- France’s far right threatens to bring down the government over the planned budget The Associated Press
- Marine Le Pen might be about to wreck the eurozone POLITICO Europe
- Marine Le Pen renews threat to back censure motion that could topple Barnier as PM The Guardian
- Le Pen makes new threat to withdraw support for French government Reuters
- Will the French government fall by Christmas? The Local France
Wales may introduce visitor levy for people staying overnight
Proposal would give councils option to charge 75p-£1.25 a night to help alleviate pressure on local services
People who stay in Wales overnight, including children, are set to be charged a visitor levy under a scheme that could raise up to £33m a year to be ploughed back into tourism and culture.
All visitors would be charged 75p a night to stay in campsites and hostels and £1.25 for all other accommodation including hotels, B&Bs and holiday lets.
Continue reading...Norway launches Jon Fosse prize for literary translators
The award will be the biggest of its kind in Europe and aims to celebrate the work of an overlooked and underpaid profession facing an existential threat from AI
Norway is launching a new translation price that is one of the most highly endowed of its kind in Europe, in an attempt to boost a “partly invisible” and often poorly paid profession increasingly under threat from machine translation.
Named after the Norwegian novelist and playwright who won the 2023 Nobel prize in literature, Jon Fosse, the Fosse prize for translators will reward one author every year with 500,000 NOK (£36,000) for making “a particularly significant contribution to translating Norwegian literature into another language”.
Continue reading...Barclays fined £40m for ‘reckless’ failures in 2008 Qatari fundraising
Bank’s shares rise as it disputes FCA finding it should have disclosed more about deal during financial crisis
Barclays will pay a fine of £40m for “reckless” failures to disclose a fundraising deal with Qatar at the height of the financial crisis, after the British bank agreed to withdraw a legal challenge against it.
The FTSE 100 bank effectively won a discount of £10m by challenging the fine, but was found by the regulator to have committed serious misconduct. Barclays withdrew an appeal shortly before it was due to be heard on Monday by the upper tribunal, a court in London.
Continue reading...Far-right candidate takes shock lead in Romania presidential election
Calin Georgescu, a NATO and EU critic, is ahead in the first round of voting, overtaking the prime minister.
Danish parenting tests under fire after baby removed from Greenlandic mother
Campaigners say psychometric tests are discriminatory amid protests over case of Keira Alexandra Kronvold
Denmark is under pressure to stop subjecting Greenlandic people to “parenting competency” tests that campaigners say discriminate against them, amid uproar over the case of a mother whose baby was removed two hours after she gave birth.
The psychometric tests are widely used in Denmark as part of child protection investigations into new parents, and have long been criticised by human rights bodies as culturally unsuitable for Greenlandic people and other minorities.
Continue reading...Storm Bert: roads and trainlines blocked with reports of lack of warning for communities – live updates
Natural Resources Wales to investigate whether sufficient warnings of Storm Bert and the flooding it caused were given to people in advance
- Have you been affected by flooding in the UK? Get in touch
Northamptonshire Police have warned people in the area “while the flooding remains ongoing, please avoid all unnecessary travel and do not drive through floodwater of any depth – it is not worth the risk.”
In Yate in the west of England, BBC Bristol reports that about 100 properties were flooded overnight, and residents had to be evacuated.
Continue reading...Storm Bert Batters UK With Rain and Fierce Winds, Killing at Least 3 – The New York Times
- Storm Bert Batters UK With Rain and Fierce Winds, Killing at Least 3 The New York Times
- 'There wasn't enough time to get out': Storm Bert clean-up operation begins across the UK Sky News
- Storm Bert Brings Deadly Flooding, Wind To UK The Weather Channel
- Wiltshire town submerged in Storm Bert flood water BBC.com
- Storm Bert: forecasters and politicians criticised after devastating floods The Guardian
First Thing: Amazon workers in 20 countries to protest or strike on Black Friday
Organizers demand better workers’ rights and climate action. Plus, Israeli killing of journalists in Lebanon could be war crime, experts say
Good morning.
Thousands of Amazon workers are expected to protest or strike in more than 20 countries during Black Friday and Cyber Monday to agitate for better workers’ rights and climate action.
What are organizers saying? Christy Hoffman, the general secretary of UNI Global Union, said: “Amazon’s relentless pursuit of profit comes at a cost to workers, the environment and democracy.” Amanda Gearing, a senior organiser at GMB, said: “Amazon represents everything that is broken about [the UK’s] economy. Insecure work, poverty wages and often unsafe working conditions.”
How has Amazon responded? A spokesperson said “we’re always listening and looking at ways to improve” but insisted “we remain proud of the competitive pay, comprehensive benefits, and engaging, safe work experience we provide our teams”.
What’s the humanitarian toll of the war? After the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, which killed 1,200 people and during which 250 were taken hostage, Israel has bombarded the territory with airstrikes and a ground invasion. Infrastructure has been decimated, the population displaced multiple times and brought close to starvation, and more than 44,000 people have been killed, according to Gaza health officials, with the UN Human Rights Office verifying nearly 70% were women and children. The death toll is understood to be an underestimate, with the UN estimating in May 2024 that more than 10,000 people’s bodies were under the rubble.
Continue reading...Trump Pentagon pick attacks UN and Nato and urges US to ignore Geneva conventions
Revealed: Pete Hegseth writes scathingly of key institutions and says ‘If you love America, you should love Israel’
Pete Hegseth, Trump’s nominee for secretary of defense, has attacked several key US alliances such as Nato, allied countries such as Turkey and international institutions such as the United Nations in two recent books, as well as saying US troops should not be bound by the Geneva conventions.
At the same time, the man who would head America’s gigantic military has tied US foreign policy almost entirely to the priority of Israel, a country of which he says: “If you love America, you should love Israel.”
Continue reading...RFK Jr will cut prescription drugs and increase weed and psychedelics access
Trump’s health department pick has expressed distrust of pharmaceuticals and attacked ‘suppression of psychedelics’
Public health experts are concerned that, if confirmed, Donald Trump’s choice for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) – Robert F Kennedy Jr – could upend access to pharmaceutical drugs in favor of more experimental treatments.
Kennedy, who the president-elect picked earlier this month, has repeatedly expressed distrust for pharmaceuticals, and criticized the FDA for its “aggressive suppression of psychedelics”. On his podcast, he called the US “the sickest country in the world”, blaming its healthcare system for devoting billions to “the pills and the potions and the powders rather than on actually getting people healthy, building their immune systems”.
Continue reading...Sixteen missing after Red Sea tourist boat sinks
Egyptian officials say 28 people from the vessel have been rescued after it sank on a five-day trip.
Shock as pro-Russia independent wins first round of Romanian election
Călin Georgescu, a critic of Nato, says people have ‘cried out for peace’ after he heads into runoff with 22.9% of vote
An ultranationalist, Moscow-friendly Nato critic is set to face a centre-right candidate in the runoff of Romania’s presidential elections after a shock first-round result that has upended the country’s politics and could jeopardise its support for Ukraine.
With 99.98% of votes counted, Călin Georgescu, an independent who has praised Vladimir Putin as “a man who loves his country”, was on 22.9%, with the reformist Elena Lasconi, of the Save Romania Union (USR), second on 19.17%.
Continue reading...Plastic waste is everywhere. Countries have one more chance to agree on a solution – NPR
- Plastic waste is everywhere. Countries have one more chance to agree on a solution NPR
- The World Seeks an End to Plastic Pollution at Talks in South Korea The New York Times
- World will be ‘unable to cope’ with volume of plastic waste in 10 years, warns expert The Guardian
- The US no longer supports capping plastic production in UN treaty Grist
- What to know about the plastic pollution treaty talks in South Korea The Associated Press
Send crisis in England and Wales leaving children more vulnerable, says report
Experts point to increased risk of criminal and sexual exploitation and call for urgent action from government
The crisis in special needs education has left children vulnerable to criminal and sexual exploitation, experts have warned, as parents of victims described years of failed attempts to get support.
Last year, 7,432 children were referred to the national referral mechanism – the framework for identifying potential victims of trafficking and modern slavery in England and Wales.
Continue reading...Storm Bert: forecasterse and politicians criticised after devastating floods
Critics claim warnings and defences were inadequate but Met Office says storm was ‘well forecast’
Weather forecasters and politicians have come in for strong criticism after hundreds of homes and businesses across the UK suffered devastating flooding in Storm Bert but the Met Office has said it issued sufficient warning.
There were growing complaints in south Wales, one of the areas most heavily hit, that the Met Office issued only a yellow warning, rather than an amber or red, and that not enough new defences had been put in place by the Welsh government since storms last wreaked havoc in the area four years ago.
Continue reading...Iran’s Khamenei calls for death sentence for Israeli leaders, not arrest warrants – The Times of Israel
- Iran’s Khamenei calls for death sentence for Israeli leaders, not arrest warrants The Times of Israel
- David Schoen criticizes 'corrupt' ICC over Netanyahu charges: 'Nothing legitimate' Fox News
- G7 seeks unity on ICC arrest warrant for Netanyahu Reuters
- 'Rule of law disgraced by ICC': Alan Dershowitz to assemble team to defend Israel in The Hague The Jerusalem Post
- Arrest warrants for Israeli leaders amplify Democratic rupture Yahoo! Voices
Angela Merkel defends ties with Russia and blocking Ukraine from Nato
The former German chancellor, who quit politics three years ago, speaks to the BBC in a rare interview.
Philippines President Slams Vice President’s Assassination Plot – The New York Times
- Philippines President Slams Vice President’s Assassination Plot The New York Times
- The Philippine vice president publicly threatens to have the president assassinated The Associated Press
- Philippine VP Duterte denies assassination plot against President Marcos Jr Al Jazeera English
- Philippines summons VP Duterte over threat to have Marcos killed Reuters
- Philippine VP Sara Duterte Threatens to Assassinate Pres. Marcos During Live-Streamed Briefing Democracy Now!
Pakistani capital under lockdown to block rally by Imran Khan supporters
Government shuts down internet, blocks highways and brings in troops to stop protest by former PM’s supporters
Pakistan’s capital was put under lockdown as the government shut down the internet, blocked highways and brought in thousands of police and paramilitaries in an attempt to prevent supporters of the former prime minister Imran Khan protesting in Islamabad.
Khan, who has been in jail for more than a year facing hundreds of charges, had issued a “final call” for his supporters to descend on Islamabad to demand his release and protest against recent changes to the judiciary and constitution.
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