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rachelramirez

Trump worries Nato with 'obsolete' comment - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-us-canada-38635181

trump nato politics policy economics

shared by rachelramirez on 16 Jan 17 - No Cached
  • Trump worries Nato with 'obsolete' comment
  • A statement by US President-elect Donald Trump that Nato is "obsolete" has caused "worry" in the alliance, Germany's foreign minister says.
  • Shares in BMW, Volkswagen and Daimler fell after he warned that cars built in Mexico, where they have invested in factories, would be taxed at 35% if exported to the US.
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  • Few expected the new transatlantic relationship to echo the warm and trusting alliance nurtured by Angela Merkel and Barack Obama, who was a vocal supporter of Mrs Merkel's refugee policy.
  • Germany's outspoken Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel retorted that the migrant crisis was the result of "faulty, interventionist American policies in the Mediterranean and Middle East".
  • though few here believe his Congress would approve the 35% tax he appears to be threatening to impose on imported vehicles.
  • "A lot of these countries aren't paying what they're supposed to be paying, which I think is very unfair to the United States."
  • Mr Trump added that Nato was "very important" to him
  • Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, Mr Steinmeier said the president-elect's comments had caused "worry and concern".
  • the US deployed 3,000 soldiers, 80 tanks and hundreds of armoured vehicles to Poland in a move by President Barack Obama to reassure Nato allies concerned about a more aggressive Russia.
  • At his Senate confirmation hearing last week, Mr Trump's choice for defence secretary, Gen James Mattis, had described Nato as central to US defence, and had accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of trying to "break" the alliance.
  • Mr Trump described Mrs Merkel as Europe's most important leader but said the EU had become "basically a vehicle for Germany".
sarahbalick

Bangladesh LGBT editor hacked to death - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-asia-36128729

bangladesh lgbt editor hacked death

shared by sarahbalick on 26 Apr 16 - No Cached
  • Bangladesh LGBT editor hacked to death
  • Bangladesh police say a top gay rights activist and editor at the country's only LGBT magazine is one of two people who have been hacked to death.
  • Another person was also injured when the attackers entered a Dhaka flat.
  • ...10 more annotations...
  • The two men were murdered two days after a university teacher was hacked to death by suspected Islamist militants.
  • So-called Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility - but the Bangladeshi government insists there is no IS presence in the country.
  • "I am devastated by the brutal murder of Xulhaz Mannan and another young Bangladeshi," said US Ambassador Marcia Bernicat."We abhor this senseless act of violence and urge the government of Bangladesh in the strongest terms to apprehend the criminals behind these murders," she added.
  • A British photographer who knew Mr Mannan and the other victim, known as
  • "Tonoy" and named in Bangladeshi media as Tanay Mojumdar, said they and other friends had set up Roopbaan with the aim of spreading tolerance.
  • Homosexuality is technically illegal in Bangladesh and remains a highly sensitive issue in society.
  • "Both were extremely gentle, non-violent and aware that being openly gay and active in their work was a personal danger," the photographer said.
  • "Until a year ago the only threat to coming out was shame of the family and having to start a new life elsewhere in Bangladesh. Now it's one of danger," he said.
  • Imran Sarker, who led major protests by secular activists in 2013 against Islamist leaders, said he had received a phone call warning that he would be killed "very soon".
  • Last year, four prominent secular bloggers were also killed with machetes.The four bloggers had all appeared on a list of 84 "atheist bloggers" drawn up by Islamic groups in 2013 and widely circulated.
julia rhodes

BBC News - Bahrain opposition leadership 'systematically targeted' - 0 views

www.bbc.co.uk/...world-middle-east-24999699

bbc bahrain arab spring crisis policy culture peaceful opposition

shared by julia rhodes on 20 Nov 13 - No Cached
  • The head of the main Shia political society in Bahrain has told the BBC that the opposition leadership is being systematically targeted by the state.
  • Khalil Marzook, is on trial for inciting youth violence and trying to overthrow the Sunni-led government.
  • "Khalil and the Wefaq party have always advocated a peaceful path to democracy and condemn violence," he insisted.
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  • In February 2011, many Bahrainis inspired by the Arab Spring gathered at the prominent Pearl Roundabout in the capital Manama calling for democratic reforms.
  • Many were from the majority Shia community, which has long complained of being marginalised by the Sunni royal family.
  • These included the prosecution of security forces personnel responsible for torture and the deaths of detainees, the release prisoners of conscience, and the reinstatement of dismissed Shia workers.
  • "The torture continues, unfair trials continue," he added. "Nearly 3,000 people are in jail and the numbers increase all the time.
  • But the idea is very clear. The authorities are saying we can put any one of you in jail whenever we want. "And this is their plan, to put all the opposition under pressure, target the leadership and put us in jail or force us out of the country or take away our citizenship." Mr Salman warned that if they jailed peaceful opposition leaders from groups such as Wefaq, only hardliners would remain and that would lead to more and more violence.
  • As a result, terrorists who are trained by Hezbollah in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran, took advantage and threatened the safety of civilians in Bahrain
qkirkpatrick

Middle East map carved up by caliphates, enclaves and fiefdoms - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-middle-east-32930004

middle east history culture

shared by qkirkpatrick on 04 Jun 15 - No Cached
  • Nearly a century after the Middle East's frontiers were established by British and French colonialists, the maps delineating the region's nation states are being overtaken by events
  • Countries created to suit the imperial designs of London and Paris are being replaced by patches of territory carved out by jihadis, nationalists, rebels and warlords.
  • As some of the nation states disintegrate, once powerful capital cities become ever more irrelevant. The rest of the world may have embassies in the Middle East but, increasingly, there are no effective ministries for them to interact with.
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  • Even the most precious Middle Eastern resource of all - oil - is slipping out of government control.
  • The Iraqi Kurds have been creating a legal infrastructure for oil exports for nearly a decade, while rebel forces in Libya and the Islamic State group have both accrued revenues from the oil industry
  • Israel's borders remain a matter of impassioned debate. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's new Deputy Foreign Minister, Tzipi Hotovely, recently told members of the Israeli diplomatic corps that they should tell the world that the West Bank belongs to the Jews.
  • The Middle East is facing years of turmoil. Many in the region are increasingly driven by religion and ideology rather than nationalism. For them - whether conservative or liberal, religious or secular - the priority is not to change lines on the map but to advance their view of how society should be organised.
  • qkirkpatrick on 04 Jun 15
     
    Changes to the map of the Middle East
Maria Delzi

BBC News - UK storms: Fresh flood fears for coming days - 0 views

www.bbc.co.uk/uk-25606031

shared by Maria Delzi on 05 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • People are being warned to brace themselves for floods on England's coasts and rivers, with further severe weather forecast.
  • More than 90 flood warnings, meaning flooding is expected, are in place in England and Wales, with 10 in Scotland.
  • The search for a teenager in Devon who has been missing since Thursday has been called off for a second night.
  • ...11 more annotations...
  • The Environment Agency said parts of England's north-east coast could see flooding while parts of the south coast - including Portsmouth and Newhaven - were also at risk over the weekend.
  • Spokesman Jonathan Day added: "The risk of flooding to the coast will continue over the next few days, especially on the south and west coast and along the Severn estuary."
  • A man was rescued by police in Newquay after going into the sea in the early hours of Saturday morning
  • Part of a cliff has collapsed into the sea on the East Sussex coast after being undermined by rough seas
  • In Scotland, flooding was less severe than expected after warnings of a tidal surge on the east coast
  • There are currently no severe flood warnings - indicating danger to life - in place across the UK.
  • However, more than 240 flood alerts - meaning flooding is possible, be prepared - are in place in England and Wales, in addition to more than 90 flood warnings.
  • Prime Minister David Cameron praised the agencies involved in dealing with the storm threat.
  • He tweeted: "Great work by emergency services & @EnvAgency helping people flooded. 200,000 properties have been protected by flood defences in last 36hrs."
  • Forecasters have warned of heavy rain in southern England, south-east Wales, Northern Ireland and parts of Scotland.
  • There is an increased risk of flooding risk to Weybridge and Guildford on Sunday and into Monday and people living along the non-tidal Thames, including Oxford and Osney, could be at risk from Sunday, the EA said.
Emilio Ergueta

BBC News - UK ends Afghan combat operations - 0 views

www.bbc.com/uk-29776544

bbc news afghan combat history politics

shared by Emilio Ergueta on 26 Oct 14 - No Cached
  • The last UK base in Afghanistan has been handed over to the control of Afghan security forces, ending British combat operations in the country.
  • The number of deaths of British troops throughout the conflict stands at 453. The death toll among US military personnel stands at 2,349.
  • Speaking on the BBC's Andrew Marr Show, Mr Fallon accepted the Taliban had not been defeated, but said Afghan forces were now taking "full responsibilities".
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  • The UK forces were part of a US-led coalition which toppled the ruling Taliban in 2001, following the 9/11 attacks in the US. After 9/11, US President George Bush had demanded that the Taliban hand over any leaders of al-Qaeda - the militant group which later claimed responsibility for the attacks - in Afghanistan, but the Taliban did not immediately comply.
  • "We're not going to send combat troops back into Afghanistan, under any circumstances," he added.
  • At the height of the war in 2009, about 10,000 UK troops were based at Camp Bastion and the UK's 137 patrol bases in southern Afghanistan.
  • Rear Adm Chris Parry, who helped plan the role of UK troops in Afghanistan, told the BBC that Britain's involvement had been "worth it", saying the country was now "more stable", was improving economically and had 40% more children going to school. But he said politicians in 2001 had not known what they wanted to achieve, the military had not had enough resources and there had been no "coherent military plan".
Emilio Ergueta

BBC News - Exit polls: Uruguay's presidential election goes to run-off - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-latin-america-29775819

uruguay election bbc politics

shared by Emilio Ergueta on 26 Oct 14 - No Cached
  • Uruguay's election of a new president to succeed Jose Mujica, who is barred from running for a second consecutive term, goes to run-off, exit polls say.
  • If no candidate obtains the 50.1% needed to avoid a second round, Uruguayans will choose between the two leading candidates on 30 November.
  • Mr Mujica remains popular after leading Uruguay through economy growth and wage rises, but he is barred by the constitution from running for a second consecutive term.
redavistinnell

Migrant crisis: EU meeting seeks to heal growing rifts - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-europe-35657054

crisis meeting growing bbc news

shared by redavistinnell on 25 Feb 16 - No Cached
  • Migrant crisis: EU meeting seeks to heal growing rifts
  • Ministers from EU and Balkan nations are meeting in Brussels to try to heal rifts over migrants that have plunged common policy into chaos.
  • More than 100,000 migrants have entered the EU illegally this year.
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  • An official from the current Dutch presidency of the EU told AFP news agency Thursday's meetings would aim to "avoid surprises - we have to avoid that one country is surprised by the measures taken by another".
  • The new measures - from Austria and its Balkan partners - include fingerprinting all entrants and turning back anyone without a passport or holding fake documents.
  • Greece has threatened to block all decisions at EU migration summits next month if member states do not agree to take in quotas of migrants.
  • Several papers from countries in the thick of the EU migrant crisis are worried about their leaders' approach. Influential journalist Alan Posener, in Germany's Die Welt, believes Chancellor Angela Merkel's "short-sighted actions" on the crisis are helping Russia sow division among European states. "The EU is blowing up around Merkel - to Putin's delight," he writes.
  • "Europeans have a responsibility not to feed the snake of anti-European sentiment in Greece."
  • In September, EU ministers agreed plans to relocate 120,000 migrants from Italy, Greece and Hungary to other EU countries. But the majority vote decision was opposed by Romania, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary.
lenaurick

BBC - Earth - The remote lake that tells the story of humanity's birth - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...s-the-story-of-humanitys-birth

humanity history humans

shared by lenaurick on 07 Dec 15 - No Cached
  • It was a skeleton of a young boy, discovered at Lake Turkana in the deserts of northern Kenya. He died when he was about eight years old and his bones sank into the sediments of the lake, where they were preserved for 1.5 million years. He was, and is, the most complete early-human fossil ever discovered
  • Together they span four million years of human evolution.
  • 1.9 million-year-old Homo rudolfensis, known as "skull 1470".
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  • The discovery reinforced an idea that was emerging at the time: that there was not a single line of early humans, but multiple lineages. It was already known that three other species were living in Africa around the same time: H. habilis, H. erectus and Paranthropus boisei. H. rudolfensis added to this diversity.
  • Later finds from Koobi Fora suggest that the three Homo species coexisted between 1.78 and 1.98 million years ago.
  • H. erectus are thought to be our direct ancestors. They were the first hominins to migrate out of Africa, spreading into Europe and Asia.
  • but a 2013 study suggested that H. erectus had evolved the ability to throw.
    • lenaurick
      lenaurick on 07 Dec 15
       
      throwing makes them evolutionarily better, and caused h. erectus to be the group that survived
  • This may have given H. erectus the drive they needed to become more social.There is some evidence that they shared information and worked in teams.
  • In the summer of 2015, researchers announced the discovery of the oldest known stone tools, dating to 3.3 million years ago. It had been assumed that only Homo species could make stone tools, but the tools were older than any known Homo fossils, suggesting that older species like A. afarensis or K. platyops could also make stone tools.
  • a 3.2-million-year-old fossil Australopithecus afarensis, nicknamed "Lucy". Lucy's species was immediately hailed as a key contender for our direct ancestor.
  • The earliest known Acheulean hand-axes were discovered near Lake Turkana in 2011. They are 1.76 million years old and were probably made by H. erectus.
  • sense.
  • Her team found fossils on the western shore of lake that demonstrated there was "diversity at the age of Lucy".
  • A. anamensis. This was the oldest species known from Lake Turkana, having lived about four million years ago.
  • another new species called Kenyanthropus platyopus, or "flat-faced man". This species lived 3.5 million years ago, when other members of Lucy's species also roamed.
  • "the common ancestor" of Homo, and largely killed off the idea that humans evolved on a single line.
  • There was a single lineage descending from apes through to Lucy, "and then out pops our immediate ancestors". To her, that did not make
  • There was thought to be a "substantial link between the emergence of humans (Homo) and the emergence of technology", says de la Torre, but it now seems this is not necessarily true.
  • Lake Turkana has played a pivotal role in our understanding of human evolution. But that is not to say the area was particularly significant for the early humans themselves.
  • Lake Turkana was simply an ideal place for fossils to be preserved, says Spoor. "That doesn't mean human evolution doesn't happen everywhere else in Africa."
  • It allows us to see multiple species that lived millions of years apart, and compare them.
redavistinnell

Islamist extremism: Why young people are being drawn to it - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-europe-35060020

people being bbc news

shared by redavistinnell on 11 Dec 15 - No Cached
  • Islamist extremism: Why young people are being drawn to it
  • She was speaking after a 15-year-old boy was charged with conspiracy in connection with an alleged terror plot in Australia.
  • Last month, reports said one of two girls who ran away from their home in Austria to join the so-called Islamic State in Syria had been beaten to death while trying to escape. She was 17.
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  • The number of under-18s arrested for alleged terror offences in the UK almost doubled from eight to 15 from 2013-14 to 2014-15. The total number of arrests for all age groups was 315 - an increase of a third on the previous year.
  • The main target for groups like Islamic State is said to be young people between 16 and 24 years old.However the radicalisation process can start as early as 11 or 12, says Daniel Koehler, director of the German Institute on Radicalization and Deradicalization Studies (GIRDS).
  • "The internet is essential…. IS produces an average of 30 to 40 high-quality videos per day in almost every language," says Mr Koehler."They have an estimated Twitter network of 30,000 to 40,000 accounts, and guides for carrying out jihad or how to join IS are easily available online."
  • "While the internet does play an important role, what is different with IS is that it is much more outward facing," says Mr Winter, a senior research associate at Georgia State University.
  • "IS is really trying to push this idea of a counter culture. They have crafted this idea of state building, of democratic jihad.
  • "Ideology is very important but it is also about how people feel about the society they live in.
  • "What we have seen a lot of times is people being enlisted by friendship groups," says Mr Winter.
  • Experiences are whitewashed to hide the iniquities and hypocrisies of the group's mission.Young people are particularly impressionable when they hear these stories, Mr Winter says.
  • "It is about when and how you come across a certain ideology and group, and what you are currently looking for in your life."
jongardner04

Iraq: US confirms Americans kidnapped in Baghdad - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-middle-east-35339840

iraq americans

shared by jongardner04 on 18 Jan 16 - No Cached
  • The US embassy in Baghdad has confirmed that "several" Americans have been kidnapped there.
  • "We are working with the full co-operation of the Iraqi authorities to locate and recover the individuals," said a state department official.
  • An attack on a Baghdad shopping centre last week, claimed by so-called Islamic State militants, brought to an end a relative lull in violence that had seen no major bloodshed in the city in months.
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  • Since then, BBC Iraq correspondent Ahmed Maher says, there has been no claim of responsibility and the fate of those kidnapped remains unknown - a sign of how secretive and complicated the negotiation process is.
johnsonma23

US Democratic debate: Candidates spar on gun control - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-us-canada-35340061

gun control bbc

shared by johnsonma23 on 18 Jan 16 - No Cached
  • Candidates for the Democratic race for the White House are taking part in a TV debate, with gun control and healthcare among the main topics
  • Mr Sanders' universal healthcare plan, announced two hours before the debate started, would see citizens pay what he called "a 2.2% income-based premium" towards healthcare. Companies would pay an extra 6.2% of an employee's income towards the plan.
  • Polls indicate Ms Clinton and Mr Sanders are neck-and-neck ahead of the caucus in Iowa, where voters will decide who they want as their preferred candidate. She had once commanded a large lead.
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  • Clinton said any moves to scrap the current Affordable Healthcare Act risked plunging the Democrats into "contentious debate". Instead, the party should work on improving the programme, known as Obamacare.
  • US Democratic debate: Candidates spar on gun control
  • Before the debate in South Carolina, Mr Sanders unveiled a healthcare plan for all American citizens.
  • move risked derailing healthcare legislation introduced under President Obama.
  • Gun control was the first subject in the debate, that was held near a church where nine parishioners were shot dead in June 2015
  • released an advertisement this week attacking Mr Sanders for his attitude towards gun control
runlai_jiang

China congress: Communists to unveil new leaders - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-asia-china-41744904

politics china

shared by runlai_jiang on 25 Oct 17 - No Cached
  • It is believed that two current Politburo members will likely be promoted to the Standing Committee - vice premier Wang Yang will become China’s executive Vice-
  • If it all seems opaque, that’s because it is. Most decisions happened behind closed doors this past week - but here's what we do know. 18 October: Xi Jinping opened the congress, introduced his political philosophy Delegates picked provincial party chiefs, governors and heads of some state-owned enterprises 24 October: The party voted to enshrine “Xi Jinping Thought” into its constitution, also finalised top bodies like the Central Committee Today: The Central Committee elects the Politburo and Standing Committee
  • if any of them are from a younger generation of party leaders, it could mean Mr Xi is positioning a successor. If not, it might mean he intends to stay on beyond the end of his second five-year term.
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  • will appear in front of the media. One thing seems certain: President Xi Jinping will be re-elected party leader.
  • re
runlai_jiang

Xi Jinping 'most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong' - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-asia-china-41730948

china

shared by runlai_jiang on 25 Oct 17 - No Cached
  • Only Mao and Deng Xiaoping have had their names attached to their ideologies - and Deng's name was only added to the constitution after his death.
  • A call for "complete and deep reform" and "new developing ideas" A promise of "harmonious living between man and nature" - this is a call for improved environmental conservation, and could refer to the stated aim to have the bulk of China's energy needs supplied by renewables An emphasis on "absolute authority of the party over the people's army" - which comes amid what analysts call the largest turnover of senior military officials in modern Chinese history
  • An emphasis on the importance of "'one country two systems" and reunification with the motherland - a clear reference to Hong Kong and Taiwan
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  • Last week a top official claimed high-ranking Communist Party members had plotted to seize power from President Xi, in suggestions of a behind-the-scenes power struggle.
  • Analysts say its make-up may give signs of how long Mr Xi plans to stay on at the top of the party - he is expected to remain at the helm until at least 2022 - or any possible successors.
  • Mr Xi's term ruling China has been marked by significant development, a push for modernisation and increasing assertiveness on the world stage. However, it has also seen growing authoritarianism, censorship and a crackdown on human rights.
anonymous

Terminal illness led to Australia's first same-sex marriage - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-australia-43312043

policy gay marriage australia

shared by anonymous on 08 Mar 18 - No Cached
  • A dying woman and her partner were the first same-sex couple to legally marry in Australia, it has been revealed.
  • Ms Grant died from cancer on 30 January, less than seven weeks after marrying Ms Kindt. They had been together for eight years.
  • Laws allowing same-sex couples to register for marriage had come into effect six days earlier, following a decisive public vote and approval by parliament.Some other same-sex couples, including others where one partner had a terminal illness, were also allowed to skip the waiting period and a handful of well-reported midnight celebrations took place.
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  • "We considered ourselves married [in 2013], but in a legal sense we weren't," said Ms Kindt, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
runlai_jiang

Hawaii told to fix its alert system after false missile alarm - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-us-canada-42682533

shared by runlai_jiang on 15 Jan 18 - No Cached
  • The US state of Hawaii has been told it did not have "reasonable" safeguards in place to prevent the false missile alert that caused panic on Saturday.
  • Residents and visitors to Hawaii were shocked to receive the false alert of an incoming ballistic missile, sent to their mobile phones early on Saturday morning. Apologising afterwards, Hawaii's Governor David Ige said a member of staff had pressed the wrong button, releasing the alert which was also broadcast on TV and radio stations.
  • "False alerts undermine public confidence in the alerting system and thus reduce their effectiveness during real emergencies," he said.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • State officials said a "cancellation template" would be created to address the problem, the New York Times reported.
  • So Hawaii has reintroduced Cold War-era warning sirens. During a test last month, it was reported that 93% of them worked properly, although some could hardly be heard and 12 mistakenly played the ambulance siren. Media playback is unsupported on your device
runlai_jiang

North and South Korea discuss sending art troupe to Winter Olympics - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-asia-42685466

shared by runlai_jiang on 15 Jan 18 - No Cached
  • North and South Korea have begun talks on Pyongyang's plan to send an art troupe to the Winter Olympics taking place next month in the South.North Korea agreed last week to send a delegation to the Games, easing months of tensions between the neighbours over its nuclear programme.
  • The two sides are meeting in the shared border village of Panmunjom in the demilitarised zone (DMZ), also known as truce village.
  • Moranbong: Pyongyang's propaganda girl band
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • Formed in 2012, all band members are reportedly hand-picked by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un himself. Their music is a synthesiser-heavy mix of Western classics and Pyongyang propaganda songs including "We Call Him Father" - an ode to Mr Kim. The changing line-up is made up of singers and multi-instrumentalists, playing anything from electric guitars to synthesiser, violin and saxophone. In 2015, the band was rumoured to have been purged, even executed, when it briefly vanished from public view for several weeks.
  • North and South Korea are set to hold talks with the International Olympics Committee in Switzerland next Saturday to discuss the participation of North Korean athletes at the Games.
runlai_jiang

Iran nuclear deal: Trump's high-stakes balancing act - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-us-canada-42653789

shared by runlai_jiang on 15 Jan 18 - No Cached
  • Advertisement US & Canada US & Canada Iran nuclear deal: Trump's high-stakes balancing act
  • President Donald Trump has extended sanctions relief for Iran one last time, says the White House. What does it mean?The announcement puts a question mark over the future of the nuclear accord signed by Iran and six world powers in 2015.
  • What are the waivers? For years, economic sanctions were imposed by the US on Iran to try to curb its nuclear programme. These measures cut Iran off from the global financial system.
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • What is recertification? Recertification of the nuclear deal is a two-part process. Verifying that Iran is in compliance with the nuclear deal is part of it. However, the second part involves the White House certifying that the nuclear deal remains in the US national security interest.
  • Why does Trump dislike the deal?Mr Trump's repeated excoriation of the JCPOA as the "worst deal ever" while electioneering sought to depict the Obama administration as weak.When he refused in October to continue to recertify the deal, the p
  • What next?The waiver suspends sanctions on Iran for 120 days. Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said his department is weighing further sanctions in light of the protests.
runlai_jiang

Jerusalem embassy: Abbas says Trump plan 'slap of the century' - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/...world-us-canada-42684082

shared by runlai_jiang on 15 Jan 18 - No Cached
  • Jerusalem embassy: Abbas says Trump plan 'slap of the century'
  • Speaking earlier this month, Mr Trump insisted recognition of Jerusalem took the hugely divisive issue "off the table" for new peace talks. Palestinians argue the move shows the US cannot be a neutral broker.
  • Mr Abbas had already rejected Mr Trump's proposals last month, after the UN General Assembly voted to express regret at US recognition of Jerusalem.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • "What would you want, if Jerusalem were to be lost?" he asked rhetorically, according to the Jerusalem Post. "Would you want to make a state with Abu Dis as its capital?"
  • Israel claims the whole of the city as its capital. The Palestinians want East Jerusalem, occupied by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war, to be the capital of a future Palestinian state.
runlai_jiang

How to survive a missile attack: What's the official advice? - BBC News - 0 views

www.bbc.com/world-42681595

shared by runlai_jiang on 15 Jan 18 - No Cached
  • What would you do if a hostile missile was flying towards your country, and you had minutes to take cover?It's a terrifying prospect, and one the people of Hawaii faced on Saturday when an emergency warning was mistakenly sent telling them, "Seek immediate shelter. This is not a drill".
  • 'Get inside, stay inside, stay tuned'Hawaii has been pondering that question since December, when it restarted monthly tests of its nuclear attack siren for the first time since the end of the Cold War.
  • And elsewhere in the world?Hawaii isn't the only place to make headlines over a emergency alert.On the small Pacific island of Guam, home to a strategic US airbase, residents feared the worst for 15 minutes in August 2017 when two radio stations mistakenly broadcast an urgent warning.
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