The UK Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, has underlined the need for the UK to be “pragmatic” about immigration policy as Cabinet members debate further cuts to numbers. Hunt said the UK would “always be pragmatic” about limiting the number of migrant workers, but suggested that the shortage occupation list, which offers exemptions and streamlined visa processes for some industrial sectors that lack workers, could be expanded to enable companies to secure the employees they require. Home Secretary Suella Braverman has put forward a series of measures including increased minimum salaries to restrict numbers.
Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, and the United Nations have reached an agreement to extend the Black Sea Grain Initiative for another two months. The scheme began last summer to allow Ukraine to ship goods through the Black Sea without break, to parts of the world suffering from hunger, while an existing civil war had driven up prices. Whilst Russia exports of food and fertiliser are not subject to Western sanctions due to its invasion of Ukraine, Moscow says that restrictions on payments, logistics and insurance have become a challenge for shipments.
The Council of Europe is creating a 'register of damages' to record Russia's destruction of Ukraine over the past few years for future compensation. It will be lodged at the Hague and aimed to record the costs that Russia has exacted on Ukraine since the war began, not just morally, but financially. The action aims to hold Moscow accountable long-term for the situation in Ukraine. Germany’s government has said it is looking into further mechanisms to secure war damages, including the possibility of using frozen Russian assets as compensation.
Ukraine has secured an extension to its Black Sea grain deal, allowing it to export its grain safely across the Black Sea for a further two months. Russia confirmed the extension the day before it would have quit the pact over obstacles to its grain and fertiliser exports. The United Nations and Turkey brokered the deal for an initial 120 days in July last year to help tackle a global food crisis that was aggravated by Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
Prince Harry, his wife Meghan Markle, and her mother, Doria Ragland, were involved in a "near catastrophic car chase" with paparazzi photographers after attending an awards ceremony in New York. The spokesperson for the prince claimed the pursuit lasted over two hours and resulted in multiple collisions with other drivers on the road, pedestrians, and two New York Police Department officers. Harry and Meghan have previously stepped down from their royal roles and moved to the US to avoid media harassment, which Harry blames for the death of his mother, Princess Diana.
Celebrities in the US are investing millions of dollars to protect their privacy from paparazzi as such incidents are viewed as a danger to themselves and their family. The task is given to security teams, which includes veterans of armed conflicts, ex-UFC fighters, and retired NFL players who are trained in “executive protection” and evasive driving, and use vehicles with blacked-out windows and decoy cars. Increasingly, these teams have to deal with paparazzi behaving aggressively as the latter face financial desperation and seek rare opportunities to earn money. As a result, celebrities are in fear for their lives and are seeking protection from security services.
UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak has said that he wants to reduce legal migration as figures are expected to balloon to around 700,000 next week. However, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has refused to promise that he will meet his manifesto pledge of getting migration below 2019 levels. Cabinet splits are reportedly emerging, with Home Secretary Suella Braverman calling for more British workers to be trained in industries with shortages instead of relying on foreign workers. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has said the UK needs to be “pragmatic” about filling shortages with foreign workers. An official report, expected to be released next month, is predicted to show that annual net migration has tripled since the Brexit promise was made in 2019. Sunak was repeatedly asked whether he was committed to reducing net migration to the quarter of a million figure promised in the Conservative manifesto, but declined to say it would be met.
New York's Eastern District Court has gained a reputation for its extraterritorial reach, indicting an array of high-profile defendants over the years, including R&B singer R Kelly and Mexican cartel boss Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán Loera. Despite covering a district that includes Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island and Long Island, and serving a diverse demographic of 8 million residents and an international airport, the court has few qualms about exercising its jurisdiction to prosecute defendants based in other areas of the US, or even in foreign countries.
The US State Department has offered to allow the Republican chairman to the House Foreign Affairs Committee to view a classified cable from US diplomats in Kabul sent shortly before the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan. Previously the chairman had threatened to hold Antony Blinken, Secretary of State, in contempt if he did not turn over the "dissent cable". The State Department said the chairman would be invited to view the cable "with appropriate personal information redacted", although it was not immediately clear whether the offer would be sufficient.
UK aid to Afghanistan has more than halved, from £246m in 2022 to £100m in 2024, according to the Independent Commission for Aid Impact. The sharp decline, which has resulted in the halting or postponing of programmes such as polio vaccinations and the clearance of mines and explosives, is due to successive cuts to the UK’s aid budget and the use of a significant amount of it on housing refugees in the UK. The report notes that as the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan deteriorates, UK aid should focus on meeting immediate needs.
Celebrities in the US are investing millions of dollars to protect their privacy from paparazzi as such incidents are viewed as a danger to themselves and their family. The task is given to security teams, which includes veterans of armed conflicts, ex-UFC fighters, and retired NFL players who are trained in “executive protection” and evasive driving, and use vehicles with blacked-out windows and decoy cars. Increasingly, these teams have to deal with paparazzi behaving aggressively as the latter face financial desperation and seek rare opportunities to earn money. As a result, celebrities are in fear for their lives and are seeking protection from security services.
UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak has said that he wants to reduce legal migration as figures are expected to balloon to around 700,000 next week. However, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has refused to promise that he will meet his manifesto pledge of getting migration below 2019 levels. Cabinet splits are reportedly emerging, with Home Secretary Suella Braverman calling for more British workers to be trained in industries with shortages instead of relying on foreign workers. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has said the UK needs to be “pragmatic” about filling shortages with foreign workers. An official report, expected to be released next month, is predicted to show that annual net migration has tripled since the Brexit promise was made in 2019. Sunak was repeatedly asked whether he was committed to reducing net migration to the quarter of a million figure promised in the Conservative manifesto, but declined to say it would be met.
The US State Department has agreed to let two leading members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee view a redacted version of a classified cable relating to the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan that had been sought by the committee’s Republican chairperson, Michael McCaul. The cable, sent via the State Department’s “dissent channel,” had warned of the potential collapse of Kabul following the withdrawal of US troops. McCaul had scheduled a committee meeting to consider a contempt charge against Secretary of State Antony Blinken for refusing to release the cable.
The UK's aid to Afghanistan has more than halved over the past two years, according to a new review by the Independent Commission for Aid Impact. The ICAI reported that Britain is expected to provide £100m ($133m) in humanitarian assistance to the nation in 2023-24, compared with £246m in the previous year. It said the sharp fall is a result of successive cuts to the UK's aid budget and the use of a substantial part of aid funding on housing refugees in the country. Among the programmes affected have been polio vaccinations and land clearances for mines and improvised explosive devices.
Several hundred young people, mostly in their 20s, were recruited by San Francisco-based outsourcing company Sama to work in its Nairobi hub moderating Facebook content. In a lawsuit against Sama and Facebook owner Meta, 184 petitioners are alleging human rights violations and wrongful termination of contracts. The case, one of the largest of its kind, has potential global implications for the conditions of tens of thousands of moderators employed to filter out the most toxic material from social media networks. The cases are the first filed outside the US that seek to change through court procedures how moderators of Facebook content are treated. In 2020, Facebook paid out $52m to settle a lawsuit and provide mental health treatment for American content moderators. Many moderators in Kenya who spoke to The Financial Times said the work left them psychologically scarred, plagued by flashbacks and unable to maintain normal social relations.
UK defence minister James Heappey has been accused of giving misinformation regarding the number of Afghan nationals applying to relocate to the UK. Heappey said that “hundreds of thousands” of applications had been made for relocation under the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (Arap) refugee scheme. However, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) told The Independent that only 138,000 applications to the Arap scheme had been received, with 12,200 of these already approved and moved to the UK. Furthermore, the MoD suggested that the eligibility criteria for the scheme are narrower than is publicised, with only individuals specifically employed by the British forces or who held a role that materially contributed to a UK mission in Afghanistan being accepted. The Independent has launched a campaign to support Afghan air force veteran Nangialay Zakiwid, who is at risk of deportation to Rwanda.
The Taliban has appointed Maulvi Abdul Kabir, who played a key role in the 2020 Doha Agreement with the US, as Afghanistan’s new caretaker prime minister. The man he has replaced, Mullah Mohammad Hasan Akhund, 78, has been in charge of the interim government since the Taliban took control of the country in August. Kabir has been under UN sanctions since 2001 when he served as acting prime minister of the Taliban regime. Kabul University’s Faiz Zaland argued that it is unlikely there will be a change in policy on women’s rights as Kabir’s appointment is temporary and lacks decision-making rights.
The Biden administration's new foreign policy doctrine, outlined by national security adviser Jake Sullivan, has a number of flaws that could ultimately weaken US global leadership, according to The Economist. The doctrine fuses domestic prosperity, defence and climate change under a framework of a greater government role in society and an emphasis on national security. However, the combination of state-led industrial policies and protectionism underlying the plan may end up undermining the country's international strength, the magazine argued. The policy of balancing the management of the US-China relationship with a militarily cautious approach reflects a belief that establishing "strategic maturity" can make America safer and keep the world on a virtuous path, but this is flawed, as the US economic influence is far from in decline and its involvement in global economic rules is essential, warned the magazine.
China woos Central Asia as Ukraine war weakens Russian influence
CNN
23-05-18 07:21
Leaders from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, are meeting in Xi’an, China, to discuss trade, regional stability and security. It is the first in-person meeting of the Central Asian heads of state together with China since the establishment of diplomatic relations after the fall of the Soviet Union. China hopes to expand its influence over the region, which has long been considered Russia’s sphere of influence. China presents these meetings with the Central Asian leaders as the “first major diplomatic activity” it has hosted this year and an opportunity to draw a “new blueprint” with the post-Soviet states that lie between its western borders, Europe and the Middle East. Beijing and Central Asian nations are expected to sign agreements on economic co-operation, as the region suffers from the knock-on economic effects of Russia's war in Ukraine. The leaders will also discuss security co-operation and ensuring stability in the wake of unrest and militant threats, with China seeking to ensure security but not take up Russia's broader regional security role.
NATO’s upcoming summit in Vilnius in July will outline large-scale defence plans for the first time since the Cold War. The plans reveal the alliance's strategy on how exactly it would respond to a Russian attack. Marking a dramatic shift from recent years, alliance officials now warn that they must have all defence strategies in place well before conflict may arise or escalate with Moscow. The planning will also assist nations in how to upgrade their military forces and logistics.
