Ahmad Abouammo found to have given users’ personal information to Mohammed bin Salman’s aide
A former Twitter employee has been found guilty of spying on Saudi dissidents using the social media platform and passing their personal information to a close aide of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
A jury in a federal court in California found Ahmad Abouammo, a dual US-Lebanese national, had acted as an unregistered agent of the Saudi government.
Continue reading...Show of force by China has eased off, but observers say it will strike ‘fear and a sense of inevitability in Taiwanese hearts and minds’
China’s military drills targeting Taiwan have set a new normal, and are likely to “regularise” similar armed exercises off the coast or even more aggressive action much closer to the island, analysts have said.
China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has been conducting live-fire exercises and other drills in the seas around Taiwan’s main island for almost a week, in a purported response to the controversial visit to Taipei by the US House speaker, Nancy Pelosi.
Continue reading...Marape, leader of PNG since 2019, defeated ex-PM Peter O’Neill in an election plagued by violence and electoral fraud
James Marape has been returned as Papua New Guinea’s prime minister for its 11th parliament after a fraught and violent election period that has run for roughly six weeks.
Marape – who became prime minister in 2019 after toppling his predecessor and former party leader, Peter O’Neill – was invited to form government by the governor general, after his Pangu Pati secured 36 seats and was able to strike deals with coalition partners to bring its numbers to more than 80.
Continue reading...One person killed in Novofedorivka, 110 miles from frontline, after ‘aviation munitions detonated’ in storage area
A Russian airbase deep behind the frontline in Crimea has been damaged by several large explosions, killing at least one person, although it was not immediately clear whether it had been targeted by a long-range Ukrainian missile strike.
Multiple social media videos showed explosions and clouds emerging from the Saky military base in Novofedorivka on the western coast of Crimea on Tuesday afternoon, prompting questions about how a location more than 100 miles (160km) from the frontline could have been attacked. Later a senior Ukrainian official appeared to claim responsibility, without giving details.
Continue reading...Fire destroyed 40% of island’s main fuel storage facility over five days and caused blackouts
Firefighters have finally overcame what officials described as the worst blaze in Cuba’s history that over five days destroyed 40% of the Caribbean island’s main fuel storage facility and caused blackouts.
Raging flames that ravaged a four-tank segment of the Matanzas super tanker port had died down on Tuesday and the towering plumes of thick black smoke streaming from the area were diminished and now mostly gray.
Continue reading...Homeland security says it ended policy requiring asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico for hearings hours after judge lifted an order
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said that it has ended a Trump-era policy requiring asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico for hearings in US immigration court, hours after a judge lifted an order, in effect since December, that the so-called Remain in Mexico rule be reinstated.
The timing had been in doubt since the US supreme court ruled on 30 June that the Biden administration could end the policy.
Continue reading...The blaze in Matanzas province raises fears that the damaged facility will worsen the island’s energy shortage
Flames have engulfed a fourth tank at an oil storage facility in western Cuba as a raging fire consumes critical fuel supplies on an island grappling with a growing energy crisis.
Firefighters and specialists from Mexico and Venezuela helped fight the blaze in the province of Matanzas with boats, planes and helicopters as they sprayed foam on the containers, a first for crews since broiling temperatures had prevented them from doing so earlier.
Continue reading...World Health Organization issues statement after reports of animals being poisoned in Brazil
The World Health Organization has stressed that monkeypox outbreaks are not linked to monkeys, following a number of reported attacks on the primates in Brazil.
“What people need to know is that the transmission we are seeing is happening between humans,” a WHO spokesperson, Margaret Harris, told reporters in Geneva on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Tehran denies Khayyam satellite will be under Russian control, despite reported admission by Moscow
Russia has launched an Iranian satellite from Kazakhstan amid concerns it could be used for battlefield surveillance in Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
Iran has denied that the Khayyam satellite, which was delivered into orbit onboard a Soyuz rocket launched from Baikonur cosmodrome, would ever be under Russian control.
Continue reading...Former US president angered by ‘unannounced raid’ as part of ongoing investigation into potentially unlawful removal of White House records
Barbara McQuade at USA Today explains quite why the FBI and Justice Department might be concerned about White House documents being left lying around a Trump residence like Mar-a-Lago. It isn’t just a matter of wanting to retain a complete record of Trump’s time in office for the sake of it. She writes:
Mishandling classified information is a serious crime because it puts at risk sources and methods of information relating to national security. If the content of the documents were to end up in the wrong hands, the identity of government sources could become known and their lives put at risk. Or our methods of collecting information, such as technological capabilities, could become known, undermining their utility. You can’t leave boxes lying around when they contain the kinds of government secrets that can get people killed, even if you’re the former president.
Continue reading...Joseph Rowntree Foundation, consumer champion Martin Lewis and CBI chief urge PM to act urgently to help people with soaring energy bills
More on the new forecast for UK energy bills from Cornwall Insight, which spells more misery for millions of families across the UK.
The consultancy’s principal consultant, Dr Craig Lowrey, said:
It is essential that the government use our predictions to spur on a review of the support package being offered to consumers.
If the £400 was not enough to make a dent in the impact of our previous forecast, it most certainly is not enough now.
The government must make introducing more support over the first two quarters of 2023 a number one priority. In the longer term, a social tariff or other support mechanism to target support at the most vulnerable in society are options that we at Cornwall Insight have proposed previously. Right now, the current price cap is not working for consumers, suppliers, or the economy.
Continue reading...Head of region announces death after attack on base deep inside the occupied Crimean peninsula in what is being seen as a significant strike
Here are some of the latest images to be distributed from Ukraine on the newswires.
Reuters reports that the Turkish defence ministry has said two further grain-carrying ships have sailed from Ukraine’s Chornomorsk port on Tuesday, as part of the deal to unblock Ukrainian sea exports.
Continue reading...Government says Slovenian plans to ‘standardise’ use of name threaten traditional producers in Modena
The Italian government is launching infringement proceedings against Slovenia in an attempt to defend the authenticity of its famed, geographically protected balsamic vinegar.
Relations between the two countries turned sour last year when Slovenia notified the European Commission of its plans to “standardise” its vinegar production, essentially seeking to market any wine vinegar mixed with concentrated fruit juice or must as “balsamic vinegar”.
Continue reading...Tensions high as Taiwan begins live-fire drills and China continues military exercises it started after US speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taipei last week
China used its military drills last week to prepare for an invasion of Taiwan, and its anger over US speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit was just an excuse, Taiwan’s foreign minister has said.
The minister, Joseph Wu, addressed the media on Tuesday morning, as China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) continued with military exercises it began last week, and Taiwan started its own live-fire drills. Wu accused China of “gross violations of international law”.
Continue reading...Cybersecurity expert Ron Deibert to testify to Canadian MPs about troubling spread of invasive surveillance tools
The mercenary spyware industry represents “one of the greatest contemporary threats to civil society, human rights and democracy”, a leading cybersecurity expert warns, as countries grapple with the unregulated spread of powerful and invasive surveillance tools.
Ron Deibert, a political science professor at the university of Toronto and head of Citizen Lab, will testify in front of a Canadian parliamentary committee on Tuesday afternoon about the growing threat he and others believe the technology poses to citizens and democracies.
Continue reading...Man took jamón from warehouse where he worked, defrauding employers out of €520,000 over six years
A man in Huelva in southern Spain has been jailed for defrauding his employers out of €520,000 (£439,000) after he stole and resold 7,000 hams.
The man, who has not been named, stole the jamón from the curing warehouse where he worked over a period of six years from 2007 to 2013. Although he faced a six-year sentence, it was reduced to 11 months and 29 days because the case took so long to come to trial.
Continue reading...City raises upper limit of penalties for causing disturbance after botellones grow in popularity since Covid
Barcelona is clamping down on outdoor drinking parties known as botellones by imposing fines of up to €600 (£506).
Until now, fines have ranged from €60-€100, which, if paid within 30 days, are reduced by 75%.
Continue reading...Ruling party steps up rhetoric by suggesting it could unseat European Commission’s Ursula von der Leyen
Poland’s national-conservative government has significantly toughened its rhetoric in its rule-of-law standoff with Brussels, threatening to turn “all our cannon” on the European Commission and if necessary build a coalition to unseat its president.
If the EU executive “tries to push us against the wall we will have no choice but to pull out all the weapons in our arsenal” and respond “an eye for an eye”, said Krzysztof Sobolewski, the general secretary of the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party.
Continue reading...Bipartisan group calls for new hearing over lack of evidence in case of Richard Glossip, 59, as state rushes to speed up executions
A letter signed by 61 Oklahoma lawmakers – most of them pro-death penalty Republicans – has been sent to the state’s attorney general calling for a new hearing in the case of Richard Glossip, a death row inmate scheduled to be executed next month.
Forty-four Republican and 17 Democratic legislators, amounting to more than a third of the state assembly, have written to John O’Connor pleading for the new hearing.
Continue reading...A representative for the actor has described her as being in an ‘extreme critical condition’ following the incident on Friday
Anne Heche has not regained consciousness since shortly after she crashed her car in Los Angeles on Friday.
Initial reports about the actor’s condition said she was “stable” and firefighters said she had spoken to rescuers as she was pulled from the wreckage.
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