| S.Korea displays F-35 stealth jets seen by the North as a threat Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:30 PM PDT ![S.Korea displays F-35 stealth jets seen by the North as a threat]( "S.Korea displays F-35 stealth jets seen by the North as a threat") South Korea showcased newly acquired F-35 stealth fighter jets to mark Armed Forces Day on Tuesday as President Moon Jae-in tries to allay concerns that his policy of engagement with North Korea may be weakening the South's commitment to defence. North Korea has criticised the South's weapons procurements and its joint military drills with the U.S. military as undisguised preparations for war that were forcing it to develop new short-range missiles. Moon has thrown his support behind dialogue to end the North's nuclear and ballistic missile programmes, urging that working-level negotiations between the North and the United States be held soon.
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| Irish foreign min says reported UK border plan a non-starter Posted: 30 Sep 2019 05:46 PM PDT ![Irish foreign min says reported UK border plan a non-starter]( "Irish foreign min says reported UK border plan a non-starter") Irish national broadcaster RTE reported on Monday that Britain proposed in a technical, or so-called "non-paper", to set up "customs clearance centres" on both sides of the Irish border after Brexit in order to avoid the need for checks on the border itself, an idea Dublin has long rejected. Time the EU had a serious proposal from the UK Govt if a Brexit deal is to be achievable in October.
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| China Strongly Backs Hong Kong’s Leaders, Lam’s No. 2 Says Posted: 30 Sep 2019 05:29 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- As Chinese President Xi Jinping gets set to celebrate 70 years of Communist rule in China, pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong are planning to upset the celebrations with a series of potentially violent protests.The Oct. 1 National Day events in Beijing will include a high-profile speech from Xi as well as a military parade past Tiananmen Square that is set to show off China's most advanced weaponry, including ballistic missiles and warplanes. In Hong Kong, where protests have rocked the financial hub for 17 straight weekends, residents are braced for a numerous protests to push back against China's tightening grip over the city.Here's the latest (all times local):Cheung vows dialogue (8:12 a.m.)Hong Kong's acting leader, Matthew Cheung, vowed to continue dialogue with protesters in remarks following a flag-raising ceremony in the city's center. Last week, Chief Executive Carrie Lam faced a barrage of questions about her government's handling of the unrest during her first town-hall-style dialogue session."China has been strongly supportive to the Hong Kong chief executive and the SAR to govern effectively," Cheung said, referring to the special adminstrative region. "Hong Kong has been successfully following one country, two systems."He also warned about the economic fallout from the protests, saying "trade relationships have turned complicated in recent months and are getting severe."More train stations closed (8 a.m.)Amid planned protests on Tuesday, subway operator MTR Corp. announced additional station closures as a "prudent measure to ensure the safety of passengers and our staff." The operator said the Causeway Bay, Sham Shui Po, Wong Tai Sin, Sha Tin, Che Kung Temple, Tsuen Wan West and Tuen Mun stations would be closed from 11 a.m. The transit company had earlier said that the central Admiralty and Wan Chai stations, as well as Kowloon's Prince Edward station, would remain closed.Flag raising ceremony (8 a.m.)Riot cops guarded an early morning flag-raising ceremony at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in the center of the city amid worries that protesters would try and disrupt the event. Lam left the event to her number 2 official, chief secretary Cheung, after announcing that she would travel to Beijing for the festivities.Subway closures (10:45 p.m.)The MTR Corp. announced various subway closures on Hong Kong Island and in Kowloon ahead of the Oct. 1 protests. The transit company said its trains would not stop at the city's central Admiralty and Wan Chai stops or the Prince Edward station on the other side of the harbor.\--With assistance from Aaron Mc Nicholas.To contact the reporters on this story: Iain Marlow in Hong Kong at imarlow1@bloomberg.net;Annie Lee in Hong Kong at olee42@bloomberg.net;James Mayger in Beijing at jmayger@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Brendan Scott at bscott66@bloomberg.netFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Xi Hails Future of China-Hong Kong Bond on Tense National Day Posted: 30 Sep 2019 05:00 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping stressed national unity and said relations between Hong Kong and the mainland would improve, as the city braced for a wave of protests to coincide with the 70th anniversary of Communist rule."Hong Kong and Macau will be able to develop together with the motherland's interior," Xi said in a brief speech to a banquet in Beijing ahead of Tuesday's holiday marking the founding of the People's Republic of China. "Tomorrow will be even better."Xi said the "one country, two systems" principle under which Hong Kong has been governed since its return from British rule in 1997 must be upheld. The president's remarks -- his most extensive comments on Hong Kong since unrest began in June -- came as the city prepared for more unrest during the National Day holiday.The violence has threatened to mar Xi's Oct. 1 celebrations in Beijing, which will be marked by "mass pageantry" in which at least 100,000 people will take part. The festivities will include a military parade and an evening gala in Tiananmen Square.Hong Kong was on edge Tuesday, with the police boats patrolling Victoria Harbor and the city's rail operator closing several subway stations that have been near the sites of the most intense clashes. City officials were gathered at convention center in the Wan Chai area for a flag-raising ceremony.Demonstrators on Sunday set a subway station entrance ablaze and threw petrol bombs at police as tens of thousands tried to march on Hong Kong's central government offices ahead of the National Day holiday. They were met by officers who deployed rounds of tear gas and a water cannon to disperse them for a second straight day.The unrest disrupted some services in Hong Kong's city center, with rail operator MTR Corp. temporarily closing some downtown stations. Hong Kong police said they arrested 146 people and fired off 328 rounds of tear gas on Sunday. Forty-eight people were sent to the hospital, authorities said.Xi and other party leaders visited the remains of former leader Mao Zedong and attended a ceremony to pay tribute to deceased national heroes in the square on Monday morning, according to the official Xinhua News Agency.Hong Kong's 'Frontliners' Say They're Ready to Die for MovementChief Executive Carrie Lam will lead a delegation to Beijing to participate in celebrations, meaning she'll be out of the city during the holiday. She will return to Hong Kong in the evening via the border city of Shenzhen, and the city's No. 2 official, Matthew Cheung, will be its acting leader in her absence.Hong Kong's government canceled the city's annual National Day fireworks on the waterfront, citing safety concerns, and banned a planned rally by major pro-democracy organizer, the Civil Human Rights Front. The group's appeal was denied by authorities on Monday, its co-convener Jimmy Sham said.Demonstrations have rocked the Asian financial hub since early June, triggered by proposed legislation allowing extraditions to China and since morphing into a broader push back against Beijing's grip.Lam, who had tried to push the bill through before protests erupted, assumed responsibility for the "entire unrest" as she held her first community dialogue event last week -- a bid to assuage demonstrators ahead of Oct. 1.China Screens Patriotic Movies to Whip Up Nationalistic FervorTuesday's rallies have been planned in six districts that have seen some of the most violent protests of recent months, with most set to start in the afternoon. Spectators for a morning flag-raising ceremony in the city center will be moved indoors.Activist and protest organizer Ventus Lau was arrested Monday morning for alleged offenses including criminal damage and trespassing in the the city's Legislative Council chamber -- which was broken into by protesters on July 1 -- a friend told Lau's media WhatsApp group. Local actor Gregory Wong was also arrested on similar charges, activist Nathan Law wrote on his Facebook page.At one point during scuffles outside a subway station in the Wan Chai area Sunday, an officer fired a warning shot into the sky."Some police officers were surrounded and attacked by a large group of violent protesters," the Hong Kong police said. "With their lives under serious threat, an officer fired one warning shot into the sky to protect their own safety."(Adds details of Xi's speech from first paragraph.)\--With assistance from Iain Marlow and John Liu.To contact the reporters on this story: Natalie Lung in Hong Kong at flung6@bloomberg.net;Peter Martin in Beijing at pmartin138@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Brendan Scott at bscott66@bloomberg.net, Daniel Ten KateFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| U.K.'s Johnson Confronts Moment of Truth for Brexit Strategy Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:52 PM PDT ![U.K.'s Johnson Confronts Moment of Truth for Brexit Strategy]( "U.K.'s Johnson Confronts Moment of Truth for Brexit Strategy") (Bloomberg) -- British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is facing the moment of truth for his Brexit strategy as he prepares to present his blueprint for a deal to the European Union in days.The reception his plan receives in Brussels and among pro-Brexit members of his ruling Conservative Party will determine whether there is any hope of securing an orderly exit for the U.K. by the end of this month.If Johnson's strategy fails, he will face a choice between seeking another delay to the Oct. 31 deadline -- something he says he will never do -- or trying to force the country out of the EU with no deal, which his opponents in Parliament have moved to stop.While there are signs that purist euroskeptics in Johnson's Tory party are willing to compromise and back a deal to secure Brexit, it is not clear that the premier's draft legal agreement will be acceptable to the EU.The U.K. is due to leave the EU on Oct. 31 and Johnson says he is determined to deliver Brexit on time -- even if that means doing so with no deal to cushion the impact on trade.Any agreement must pass through Parliament in London but Johnson's predecessor, Theresa May, tried and failed three times to win backing for the contract she negotiated with the bloc. The key sticking point remains how to ensure there are no checks on goods crossing the land border between the U.K. and Ireland.For Johnson, a key demand is to ensure Britain is not trapped indefinitely in the so-called "backstop" arrangement, which would tie the U.K. into the EU's customs rules, defeating the point of Brexit.But there is a risk that what Johnson is asking for is unacceptable in Brussels. Irish broadcaster RTE reported late Monday that the U.K. has proposed customs checks five to 10 miles away from the Irish border. That may be rejected by the EU side.A U.K. government spokesman said Johnson was not proposing any customs controls at the Irish border. One British official added that Johnson's team expected most checks on goods to take place away from the frontier, either at dedicated premises or at the destination. It would be up to the customs authorities to decide where to conduct checks.Johnson is vowing to use the final month before Brexit day to step up efforts to get a deal that will be acceptable in both Brussels and London. He's likely to present his plans in Brussels later this week. The EU wants to know that any deal it signs will win the backing of the U.K. Parliament.The most difficult group Johnson needs to win over is arguably the 28 so-called "Spartans" -- pro-Brexit Conservatives who voted against May's deal three times and ultimately forced her out of office.When May tried to persuade hardline Tory euro-skeptics to back her agreement, they refused because they believed a purer form of Brexit option was available. This time, they're not sure that's true."It's no longer a question of 'we could do better,'" Andrew Rosindell, one of the Spartans, said in an interview. "We've reached the end of the road."The Tory hardliners on their own aren't enough to pass a deal. Johnson would still probably need the support of Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party, and some Labour MPs. Here, too, there were positive signs on Monday.DUP leader Arlene Foster said she's willing to look at the idea of a time-limit on the contentious Irish border "backstop" -- a policy designed to ensure there are no checks on goods crossing the U.K.-Ireland frontier. If a deal looked close to passing, some of the more than 20 Labour MPs who have said they'd be willing to vote for one might do so, to get Brexit finished.Greek WarriorsIn September, members of Parliament took the unprecedented step of forcing through a new law -- against the government's wishes -- to stop Johnson enacting his threat to exit the EU with no deal. That radical move has changed the calculation for the so-called Spartans.The group takes its name from the Greek warriors who held off the Persians at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC.Some of these pro-Brexit Tories fear that Johnson could be forced to delay Brexit again, and would then find himself fighting a general election having broken a promise to get Britain out of the EU. The Tories would then be vulnerable to losing votes to the Brexit Party of Nigel Farage, and ultimately at risk of being ousted by Jeremy Corbyn's Labour."An extension this time would mean an election," Rosindell said in Manchester, England, where the Tories are holding their annual conference. "If we hadn't got out by Oct. 31, the chances of a Corbyn government are very high."He's not the only hardliner showing a willingness to compromise. Mark Francois, deputy chairman of the pro-Brexit European Research Group, told a meeting at the Conservative conference that some form of "backstop" to deal with the contentious issue of how goods moved between Northern Ireland, in the U.K., and Ireland, still in the EU, wasn't necessarily a problem."If there is some form of deal, be it over the backstop or anything else, then I and my colleagues will look at it and read it very carefully," he said. "At the end of the day, we're talking about international treaty law. My acid test will be does it genuinely mean we leave the EU."One of the government officials involved in drafting the British proposal said it would be acceptable to the Brexit hardliners.According to Rosindell, they're now a receptive audience. "Boris will be in a much better position than Theresa was six months ago," he said. "It's much more likely that we would vote for it, if it's an improved deal."\--With assistance from Ian Wishart and Kitty Donaldson.To contact the reporters on this story: Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.net;Tim Ross in Manchester, England at tross54@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Emma Ross-ThomasFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| China to mark 70 years of communism with massive show of force in Beijing Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:34 PM PDT ![China to mark 70 years of communism with massive show of force in Beijing]( "China to mark 70 years of communism with massive show of force in Beijing") China will celebrate seven decades of communist rule on Tuesday with a display of power through central Beijing, showing off goose-stepping troops, new missiles and floats celebrating the country's technological prowess. The event is the country's most important of the year as China looks to project an image of confidence in the face of mounting challenges, including three months of anti-government protests in the territory of Hong Kong and a bitter trade war with the United States. President Xi Jinping will oversee a massed military parade, with 15,000 troops marching through part of Tiananmen Square, as jet fighters scream overhead.
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| Rouhani reportedly refused to take call with Trump and Macron during UN stay Posted: 30 Sep 2019 03:40 PM PDT  Iranian leader did not, at any point, show interest in a conversation despite the French president setting up a secure phone lineEmmanuel Macron, the French president, attempted to facilitate a three-way phone call with Hassan Rouhani and Donald Trump, reports say. Photograph: Ludovic Marin/AFP/Getty ImagesEmmanuel Macron's efforts to persuade Hassan Rouhani to talk to his US counterpart went as far as installing a secure telephone line on the same hotel floor where the Iranian president was staying, it was reported on Monday.Rouhani, however did not take the call offered by Macron last week, and stayed in his New York hotel room when the French president arrived to try to coax him into a conversation with Donald Trump, according to several accounts.The story was first published in the New Yorker on Monday, and then the New York Times. It was confirmed to the Guardian by sources familiar with Tuesday's events, who stressed that at no point did Rouhani show interest in such a conversation with Macron and Trump.In a desperate bid to engineer a three-way conversation, Macron had French technicians set up a line last Tuesday evening in a meeting room at the Millenium Hotel, across the road from the UN general assembly.Rouhani was informed that as soon as he entered the room the conversation could start.For months, Macron has been promoting a plan aimed at defusing tensions in the Persian Gulf, exchanging US sanctions relief for full Iranian compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal and Tehran's agreement to pursue broader talks.Trump, however, has been ratcheting up sanctions in recent weeks and announced more punitive measures in his speech to the UN earlier the same day Macron wanted Rouhani to talk to him.Iran's economy has been hard hit by a US oil and banking embargo, and diplomatic sources in New York said it was never remotely likely Rouhani would speak to Trump without sanctions relief.The Iranian president spoke by phone to Barack Obama at the UN in 2013 without the prior consent of Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, and was heavily criticised after returning home.Rouhani said on Monday that a return was possible to multilateral talks established at the time of the 2015 nuclear deal, that would include the US as part of a group of six major powers known as the P5+1.According to the Entekhab news site, Rouhani said "there was some readiness created for the P5+1" and that "all 7 countries [Iran and the US] reached agreement over the P5+1 framework".Rouhani said he would reveal more details at a cabinet meeting on Wednesday.Iranian officials said that any direct contacts with the US would only be possible after sanctions imposed by the US over the past year are removed.
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| Lawyers for Huawei CFO detail record requests to prove her rights were violated Posted: 30 Sep 2019 03:29 PM PDT  Lawyers for Huawei Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou detailed a list of emails, notes and other records they are seeking to prove that her rights were violated before her December arrest at Vancouver's airport, according to a court document released on Monday. Meng, 47, was arrested at the airport on Dec. 1 at the request of the United States, where she is charged with bank fraud and accused of misleading the bank HSBC about Huawei Technologies Co Ltd's business in Iran. In the British Columbia Supreme Court, Meng's lawyers are seeking further documentation from Canada's Department of Justice (DOJ), the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP).
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| China celebrates 70 years as Hong Kong unrest looms large Posted: 30 Sep 2019 03:00 PM PDT  China celebrates 70 years of Communist Party supremacy Tuesday with a parade of tanks, missiles and troops, a muscular display of its rising superpower status even as it faces an unprecedented challenge to its authority in seething Hong Kong. Authorities in Beijing have closed roads, banned the flying of kites, and shut some bars as they tightened security for an event celebrating China's journey from a country broken by war and poverty to being the world's second-largest economy. The massive military parade will roll across Tiananmen Square under the gaze of President Xi Jinping, the country's most powerful leader since Mao Zedong, who founded the People's Republic of China on October 1, 1949.
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| 'Jail them!': Brexit divisions rise on fringes of UK Tory meet Posted: 30 Sep 2019 02:49 PM PDT  Shouts of "jail them!" rang out at the UK Conservative party conference, as talk turned to the lawmakers who voted against Prime Minister Boris Johnson's strategy on Brexit. The flash of hostility in an otherwise largely upbeat and disciplined annual conference in Manchester, northwest England, reveals how deep tensions are running in the governing party. Few of the rebels are at this week's party meeting, where ministers fill the main stage and the airways with promises to "Get Brexit done", and moderates are consigned to the fringes.
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| The Latest: UN envoy says Syria charter panel a sign of hope Posted: 30 Sep 2019 02:42 PM PDT  The U.N. special envoy for Syria says the convening of a committee to draft a new constitution for Syria on Oct. 30 "should be a sign of hope for the long-suffering Syrian people" — but it will matter only if it becomes a step out of the more than eight-year conflict. Geir Pedersen told the U.N. Security Council on Monday on the sidelines of the General Assembly meeting that the committee alone cannot resolve the conflict.
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| Colombia offers new Venezuela rebel info after photo fiasco Posted: 30 Sep 2019 02:28 PM PDT  BOGOTÁ, Colombia (AP) — Authorities in Colombia doubled down Monday on their claim that guerrilla troops are operating in Venezuela with the support of President Nicolás Maduro a week after similar allegations presented at the United Nations were marred by erroneous photographs. Colombia's Ministry of Defense released new images showing now-captured or deceased rebels posing for photographs in front of Venezuelan monuments. The presentation also contains purported letters from Colombian rebels talking about their activities inside the neighboring Andean nation.
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| Unleashed from Trump, Bolton says N.Korea still seeks nukes Posted: 30 Sep 2019 02:27 PM PDT  John Bolton warned Monday that North Korea had not truly chosen to give up nuclear weapons in the hawk's first public appearance since he left as President Donald Trump's national security advisor. At a think-tank conference on North Korea, Bolton said he could now "speak in unvarnished terms" about the "grave threat" posed by the regime of Kim Jong Un, who has courted Trump. "It seems to be clear that the DPRK has not made a strategic decision to give up its nuclear weapons," Bolton said, referencing the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
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| Modi Wants to Take Away India’s Plastic Bags and Spoons Posted: 30 Sep 2019 02:00 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- India has a mammoth plastic waste problem and no easy way to dispose of the 9.4 million tons it generates each year.Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to fix that. Fresh from his campaign to provide tens of millions of toilets for India's citizens, he's now aiming to limit the consumption of single-use plastic -- bags, cups, straws, disposable cutlery -- and eliminate its use by 2022. The initiative, to be launched Wednesday, marks the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi who wanted everyone to "be his own scavenger."Unlike scrap metal that's recycled almost entirely, about 90% of the plastic the world has produced so far has been discarded as waste, resulting in global environmental and social damage of more than $2.2 trillion every year. More than 60 countries have so far introduced bans and levies to curb single-use plastic waste.Africa stands out as the continent where the largest number of nations have instituted a total ban on the production and use of plastic bags, according to a 2018 United Nations report. In Asia, several nations have attempted to control the manufacture and use of plastic bags through levies, but the enforcement regulations have often been poor.A crackdown on plastic in India risks jobs losses in an economy that's seeing the slowest expansion in six years and unemployment at a 45-year high, and rising.The government's ban on plastic items will disrupt the supply chain, raise the cost of goods from milk to biscuit packets, and impact the food processing and consumer goods industries, said Ankur Bisen, senior vice president with consultancy firm Technopak Advisors Pvt. in Gurugram, near New Delhi."There should be alternatives to replace plastic products," said Bisen, who has authored a book 'Wasted' on India's sanitation challenges. "The right environment should be provided to invest in recycling."Inadequate DisposalWhile India has a low per capita consumption of plastic of 11 kilograms a year, compared to 109 kilograms in the U.S, citizens have been reluctant to shun plastic as it is cheaper than other alternatives.Plastic waste is a worldwide problem, but it is acutely felt in India where towns and villages do not have adequate waste disposal systems. While about 60% of total plastic waste is recycled, the rest ends up on roadsides, landfills, lakes and oceans, eventually making way into the food chain.The federal government has already prohibited light-weight plastic carry bags, while more than of the country's states have completely banned those. Still, the enforcement of those rules is lax.Industry ResistanceIndustry lobby groups argue the move will affect small retailers, leading to the closure of plastic industries and result in job losses, while some companies are seeking government exemptions and subsidies to help them shift to alternatives, said Sadhu Ram Gupta, president of the All India Federation of Plastic Industries in Delhi.Yet global business have started seeing opportunities. Total Corbion PLA, a joint venture between French oil major Total S.A. and Dutch chemical maker Corbion NV, is holding talks with airports, consumer companies, hospitality and food delivery chains in India to offer biodegradable plastic products."If jobs shift from the plastic industry, alternatives are going to come up," said Anoop Kumar Srivastava, director at Foundation for Campaign Against Plastic Pollution in Greater Noida. "Employment opportunities will increase in eco-friendly sectors."As Modi himself is spearheading the move, the campaign is expected to be popular, following on from his 'Clean India' movement under which about 95 million toilets have been built across the country in five years.Globally, a small change in the supply of plastic carry-bags has successfully reduced their use, said Almitra Patel, who led the 1996 litigation in the Supreme Court against open dumping that led to the nation's first Municipal Solid Waste Management Rules in 2000, urging India to adopt a similar policy,"If you don't offer an alternative, people will ignore the ban," said Patel, adding the country should focus on improving the collection of plastic materials, strengthening segregation and recycling. "Banning plastic should not be our objective, banning plastic mess, its littering and careless disposal, is what we have to focus on."To contact the reporters on this story: Bibhudatta Pradhan in New Delhi at bpradhan@bloomberg.net;Vrishti Beniwal in New Delhi at vbeniwal1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Ruth Pollard at rpollard2@bloomberg.net, ;Nasreen Seria at nseria@bloomberg.net, Karthikeyan SundaramFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Russia Moves on Climate Change, While the U.S. Stalls Posted: 30 Sep 2019 01:38 PM PDT ![Russia Moves on Climate Change, While the U.S. Stalls]( "Russia Moves on Climate Change, While the U.S. Stalls") Today's AgendaAmericans will have to sacrifice to fight climate change. Trump is at war with the state itself. Stop calling Elizabeth Warren a socialist. Curbing U.S. investment in China would be disastrous. Austria's Sebastian Kurz should reject the far right.An Inconvenience Truth (Bloomberg Opinion) -- If you're like me, you ignore health problems that aren't worth the hassle of a doctor visit. Emergencies get medical attention; everything else gets WebMD. Americans are like that with climate change, except the emergency is already here.Massive storms, wildfires, droughts and more make it clear we have a worsening climate problem. But as Noah Smith points out, we can't yet be bothered to truly do anything about it. One straightforward tool for curbing carbon emissions is taxing them a bit more, for example. But we vote that down whenever it's on the ballot. Keeping warming within tolerable limits will require decades of sacrifice and upheaval far beyond a little tax. The sooner we accept that, the sooner we can solve our problem.Things may be changing at the margins. The collapse of travel agency Thomas Cook may herald the decline of the kind of the pre-packaged tourist experience it invented, writes Leonid Bershidsky. A spreading woke-ness about authentic experiences is part of this, but so is guilt over the environmental impact of living like a pasha everywhere you go.The cruise industry is a small but exemplary part of this travel-industrial complex. It has a massive negative environmental impact, Adam Minter writes, and consumers and governments are noticing. But the cruise industry is about as slow to change course as, um, a very large, ponderous watercraft. Vladimir Putin moves a bit faster. Russia has long been a climate ignorer; it even stands to benefit from unfrozen Arctic waterways. But it recently joined the Paris climate accord, and Julian Lee explains one reason why: Thawing permafrost undermines the stability of Russian oil and gas projects. That might make gasoline a bit more expensive, and we can't have that.Further Energy Reading: Oil and gas stocks avoided an embarrassing index-name change but can't avoid harsh reality. – Liam DenningImpeachoramaPresident Donald Trump continued to respond to his growing impeachment threat by watching television and tweeting. The latter included increasingly hostile attacks on the whistle-blower and Democrats; today he called for House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff to be arrested for treason. Such vitriol is a reminder that Trump's real enemy isn't some amorphous "Deep State," but the entire apparatus of state itself, writes James Gibney. If it doesn't serve him, then it must be destroyed.So far, Attorney General William Barr has been on the Trump-friendly side of the divide, helping him snuff out his little Mueller Report problem and also swatting down the whistle-blower complaint about Trump's dealings with Ukraine. In fact, writes Stephen Mihm, the Justice Department has a long history of cronies holding the job. Barr keeps that tradition alive.Still, Trump's jeopardy grows the more we learn about what's on the secret White House server where staffers quarantined his most toxic conversations. Tim O'Brien notes Trump has always hated leaving a paper trail. Now there's one that includes much more of interest to an impeachment inquiry than just his chat with Ukraine's president.Warren's No SocialistWall Street is apparently terrified of an Elizabeth Warren presidency; even Democratic fundraisers would rather keep Trump around another four years than face the horrors of a Warren administration. But she's getting a bad rap, writes Joe Nocera. Warren favors capitalism over socialism; she just wants it to be more fair. Wall Street hated FDR too, Joe notes, but he restored faith in financial markets by reforming them. Even on health care, she has not exactly been a Medicare for All zealot, writes Max Nisen.Trump's Dangerous China ThreatStocks rebounded today partly on hopes Trump will come to his senses about curbing U.S. investment in China, which would have devastating repercussions, John Authers notes. For one thing, it would give China incentive to start selling Treasury bonds, writes Shuli Ren. For another, American investors already are woefully underweight China stocks, which will probably outperform U.S. stocks for the foreseeable future, writes Nir Kaissar. And turning financial markets into political weapons would set a terrible precedent for the world. Further China Reading: Starbucks Inc. must walk a fine line in Hong Kong between fostering its China expansion and not openly opposing the protesters. – Nisha Gopalan Austria's Do-OverAustrian political wunderkind (if you can call a 33-year-old a wunderkind) Sebastian Kurz seems headed back to the chancellorship after his center-right party won a plurality in snap elections. The first time he got the job, he partnered with the far-right Freedom Party. That was a disaster that cost him his government, and he shouldn't make the same mistake again, Bloomberg's editorial board writes. Leonid Bershidsky suggests he'll probably form a coalition with the surging Greens, which could be a harbinger of what's to come in Germany.Bonus Editorial: California should jump on a proposal to ease the state's housing crisis by helping homeowners rent out parts of their property. Telltale ChartsMillennials will soon be the biggest demographic in the U.S. economy. Can they help it boom again? Brian Chappatta and Elaine He look at their balance sheets and find they're making and saving money but aren't building wealth and are weighed down by student loan debt.Forever 21's woes show the tide has turned against fast fashion, writes Sarah Halzack. Further ReadingBoeing Co.'s safety overhaul is an overdue step in the right direction. – Brooke SutherlandWeWork says it's only temporarily shelving its IPO; junk bond investors don't seem to believe it. – Brian Chappatta A crisis is growing in German industry. – Chris Bryant Turkey's finance minister looks back on the recovery from last year's turbulence. – Berat Albayrak How long must we sing Bono's Irish tax-rate song? – Lionel Laurent ICYMIRep. Chris Collins of New York resigned from Congress ahead of an insider-trading plea. Cape Town's great white sharks are missing.What's your wealth number?KickersWorms with three sexes thrive in arsenic-poisoned lake. (h/t Mike Smedley)California college athletes can get paid now.China grew two cotton leaves on the Moon.Every "Breaking Bad" episode, ranked.Note: Please send cotton leaves and complaints to Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.net.New to Bloomberg Opinion Today? Sign up here and follow us on Twitter and Facebook.To contact the author of this story: Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Mary Duenwald at mduenwald@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Mark Gongloff is an editor with Bloomberg Opinion. He previously was a managing editor of Fortune.com, ran the Huffington Post's business and technology coverage, and was a columnist, reporter and editor for the Wall Street Journal.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Bolton critical of North Korea in first speech since ouster Posted: 30 Sep 2019 12:09 PM PDT  Former national security adviser John Bolton gave a characteristically pessimistic outlook on the prospects for getting North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons as he made his first public appearance since he was ousted from his post by President Donald Trump. Bolton challenged a centerpiece of Trump's foreign policy without directly discussing the president in a speech Monday to a Korean security forum and the question-and-answer session that followed. The North Korean leader has made a "strategic decision" to do whatever he can to keep his country's nuclear weapons, and that is an "unacceptable" threat to the world, the famously hawkish former U.N. ambassador said.
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| Gen. Milley faces challenges as next Joint Chiefs chairman Posted: 30 Sep 2019 12:05 PM PDT  Army Gen. Mark Milley is taking over as the nation's top military officer against a backdrop of controversy over defense aid to Ukraine that has triggered a presidential impeachment inquiry at a time of persistent threats from China, Russia and Iran. Milley, who was sworn in during a rain-soaked ceremony Monday at Joint Base Myer-Henderson, will officially become chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and President Donald Trump's top military adviser at midnight. In a brief speech Monday, Milley told Trump, "You can rest assured that I will always provide you informed, candid, impartial military advice to you." And he vowed to maintain the high quality of the world's preeminent fighting force.
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| U.K. Is Ready to Show EU Its Draft Divorce Deal: Brexit Update Posted: 30 Sep 2019 11:48 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Follow @Brexit, sign up to our Brexit Bulletin, and tell us your Brexit story. The U.K. government has completed the draft legal text of a Brexit deal and will send it to European Union officials this week, people familiar with the matter said. The development built on hints that staunch Brexit supporters in Britain's ruling Conservative Party could back a deal if prime minister Boris Johnson secures one in talks with the EU.Johnson is in Manchester at a party conference that's been overshadowed by allegations of sexual misconduct. He insists he will lead the U.K. out of the EU next month with or without a deal.Key Developments:U.K. government is set to present detailed legal text on a deal as early as Thursday, people familiar with the matter said Brexit hardliner Mark Francois signals he would consider any deal, even if it includes an Irish border backstop -- the most controversial part of the previous dealOpposition politicians trying to oust Johnson met in London but didn't come up with any concrete new movesChancellor Sajid Javid announces higher minimum wage and infrastructure spendingU.K. Completes Draft Legal Text of a Deal ( 7:30 p.m.) Boris Johnson's officials have finished working on a draft legal text of a Brexit deal, aimed at resolving the impasse that has held up an agreement between the U.K. and the EU, according to people familiar with the matter.The text contains a proposal to allow the U.K. to exit the contentious "backstop" plan for avoiding goods checks at the Irish border. It could be presented to European officials in talks as early as Thursday or Friday, the people familiar with the plans said.One of the people said there is a clear shape to a potential deal with the EU but the biggest sticking point is the EU's insistence that Northern Ireland must remain part of its customs union. Britain wants to ensure it can leave the backstop and one option could be a time-limit, one person suggested.It's not clear whether the EU will agree to this as Johnson's predecessor administration was warned that a time limit on the backstop would be unacceptable in Brussels.EU Won't Allow U.K. to Start From Zero on Deal (6 p.m.)A senior European Union official closely involved with the Brexit negotiations suggested the U.K. will have little chance of leaving the bloc on Oct. 31 if the deal Boris Johnson proposes is substantially different from the one obtained by his predecessor Theresa May.Any new proposal would have to be negotiated with the EU, translated into legal text, win support from the House of Commons, and then get consent from the bloc's remaining 27 governments. That's difficult within 30 days even if it's not a lot different than what's currently on the table, the official said.But indications are that Johnson wants to rip up the backstop mechanism for the Irish border and start again, and that would take far more time, the official said. Starting from zero would be seen by the EU as a completely unacceptable way of going about things, the official said.CBI Warns: Don't Normalize No-Deal Brexit (5:15 p.m.)Politicians shouldn't normalize the idea of a no-deal Brexit on Oct. 31, Confederation of British Industry Director-General Carolyn Fairbairn said in an interview at the Tory Party conference in Manchester. "It is an impossibility" for companies to fully prepare for such an eventuality, which would leave the U.K. "mired in uncertainty for years to come," she said.Corbyn Won't Oust Johnson Until No-Deal Risk Over (4 p.m.)Opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said his party would not seek a vote of no confidence in the government until after a no-deal Brexit is off the table.In a pooled interview after talks with other opposition leaders (2:50 p.m.), Corbyn said the priority is to force Boris Johnson to comply with legislation -- known as the Benn Act -- to prevent a no-deal Brexit. That forces the premier to seek an extension if no agreement is reached with the EU by Oct. 19."We'll continue putting that pressure on the government," Corbyn said, according to the Press Association.Meanwhile there's no sign the Liberal Democrats are prepared to drop their opposition to Corbyn as a caretaker prime minister in a government of national unity. "He simply doesn't have the numbers," leader Jo Swinson said in broadcast comments to reporters.Brexiteer Francois Will Consider Backing Deal (3:40 p.m.)Hardline Tory Brexiteer Mark Francois hinted that the inclusion of an Irish border backstop in any exit deal wouldn't necessarily be a block to him backing it."If there is some form of deal, be it over the backstop or anything else, then I and my colleagues will look at it and read it very carefully," he said. "At the end of the day, we're talking about international treaty law. My acid test will be does it genuinely mean we leave the EU."That's potentially a hint at a softening in the die-hards' tone.No Inquiry Into Shorting Pound, Minister Says (3 p.m.)U.K. Treasury Minister Simon Clarke said there are no grounds for an investigation into a conflict of interest over links between Boris Johnson and investors shorting the pound.It is a "tin foil hat conspiracy" that those backing Johnson stand to make substantial amounts of money from his policy pledging to leave the EU without a deal if necessary on Oct. 31, Clarke said (see 1:45 p.m.)."We believe it's sensible for currency to find its own level," Clarke told MPs in the House of Commons. "I believe Sterling will find a stable level in every different scenario."Asked about moves by Hedge Fund manager Crispin Odey, Clarke said he would not comment on individuals and "we do not take a position on the issue of short selling." Investors are "entitled to hedge," he said.Opposition Parties Keep Meeting to Block No-Deal (2:50 p.m.)Opposition parties will continue to meet in the coming days as they try to find a way to prevent a no-deal Brexit.SNP member of Parliament Ian Blackford told Sky News his party still wants a vote of no-confidence but "we want to do that on the basis of the other parties coming with us as well." A government of national unity remains an option, he said.Former Minister Says No-Deal Could Bring Corbyn (2 p.m.)Former Justice Secretary David Gauke, expelled from the Tory Party for defying Johnson over Brexit, warned that leaving the bloc without a deal, could usher in a Labour government led by socialist Jeremy Corbyn."I worry delivering no-deal would create the circumstances in which a hard-left Labour Party could win a majority," he told a fringe meeting at the Conservative Party conference.The Tories "would own a no-deal Brexit and if it is anything like as bad as the consensus view on the impact of the economy, we would be out on our ear at the next election."Francois Leaves Door Open to Backing Brexit Deal (1:55 p.m.)Mark Francois, deputy chairman of the pro-Brexit European Research Group -- the caucus of hardline Tory Brexiteers who blocked Theresa May's deal with the EU -- hinted at a meeting at the Conservative Party Conference the conditions under which he'd vote for a Brexit deal ."It rather depends what's in it," he said. "If it means that we genuinely leave the EU at Halloween, then I will be the first in the Aye lobby. If it really means we don't then I will be against it, and no amount of browbeating by anybody will make me change my mind."That got a big round of applause, but it's an interestingly subjective judgement and leaves Francois room to decide that a new deal does represent Brexit.Question in Parliament on Shorting Pound (1:45 p.m.)John McDonnell, Treasury spokesman for the opposition Labour Party, will ask the government about short positions being taken against the pound in an "urgent Question" to ministers at 2:30 p.m.The question follows comments from former Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond and Boris Johnson's sister, Rachel, claiming that "speculators" among the prime minister's financial backers stand to make large amounts of money from a no-deal Brexit."As his sister has reminded us, he is backed by speculators who have bet billions on a hard Brexit -- and there is only one outcome that works for them: a crash-out no-deal Brexit that sends the currency tumbling and inflation soaring," Hammond wrote in the Times on Saturday. " They, at least, will be reassured to see no evidence at all that his Government has seriously pursued a deliverable deal."McDonnell wrote to Cabinet Secretary Mark Sedwill at the weekend asking him to investigate potential conflicts of interest in Johnson's policy to leave the EU with or without a deal by Oct. 31. Hedge funds and other large speculators trimmed their net short positions against the pound last week, according to data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.Rees-Mogg Says No Majority for Revoking Brexit (1:30 p.m.)Leader of the House of Commons Jacob Rees-Mogg said anti-Brexit MPs, who he referred to as "remoaners" should "show the color of their money" and propose revoking Article 50 in Parliament to see if a majority would back it.Rees-Mogg told a meeting on the fringes of the Conservative Party conference "I think we will leave on Oct. 31."Minister: Johnson Sex Claims Are 'Desperate' (12:45 p.m.)Business minister Kwasi Kwarteng attacked the people behind allegations of sexual impropriety against Johnson, saying they were a "desperate" attempt to "destabilize" the government's work.Kwarteng told Bloomberg in Manchester he believes the prime minister's denial of claims he groped journalist Charlotte Edwardes 20 years ago."What it says to me is that people are desperate because they see Boris as someone who is a winner and they take him seriously as a threat -- and that's why they are trying to destabilize," Kwarteng said. "I think the prime minister should be allowed to get on with his job and run the country."He said he did not know anything about the allegations, was not saying anything about Edwardes, and was "not interested in" the investigations into Johnson's links to businesswoman Jennifer Arcuri.Johnson Denies Groping Allegation (12:20 p.m.)Prime Minister Boris Johnson denied touching journalist Charlotte Edwardes's thigh 20 years ago, and said voters are more interested in his government's infrastructure spending plans.Asked in a pooled television interview if the allegation is true, Johnson replied: "No, and I think what the public want to hear is about what we're doing to level-up and unite the country."Johnson then listed planned road investments and said the government has "revolutionary" plans for buses. "Buses transform people's lives," he said. "If you have a good bus route it gives you access to employment that hardly any other transport mode can."EU Needs 'Legally Operational Solutions' (12:10 p.m.)EU officials said they're pleased the U.K. is ready to offer something more constructive to solve the deadlock (see 12 p.m.) but the devil would be in the detail and it couldn't be more of the same vague ideas that didn't solve the problems of the Irish border -- or promised to solve them at a later date."It's the U.K.'s responsibility to come forward with legally operational solutions that are compatible with the withdrawal agreement," European Commission spokeswoman Mina Andreeva told reporters in Brussels on Monday. "Then the commission is, and remains, open to examine whether such proposals meet the objectives of the backstop."U.K. to Show EU More Detailed Proposals (12 p.m.)British negotiators will present further proposals to their European Union counterparts at the end of this week, which will contain more detail on the government's solutions for the Irish border, a U.K. official said.In a change from the practice so far in talks since Boris Johnson became prime minister, the proposals will be left with the EU, rather than shown to them and taken away, according to the official, who was speaking on condition of anonymity.Johnson's team has so far been reluctant to hand over formal papers because they would be quickly disseminated to EU capitals and leaked to the media. The willingness to leave the papers with the EU suggests the U.K. is getting closer to its final position in the talks.This week's proposals -- which will be more detailed than anything submitted so far -- will cover areas where the EU has asked for more detail, including building on proposals for an agri-food zone for the whole of Ireland, the official said.Grieve: Law Means Confidence Vote Not Yet Needed (11 a.m.)Former Attorney General Dominic Grieve said he thinks legislation designed to prevent a no-deal Brexit -- known as the Benn Act -- is "robust" and means members of Parliament do not need to hold a no-confidence vote in the government prior to the legislation taking effect on Oct. 19."I'm always vigilant but I think the Benn Act is fit for purpose," Grieve said.Grieve said the key question is what happens after a Brexit delay is secured, likely until Jan. 31. A second referendum is the best way out of the impasse, he said, adding that the numbers are likely there in Parliament for a government of national unity to deliver one."But it very much depends on whether the Labour Party leadership are prepared to back it and accept the reality that it cannot be led by the Leader of the Opposition," he said, referring to Jeremy Corbyn.Grieve's comments come ahead of a meeting between Corbyn and other opposition party leaders in Westminster, as splits emerge over how to prevent a no-deal Brexit. The Liberal Democrats have made clear they're not prepared to back Corbyn as a caretaker premier, while there are also divisions over the timing of when to try to bring down the government. The Scottish National Party has indicated a no-confidence vote should be held sooner than later.Javid Says No One Knows Cost of No-Deal Brexit (Earlier)Asked about the cost to the economy of a no-deal Brexit, Javid told the BBC: "I don't think anyone really knows the full proper answer to that question."But he promised a fiscal response and said the Bank of England would also act.He declined to say how the government will pursue a no-deal exit now that Parliament has passed a law to block it. Asked if he knew what the government's strategy was, he said: "I think I do."Javid Says He Trusts Johnson On Grope Allegation (Earlier)Javid said he's received a personal denial from the prime minister of allegations that he groped a journalist at a lunch around 20 years ago."If you're referring to these allegations of personal nature that were made a couple of days ago, I've talked to the Prime Minister about that and he couldn't be clearer, absolutely clear that they are completely untrue and I totally trust him on that," he said during an interview with BBC Radio 4's Today Program.On Sunday, Health Secretary Matt Hancock retracted his comment that the matter was a personal one, after critics pointed out that the alleged touching happened in a workplace environment. He told Channel Four he trusts the journalist who made the allegation.\--With assistance from Stuart Biggs, Jessica Shankleman, Ian Wishart and Thomas Penny.To contact the reporters on this story: Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.net;Kitty Donaldson in London at kdonaldson1@bloomberg.net;Tim Ross in Manchester, England at tross54@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Emma Ross-Thomas, Stuart BiggsFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Brexit-Backing Hedge Fund Boss Odey Rejects Conflict Claims Posted: 30 Sep 2019 11:20 AM PDT ![Brexit-Backing Hedge Fund Boss Odey Rejects Conflict Claims]( "Brexit-Backing Hedge Fund Boss Odey Rejects Conflict Claims") (Bloomberg) -- Hedge fund manager Crispin Odey is a Brexit supporter and he's shorting the pound. But he dismisses allegations that Prime Minister Boris Johnson's links with investors like him amount to a conflict of interest."What they're thinking is: can we show that the people who back Boris are unpatriotic, have no interest in the U.K. and basically are only there to try and make money out of the suffering of others," Odey said by phone on Monday. "That's what they are trying to do. The answer is it's all crap."Former Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond and Boris Johnson's sister, Rachel, have said recently that "speculators" among the prime minister's financial backers stand to make large amounts of money from a no-deal Brexit. Treasury Minister Simon Clarke said in Parliament on Monday that there are no grounds for an investigation of the claims, which he derided as a "tinfoil-hat conspiracy."For all the outcry about Odey's bets against the pound, they haven't exactly made him or his investors rich. The short position he built up before the Brexit referendum in mid-2016 initially made about 220 million pounds ($270 million) when the currency plunged after voters backed withdrawal from the European Union. But those gains drained away in a matter of weeks as markets rallied, and he ended the year down nearly 50%.Flagship FundOdey said Johnson's opponents are trying to sully him by implying that his backers will benefit from the sort of Brexit that the prime minister has promised to deliver. "But the answer is Boris is sensible enough," Odey said. "He doesn't talk to me."This year, as Parliament battles bitterly before the Oct. 31 Brexit deadline, Odey's still betting against the pound, and his flagship fund, Odey European Inc., is down 14.2% through Sept. 26, according to a spokesman for the firm.What's more, Odey has trimmed his bet against the pound to about 10% of the flagship's total currency exposure at the end of August, according to a letter sent to investors on Monday and seen by Bloomberg. Another bet on a fall in the value of long-dated U.K. government debt was cut to 17.5% from 60% a month earlier, the letter shows.And Odey's not alone. Hedge funds and other large speculators trimmed their net short positions in the past two weeks, according to data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Their bets against the pound in August were the most bearish since early 2017. The pound was the best-performing Group of 10 currency in September.Argentina WagersOdey's recent losses are largely the result of ill-timed bets made since mid-August. His main fund lost a fifth of its value in the month through mid-September, with most of the decline resulting from wagers gone wrong in Argentina. His firm's biggest short bet by value, against Lancashire Holdings Ltd., also didn't help as the stock rose this month.When Clarke, the Treasury minister, was asked about Odey in Parliament on Monday, he declined to comment on individuals and said the government isn't taking a position on the issue of short-selling. Investors are "entitled to hedge," he said.When Odey learned that his name had come up in the lawmakers' debate, he replied: "Fame at last!"(Updates with Odey comment in second paragraph.)To contact the reporter on this story: Nishant Kumar in London at nkumar173@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Shelley Robinson at ssmith118@bloomberg.net, Patrick Henry, Sree Vidya BhaktavatsalamFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| World leaders pay final tribute to France's Chirac Posted: 30 Sep 2019 10:38 AM PDT  Dozens of world leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, on Monday paid their final respects to ex-president Jacques Chirac as France held a national day of mourning for the popular former head of state. Putin, former US president Bill Clinton and other dignitaries joined President Emmanuel Macron for a funeral service at Saint-Sulpice church in Paris, a day after 7,000 people queued to view Chirac's coffin at Invalides military hospital and museum.
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| John Bolton used his first major public appearance since leaving the White House to criticize Trump's North Korea policy Posted: 30 Sep 2019 10:17 AM PDT ![John Bolton used his first major public appearance since leaving the White House to criticize Trump's North Korea policy]( "John Bolton used his first major public appearance since leaving the White House to criticize Trump's North Korea policy") Former National Security Adviser John Bolton is out of the White House, but he's not done talking about the United States' foreign policy.Bolton spoke about the Trump administration's approach toward North Korea in less-than-glowing terms Monday during a talk at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. He reportedly said the U.S. should stop trying to organize summits between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and instead opt for a tougher path that could ultimately include regime change or even military force to halt North Korea's nuclear program."I don't think the North Koreans will ever voluntarily give up enough," Bolton said, referring to the negotiation strategy, which remains Washington's preferred option at the moment. "There is no basis to trust any promise that regime makes."Bolton also reportedly added that the White House is not being harsh enough when it comes to North Korea's United Nations Security Council violations.As The Washington Post notes, Bolton's comments are hardly surprising -- he has long held a reputation for favoring forceful foreign policy -- and his opinion, frankly, doesn't carry any actual decision-making weight at the moment. Still, his willingness to coyly, but publicly criticize the White House does raise some questions as to whether Bolton could eventually serve as a witness in the Democrats' impeachment inquiry, the Post reports. Read more at The Washington Post.
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| North Korea blames U.S. for failure to restart talks Posted: 30 Sep 2019 10:15 AM PDT  North Korea blamed the United States on Monday for a failure to restart stalled talks, more than a year after President Donald Trump's first meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. North Korea said this month it was willing to restart talks in late September but Washington needed to adopt a fresh approach. In a speech at the U.N. General Assembly, Pyongyang's U.N. ambassador Kim Song said it was time for Washington to share proposals for talks.
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| U.K. Business Warns Against ‘Normalizing’ No-Deal Split From EU Posted: 30 Sep 2019 09:14 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Follow @Brexit, sign up to our Brexit Bulletin, and tell us your Brexit story. The possibility of the leaving the European Union without an agreement shouldn't be "normalized," the leader of the U.K.'s biggest business lobby group said as she warned of the "extraordinary uncertainty" it would trigger.An extension to the Oct. 31 Brexit deadline would prolong the limbo in which British companies find themselves, but would be "preferable to no-deal by a very large margin," Confederation of British Industry Director-General Carolyn Fairbairn said in an interview."We are 21 working days from a potential overnight rupture with our biggest trading partners of the past 40 years, and it's become normalized," Fairbairn said. "It's very important there's no complacency about that."Fairbairn issued her warning at the annual conference of Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party, at which minister after minister stressed the importance of getting Brexit done by Oct. 31 -- even if it means doing so without a deal."It's incredibly important thing for everyone to understand business cannot be fully prepared for no deal: it is an impossibility," she said. "It's very important that that myth is not allowed to become conventional wisdom."Spending BoostChancellor of the Exchequer Sajid Javid has ramped up spending on preparations for leaving the bloc without an agreement, and at the weekend pledged a no-deal Brexit "guarantee" worth 16.6 billion pounds ($20.4 billion). The government has repeatedly said Britain will be ready for such an eventuality."The impact of a no-deal Brexit would be to trigger a whole new phase of the most extraordinary uncertainty," Fairbairn said. "We'd need to have tens or hundreds, if not thousands, of side deals to be able to cope with the impact of no-deal on borders, on Northern Ireland, on tariffs, on people. We'd be mired in uncertainty for years to come."The government says it wants a deal, but that the deadline for leaving must be adhered to."The problem that we have is that this has been an endless debate. The referendum took place three and a half years ago -- people have gone to university and graduated in that time," Business Minister Kwasi Kwarteng said in an interview. "We've got to end this without just reiterating the question."A group of opposition parties are working with former Conservative members of Parliament to stop a no-deal departure, and have passed legislation to force the premier to delay Brexit if he hasn't got a deal approved by Oct. 19.Fairbairn said the CBI is "trying to stay completely out of the politics," but acknowledged "yes, we do talk to them," when asked about the anti-no-deal coalition. "But we also talk to the government, we talk to the opposition, we talk to all parties."\--With assistance from Tim Ross and Kitty Donaldson.To contact the reporter on this story: Alex Morales in London at amorales2@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Thomas Penny, Stuart BiggsFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Release of Trump-Putin transcripts needs Russian approval, Kremlin says Posted: 30 Sep 2019 08:36 AM PDT  * 'If the American send us signals, then we'll discuss it' * Leaders have held at least 11 phone calls and met in personDonald Trump holds a bilateral meeting with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, at the G20 leaders summit in Osaka, Japan, in June 2019. Photograph: Kevin Lamarque/ReutersThe Kremlin has said it would need to give permission for Donald Trump to release details of his one-on-one conversations with Vladimir Putin, a likely target of Democratic lawmakers in an upcoming impeachment inquiry.Speaking with journalists on Monday, the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, said that the release of summaries or transcripts of the two leaders' discussions – details of which have remained a closely guarded secret – is "only possible with the mutual agreement of both sides"."Diplomatic practice does not allow for the publication [of these records]," Peskov said, according to the Interfax news service. "So if the Americans send us signals, then we'll discuss it."Trump and Putin have held at least 11 phone calls since Trump's inauguration, according to the Kremlin website, and also have met several times in person with only a translator present. Trump's affinity for Putin and his rejection of Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential elections have brought additional scrutiny to those conversations. The White House has released little or no information about some of the conversations.Adam Schiff, the chair of the House intelligence committee who is leading the impeachment inquiry, said in a television appearance this weekend that he would seek access to Trump's conversations with Putin as part of a growing investigation into his alleged abuse of presidential powers to aid his re-election campaign."I think the paramount need here is to protect the national security of the United States and see whether in the conversations with other world leaders – and in particular with Putin – that the president was also undermining our security in a way that he thought would personally benefit his campaign," Schiff said on NBC's Meet the Press.It is not clear how the Kremlin could stop Trump from complying if the documents are subpoenaed by Congress, although the White House could claim the documents are protected by executive privilege.Peskov's remarks can also be seen as trolling, creating the perception that Trump is compromised by his relationship with the Kremlin in a show of contempt for current US political attitudes toward Russia.Democrats have launched the impeachment inquiry into Trump's attempts to pressure the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, into investigating his political rival Joe Biden ahead of the 2020 election.According to records of a telephone call and a whistleblower complaint by a member of the intelligence community, Trump blocked military aid to Ukraine before repeatedly telling Zelenskiy on a 25 July call to speak with his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani about investigating Biden's son's business dealings in Ukraine.According to the whistleblower complaint, the Trump administration sought to restrict access to records of his conversation with Zelenskiy by putting them on a system used to hold highly sensitive and classified material. The call did not contain any information pertinent to national security, the whistleblower complaint said, but was potentially embarrassing for Trump.White House officials also sought to limit access to Trump's conversations with Putin, CNN reported on Friday, refusing to circulate transcripts of at least one telephone call among senior staff. The White House also did not make available transcripts of calls between Trump and the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, after the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, according to the news station, in an effort to prevent leaks.
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| Chinese president pledges to uphold 'one country, two systems' as Hong Kong braces for protests Posted: 30 Sep 2019 08:24 AM PDT  Chinese leader Xi Jinping stated on Monday that Beijing would continue to allow Hong Kong to handle its own affairs as anti-government protests threaten to tarnish a massive celebration honouring 70 years of Communist rule. "We will continue to fully and faithfully implement the principles of 'One country, two systems' [and] 'Hong Kong people administering Hong Kong,'" Mr Xi said, according to a printed copy of remarks given on the eve of China's National Day holiday. China's approach is to ensure that Hong Kong and its fellow semi-autonomous region of Macau "prosper and progress alongside the mainland and embrace an even brighter future," he said. Protests sweeping Hong Kong are now heading into their fifth month, posing the greatest popular challenge against Mr Xi since he took power in 2012. Such uprisings are never tolerated and instead suppressed in mainland China, though Hong Kong has long enjoyed greater freedoms. But many in the former British colony say the Communist Party is chipping away at the autonomy promised when it was returned to Beijing rule. Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks in advance of the anniversary Credit: KYODO NEWS/Naohiko Hatta - Pool/Getty Images As the unrest has continued, unease has grown over whether Beijing will send in the military to restore order – a move that would be reminiscent of the bloody Tiananmen Square crackdown in 1989 when soldiers fired on peaceful student demonstrators. Despite Mr Xi's remarks that Beijing would remain hands off in dealing with the protests, it emerged Monday that foreign envoys believed China had assembled its largest-ever active force of military troops and other anti-riot personnel in Hong Kong – estimated at as many as 12,000. The addition had been explained away by Beijing in late August as a "routine" rotation of troops. A build-up of military has also occurred in Shenzhen, a neighbouring Chinese city, with state media releasing videos of troops engaging in anti-riot drills, an ominous warning that soldiers were ready to deploy. More of that posturing is coming as Mr Xi will preside over a massive military parade on Tuesday for China's 70th anniversary celebrations, with plans to showcase 15,000 troops, 160 aircraft and 580 pieces of military equipment. The parade is expected to include the DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missile. Billed as the world's most powerful, the nuclear-capable missile is thought to be able to reach the US in 30 minutes. Flower baskets have been presented to deceased national heroes Credit: VCG/VCG via Getty Images Other equipment that will be seen for the first time include the DR-8 supersonic reconnaissance drones and the DF-17 hyper sonic missile, and the H-6N strategic bomber, all of which are designed to project Chinese power deep into the Pacific. "They will go all out to demonstrate military capability and promote Xi Jinping as president for life. He will want a parade par-excellence," said Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst in defence strategy and capability at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a think tank. "The theme is anti-access and air denial capabilities, making more and more difficult for the US to project power into the Western Pacific," he said. "These systems are designed to achieve that." The pageantry – and another speech expected from Mr Xi – is meant to underscore China's global ambitions to become the dominant power in the Asia-Pacific region. It lays claim to the democratic island of Taiwan, long regarded by Beijing as a runaway province, and the South China Sea. The Communist Party faces challenges to its authority from the unrest in Hong Kong and an economy weakened by the trade war Credit: Giulia Marchi/Bloomberg The big showing is also aimed at stirring nationalist sentiments at a time the country faces a waning economy, bogged down by a protracted trade war with the US. A large swathe of Beijing closed down Monday evening, with the authorities cutting radio signals and sealing roads along the planned parade route and its surroundings. Dissidents have also been detained and placed under house arrest to ensure the festivities go off without a hitch. But China's big birthday is set to be marred by multiple rallies planned in Hong Kong. Protests over the weekend ended in multiple arrests and clouds of smoke from police shooting tear gas and activists throwing petrol bombs. Clashes have continued in recent days, with officers warning the public that Tuesday would likely turn "very, very violent," said police superintendent John Tse. ends
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| Bluff or masterstroke? Johnson's Brexit riddle baffles his party Posted: 30 Sep 2019 08:11 AM PDT ![Bluff or masterstroke? Johnson's Brexit riddle baffles his party]( "Bluff or masterstroke? Johnson's Brexit riddle baffles his party") As Britain's governing Conservatives hold their annual conference in Manchester there is one riddle which has echoed around the bars and restaurants - how will Prime Minister Boris Johnson fulfil his pledge to deliver Brexit on Oct. 31? Johnson opened the four-day event by repeating a pledge to take Britain out of the European Union with or without a deal, but there is a catch. Is he bluffing over a no-deal Brexit or does he have a masterstroke to take the United Kingdom out of the EU in just a month's time?
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| U.S. Again Sanctions ‘Putin’s Chef’ for Election Interference Posted: 30 Sep 2019 07:54 AM PDT ![U.S. Again Sanctions 'Putin's Chef' for Election Interference]( "U.S. Again Sanctions 'Putin's Chef' for Election Interference") (Bloomberg) -- The Trump administration sanctioned nearly a dozen companies and individuals along with three planes and a yacht connected to one of Russian President Vladimir Putin's closest confidants to punish the country for interference in the 2018 U.S. elections.The Treasury Department added two more employees of the St. Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency to its sanctions list. The organization and its alleged financier, Yevgeny Prigozhin, were previously sanctioned for leading an interference campaign in the 2016 election that U.S. officials have said was intended to help elect President Donald Trump.Treasury said in a statement Monday that in 2018, "there was no indication that foreign actors were able to compromise election infrastructure that would have prevented voting, changed vote counts, or disrupted the tallying of votes."The new Treasury action increases pressure on Prigozhin's financial assets. In its statement, Treasury included photos of one of his private jets and the St. Vitamin, Prigozhin's yacht.Prigozhin has been nicknamed "Putin's chef" for his close relationship with the Russian leader. He was accused by Special Counsel Robert Mueller of bankrolling a broad, multimillion-dollar effort to help Trump win the 2016 election using fake social media accounts and staging rallies through a firm he controls, Concord Management and Consulting.That case is now being prosecuted by the office of U.S. Attorney Jessie Liu in Washington.A bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers has urged a reluctant Trump administration to continue punishing Russia over its meddling in the 2016 election. There are several bills in Congress with broad support to target Russian sovereign debt, its energy sector and financial institutions in an effort to force Trump's hand.The Treasury Department in April 2018 sanctioned more than two dozen Russian businessmen and companies over election interference.To contact the reporter on this story: Saleha Mohsin in Washington at smohsin2@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Joshua GalluFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Yemen rebels free 290 detainees, reviving hopes for talks Posted: 30 Sep 2019 07:42 AM PDT  Yemen's rebels on Monday released scores of detainees they had rounded up and held for years in rebel-controlled territory, a development that raised hopes of reviving stalled peace talks between the warring sides. The International Committee of the Red Cross said the Iran-aligned rebels, known as Houthis, freed 290 detainees. Franz Rauchenstein, the ICRC's chief in Yemen, said the Red Cross facilitated the release following a request from the Houthis.
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| UPDATE 2-North Korea won't give up nuclear weapons -ex-Trump adviser Bolton Posted: 30 Sep 2019 07:37 AM PDT ![UPDATE 2-North Korea won't give up nuclear weapons -ex-Trump adviser Bolton]( "UPDATE 2-North Korea won't give up nuclear weapons -ex-Trump adviser Bolton") North Korea has no intention of giving up its nuclear weapons and Pyongyang benefits from stalling in its standoff with Washington, U.S. President Donald Trump's ousted national security adviser John Bolton said in a speech on Monday. "It seems to be clear that (North Korea) has not made a strategic decision to give up its nuclear weapons. In fact, I think the contrary is true," Bolton, a hardliner towards North Korea and Iran who was fired by Trump three weeks ago, said at Washington's Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.
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| Bremmer Says U.S.-China Trade War Getting ‘Considerably Worse’ Posted: 30 Sep 2019 07:29 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Terms of Trade is a daily newsletter that untangles a world embroiled in trade wars. Sign up here. The U.S.-China trade war is getting "considerably worse" and comments at the United Nations General Assembly suggest no end in sight, according to Ian Bremmer, the New York-based president of Eurasia Group.Chinese officials will be patient, hoping to maintain the status quo while making no serious attempts at a breakthrough deal until after the 2020 U.S. election, Bremmer wrote in an email summarizing his UN meetings. He said China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi's combative tone suggests a much deeper divide between the world's two largest economies than six months ago."The two sides are digging in and it's gotten considerably worse in the past weeks," Bremmer said.On Friday, Wang hit back at President Donald Trump's trade policies, warning that protectionism could plunge the world into a recession just as negotiators from both countries prepare to meet in Washington next month. The Trump administration played down a Bloomberg report the same day that the White House was weighing limits on U.S. portfolio flows into China.Here are some of Bremmer's other key takeaways from UN week:A top White House adviser said Trump wants to reduce trade tensions with the Europeans because "it's going to get tougher with China"Meantime, there will be a stronger push to complete bilateral deals with Japan (which is close) and India (just getting started)Risk of U.S. escalation with Iran following recent attacks on Saudi Arabia's oil export capabilities was "definitively put to bed"Expect more volatile behavior from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is "sliding Toward the end of his rule"There's "palpable frustration" from the Trump administration on Venezuela, although some signs that Cubans (facing pressure from U.S. sanctions) will return to political negotiationsThe "alliance for multilateralism," a gathering led by the German and French governments, is the broadest effort yet to counterbalance the growing schism between the U.S. and ChinaTrump impeachment proceedings will occupy virtually all of the U.S. political coverage for the rest of 2019, yet there's "virtually no chance" it gets Republican support in the SenateImpeachment will probably increase voter turnout, a negative for TrumpProceedings will also hurt former Vice President Joe Biden's candidacy and benefit Senator Elizabeth WarrenIncreasing odds of U.S. constitutional crisis with tinges of Watergate and Bush/Gore 2000To contact the reporter on this story: Ben Bartenstein in New York at bbartenstei3@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Carolina Wilson at cwilson166@bloomberg.net, Alec D.B. McCabeFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| British opposition parties unite to stop no-deal Brexit Posted: 30 Sep 2019 07:20 AM PDT  Britain's opposition parties have met to plan how to be block a "no-deal" Brexit from taking place against Parliament's will. The parties, including the Labour Party and the Scottish National Party, are concerned that Prime Minister Boris Johnson of the Conservative Party may not adhere to a new law requiring him to seek a Brexit extension if no divorce deal is reached with the European Union.
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| Bolton undercuts Trump and says North Korea has no desire to give up its nukes Posted: 30 Sep 2019 07:12 AM PDT ![Bolton undercuts Trump and says North Korea has no desire to give up its nukes]( "Bolton undercuts Trump and says North Korea has no desire to give up its nukes") Ousted national security adviser John Bolton put on display the deep schisms between himself and President Donald Trump on North Korea, publicly breaking with his former boss on Monday about how best to get Kim Jong Un's regime to wind down its nuclear weapons program. At one of his first public appearances since his abrupt and rocky departure from the White House, Bolton did not name the president but delivered an unmistakable airing of grievances. Specifically, he threw cold water on the president's assertion that North Korea is ready to make a deal and gave his "unvarnished" view that Kim would not voluntarily give up his nuclear weapons under current conditions.
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| UK government says Labour spreading myths with Brexit sterling talk Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:59 AM PDT ![UK government says Labour spreading myths with Brexit sterling talk]( "UK government says Labour spreading myths with Brexit sterling talk") Britain's government accused the opposition Labour Party of "trying to propagate myths" by suggesting a possible conflict of interest between Prime Minister Boris Johnson's stance on Brexit and hedge funds betting against sterling. Labour's John McDonnell, the party's top finance official, said on Saturday he had asked Mark Sedwill, the government's cabinet secretary, to investigate any conflict of interest after former finance minister Philip Hammond said "speculators" who backed Johnson stood to profit from a falling pound in the event of a no-deal Brexit.
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| Boris Johnson’s Foes May Try to Get the Queen to Fire Him Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:56 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Politicians determined to stop Boris Johnson leaving the European Union without a deal are trying to work out how to force the prime minister from office.They have hit upon an arcane constitutional trick that relies on Queen Elizabeth II to fire him, according to a person familiar with the matter.Under the plan:A so-called Humble Address could be used to remove Johnson in a day if he refuses to send a letter to the EU on Oct. 19 requesting a delay to Brexit.A Humble Address is a message from the House of Commons to the Queen as head of state and arbiter of the constitution. This method was traditionally used during Victorian times, but more recently has been successfully used to force the government to reveal details about its Brexit planning. It could also be used to instruct the Queen to appoint another member of Parliament as prime minister and to form a government. A Cabinet minister, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they had taken their own legal advice that a Humble Address cannot be used to oust the premier. Opposition parties have been discussing suitable candidates to replace Johnson, with Labour Labour's Harriet Harman and Tory Kenneth Clarke among names being floated. Leader of the opposition Jeremy Corbyn may not have enough support from other MPs to take on the role of care-taker prime minister.Dominic Grieve, a former Conservative Attorney General, who was expelled from the party for voting against Johnson's Brexit plan, said there could now be enough MPs to back a government of national unity. "I myself would be willing to support a government of national unity and potentially I think the numbers are there to deliver it," Grieve told Bloomberg TV on Monday."It cannot be led by the leader of the opposition," he said. "It's not a criticism of him personally, but he has a highly partisan agenda, which he is perfectly entitled to hold, which is incompatible with a government of national unity."Corbyn is set to meet politicians from other opposition parties on Monday to discuss their strategy.To contact the reporters on this story: Kitty Donaldson in Manchester at kdonaldson1@bloomberg.net;Jessica Shankleman in Manchester at jshankleman@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Thomas PennyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Monday's Market Minute: Jobs And Central Banks In Focus Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:37 AM PDT ![Monday's Market Minute: Jobs And Central Banks In Focus]( "Monday's Market Minute: Jobs And Central Banks In Focus") The S&P 500 closed the week under pressure and lower for the second week in a row as reports that the White House might limit U.S. investment in China weighed on investor sentiment and the four major U.S. indices. This all comes ahead of a big week with all eyes on U.S. jobs data and Fed Chair Jerome Powell speaking Friday, both of which have potential to move markets. With the U.S. Dollar nearing yearly highs, the Brexit deadline one month away, and some of the volatility in rates the last few months, traders should be dialed in on financial markets.
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| Forget the ‘Deep State.’ What Trump Hates Is the State Itself. Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:30 AM PDT ![Forget the 'Deep State.' What Trump Hates Is the State Itself.]( "Forget the 'Deep State.' What Trump Hates Is the State Itself.") (Bloomberg Opinion) -- President Donald Trump's suggestion last week that the Ukraine whistle-blower and his sources were no better than spies, and hinting at treason and the death penalty, has been variously described as despicable, terrible, un-American and reprehensible. I am here to tell you that it was actually worse than that.Trump delivered his remarks before the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, a branch of the bureaucracy already under assault from his political appointees. The president might like to complain about the "deep state," but what Trump really doesn't like is the state itself — the idea of a nonpartisan, professional civil service responsible for executing policies and following procedure regardless of who is in office.The U.S. Mission to the UN works in tandem with the State Department's Bureau of International Organization Affairs, which was just the subject of a withering report by the department's inspector general. It found evidence of harassment of career employees judged "disloyal" based on their perceived political views, retaliation for refusing to accede to conflicts of interest, and numerous other instances of disrespectful and hostile treatment. The bureau's politically appointed leaders ignored or deflected protests, in one case telling an employee that complaints were pointless because the Trump administration "has my back." This climate of fear and mismanagement helped to drive away 50 out of the bureau's 300 U.S. employees.Trump's remarks last week were short on gratitude and long on attacks on the press, Democrats, former Vice President Joe Biden and the whistle-blower report. (As someone who used to draft speeches for embassy pep rallies for a U.S. president and secretary of state, I can tell you that Trump's was not standard fare.) And given what the mission and bureau's staff have already endured, his closing message was undoubtedly crystal clear: If you speak out against this administration, you will pay a huge price.Sadly, many State Department officials are already conditioned by training and temperament not to rock the boat. During my foreign service orientation back in the 20th century, my class dutifully sat through a television documentary about an officer whose aggressive human-rights reporting derailed his career. The message was clear, despite the department's clumsy attempt to show us that it did, in fact, tolerate dissent: a visit from two senior officers with tales of how they bucked the system and prevailed. Unfortunately, neither was still with the service — a detail that did not go unnoticed by me or my classmates. Turns out it takes real guts to be a whistle-blower.That's exactly the kind of courage that this administration doesn't want to cultivate — notwithstanding Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's empty pledges to restore "swagger" to his department. (Just ask the recalled U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, now cooling her heels in a fellowship despite a stellar career.) Trump himself has said that he prefers an administration filled with acting officials because they're easier to push around. Next best, apparently, is an empty chair — witness this administration's remarkable number of them. Rather than a fully staffed, well-resourced corps of civil servants sworn to uphold the Constitution, he wants a tiny band of loyalists bound by omerta.President Teddy Roosevelt once described an efficient and professional civil service as a "powerful implement with which to work for the moral regeneration of our public life." Trump, sadly, seems intent on degrading the quality of America's civil service — and using it for the opposite purpose.To contact the author of this story: James Gibney at jgibney5@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Newman at mnewman43@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.James Gibney writes editorials on international affairs for Bloomberg Opinion. Previously an editor at the Atlantic, the New York Times, Smithsonian, Foreign Policy and the New Republic, he was also in the U.S. Foreign Service from 1989 to 1997 in India, Japan and Washington.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Forget the ‘Deep State.’ What Trump Hates Is the State Itself. Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:30 AM PDT ![Forget the 'Deep State.' What Trump Hates Is the State Itself.]( "Forget the 'Deep State.' What Trump Hates Is the State Itself.") (Bloomberg Opinion) -- President Donald Trump's suggestion last week that the Ukraine whistle-blower and his sources were no better than spies, and hinting at treason and the death penalty, has been variously described as despicable, terrible, un-American and reprehensible. I am here to tell you that it was actually worse than that.Trump delivered his remarks before the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, a branch of the bureaucracy already under assault from his political appointees. The president might like to complain about the "deep state," but what Trump really doesn't like is the state itself — the idea of a nonpartisan, professional civil service responsible for executing policies and following procedure regardless of who is in office.The U.S. Mission to the UN works in tandem with the State Department's Bureau of International Organization Affairs, which was just the subject of a withering report by the department's inspector general. It found evidence of harassment of career employees judged "disloyal" based on their perceived political views, retaliation for refusing to accede to conflicts of interest, and numerous other instances of disrespectful and hostile treatment. The bureau's politically appointed leaders ignored or deflected protests, in one case telling an employee that complaints were pointless because the Trump administration "has my back." This climate of fear and mismanagement helped to drive away 50 out of the bureau's 300 U.S. employees.Trump's remarks last week were short on gratitude and long on attacks on the press, Democrats, former Vice President Joe Biden and the whistle-blower report. (As someone who used to draft speeches for embassy pep rallies for a U.S. president and secretary of state, I can tell you that Trump's was not standard fare.) And given what the mission and bureau's staff have already endured, his closing message was undoubtedly crystal clear: If you speak out against this administration, you will pay a huge price.Sadly, many State Department officials are already conditioned by training and temperament not to rock the boat. During my foreign service orientation back in the 20th century, my class dutifully sat through a television documentary about an officer whose aggressive human-rights reporting derailed his career. The message was clear, despite the department's clumsy attempt to show us that it did, in fact, tolerate dissent: a visit from two senior officers with tales of how they bucked the system and prevailed. Unfortunately, neither was still with the service — a detail that did not go unnoticed by me or my classmates. Turns out it takes real guts to be a whistle-blower.That's exactly the kind of courage that this administration doesn't want to cultivate — notwithstanding Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's empty pledges to restore "swagger" to his department. (Just ask the recalled U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, now cooling her heels in a fellowship despite a stellar career.) Trump himself has said that he prefers an administration filled with acting officials because they're easier to push around. Next best, apparently, is an empty chair — witness this administration's remarkable number of them. Rather than a fully staffed, well-resourced corps of civil servants sworn to uphold the Constitution, he wants a tiny band of loyalists bound by omerta.President Teddy Roosevelt once described an efficient and professional civil service as a "powerful implement with which to work for the moral regeneration of our public life." Trump, sadly, seems intent on degrading the quality of America's civil service — and using it for the opposite purpose.To contact the author of this story: James Gibney at jgibney5@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Newman at mnewman43@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.James Gibney writes editorials on international affairs for Bloomberg Opinion. Previously an editor at the Atlantic, the New York Times, Smithsonian, Foreign Policy and the New Republic, he was also in the U.S. Foreign Service from 1989 to 1997 in India, Japan and Washington.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| UPDATE 1-Kremlin says disclosure of Trump-Putin phone calls would need Russian consent Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:21 AM PDT ![UPDATE 1-Kremlin says disclosure of Trump-Putin phone calls would need Russian consent]( "UPDATE 1-Kremlin says disclosure of Trump-Putin phone calls would need Russian consent") The Kremlin said on Monday that Washington would need Russian consent to publish transcripts of phone calls between U.S. President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. Congress is determined to get access to Trump's calls with Putin and other world leaders, the U.S. House Intelligence Committee's chairman said on Sunday, citing concerns that the Republican president may have jeopardised national security. Asked about those comments, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Russia would be prepared to discuss the issue with Washington if it sent Moscow a signal, but that such disclosures were not normal diplomatic practice.
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| British PM on defensive again over groping claim Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:12 AM PDT  Britain's Boris Johnson is known for his colourful love life but the accusation he grabbed a young woman's thigh when he was a magazine editor risks a scandal as he seeks to unite his party over Brexit. The prime minister, who is attending his Conservative party's conference in Manchester, northwest England, is accused of giving a female journalist's leg "a squeeze" while at a private lunch 20 years ago. In an article published in The Sunday Times, journalist Charlotte Edwardes described a boozy lunch in the offices of The Spectator magazine around two decades ago, when Johnson was editor.
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| Houthis, Saudi Prince Weigh In as Efforts to End Yemen War Grow Posted: 30 Sep 2019 05:39 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- A Houthi rebel leader welcomed comments by Saudi Arabia's crown prince on stopping the fighting in Yemen, the latest signal momentum is growing behind efforts to end a conflict that's pushed the Gulf to the brink of war."The optimism of Mohammed Bin Salman on stopping the war is positive," a member of the rebels' ruling political council, Mohammed Al-Houthi, said on Twitter. Turning the opening into meaningful negotiations requires "seriousness and dealing realistically" with the situation, he said.In a Sunday interview for CBS's "60 Minutes," the prince said that ending the Yemen war through a peace deal would be "much easier" if Iran stopped backing the Houthis. Still, he said, "today, we open all initiatives for a political solution in Yemen."Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates entered the Yemen war in 2015 to restore an allied government ousted by the Houthis. The conflict, which has killed thousands of people and left millions facing chronic food and water shortages, soared to the top of the world's agenda after Sept. 14 drone and missile strikes on critical Saudi oil facilities were claimed by the Houthis.The U.S., Saudi Arabia and major European nations concluded the rebels didn't possess the sophistication needed to launch attacks that embarrassed one of the world's leading purchasers of American military hardware -- knocking out almost 5% of global oil supply -- and pointed the finger instead at Iran.After first indicating he was readying a military reprisal, President Donald Trump opted to tighten sanctions on Tehran, while the U.K., Germany and France have pushed for talks with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.Prince Mohammed on Sunday backed that approach, warning that a war between his country and Iran would lead to a "total collapse of the global economy" and should be avoided.A "political and peaceful solution is much better than the military one," the prince said. Iran denies it carried out the strikes, saying the Houthis were most likely responsibleThe prince said he's in favor of Trump and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani holding face-to-face talks.End SanctionsTrump -- who won the White House vowing to remove the U.S. from wars overseas and faces re-election next year -- had talked up the possibility of meeting Rouhani until the attack on Saudi oil facilities.Iran has said it won't negotiate with the U.S., a longtime foe, until it drops sanctions reimposed after Trump exited the 2015 nuclear deal last year. In response to the U.S. economic offensive, Tehran has abandoned some of its enrichment commitments under the accord.While previous cease-fires between the Houthis and the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen have collapsed, the recent violence and the risk it carries of a wider war could be catalyzing peace efforts.Saudi authorities are yet to comment on Houthi claims over the weekend that rebel fighters killed or captured hundreds of Saudi troops in raids across the border.However, a Yemeni official said Friday that Saudi Arabia had agreed to a limited cease-fire covering parts of Yemen, including the Houthi-controlled capital Sana'a, a week after the rebels announced an end to drone and rocket strikes on the kingdom.The U.A.E. has already begun to scale back its role as the war threatened to ignite a wider conflict with Iran.Calling on Saudi Arabia to end its airstrikes on Yemen, Iran on Monday said the kingdom had contacted Rouhani through a mediating country."One of the heads of states carried a message from Saudi Arabia to Mr. Rouhani, but we need to see clear signs from the Saudis, the first of which is stopping attacks on Yemen," Ali Rabiei, government spokesman, said in a press conference, without naming the country.To contact the reporters on this story: Mohammed Hatem in Dubai at mhatem1@bloomberg.net;Arsalan Shahla in Tehran at ashahla@bloomberg.net;Hailey Waller in New York at hwaller@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Lin Noueihed at lnoueihed@bloomberg.net, Mark WilliamsFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| A Scandal Has Everyone Talking About Their Homeland. Some Ukrainian Americans Welcome the Change. Posted: 30 Sep 2019 05:14 AM PDT  PITTSBURGH -- Bohdan Czmola kicked off the Ukrainian Film Festival on Saturday night with a topical opener: "Has anybody been watching the news this week?"After years of being largely overlooked in the United States, Ukraine, the country of Czmola's parents, was suddenly in the middle of a blockbuster news story. It has been in more headlines in the space of a few days than Czmola remembers in all of his 68 years."Ukraine," Czmola declared, like a proud father, to the 30 or so people in the auditorium, "is the hot topic of discussion."Most of the time, all that Americans typically know about Ukraine is -- maybe -- the food and music, lamented Czmola and others, sitting in the auditorium before the first film of the night. Some might have paid a little attention during the recent revolutions, or were aware that a war is going on in eastern Ukraine in which 13,000 people have been killed. The crowd bristled that people still seemed to associate Ukraine with tsarist pogroms, pointing out that its voters had recently elected a Jewish comedian as president.Maddeningly to many with Ukrainian heritage, pundits on TV even occasionally say "the Ukraine," as if it were still just another region of the Russian empire."They don't say the France or the Spain," muttered Paul Gerlach, the president of the Ukrainian Community of Western Pennsylvania, which had organized the film festival.But suddenly the news broke that President Donald Trump, in a phone call with Ukraine's president, had pushed for an investigation into the Biden family, and Ukraine was the only thing anyone on the news was talking about. It might be bad news for Trump, or Joe Biden, or Rudy Giuliani. But for Ukraine?While many analysts see multiple downsides for Ukraine in these developments, Czmola didn't see it that way."I think it's extremely positive," he declared. "The more news about Ukraine the better."To clarify: Few in the audience thought this would end badly for Trump. In interview after interview, people saw the whole thing as cooked up by Democrats and in fact revealing much more about the unsavoriness of the Biden family. The Ukrainian-American diaspora here, at least among the largely middle-aged people who go to film festivals, was solid Trump country."This president is wonderful," said Hanna Dziamko, 48, a pharmacist who immigrated to the United States in 1997. "Everything he does is just unbelievable, everything he touches is successful."This affection is driven in part by what they see as an unforgivably feeble response by the Obama administration to Russian intrusion into Ukraine. Trump may have delayed sending military aid to Ukraine -- a delay at the heart of the scandal -- but unlike his predecessor, he had agreed to provide Ukraine with arms.More fundamentally, many hold a deep distrust, shared by immigrants from other communist or formerly communist countries like Cuba or Vietnam, for anyone with even the slightest good word to say about socialism or anything like it."We had eight years of Obama taking us back to socialism," Dziamko said. "We don't want it."The contempt for socialism is interwoven with a contempt for Russian domination, which at the current moment means a furious loathing of President Vladimir Putin. So the question presents itself: What of Trump's fond words for Putin, his desire to bring Russia back into the Group of 7, his associates' tendency to work for Kremlin interests, his expressed wish that the president of Ukraine "get together" with Putin?Some of this is indeed hard to make sense of, several said. But, they cautioned, it is important to understand that Trump deals in long-game strategy."What he's doing, it might look bad for Ukraine today, but it's going to look great for Ukraine in a year," said George Honchar, a semiretired agronomist whose front porch doormat has a picture of Putin's face on it, along with an invitation in Ukrainian to wipe your feet.What all this could do for Ukraine's profile here in the United States, he said, that was the thing to focus on."After what happened this week, I wouldn't be surprised that we'll see more kids in our Ukrainian school, from parents who might have been ashamed of their roots," he said on Friday night at the Ukrainian American Citizens Club, a smoky bar and meeting hall in the Pittsburgh suburb of Carnegie. "This gives them pride, or it should! And if it doesn't, they're fools."The club, which sits across from a striking Ukrainian Orthodox church, is adorned with Ukrainian flags and a painting of a girl playing the bandura, the Ukrainian national instrument. Its membership is mostly Irish.Western Pennsylvania has drawn waves of Ukrainian immigrants, starting in the late 19th century when they came in to power the steel mills, coal mines and railroad crews. The golden domes of Ukrainian Catholic and Orthodox churches tower throughout the region. But the congregations are old and shrinking, often reliant on homemade pierogi sales to pay for basic repairs. Though as many as 100,000 people in the region have Ukrainian heritage, a cohesive community never really formed here, to the dismay of self-described patriots like Honchar. He hoped this would change.On Friday night, at his invitation, a small group gathered in the dimly lit event hall at the club, talking through the week's events. Everyone believed the Democrats were making something out of nothing, that Trump was right to balk at corruption in Ukraine -- even the biggest Ukraine boosters could not dispute that.But not everyone was optimistic that this time in the spotlight would amount to much."It's like a flash in the pan," said Stephen Haluszczak, 56, who is active in efforts to promote local Ukrainian identity. He went through the long history of Ukraine being batted around by larger powers. "Again, Ukraine is just a pawn on the chessboard."The next night, when the lights came on after the first film at the festival -- a film that took place in the 1930s, portraying the brutality of Soviet domination -- Honchar stood up at his seat."This place should be full. Shame on our people," he declared to the auditorium. "And to our fellow Americans who are considering socialism: Shame on you!"He was too choked up to say more, he said, and he walked out to the lobby. But Natalie Onufrey, 57, had something she wanted to add."Everything in this movie, it happened," she said. It was in fact much worse than that, she went on: terror, man-made famine, mass murder. If people disagreed about politics, or criticized the government, they were killed."Now we come home and we listen to all this emptiness," she said of the news in America, her home for nearly three decades. Life isn't perfect; no politician is perfect, she said. But all of the partisan sparring is exasperating. "This country is a dream," she said. "What are we complaining about? It's an absolute sin."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company
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| The US military is practicing moving its Middle Eastern command base to South Carolina because its Qatar base is a 'sitting duck' for Iran Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:49 AM PDT  Iran's military strength - along with its Houthi proxies - is turning out to be more of a threat than people thought.
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| China's Xi renews commitment to Hong Kong amid protests Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:24 AM PDT  Chinese Communist Party leader and President Xi Jinping on Monday renewed his government's commitment to allowing Hong Kong to manage its own affairs amid continuing anti-government protests in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory. Xi made his remarks at a reception on the eve of a massive celebration of the People's Republic's 70th anniversary that threatens to be marred by clashes between police and anti-government demonstrators in Hong Kong. "We will continue to fully and faithfully implement the principles of 'One country, two systems' (and) 'Hong Kong people administering Hong Kong,''' Xi said according to a printed copy of his remarks.
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| Saudi prince warns regional war with Iran could lead to 'total collapse of global economy' Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:20 AM PDT  A war with Iran would lead to "a total collapse of the global economy", Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman has said, as he called for a political solution and endorsed talks between Donald Trump and Iranian leaders. Speaking two weeks after Iran allegedly bombed major Saudi oil facilities, and as new footage of the attack surfaced, the kingdom's de-facto ruler said that a full-scale conflict in the Persian Gulf would cause oil prices to jump to "unimaginably high numbers that we haven't seen in our lifetimes". "The political and peaceful solution is much better than the military one," Crown Prince Mohammed told CBS News. Saudi Arabia has taken a relatively mild approach since the September 14 attack on oil facilities at Abqaiq and Khurais, which the US blames on Iran, and has not called for military retaliation. That stance is believed to reflect Saudi concerns that they would be the main target for Tehran if a regional war did break out, and that the kingdom's military would struggle to defend against experienced Iranian forces. Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman spoke for the first time since the air strikes Credit: Mandel Ngan/Pool Photo via AP, File The crown prince was pressed on the imprisonment and alleged torture of around a dozen female activists who were arrested last year by Saudi authorities. Most of the women, including campaigner Loujain al-Hathloul, had been involved in calls for women to be allowed to drive. Crown Prince Mohammed said he was powerless to interfere in the Saudi judicial system and appeared to claim that he was hearing of the issue for the first time, even though the women's cases have been widely reported in international media for a year. "If this is correct, it is very heinous. Islam forbids torture. The Saudi laws forbid torture. Human conscience forbids torture. And I will personally follow up on this matter," he said. He said he was "pained" by the perception that he did not support women's rights. "This perception pains me. It pains me when some people look at the picture from a very narrow angle," he said. A metal part of a damaged tank at the damaged site of Saudi Aramco oil facility in Abqaiq Credit: REUTERS/Hamad l Mohammed Meanwhile, questions continued to surround the sudden death of one King Salman's bodyguards. General Abdulaziz al-Faghem, a personal bodyguard to the Saudi monarch, was shot dead by a friend during a personal dispute, according to state media. The two men reportedly got into an argument in the city of Jeddah on Saturday night and the friend killed Gen. al-Faghem and wounded two other people. The man, who has not been identified, was then killed by Saudi security services. It remains unclear what the dispute was about.
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| Austria’s Elections Show Germany’s Future Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:19 AM PDT  (Bloomberg Opinion) -- Austria just held an election that indicates a new direction for European politics: Increasingly, the center right might find itself working with the Greens.The 33-year-old Sebastian Kurz, the winner of Sunday's election, is more than a successful small-country politician. He's a weathervane for all of Europe. Two years ago, he scored a difficult victory for his Austrian People's Party (OeVP) by swinging to the right and adopting some of the anti-immigrant rhetoric of the surging nationalists from the Austrian Freedom Party (FPOe). Then he built a coalition government with the FPOe, which drove the number of asylum applications in Austria sharply down. The repercussions were felt next door in Germany, where parts of the German center right held Kurz up as an example to Chancellor Angela Merkel, and where all the contenders to replace Merkel last year as leader of the conservative Christian Democratic Union were to the right of her.Then, earlier this year, Kurz changed course. His vice chancellor, FPOe leader Heinz-Christian Strache, resigned after being caught in a spectacular sting operation in which he was recorded discussing corrupt deals with a woman he thought was a Russian billionaire's niece. The incident demonstrated that the far right was not scandal-proof, notwithstanding Donald Trump's boast that he could shoot someone on New York's Fifth Avenue and still lose no voters. Even in Austria, a country with a powerful far right tradition barely broken by the Nazis' defeat in World War II, an anti-establishment force could take a serious hit if it proved more corrupt than the establishment.Instead of clinging to power by preserving the coalition without Strache, Kurz chose to dissolve it and fight a new election. He appeared to target FPOe voters first, denouncing "political Islam" and expressing sympathy for people who felt that immigrants were crowding them out of their neighborhoods. His youthful charisma and hard work on the campaign trail allowed him to overcome a mini-scandal, in which a leftist newspaper reported that his party used creative accounting to stay within Austria's campaign spending limits and that large sums were spent on his travel and grooming.Kurz's bold strategy largely paid off: The OeVP won 38% of Sunday's vote, compared with 31.5% in 2017. The two parties that most wished he would fail — the FPOe and the center-left Social Democrats (SPOe) — suffered the biggest losses. He attracted more swing voters from the FPOe than from any other party. But he still has to find a party with enough support to form a coalition government.The FPOe isn't attractive: There's the scandal, and Kurz has bad chemistry with popular party member and former interior minister Herbert Kickl. The center-left isn't much of an option given its waning support in most of Europe, and in any case Kurz is reluctant to work with the SPOe, which has irked him by challenging the ethics of his cooperation with the far right.Enter the Green party, which has surged along with Greta Thunberg's climate-strike movement. A coalition with the Greens might allow Kurz to co-opt the climate warriors without bending too much to their radical demands. Austrian ministers are relatively independent within their domains, so Kurz can give the Greens some cabinet posts without taking full responsibility for what they do. He can also counterbalance the Greens by inviting a third party, the pro-business Neos, into the coalition.Talks to build a coalition might take months, as they tend to do in Austria. But a more stable government is worth it. So is showing the rest of Europe, and above all Germany, that an alliance of the center right and the environmentalists can work. The conservatives' fiscal sobriety and pro-business stance can balance the Greens' zeal for saving the planet. If the parties can learn to cooperate and compromise, they can forge an enduring majority — an achievement that German conservatives will be tempted to imitate.In 2017, Merkel tried and failed to form a coalition with the Greens and the pro-business Free Democrats, largely because the personal ambitions of the Free Democrat leader, Christian Lindner, got in the way. But such a deal is likely to be the most viable option for Merkel's chosen successor, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, in 2021. Recent polls place the Greens second after Merkel's party, or maybe even on par. Hence, German politicians will be paying a lot more attention to Kurz's strategic and tactical moves that Austria's size would otherwise merit.To contact the author of this story: Leonid Bershidsky at lbershidsky@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Whitehouse at mwhitehouse1@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Leonid Bershidsky is Bloomberg Opinion's Europe columnist. He was the founding editor of the Russian business daily Vedomosti and founded the opinion website Slon.ru.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Iran defends Yemeni rebel attack on Saudi Arabia's oil sites Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:13 AM PDT  Iran said Monday that the missile-and-drone attack on major Saudi oil sites earlier this month was an act of "legitimate defense" by Yemen's Iran-allied Houthi rebels. The Sept. 14 assault was claimed by the Houthis, though Saudi Arabia says it was "unquestionably sponsored by Iran." The kingdom has been at war with the Houthis in Yemen since March 2015.
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| China readies for anniversary, Hong Kong for protest Posted: 30 Sep 2019 04:09 AM PDT  Chinese President Xi Jinping vowed Monday to uphold Hong Kong's special status on the eve of a huge military parade in Beijing that risks being upstaged by more protests in the semi-autonomous city. Some 15,000 soldiers will march across Tiananmen Square and the latest military technology will be displayed as part of the 70th anniversary celebrations, a patriotic show of strength to demonstrate the country's emergence as a global superpower. Xi told a reception in Beijing on Monday night that China would "continue to fully and faithfully implement the principles of 'one country, two systems'" in Hong Kong.
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| World leaders pay final respects to Jacques Chirac at Paris funeral as France mourns popular ex-president Posted: 30 Sep 2019 03:44 AM PDT  Dozens of world leaders, including Vladimir Putin, have paid silent tribute to Jacques Chirac, the late French president, at a funeral service in Paris. Flags flew at half-mast across the country on a national day of mourning. Thousands of well-wishers had lined the streets of Paris to get a glimpse of the military motorcade carrying the casket. To the strains of Fauré's Requiem, Mr Chirac's former bodyguards carried the coffin of the former Gaullist leader, draped in a French flag, up the steps of the Saint-Sulpice church. Inside, Mr Putin - who heaped praise on Mr Chirac after his death aged 86 last week as a "wise" and "intelligent" leader - paid his respects alongside 80 other current and former heads of state and royals. Among them was former US president Bill Clinton, who said: "I'll miss Chirac, I'll really miss him". German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri and Qatar Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani were also present. Representing Britain was Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex. Dozens of world leaders have attended a funeral service in memory of former French president Jacques Chirac, who died last week Credit: MARTIN BUREAU/AFP President Emmanuel Macron of France was joined by three predecessors, including Mr Chirac's erstwhile centre-Right rival Valérie Giscard d'Estaing, 93, his former protege Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande. Conspicuously absent was far-Right leader Marine Le Pen whose former Front National party Mr Chirac saw as beyond the Republican pale and whose father he beat in a shock 2002 presidential run-off. The Chirac family had requested she stay away. Mr Chirac, who served as president from 1995 to 2007, was feted by many French for opposing the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, a stance that put him at odds with Washington but burnished his Gaullist credentials. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo only sent belated condolences on Sunday, saying Chirac "worked tirelessly to uphold the values and ideals that we share with France". Former US President Bill Clinton said: "I'll miss Chirac" Credit: Kamil Zihnioglu/AP Inside Saint-Sulpice, President Macron at one point approached laid his hand briefly on the coffin before withdrawing. During the service, Archbishop Michel Aupetit of Paris told the 2,000-strong throng gathered in the church: "Our former president, this warm man, had a true love for people, equally at home in the salons of the Elysee as the agricultural fair. Many who met him felt valued." The avuncular late leader embodied a love for his fellow man that is missing from today's society, said the Archbishop. "Goodbye, and thank you Monsieur Chirac." Argentinian pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim played Franz Schubert's Impromptu. Honor guards carry the flag-drapped coffin of late French President Jacques Chirac Credit: Chesnot/Getty Images The funerals of the previous three French presidents were held in Notre-Dame, currently unusable after a devastating fire earlier this year. But to herald the national day of mourning, the cathedral's bell was manually rung for the first time since the blaze The service came a day after 7,000 people queued to view Mr Chirac's coffin at the Invalides monument in a public show of affection for the former president, whose popularity has soared since he left office in 2007 after 12 years in charge despite a 2011 corruption conviction. A poll out this weekend suggested he was the best-loved French leader since Charles de Gaulle. "France is always paradoxical: it wants kings and then cuts off their head, it forces out the living and consecrates the dead," Mr Hollande told France Inter radio earlier. "He was close to people. He loved people," said Florian, a well-wisher. Jacques Chirac received a full military funeral at Les Invalides Credit: YOAN VALAT/EPA-EFE/REX Mr Chirac's widow, Bernadette, was not present due to ill health but she earlier attended a private family service at Saint-Louis des Invalides, along with their daughter, Claude, and 23-year-old grandson, Martin. Afterwards, a sombre-looking President Macron presided over a military ceremony in the courtyard of Les Invalides, the site of Napoleon's tomb. Mr Chirac's casket was laid on the cobblestones as the band played the Marseillaise. The former president will be buried today at the Montparnasse cemetery Credit: Chesnot/Getty Images Mr Chirac was later buried in a private ceremony the Montparnasse cemetery in Paris, in a plot next to his daughter Laurence, who died in 2016 after a long struggle against anorexia.
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| UN calls for mass evacuation of 'hellish' migrant camp on Greek island of Lesbos Posted: 30 Sep 2019 03:33 AM PDT  The United Nations called for migrants crammed into a squalid camp on the Greek island of Lesbos to be immediately transferred to the mainland, following a fire in which a woman and a child were killed. The UN's refugee agency said the situation in the notorious Moria camp, where 13,000 people are living in a facility designed for 3,000, is "critical". "We are calling to accelerate the transfers and improve conditions in Moria," said Boris Cheshirkov, UNHCR's spokesman in Greece. The mayor of Lesbos also said asylum seekers needed to be moved off the island, which lies in sight of the Turkish coast. Stratos Kytelis demanded the "immediate decongestion of our islands and for borders to be guarded". The population of Moria has oscillated over the years as large groups are transferred to the Greek mainland, usually by ferry, only to be replaced by more asylum seekers crossing by sea from Turkey. Clashes erupted between asylum seekers and Greek police on Sunday evening, after the blaze broke out in some of the shipping containers in which many migrants are housed. A woman and child died in the fire and at least 17 people were hurt. Police fired tear gas to control furious asylum seekers, who accused the authorities of taking too long to respond to the blaze. Police reinforcements were flown to Lesbos in Hercules transport planes. There were reports that as many as two children may have died in the fire. "We found two children completely charred and a woman dead. We gave the children covered in blankets to the fire brigade," Fedouz, a 15-year-old Afghan, told AFP. Humanitarian organisations condemned the "hellish" conditions in the camp, which is so packed that thousands of Afghans, Syrians and other nationalities have to sleep in tents in a huge spillover area in olive groves outside the facility. Medical teams from Medecins Sans Frontieres were on Monday assessing people who had been affected by the violence. An aerial view of Moria refugee camp on Lesbos Credit: Michael Varaklas/AP "We are outraged by the events in Moria and the reported death of at least two people, a mother and a child, as a result of a fire inside the camp. No one can call the fire and these deaths an accident," said Marco Sandrone, MSF's field coordinator on Lesbos. "European and Greek authorities who continue to contain these people in these conditions have a responsibility in the repetition of these dramatic episodes." The charity said it was "high time to stop" what it called an inhumane policy of containment and called for the urgent evacuation of people "out of the hell that Moria has become." It is the second death of a child in the camp in a week. Last week a five-year-old Afghan boy, who was either asleep or playing in a large cardboard box, was accidentally run over by a lorry. The truck driver was delivering goods when he ran over the box without realising there was anyone inside it. "The death of a mother and a baby is appalling, and a direct consequence of the EU's migration policies," said Renata Rendón, Oxfam's head of mission in Greece. She called for the evacuation of refugees held in the camp. A man and a boy react to tear gas fired by Greek police in the camp following clashes Credit: AFP "People arriving in Greece should be relocated to safe accommodation across the EU, not crammed into dangerous spaces where their life is at risk." Greek officials said on Monday they would step up the rate of transfers to reception centres on the mainland. With cold weather approaching, the government intends to move at least 3,000 people from Lesbos and camps on other Aegean islands by the end of October. More than 9,000 asylum seekers reached Greece in August, the highest number in the three years since the EU and Turkey implemented a deal to shut off the Aegean migrant route. More than 8,000 people have arrived in September, according to the UNHCR.
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| Trump Hints at Civil War But He Launched a War on Facts Posted: 30 Sep 2019 03:30 AM PDT ![Trump Hints at Civil War But He Launched a War on Facts]( "Trump Hints at Civil War But He Launched a War on Facts") (Bloomberg Opinion) -- The president of the United States suggested on Twitter on Sunday night that the country may have to endure a civil war should he be impeached and removed from office. So a timeline detailing how Donald Trump and the rest of us got to this point is probably in order.Less than two weeks into Trump's presidency, unseemly details of his conversations with the leaders of Mexico and Australia leaked to the media. After that, the White House limited the number of people with access to transcripts or records of Trump's phone calls.Three months later, in May 2017, Trump fired the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, James Comey, and gloated about it in an Oval Office meeting with Russia's foreign minister and its ambassador to the U.S., referring to Comey as a "nut job." That ugly bit of juvenalia also made it into the press, along with the more serious and disturbing revelation that Trump disclosed classified intelligence information to the Russians. With that, the White House clamped down even further and began moving records and transcripts of some of Trump's conversations onto a so-called "code-word" protected and highly classified National Security Council computer network, according to the New York Times.Ever since then, apparently, many of Trump's potentially embarrassing diplomatic machinations reportedly made it into that database alongside the more typically sensitive records all presidents have routinely and legitimately classified for national security purposes. Based only on what we know thus far, among the material on the secret NSC network reportedly ranking as possibly ghastly rather than improper or illegal are discussions Trump had with Saudi Arabia's royal family about the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi.But it's the opaque and overtly illicit material that we now know is hidden on that system, the use of which only became known thanks to a complaint filed by a Central Intelligence Agency whistle-blower, that is the stuff of presidential impeachment proceedings. The foundational disclosure, from the whistle-blower, was that Trump called Ukraine's president in July and offered to connect him to his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and Attorney General William Barr so they could jointly dig up dirt in Ukraine on a political opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden. That conversation, the whistle-blower said, got stashed away on the restricted NSC network – which the White House later confirmed.On Friday night, the Washington Post disclosed that when Trump met with the Russians in the Oval Office in 2017, he went beyond slagging Comey and disclosing classified intelligence. He also told them "he was unconcerned about Moscow's interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election because the United States did the same in other countries." That statement "alarmed White House officials" who decided a memo summarizing the meeting should be "limited to a few officials with the highest security clearances in an attempt to keep the president's comments from being disclosed publicly." It wasn't clear if that memo was secreted on the NSC's restricted network, but Congressional investigators can go ahead and find out.CNN reported on Friday night that transcripts of sensitive calls between Trump and President Vladimir Putin of Russia were also limited to a select group in the Trump administration. CNN said it wasn't clear if those transcripts were placed on the restricted network; the New York Times reported that they were. The Kremlin, unsurprisingly, said over the weekend that it would rather not see those transcripts made public. Congressional investigators should try to get a look at those conversations, too.Apart from Trump's staggering abuse of presidential power, one of the more troubling and pivotal disclosures from the whistle-blower's complaint is that the White House systematically used the NSC network to hide his misdeeds. Doing so immediately turned that system into a Pandora's Box of current and future woes for Trump and his White House. It also made those who managed the system, or who passed judgment on or had knowledge of the material that went into it – including witnesses and possible co-conspirators – into more than fair game for the Democrats running impeachment proceedings.For anyone who has paid attention to Trump over the years, it's all very familiar.For example, the Trump Organization had its own email network, though the company's proprietor and namesake never used it. In part this was due to his preference for telephone conversations and a certain amount of technophobia. But it was also because, as his business associates told me, so he could retain plausible deniability should disputes arise – and also because he didn't like leaving paper trails around his dealings.Trump used to tell reporters, myself included, that he had a taping system in his office and that he was recording conversations during interviews at Trump Tower. Trump's employees worried he was taping them. Trump also suggested more recently that he had a taping system in the White House that he used to record his conversations with Comey. I never thought he had anything like that in place in Trump Tower or the White House (though Congress should ask as part of the impeachment inquiry). When Trump unsuccessfully sued me for libel my lawyers deposed him for two days in 2007 and he was forced to admit he had been lying about having a taping system. I imagine that Trump was averse to a taping system in his business (and at the White House) for the same reason he was averse to email: It created a record he might not want other people to see.As Politico reported last year, Trump routinely tears up speeches and other documents once he's done with them – forcing White House staffers to tape them together piecemeal so the administration can comply with the Presidential Records Act and make sure that all non-classified material the president touches is sent to the National Archives and preserved. (The White House, according to Politico, eventually fired the employees tasked with taping shredded documents back together.)Trump has concealed details of several encounters with Putin dating back to the earliest days of his administration. In 2017, he asked his interpreter to give him the notes of a conversation with Putin in Hamburg and ordered the interpreter not to discuss any of it with other officials in his own administration. Trump and Putin met privately for more than two hours in Helsinki in July 2018 with only interpreters present, after which Trump told reporters at a press conference that he accepted the Russian leader's assurances that the Kremlin didn't meddle in the 2016 election. That assertion was at odds with the conclusions of Trump's own law enforcement and intelligence teams and with what we now know he told Russian diplomats in the White House in 2017. Trump reportedly met late last year last year with Putin at a G-20 summit without a White House interpreter or aide, apparently relying on Putin's interpreter to translate the conversation.The White House's use of the restricted NSC network to cover up the president's various communications with foreign leaders is of a fit with all of this. It's still not clear whether Trump personally directed that nettlesome files be put on that network; the whistle-blower's complaint said that White House lawyers "directed" that Trump's July call to Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, be put on the network. The Washington Post reported that use of the restricted network required a senior White House official — "someone as high as the chief of staff or the national security adviser" — to request it in writing (so there's some more documentation for Congressional investigators to request).CNN, citing officials in the Trump administration, reported Friday night that John Eisenberg, the White House's deputy counsel for national security affairs, ordered that the call with Zelenskiy be put on the restricted NSC server. As it turns out, Eisenberg also fielded initial conversations with the CIA's legal counsel, Courtney Elwood, when the whistle-blower first aired his concerns about Trump's call to Zelenskiy. So any communication Trump has had with Eisenberg about his calls with foreign leaders, and ways to hide those calls, will matter as the impeachment inquiry moves along.The entire highly classified NSC network is likely to become a legal football in coming weeks as Congressional investigators seek broader access to records the White House won't want to give up. Trump may not be able to rely on Barr – who should recuse himself from deliberations given that his name has surfaced in the Ukraine matter -- to help adjudicate any of that, which may explain some of the added desperation that has crept into the president's Twitter feed over the last few days.In addition to warning of civil war, Trump took to Twitter on Sunday evening to accuse Representative Adam Schiff, the Democrat spearheading the impeachment inquiry, of "Fraud & Treason" and to demand that he be allowed to meet the whistle-blower who might have been "SPYING on the U.S. President?" He also said he wanted to meet "the person" who gave information to the whistle-blower. (The whistle-blower's complaint actually cites several people that provided information.)Running parallel to Trump's attacks on his accusers is, of course, the war on facts he and his administration have waged since the moment he was inaugurated as president. And the White House's classified computer network has emerged as a clear metaphor for all of that, forcing anyone watching this unfold to ask the most obvious and fundamental question: What kind of a person spends a lifetime going out of his way to hide records or avoid leaving a paper trail?Someone who is either deeply paranoid or very, very naughty.To contact the author of this story: Timothy L. O'Brien at tobrien46@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Matthew Brooker at mbrooker1@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Timothy L. O'Brien is the executive editor of Bloomberg Opinion. He has been an editor and writer for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, HuffPost and Talk magazine. His books include "TrumpNation: The Art of Being The Donald."For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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