Category Archives: Politics

Merkel among winners as Europeans give verdict on anti-Covid battles

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Satisfaction levels across the continent have risen and fallen, but nowhere have they plunged as for Boris Johnson’s government

All across the continent, most Europeans now trust their leaders generally, and how they have handled the coronavirus pandemic in particular, a little less than when the crisis began – but nowhere has public confidence fallen as far and as fast as in the UK.

Even leaders seen as having managed Covid-19 the most successfully, such as Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel and Denmark’s prime minister Mette Frederiksen, have suffered slight dips in popular satisfaction as the weeks have worn on.

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UK coronavirus live: infection R rate rises to between 0.7 and 1 in England

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News updates: EHRC will look into ‘long-standing, structural race inequality’; those shielding in Wales asked to stay home until mid-August

A senior Northern Ireland police officer has made a strong appeal to protesters not to take part in demonstrations this weekend.

PSNI assistant chief constable Alan Todd said his officers are engaging with organisers of Black Lives Matter gatherings to explain the coronavirus regulations, adding if the warnings are ignored then enforcement will be used.

I have a very clear message to organisers, the best way to resolve this for everybody’s interests is to call off these events.

Large crowd protests are at this time inappropriate.

On any other day as a police service we would be fully facilitating those protests in a peaceful and lawful manner with the organisers, however this is not any other day, we’re in the middle of a pandemic and gathering in crowds, socially distanced or otherwise, is both a risk to public health and a breach of the health protection regulations.

It seems to be somewhat ironic that we would protest the avoidable and unnecessary death of an individual in the United States by risking unnecessary and avoidable deaths in Northern Ireland.

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Zaghari-Ratcliffe endures further wait for Iranian decision on release

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Campaigners contrast British-Iranian’s plight with return of prisoner Michael White to US

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the British-Iranian dual national detained by Iran since 2016, has been told her furlough from prison will be extended beyond the previous cut-off date of early June, according to her lawyer. But she has not been informed she will be granted a full clemency, which would allow her to return to the UK.

Her family said they were investigating the reports. They previously said they expected to hear on Saturday whether she was to be given clemency. Her lawyer, Mahmoud Behzadi-Rad, was reported by Iran International TV on Friday as saying only her furlough had been extended.

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Israel’s West Bank plans condemned by leading British Jewish figures

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Simon Schama and Sir Malcolm Rifkind among those warning that annexation ‘would have grave consequences’ for Palestinians

Some of the most prominent and respected names in British Jewry have raised alarm over the Israeli government’s plans to annex parts of the West Bank, saying such a move would be an existential threat to Israel.

Among more than 40 signatories of an unprecedented letter to the Israeli ambassador to the UK are Sir Ben Helfgott, one of the best-known Holocaust survivors in Britain; the historians Sir Simon Schama and Simon Sebag Montefiore; the former Conservative foreign secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind; the lawyer Anthony Julius; the philanthropist Dame Vivien Duffield; the scientist Lord Robert Winston; the former MP Luciana Berger; the Times columnist Daniel Finkelstein; and the author Howard Jacobson. 

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Business leaders demand delay to Irish Sea border checks

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Six months needed to prepare for Brexit border checks, warn Northern Ireland business groups

Northern Ireland business groups are calling for a six month delay to Brexit checks in the Irish Sea saying that Boris Johnson’s late admission that he is legally obliged to implement them has left them no time to prepare for the December cliff edge.

They have also hit out at Downing Street secrecy, saying they are refusing to discuss the plans with the very people that needed to implement them.

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EU leaders will intervene in Brexit talks in autumn, says German official

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Michael Clauss says talks will be a focus from September and UK needs more realistic approach

Britain must give away some sovereignty to secure free trade with the EU but Europe’s leaders will intervene in the negotiations in the autumn with the aim of sealing a compromise deal at a summit on 15 October, Germany’s ambassador in Brussels has said.

Michael Clauss, whose country will take over the rolling presidency of the EU for the second half of the year, said there had been “no real progress” in the talks so far but predicted they would become the EU’s main political focus in September and October.

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Business secretary Alok Sharma appears unwell in House of Commons chamber – video

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Alok Sharma, the business secretary, has been tested for coronavirus after feeling unwell while delivering a statement in the Commons. Sharma appeared ill and to be sweating while he spoke about a bill. The parliamentary authorities are understood to have given the area a deep clean and MPs were at the time sitting at least two metres apart. 'This was done as a precaution,' a House of Commons source said

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Britons applying for German citizenship up 2,300% last year

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Since Britain voted to leave the EU in 2016, 31,600 Britons have acquired German citizenship

The number of Britons applying for a German citizenship last year was up by approximately 2,300% compared to the year before the Brexit referendum, driving up the number of naturalisations in the country to a 16-year high.

According to data released by the Federal Statistical office on Wednesday, the total number of citizenship applications granted in 2019 increased by 15% year on year to 128,900, with 14,600 granted applications from British citizens accounting for almost half the increase.

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China accuses UK of gross interference over Hong Kong citizenship offer

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‘Serious representations’ made after worries offer could trigger brain drain from region

China’s foreign ministry has accused Britain of “gross interference” in the country’s affairs after Boris Johnson said he would offer millions of Hong Kong residents a path to UK citizenship if Beijing pushed ahead with a controversial security law for the city.

The ministry’s spokesman Zhao Lijian told Britain to “step back … otherwise there will be consequences” and said China had made “serious representations” to London over its offer to holders of British national (overseas) passports.

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Theresa May attacks Boris Johnson over Brexit and Covid quarantine plans

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Former PM warns of security implications of no deal and threat to trade from travel restrictions

Theresa May has launched a double attack on Boris Johnson’s government, speaking in the Commons to first warn about the security implications of a final no-deal Brexit, and then against the coronavirus quarantine plans.

May, who has largely kept a low profile since returning to the backbenches, used prime minister’s questions to express worry at a lack of possible lack of intelligence and data sharing if the Brexit transition period ends without a formal agreement.

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Cabinet Office ignored warning EU voters could miss out in 2019 elections

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Documents show ministers were urged to make preparations before EU parliament elections

The Cabinet Office ignored warnings that EU citizens living in the UK would be disenfranchised in the May 2019 European parliamentary elections if preparations were not made long before polling day, according to internal documents released during legal action against the government.

Details of efforts made by officials to persuade ministers to prepare in advance of voting have been revealed in submissions to the high court in a case launched last year by the3million, a group campaigning on behalf of resident EU citizens.

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‘We were packed like sardines’: evidence grows of mass-event dangers early in pandemic

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Research appears to back up stories of people who believe they got coronavirus at events UK government allowed to go ahead

The last major football match played in England before all sport was suspended because of the coronavirus crisis was the European Champions League showpiece between Liverpool and Atletico Madrid. It was a thrilling contest that transfixed 54,000 people under the floodlights of Anfield.

But now that match, along with many other mass events that the government allowed to go ahead as the pandemic spread in March, is coming under renewed scrutiny as evidence grows of the lethal danger to which people were exposed. They include rugby matches, horse races, musical concerts and dog shows attended, in total, by hundreds of thousands of Britons.

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George Floyd protest: halt UK riot gear sales to US police, says Labour

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Tory government must act as exports are prohibited if used for internal repression, says Emily Thornberry

Labour has called on the UK to suspend the sale of riot control equipment to the United States and review whether any British-made teargas or crowd control guns were being used against demonstrators across the United States.

Emily Thornberry, the shadow international trade secretary, has written to her opposite number, Liz Truss, arguing it would “be a disgrace” if the UK supplied material that was used by US police or national guard during crisis sparked by the death in police hands of George Floyd.

In her letter the Labour MP said: “If this were any other leader, in any other country in the world, the suspension of any such exports is the least we could expect from the British government in response to their actions, and our historic alliance with the United States is no reason to shirk that responsibility now.”

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Boris Johnson lays out visa offer to nearly 3m Hong Kong citizens

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UK prime minister says all eligible for BNO passport can apply if China cuts freedoms

Boris Johnson has opened the path to what he called one of the “biggest changes” ever to the British visa system, stating he was ready to offer a right to live and work in the UK to any of the nearly 3 million Hong Kong citizens eligible for a British National Overseas passport.

Ministers have been ambivalent since last Thursday on whether the government’s offer of an extendable 12-month visa would be available only to the 350,000 current BNO passport holders in Hong Kong, or would also include the more than 2.5 million eligible to apply for the passport.

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Keir Starmer warns PM: get a grip or risk second wave of coronavirus

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Labour leader accuses Boris Johnson of ‘winging it’ in stinging attack

Keir Starmer has accused Boris Johnson of causing a collapse in public confidence over the government’s handling of the coronavirus crisis, saying No 10 will be directly responsible if the infection rate starts to rise again.

In an exclusive interview with the Guardian, the Labour leader launched a stinging attack on the the prime minister, accusing him of “winging it” over the easing of the lockdown and making an already “difficult situation 10 times worse”.

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MPs join 90-minute-long queue to vote to end virtual voting

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Critics say move to physically-distant voting puts vulnerable and BAME politicians at risk

MPs are to return to parliament after a government motion was passed to prevent the resumption of virtual voting, despite what one MP called “absurd” scenes of a kilometre-long conga line of politicians trying to vote.

The 527 MPs snaked through Westminster halls and courtyards for an hour and 23 minutes to vote on the proposal by the Commons leader, Jacob Rees-Mogg, which was carried by 261 votes to 163. It incited a furious reaction from many MPs, including those who are shielding and black and ethnic minority (BAME) politicians.

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EU has no legal duty to give UK trade privileges, document says

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Paper concludes EU does not have to offer privileges given to others in previous deals

The EU has no legal duty to grant the UK privileges offered to other countries in trade deals, an internal European parliament paper has concluded ahead of a crucial round of Brexit talks this week.

The document, drawn up by officials for the parliament’s UK coordination group, is a short analysis of arguments made by the UK’s chief negotiator, David Frost, in a letter to his counterpart, Michel Barnier. Frost accused the EU of treating the UK as an “unworthy” negotiating partner by denying the UK “the kind of well-precedented arrangements commonplace in modern FTAs [free trade agreements]”.

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Northern Ireland faces ‘potent threat’ from Brexit and Covid-19

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Lords committee warns uncertainty over trading rules may add to economic damage of crisis

Northern Ireland faces a “potent threat” to its prosperity and stability if reduced business confidence due to uncertainty over post-Brexit trading rules compounds the economic damage from coronavirus, a Lords committee has warned.

A fourth round of talks between the UK and EU over a permanent deal begins this week, with little apparent progress made, and the looming deadline of 1 July for the UK to seek an extension to the transition period beyond this year.

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Seven former foreign secretaries urge UK to take lead on Hong Kong

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Cross-party initiative reflects concern response to China’s imposition of security laws cannot be left to Donald Trump

Britain must take the lead in co-ordinating the international response to China’s efforts to impose draconian security laws in Hong Kong, seven former Conservative and Labour UK foreign secretaries have come together to declare.

Related: Hong Kong officials lash out at Trump plan to strip city of special status

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Health officials make last-minute plea to stop lockdown easing in England

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Royal College of Nursing also fears lifting of more restrictions on ‘happy Monday’ is too early

Senior public health officials have made a last-minute plea for ministers to scrap Monday’s easing of the coronavirus lockdown in England, warning the country is unprepared to deal with any surge in infection and that public resolve to take steps to limit transmisson has been eroded.

The Association of Directors of Public Health (ADPH) said new rules, including allowing groups of up to six people to meet outdoors and in private gardens, were “not supported by the science” and that pictures of crowded beaches and beauty spots over the weekend showed “the public is not keeping to social distancing as it was”.

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