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Boris Johnson loses Parliamentary majority, faces Brexit showdown
Britain's Parliament returns from its summer recess and is facing a titanic showdown over Prime Minister Boris Johnson's plans to leave the European Union. Here's what we know:
● Johnson has lost his majority in Parliament, with the defection of Conservative Phillip Lee to the Liberal Democrats.
● The opposition, including members of Johnson's party, is seeking to pass legislation to delay Brexit.
● Johnson has said that if his foes succeed he will call early elections.
List of prime ministers of the United Kingdom by length of tenure
#54: George Canning, 119 days (1827)
#55: Boris Johnson, 40 days (Incumbent) (2019)
See also: Brexit: Tory MP defects ahead of crucial no-deal vote
How Brexit Blew Up Britain's Constitution
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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
From Cyprus to Ukraine, Israel to the Balkans, conflicts over land have long turned bloody. But on Monday, the Netherlands and Belgium managed to settle a festering territorial problem, without firing a single bullet and with an unlikely spur: a headless corpse.
In a signing ceremony attended by their respective royals, Belgium agreed to cede about 35 acres of scenic land by the Meuse River in exchange for about seven acres of land from the Netherlands. The two countries had formalized their border in the Treaty of Maastricht in 1843.
In a region that has long known geopolitical and linguistic squabbles, and where Belgium has lived in the shadow of its neighbor, the land swap was anything but inevitable. That apparently is where the headless body comes in.
The land belonging to Belgium — equivalent to about 15 soccer fields — is linked to a hard-to-reach peninsula belonging to the Netherlands. In 1961, when the Meuse was reconfigured to aid navigation, it had the side effect of pushing three pieces of land onto the wrong side of the river. According to the Dutch news media, the uninhabited area subsequently gained a reputation for lawlessness, wild parties and prostitution.
However, several years ago, when a couple accidentally stumbled on a headless body and called the Dutch authorities, they were informed that the strip of land was under Belgian jurisdiction. But the Belgian authorities could not get there by land without crossing Dutch territory, which required special permission. The only alternative was a difficult river crossing.
Referring to the discovery of the body, Jean-François Duchesne, the police commissioner of the Lower Meuse region, told The Associated Press last year that the journey to the area had been arduous. “So we had to go there by boat with all that was needed — the prosecutor, the legal doctor, the judicial lab — we had to do round trips over the water,” he said. “It really was not very practical.”
The two nations then decided to head off future jurisdictional problems by negotiating a peaceful exchange of parcels of land each country had that were stranded on the wrong bank of the river. Belgium’s foreign minister, Didier Reynders, said on Monday that the agreement reflected excellent Belgian-Dutch relations and was proof that “borders can be peacefully changed.”
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from the fiddling-while-the-Amazon-burns dept.
Brazil Says It Will Reject Millions in Amazon Aid Pledged at G7
Hours after leaders of some of the world's wealthiest countries pledged more than $22 million to help combat fires in the Amazon rainforest, Brazil's government angrily rejected the offer, in effect telling the other nations to mind their own business — only to later lay out potential terms for the aid's acceptance.
President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil expressed his ire in a series of Twitter posts on Monday, and specifically criticized and taunted President Emmanuel Macron of France, who had announced the aid package at the Group of 7 summit meeting. Their comments extended a verbal feud between the two leaders.
But early the next day, Mr. Bolsonaro offered possible terms for the acceptance of the aid package when he spoke to reporters in the capital, Brasília.
He said that if Mr. Macron withdrew "insults made to my person," and what Mr. Bolsonaro interpreted as insinuations that Brazil does not have sovereignty over the Amazon, he would reconsider.
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Ankara has gone ahead with its purchase of the Russian defence system despite threats of US sanctions.
Ankara received its first supply of S-400 missiles in July, despite a warning by the United States about possible sanctions. The acquisition of the highly-advanced air defence system has led to a standoff between Turkey and its NATO allies, especially the US.
[...] The modular S-400 is seen as one of the most advanced missile systems in the world, capable of tracking several targets simultaneously and ready to be fired within minutes.
The US has repeatedly said that the Russian system is incompatible with NATO systems and is a threat to the hi-tech F-35 fighter jets, which Turkey is also planning to buy.
Washington has said Turkey will not be allowed to participate in the F-35 programme because of the Turkey-Russia deal.
The US has strongly urged Turkey to pull back from the deal - the first such move between a NATO member and Russia - warning Ankara that it will face economic sanctions under the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act if it goes ahead with the purchase, reportedly costing more than $2bn.
So far, however, Ankara has refused to give in to US pressure, insisting that choosing which defence equipment to buy is a matter of national sovereignty.
Previously: US Warns Turkey Not To Buy Russian S-400 Missile System
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YouTube Disables 210 Channels That Spread Disinformation About Hong Kong Protests
YouTube said on Thursday that its site was used to spread disinformation about the mass protests in Hong Kong, days after Twitter and Facebook cracked down on thousands of China-backed accounts that compared the demonstrators to terrorists and accused them of being at the whim of foreign interests.
In a blog post, YouTube said it had disabled 210 channels this week that had uploaded videos about the protests in Hong Kong. The channels had worked in a coordinated fashion to spread disinformation, the company said. YouTube, which is owned by Google, did not specify when the channels were taken down.
Shane Huntley, a software engineer on Google's threat analysis team, said the channels that were removed were "consistent with recent observations and actions related to China announced by Facebook and Twitter."
Facebook and Twitter said on Monday that they had removed thousands of accounts that originated in China and that acted together to amplify messages and images portraying Hong Kong's protesters as violent and extreme. It was the first time that the social media companies had removed accounts linked to disinformation in China. At the time, Twitter said it had "reliable evidence to support that this is a coordinated state-backed operation."
Also at The Guardian and Reuters.
See also: The People's War Is Coming in Hong Kong
Hong Kong: British consulate employee Simon Cheng detained in China
China's arrest of a Hong Kong man puts spotlight on a controversial shared rail station
Previously: Extradition Law Amendments Protested in Hong Kong
One Million People Protest a Proposed Extradition Law in Hong Kong; Gov't Acquiesces, for Now
How Hong Kong's Protestors Are Hindering (and Hijacking) the Tools of Surveillance
China Warns Hong Kong Protesters Against "Playing With Fire"
China Says Sino-British Joint Declaration On Hong Kong No Longer Binding
Hong Kong Airport Paralysed for a Second Day by Protesters; US Naval Ships Blocked
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According to BNN, Baltic News Network, quoting Al Jazeera reporting, the Italian government has collapsed.
Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has resigned following a decision by the far-right League party to present a no-confidence motion in the 14-month old coalition government.
The move on Tuesday leaves Italy in a political vacuum until President Sergio Mattarella decides whether to form a new coalition or call an election after talks with parties in the coming days.
Mattarella charged Conte with heading a caretaker administration after he handed in his resignation, pending consultations on a new government which are set to begin at 14:00 GMT on Wednesday.
The crisis began on August 8 when Matteo Salvini, the head of the League party, declared his alliance with the anti-establishment Five-Star Movement was dead and called for elections, a move he hopes will make him prime minister.
Addressing parliament on the turmoil unleashed by the League's move, Conte accused Salvini, who is also deputy prime minister and interior minister, of trying to drag down the coalition for personal and political gain, and putting the nation at risk of financial instability.
"I'm ending this government experience here," Conte, who does not belong to either of the coalition parties, said in his almost hour-long speech to the chamber.
Widespread reporting including:
- https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/20/world/europe/italy-pm-giuseppe-conte-resign.html
- https://www.wsj.com/articles/italian-prime-minister-to-resign-declaring-end-of-government-11566310341
- https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/italian-premier-quits-blames-deputy-1.5253440
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Submitted via IRC for AndyTheAbsurd
The proposal is part of Sanders' broader plan for police reform.
Wait, they used WOODY HARRELSON as a template? And I'm not sure why facial recognition is the focus here, when I feel that the end of providing military equipment to police forces is much more impactful a change.
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from the we're-not-listening....but-we-might dept.
Breaking a long silence about a high-profile National Security Agency program that sifts records of Americans' telephone calls and text messages in search of terrorists, the Trump administration on Thursday acknowledged for the first time that the system has been indefinitely shut down — but asked Congress to extend its legal basis anyway.
In a letter to Congress delivered on Thursday and obtained by The New York Times, the administration urged lawmakers to make permanent the legal authority for the National Security Agency to gain access to logs of Americans' domestic communications, the USA Freedom Act. The law, enacted after the intelligence contractor Edward J. Snowden revealed the existence of the program in 2013, is set to expire in December, but the Trump administration wants it made permanent.
The unclassified letter, signed on Wednesday by Dan Coats in one of his last acts as the director of National Intelligence, also conceded that the N.S.A. has indefinitely shut down that program after recurring technical difficulties repeatedly caused it to collect more records than it had legal authority to gather. That fact has previously been reported, but the administration had refused to officially confirm its status.
[...] The executive branch had been internally divided over whether to push for an extension of the part of the Freedom Act that authorizes the phone records program. Months ago, the N.S.A. presented a bleak assessment of the program to the White House, saying it carried high costs and few benefits, but some officials argued that it made sense to keep the legal authority in case technical solutions emerged to make it work better, according to officials familiar with internal deliberations.
Trump Administration Asks Congress to Reauthorize N.S.A.'s Deactivated Call Records Program
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COPENHAGEN (The Borowitz Report)—After rebuffing Donald J. Trump's hypothetical proposal to purchase Greenland, the government of Denmark has announced that it would be interested in buying the United States instead.
"As we have stated, Greenland is not for sale," a spokesperson for the Danish government said on Friday. "We have noted, however, that during the Trump regime, pretty much everything in the United States, including its government, has most definitely been for sale."
"Denmark would be interested in purchasing the United States in its entirety, with the exception of its government," the spokesperson added.
A key provision of the purchase offer, the spokesperson said, would be the relocation of Donald Trump to another country "to be determined," with Russia and North Korea cited as possible destinations.
If Denmark's bid for the United States is accepted, the Scandinavian nation has ambitious plans for its new acquisition. "We believe that by giving the U.S. an educational system and national health care, it could be transformed from a vast land mass into a great nation," the spokesperson said.
Attention Denmark: at least our politicians are for sale, regardless of party affiliation, to purchasers both foreign and domestic.
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from the gunboats,-always-associated-with-diplomacy dept.
Hong Kong Airport Paralysed for a Second Day by Protesters:
The US is claiming its naval ships have been denied entry to Hong Kong, as Donald Trump suggests troops are “moving towards the border”.
A US Commander has confirmed China has blocked the Pacific Fleet’s naval ships from entering ports in Hong Kong.
Two US naval ships due to visit Hong Kong have been denied scheduled access to the city’s ports by China, the US Pacific Fleet confirmed today.
A US Navy spokesman today said two vessels had been blocked from entering the port, hours after President Donald Trump said China was moving its troops towards the border.
The president’s claims were made without specific evidence, according to The Australian
Commander Nate Christensen, the deputy spokesman for the United States Pacific Fleet, confirmed this morning the two US ships, USS Green Bay and USS Lake Erie, had been barred from entering the port. The first vessel, an amphibious dock landing ship, was due to stop in Hong Kong on Saturday, and the second was due in the city next month.
The last time the US Navy visited Hong Kong was in April.
Our Intelligence has informed us that the Chinese Government is moving troops to the Border with Hong Kong. Everyone should be calm and safe!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 13, 2019
[...]Hong Kong’s 10-week political crisis, in which millions of people have taken to the streets calling for a halt to sliding freedoms, was already the biggest challenge to Chinese rule of the semi-autonomous city since its 1997 handover from Britain.
But two days of protests at the airport have again raised the stakes for the financial hub.
Beijing is sending increasingly ominous signals that the unrest must end, with state-run media showing videos of security forces gathering across the border.
[...]All check-ins were cancelled on Tuesday afternoon after thousands of protesters wearing their signature black T-shirts made barricades using luggage trolleys to prevent passengers from passing through security gates.
[...]Demonstrators say they are fighting the erosion of the “one country, two systems” arrangement that enshrined some autonomy for Hong Kong since China took it back from Britain in 1997.
While Hong Kong is a sovereign part of China, the former colony has significant differences to the mainland, including separate legal and political systems, distinct currency, national sporting teams and a greater tolerance for freedom of expression.
Hong Kong also retains many of its pre-colonial features, including driving on the same side of the road as Britain and Australia but not China, the retention of many British place names and statues of British monarchs and dignitaries.
Those two different systems are supposed to remain in place for at least 50 years.
However, Beijing has sought to erode these freedoms in recent years through changes to the law, attempts to not allow pro-independence politicians to take their seats in the region’s parliament and even the disappearance of booksellers critical of the Communist Party leadership.
See also: Navy Times, Business Insider, CNN.
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