Politics

Bloomberg Kofi Annan, the soft-spoken Ghanaian diplomat who served as the first United Nations secretary-general from sub-Saharan Africa, has died. Annan died on Saturday after an unspecified short illness, according to a statement from his family and the Kofi Annan Foundation. He was 80. “Kofi Annan was a global statesman and a deeply committed internationalist who fought throughout his life ...

Bloomberg Imran Khan was sworn in as Pakistan’s prime minister on Saturday after winning a vote from a majority lawmakers with a pledge to curb corruption through “ruthless accountability.” President Mamnoon Hussain took oath from the 65-year-old former cricket star in Islamabad. Khan, whose Movement for Justice party won the most seats in last month’s national poll, beat his opponent ...

Bloomberg Chinese President Xi Jinping is set to visit Pyongyang next month as ties between the two countries improve amid mounting US-China trade tensions, The Straits Times reported, without citing anyone. Xi has been invited by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the country’s founding on September 9, the paper said. The visit would be ...

Bloomberg The whirlwind tearing through international relations that is US President Donald Trump may be forcing Angela Merkel and Vladimir Putin into a marriage of convenience after years of antagonism. On Saturday, the German chancellor hosted the Russian president at an 18th century Baroque palace near Berlin, their first bilateral meeting in Germany since before Putin’s 2014 annexation of Crimea ...

Bloomberg Russia’s social-media trolling operation began stepping up its Twitter presence to new heights in late July 2017 — more than eight months after sowing discord and disinformation in the 2016 presidential election. The burst of activity —revealed in a new, comprehensive dataset of nearly 3 million tweets—had an overriding focus over the ensuing three months: popularising headlines and news ...

Bloomberg Two high-ranking military officials were detained in the ongoing investigation into the attempt on President Nicolas Maduro’s life using explosive-laden drones, Venezuela’s leading prosecutor said. The two join a lawmaker already in custody in what authorities say was a complex plot to assassinate Maduro, the first lady and senior members of government at a military parade August 4 in ...

Bloomberg South Korean President Moon Jae-in proposed setting up an “East Asian Railroad Community” that includes the US and North Korea as he seeks to tamp down rising tensions between the two adversaries. Moon said in an address on Wednesday that the new economic community would connect his country’s railroads to those of other northeast Asian nations. He compared the ...

Bloomberg The populists setting the agenda in Italy’s coalition government seized on the collapse of a bridge in northern Italy to question whether they should respect European Union budget constraints. Deputy Premier Matteo Salvini of the euroskeptic League led the way, telling reporters in Catania, Sicily, that the failure of a roughly 50-year-old suspension bridge in Genoa shows how important ...

Bloomberg Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte keeps saying that he’s tired and ready to quit. What’s holding him back? He’s not satisfied with his successor. “Guys, I want you to know that I am thinking of stepping down because I’m tired,” Duterte told a group of executives and politicians at the launch of a business program. Still, he told them he ...

Bloomberg Nigerian Senate President Bukola Saraki is considering running against President Muhammadu Buhari when Africa’s top oil producer holds elections in February. “I am consulting and actively considering it,” Saraki, 56, said in an interview at his residence in the capital, Abuja. “I believe I can make the change.” After recently defecting from the ruling All Progressives Congress, Saraki said ...