Politics

Bloomberg Defense Secretary Jim Mattis vouched for Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s diplomatic efforts to defuse the North Korea crisis after President Donald Trump said Tillerson “is wasting his time.” “The Defense Department supports fully Secretary Tillerson’s efforts to find a diplomatic solution but remains focused on defense of the United States and our allies,” Mattis said in testimony on ...

Bloomberg At least 500 Spanish police officers were driven out of their hotels by angry locals last night as Catalan separatists pushed back against state forces after the crackdown on their illegal vote for independence. “This is a mafia behavior,” Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said in a televised statement on Tuesday. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy is fighting ...

Bloomberg Extremists who repeatedly watch terrorist content online could be jailed for as long as 15 years, UK Home Secretary Amber Rudd said on Tuesday, announcing an update of counter-terrorism laws. The move will expand the existing offense of possessing information likely to be useful to a terrorist so it does not only apply to downloaded or stored information. UK ...

Bloomberg The Palestinian Authority cabinet met in the Gaza Strip for the first time in three years as its members began to take charge of ministries from Hamas, and said they would start talks next week on the contentious issue of security forces. The government is “ready to take complete responsibility and extend its full control over Gaza, without exceptions,” ...

Bloomberg At least 58 people were killed and 515 were injured at a concert by a lone gunman, firing from a hotel room overlooking the venue, who later died and whose motive was unclear. President Donald Trump said he’ll travel to Las Vegas on Wednesday to meet victims and emergency workers after a killing spree late Sunday that is likely ...

Bloomberg Kenyan opposition supporters began protests in the western city of Kisumu to press their demands for an overhaul of the electoral authority before a rerun of an annulled presidential election. Police fired teargas to disperse National Super Alliance protesters, while anti-riot police were stationed outside the headquarters of the Independent Electoral & Boundaries Commission in the capital, Nairobi, in ...

Bloomberg Support for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe fell in two polls released on Monday, three weeks before a general election where Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike’s new Party of Hope threatens to eat into his majority. The premier’s approval rate dropped below his disapproval rate in polls by Kyodo News and the Asahi newspaper. Almost 46 percent of respondents to ...

Bloomberg Spain’s government will consider using all means at its disposal to uphold the law in Catalonia, the justice minister said, praising the police for their “exemplary” action in defense of the constitution. “We have always said that we would use all the force of the law and all the mechanisms that the constitution and laws grant to the government,” ...

Bloomberg The minority government of Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa received a boost after his Socialist Party gained in national municipal elections. Two years before the next general election is due, the Socialists took 38 percent of the vote and 157 town halls with 99.8 percent of the country’s voting districts reporting, according to the government’s election website. Turnout was ...

Bloomberg As the Palestinian Authority attempts to reassert control over the Gaza Strip this week, Hamas’s refusal to give up its guns is feeding doubts that a unity deal can take root. The authority’s prime minister, Rami Hamdallah, led a parade of senior officials from the West Bank on Monday to take over ministries that have been operated by Hamas ...