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The Los Angeles Times reports because of intense pressure the Trump administration has applied on Mexico’s new government, Mexico City has budgeted more than $30 billion into development for southern Mexico, an investment plan meant to partially deter illicit migration from Central America, the country’s top diplomat said. Speaking at a global migration conference in Marrakech, Morocco, Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard pledged Mexico would invest in a five-year plan to create jobs in the region and would also help spur development in Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, the report said. The area, known as the Northern Triangle nations, the Times reported, account for most U.S.-bound...

The French have a word for pressing on to the bitter end without considering the consequences: jusqu’au-boutisme (to the end-ism). It’s a refusal to recognise when you have lost; a refusal also to recognise when you’ve won....

(CNN)Five US Marines who were missing after two aircraft collided mid-air off the coast of Japan on Thursday morning have been declared dead, the US Marine Corps said. The US military called off its search for the Marines on Tuesday, according to a statement from the Marine Expeditionary Force. "The Marine Corps has pronounced the five remaining Marines involved in the F/A-18 and KC-130 aviation mishap deceased," the Marine Corps said in a statement. "The change in status comes at the conclusion of search and rescue operations." The identities of the Marines have not been released, but the Marine Corps said their next of kin have been notified. "Every possible effort was made to...

Theresa May faced humiliation after being forced to abandon a vote on her Brexit deal, admitting it "would have been rejected by a significant margin” if put before MPs. The Prime Minister was accused of “an act of pathetic cowardice” by Nicola Sturgeon, who demanded an immediate vote of confidence in the government. Mrs May will now tour European capitals in a desperate bid to reopen the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement and strip it of the Irish border backstop, which she conceded had caused MPs “widespread and deep concern”. The EU Council President Donald Tusk announced that Brexit would be added to the schedule of a summit of European leaders starting on Thursday, but warned...

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party won by a landslide in India’s last general election in 2014, Reuters reported Monday, and grabbed almost every parliamentary seat in the heartland states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. But that dominance could all change early Tuesday for Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) when results of recent state assembly elections will be announced and throw into question Modi’s bid for re-election in May polls, the report said. A big loss by BJP in rural districts could foretell dismay and help unite opposition to Modi, who despite heavy criticism of keeping his promises to young people and farmers remains at a high level, Reuters reports....

United Nations special envoy Martin Griffiths said on Monday Yemen’s warring parties had yet to agree on main sticking points in peace talks, including a ceasefire in Hodeidah and reopening Sanaa airport, but that consultations would continue, Reuters reports. The talks in Rimbo, Sweden, are set to last until Dec. 13. Grifffiths said another round would be held early next year in the effort to end a war pitting the Iranian-aligned Houthi group against the Saudi-backed government of Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.“I’m hopeful that we can reach an agreement on de-escalation to reduce fighting in (Hodeidah and Taiz). I am hoping that we can, we are not there yet.” – Martin Griffiths The mediator, who...

The FBI was sued Monday by a government and ethics watchdog group for failing to fulfill a records request involving a leak to President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer and longtime backer Rudy Giuliani, The Hill reported. Announcing the lawsuit, the group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), claims information was leaked to Giuliani in October 2016 – at the presidential campaign came to a close – giving him a tip then-FBI Director James Comey was about to reopen the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server while she served as Secretary of State, the report said. Speaking to Fox News at the time, the former mayor New York City said: “Did I...

Russian ships that sailed through the contested Sea of Azov should be banned from entering Western ports, a former U.S. ambassador said, speaking after Russia seized Ukrainian vessels, sparking fears of open conflict, Britain’s Express newspaper reported. The suggestion was made by John Herbst, former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. Three Ukrainian naval vessels were seized by the Russian military late last month as they passed through the Kerch Strait. The Kerch Strait separates the Sea of Azov from the Black Sea, passing by contested Crimea. Ambassador Herbst wrote: “The United States and the EU should also look closely at Kremlin provocations in the Sea of Azov, and consider an appropriate...

Officials from the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s Office of Northern Ohio told a news conference Monday two Toledo-area residents are under arrest for allegedly plotting separate terror attacks, The Huffington Post reported. Officials told HuffPo 23-year-old Elizabeth Lecron was arrested early Monday and accused of plotting to attack a Toledo bar. She faces charges of transporting explosives for the purposes of harming others and property, HuffPo reported. In a statement released by United States Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, Justin E. Herdman said Lecron “bought black powder and hundreds of screws that she expected would be used to make a bomb,” the report said. “Through her words...

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is under fire for a series of tweets he sent upon returning from a 10-day meditation retreat in Myanmar, Fox News reports. The 42-year-old executive, who wrote positively about the country and its people, did not mention the plight of the Rohingya, a mostly Muslim minority group that has faced a series of vicious attacks at the hands of Myanmar's military. Since August 2017, an estimated 10,000 Rohingya are reported to have been murdered, according to Doctors Without Borders. In addition, at least 750,000 people, according to Amnesty International, have been forced over the border to Bangladesh. Dorsey's tweets, which detailed his experiences with vipassana meditation...

The number of migrants requesting asylum at ports of entry along the southwest border doubled in fiscal year 2018 from the previous year, according to Customs and Border Protection data released on Monday, USA Today reports. But the new data also show that the percentage of foreigners who entered the country illegally before requesting asylum stayed flat in 2018, raising questions about the Trump administration's purely law enforcement-focused response to migrant caravans. In an effort to halt what he's described as an invasion by mostly Central American migrants, President Donald Trump has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to deploy more than 2,000 National Guard troops, nearly 6,000...

US President Donald Trump wasted little time during his negotiations with Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff Nick Ayers for a similar role replacing John Kelly on the president’s staff, CNN reports. Trump gave Ayers a task, the network said, asking Ayers to conduct a thorough review of how the West Wing operates, including evaluating staffing, in order to make it more politically focused over the next two years. The evaluation, CNN reports, comes as Trump gears up for January, when newly empowered Democrats are expected to unleash a flurry of oversight investigations as leaders of the House of Representatives following Novembers midterm elections. Those investigations are expected to...

(CNN)Rep. Eliot Engel, who is poised to lead the House Foreign Affairs Committee, plans to conduct a thorough review of US policy towards Saudi Arabia -- and that could include Jared Kushner's ties to the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, according to a Democratic aide. Engel is "committed to conducting a top-to-bottom review of US policy towards...

Maria Butina’s lawyers and federal prosecutors have filed a request for a court hearing so that the accused Russian agent can change her plea, a joint filing shows. The court filings follow after it was revealed that Ms Butina and her attorneys had...

With a bleak outcome to a parliamentary vote set for Tuesday to endorse the Brexit plan she negotiated with the European Union, British Prime Minister Theresa May announced Monday she would pull the plan and delay the vote, The Washington Post reported. “If we went ahead and held the vote tomorrow, the deal would be rejected by a significant margin. We will therefore defer the vote scheduled for tomorrow and not proceed to divide the House at this time.” – British Prime Minister Theresa May May is expected to head to Brussels this week May in a last-ditch attempt to seek new concessions from European Union leaders and write a deal that her own party can support, the report said. Prospects,...

The Washington Post reports the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected appeals by Kansas and Louisiana to strip public Medicaid money from Planned Parenthood in battles over abortion rights. While the cases didn’t actually involve abortion itself, three justices who said the court should have accepted the cases said that was the reason the court did not get involved, the report said. “What explains the court’s refusal to do its job here? I suspect it has something to do with the fact that some respondents in these cases are named ‘Planned Parenthood,’” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote, the Post reported. Thomas was joined in his opinion by Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Neil M. Gorsuch, the...

Despite enormous pressure from the United States and a few other nations, nearly 85 percent of United Nations countries agreed Monday on a sweeping, non-binding accord to ensure safe, orderly and humane migration, Fox News reported. The Global Compact for Migration accord, the report said, is the first of its kind and was described as a pivotal test of the UN-led effort to crack down on the dangerous and illegal cross border movements that has turned smuggling into a booming worldwide industry. "Unregulated migration bears a terrible human cost: a cost in lives lost on perilous journeys across deserts, oceans and rivers; and a cost in lives ruined at the hands of smugglers, unscrupulous...

“There’s a very real prospect that on the day Donald Trump leaves office, the Justice Department may indict him, that he may be the first president in quite some time to face the real prospect of jail time,” said Rep. Adam Schiff, the incoming chairman of the House intelligence committee. “The bigger pardon question may come down the road as the next president has to determine whether to pardon Donald Trump.” Rep. Jerry Nadler, the incoming chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, described the details in prosecutors’ filings Friday in the case of Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, as evidence that Trump was “at the center of a...

Following a fourth weekend of violent protests by Yellow Jacket protesters, French President Emmanuel Macron prepared to address the nation Monday after discussions with lawmakers, unions and business leaders to hear their concerns, NBC News reported. Macron has been accused by protesters of failing to act on the crisis triggered by his economic reforms – including a hike in gas taxes which his government agreed to postpone last week, the report said. The country’s Interior Ministry estimated 10,000 protesters took to the streets in Paris Saturday, while more than 125,000 protesters marched in other towns and cities across France, NBC reported, resulting in 2,000 arrests and violence leaving...

Two British banks – Standard Chartered and HSBC – were reportedly among several financial institutions misled by Huawei into funneling illicit payments from Iran, sources told The Wall Street Journal. The Chinese technology giant allegedly used a third-party intermediary – a small Hong Kong-base technology firm called Skycom – to channel payments between the company and Iran, the report said. A spokesman for Huawei declined to comment, the Journal reported. During a layover in Vancouver, Canada on Dec. 1, the report said, Huawei's chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou was arrested. An angry Beijing has threatened unspecified “severe consequences” if Canadian courts don’t free Meng, The...

The US has allied with major oil producers Russia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to intercept the adoption of a crucial climate change report by world leaders at a UN conference. Experts have condemned these...

Article by WN.Com Correspondent Dallas Darling Political power doesn’t always have to grow out of the barrel of a gun. It can also grow out of imaginary crises and last-minute power grabs. Consequently, as President Donald Trump and Republicans feel their popular support slipping away expect more last-minute power grabs like the ones that just occurred in Washington and Wisconsin and North Carolina. Last-minute power grabs, that is, which will be fueled by more imaginary crises used as a pretext to first defend, and then later subvert, democracy. Meanwhile, nothing strengthens the nature of an authoritarian leader and their last-minute grabs for power as much as ignorance and the public’s...

Ruth McLarty, an experienced surgeon, was fairly certain she was about to die in a particularly grisly way. Surrounded by a hellish inferno of burning trees and cars, McLarty reasoned the flames would engulf her long before the smoke could choke her to death....

Tokyo prosecutors have charged Nissan's former chairman Carlos Ghosn, another executive and the carmaker itself for allegedly underreporting income. The charges, imposed on Monday, involve allegations that Ghosn's pay was underreported by about 5 billion yen (R615m) in 2011-2015. The prosecutors said...

Elon Musk stuck a finger in the SEC's eye Sunday night on "60 Minutes." "I want to be clear: I do not respect the SEC. I do not respect them," ......

The European Union’s top court ruled on Monday that the British government may unilaterally reverse its decision to leave the bloc, without consulting the other member states. Monday’s 8am ruling comes less than a week after an European Court of Justice advocate general rejected the contention that Article 50 only allows the possibility of revocation following a unanimous...

Negotiators from the US, Saudi Arabia, Russia and Kuwait refused to "welcome" the IPCC report on 1.5C that a huge majority of countries wanted to put at the heart of the talks. Researchers and...

LONDON: Indian tycoon Vijay Mallya will appear in a London court on Monday to find out whether he will be extradited to his homeland, where he is accused of fraud. Mallya, chairman of the UB Group drinks conglomerate and chief executive of the Force India Formula One team, will discover his fate at Westminster Magistrates’ Court. He left India in March 2016 owing...

Italian priests have declared their willingness to “open the church doors of every single parish” to people expelled from reception centres as an anti-immigration law from Italy’s rightwing government threatens to make thousands homeless....

US president has published a series of tweets criticising Emmanuel Macron's policies and his low approval rating. ......

WASHINGTON: The White House official widely touted as Donald Trump’s favorite to succeed his outgoing chief of staff John Kelly is instead leaving the administration at year’s end, he tweeted Sunday. Nick Ayers, the 36-year-old chief of staff to Vice President Mike Pence, tweeted that "I will be departing at the end of the year but will work with the #MAGA team to advance the cause," referring to Trump’s campaign. "Thank you @realDonaldTrump, @VP, and my great colleagues for the honor to serve our Nation at The White House." Trump announced Saturday that Kelly, 68, would leave the administration -- the latest key personnel move at a time of mounting pressure from the Russia...

Pakistan continues to harbour terrorists that turn around and kill American soldiers, US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley has said, asserting that Washington should not give Islamabad even a dollar until it addresses the issue. Haley, the first Indian-American ever appointed to a Cabinet position in any US presidential administration, said the US did not need to give money to countries that wish harm to America, go behind its back and try and "stop us from doing things". "...I think there should be a strategic view on which countries we partner with, which ones we count on to work with us on certain things, and move...

PARIS — Pressure mounted on French President Emmanuel Macron to announce concrete measures to calm protests marked by violence when he addresses the nation Monday evening, and breaks a long silence widely seen as aggravating a crisis that has shaken the...

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir speaks during in the capital Riyadh during a summit of Gulf Cooperation Council states on December 9, 2018 Saudi Arabia's foreign minister on Sunday rejected demands to extradite suspects connected to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi as sought by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "We do not extradite our citizens," Adel al-Jubeir told a news...

TOKYO: Japan’s Crown Princess Masako on Sunday pledged to do her best despite feeling “insecure” about becoming empress in mere months, in a candid statement released on her 55th birthday. Emperor Akihito will step down on April 30, 2019 — the first abdication in the Japanese imperial family in more than...

New court filings show Donald Trump was “at the center of a massive fraud” against the American people, the incoming chair of the House judiciary committee said on Sunday. Mob mentality: how Mueller is working to turn Trump's troops...

WASHINGTON -- The FBI's counterintelligence investigation into potential ties between President Donald Trump's campaign and Russia initially focused on four Americans and whether they were connected to Russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election, former FBI Director James Comey told lawmakers during hours of closed questioning. Comey did not identify the Americans but said Trump, then the Republican candidate, was not among them. The House Judiciary Committee released a transcript of the interview Saturday, just 24 hours after privately grilling the...

Ms Meng's arrest while she was changing planes in Vancouver last Saturday was a serious breach of her rights, Reuters quoted the foreign ministry as saying. It "ignored the law" and was "unreasonable", it said. "China strongly urges the Canadian side to immediately release the detained person... otherwise Canada must accept full responsibility for the serious consequences caused," the statement added.What happened during Friday's court appearance? The Supreme Court of British Columbia was told that Ms Meng had used a Huawei subsidiary called Skycom to evade sanctions on Iran between 2009 and 2014. The court was told that she had publicly...

By JOSHUA GOODMAN BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Former Colombian President Belisario Betancur, whose bold efforts to reach a peace deal with leftist rebels in the 1980s were undone by drug-fueled bloodletting and an explosion of violence backed by state security forces, died on Friday. He was 95. Betancur’s death was confirmed by President Ivan Duque, who said on his Twitter account that the ex-president’s legacy in Colombian politics, history and culture would be “an example for future generations.” Betancur, who governed from 1982-1986, died in a Bogota clinic after...

Prized Paris monuments and normally bustling shopping meccas locked down Saturday and tens of thousands of police took position around France, fearing worsening violence in a new round of anti-government protests. President Emmanuel Macron's government has warned that Saturday's "yellow vest" protests in Paris will be hijacked by "radicalized and rebellious" crowds and become the most dangerous yet after three weeks of demonstrations. The Eiffel Tower and Louvre Museum shut down Saturday...

A senior Chinese tech executive faces fraud charges in the United States related to business dealings with Iran, a Canadian prosecutor said Friday, offering the first details of a case that has pummeled financial markets and raised questions about a current trade truce between Beijing and Washington, The Washington Post reports. Before a packed courtroom in Vancouver, the prosecutor argued that Meng Wanzhou committed fraud in 2013 by telling U.S. financial institutions that Huawei had no connection to a Hong Kong-based company, SkyCom, which was reportedly selling U.S. goods to Iran in violation of U.S. sanctions. The prosecutor argued that Meng, the daughter of the company’s billionaire...

Two years after the most contentious referendum in British history, an anti-Brexit activist is feeling more confident that his campaign can help secure another referendum that he hopes would overturn the 2016 result, Reuters reports. James McGrory’s dream of reversing Brexit, which seemed hopeless two years ago, is gathering support from some senior British politicians as the country faces a crisis over how or whether to leave the European Union. The idea of a second referendum seems to have traction with sections of public opinion, but the political situation is so uncertain that it is hard to say whether this will actually translate into another vote, and when or how that might be done, or...

Uighur activists and community groups called on democratic governments and international organizations to confront Beijing over its continued targeting of Uighur Muslims and other ethnic minorities by detaining hundreds of thousands in re-education camps across Xinjiang, according to The Guardian. During a visit to Australia on Friday, the leaders of the Uyghur Human Rights Project (UHRP) said governments, businesses, academics, and thinktanks were responsible to end their "business as usual" relations with China over the practice which they said contained "precursors to genocide." “It’s time for action, something horrific is happening on our watch,” said Nury Turkel, chair of the board for...

Yemen's democratically elected government proposed reopening the Houthi-controlled airport in the capital Sanaa so long as planes were inspected in the airports of Aden or Sayun, which remain under its control, during the ongoing United Nations peace talks between the warring parties on Friday, according to Reuters. The Houthis rejected the proposal, but both sides are facing immense pressure to compromise due to the immense humanitarian costs of the war since thousands of civilians have already been killed and millions are facing potential famine in the Middle East's poorest country. The UN-sponsored talks are attempting to build confidence between the Iran-backed Houthi rebels and the...

The 2019 Grammy Award nominations were revealed earlier today in Los Angeles, The Los Angeles Times reported. Multiple nominations were announced for Drake, Brandi Carlile, Cardi B and the soundtracks to "Black Panther” and "A Star is Born." The 61st Grammy Awards take place Sunday, Feb. 10 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Here's a listing of all nominees for the awards: – WN.com, Jack Durschlag...

Greek police clashed with protesters on Thursday night in Athens after demonstrations to commemorate the 10th anniversary of a police shooting of a teenage boy that sparked some of the Mediterranean country's worst riots in decades, according to Al Jazeera. Hundreds turned out to march through central Athens to pay tribute to Alexandros Grigoropoulos, who was only 15 when he was shot dead in 2008. The police officer claimed he shot in the air to intimidate Grigoropoulos, but the bullet ricocheted off a balcony; but many of the protesters did not accept this claim."The officer's gun was magic. When he fired into the air, the bullet found its mark," chanted some of those marching...

Germany's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) selected Chancellor Angela Merkel's successor on Friday, delivering the outgoing leader another win by selecting her preferred candidate Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, according to The Washington Post. The 56-year-old Kramp-Karrenbauer is a moderate who resembles Merkel's politics and her selection signals the CDU prefers continuing on a similar path. She now becomes the favorite to take over as Germany's next chancellor, though Merkel said she intends to remain in office until 2021, which is possible with her ally as the party leader. Merkel announced in October she would stand down as the CDU party leader after a series of disappointing election...

President Donald Trump said on Friday he intends to nominate William Barr as his new Attorney General and will also nominate Heather Nauert to replace Nikki Haley as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations, according to Friday. Barr was previously in the top Justice Department role under President George H.W. Bush from 1991 to 1993 but would now take the reins on the department currently investigating the president. Trump also continued his attack at the Special Counsel Robert Mueller on Friday when he tweeted his legal claim was preparing a rebuttal to the forthcoming report from Mueller. "It has been incorrectly reported that Rudy Giuliani and others will not be...

Article by WN .Com Correspondent Dallas Darling. History never repeats itself in the United States, but the imperial presidency does. As a result, not everyone praised President George H.W. Bush in his recent death. Nor did they consider him a “Great Man” or “Gentle Soul” as House Speaker Paul Ryan did. From Iraq to Russia and Panama, even the United States, some remembered him as “Mr. Embargo,” “The Butcher of Washington,” “A Yankee Bastard” and a leader who sent their sons and daughters abroad to die in the deserts of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. There’s also those in Russia who allege he turned his back when the Soviet Union collapsed and allowed Wall Street to fleece it. At any rate, he too...

CNN's New York offices were evacuated Thursday night after a bomb threat, but no explosive was found and police later gave the all clear, the network said. The roughly 90 minute drama recalled a similar evacuation in October after an explosive device was...