg Switzerland overwhelmingly rejected a plan that could have caused a worsening of relations with the European Union by forcing the government in Bern to renegotiate international treaties. Two-thirds voters opposed the “self-determination” initiative, which argued for the constitution to take precedence over international law, potentially triggering revisions of treaties if there are conflicts. Polls had indicated a likely rejection. ...