LONDON: King Charles III has applauded people who took to the streets of British towns and cities earlier this week to help blunt days of unrest fueled by far-right activists and misinformation about a stabbing attack that killed three girls.
Charles on Friday held telephone audiences with Prime Minister Keir Starmer and law enforcement officials during which he offered his “heartfelt thanks” to police and other emergency workers for their efforts to restore order and help those affected by the violence, Buckingham Palace said in a statement.
“The king shared how he had been greatly encouraged by the many examples of community spirit that had countered the aggression and criminality from a few with the compassion and resilience of the many,” the palace said. “It remains his majesty’s hope that shared values of mutual respect and understanding will continue to strengthen and unite the nation.”
British police remain on alert for further violence after the nation was convulsed by rioting for more than a week as crowds spouting anti-immigrant and Islamophobic slogans attacked mosques, looted shops and clashed with police. The government described the violence as “far-right thuggery,” and mobilized 6,000 specially trained police officers to quell the unrest.
The disturbances have been fueled by right-wing activists using social media to spread misinformation about the July 29 knife attack in which three girls between the ages of 6 and 9 were killed during a Taylor Swift-themed dance event in the seaside community of Southport.
Police detained a 17-year-old suspect. Rumors, later debunked, quickly circulated on social media that the suspect was an asylum-seeker, or a Muslim immigrant.
The unrest has largely dissipated since Wednesday night, when a wave of expected far-right demonstrations failed to materialize after thousands of peaceful protesters flocked to locations around the UK to show their support for immigrants and asylum-seekers.
Police had prepared for confrontations at more than 100 locations after right-wing groups circulated lists of potential targets on social media. While anti-racism groups planned counterprotests in response, in most places they reclaimed the streets with nothing to oppose.
Starmer has insisted the police will remain on high alert this weekend, which marks the beginning of the professional soccer season. Authorities have been studying whether there is a link between the rioters and groups of “football hooligans” known to incite trouble at soccer matches.
“My message to the police and all of those that are charged with responding to disorder is maintain that high alert,” Starmer said on Friday while visiting the special operations room of London’s Metropolitan Police Service.
The National Police Chiefs’ Council said some 741 people have been arrested in connection with the violence, including 304 who have been charged with criminal offenses.
Courts around the country have already begun hearing the cases of those charged in relation to the unrest, with some receiving sentences of three years in prison.
Starmer has said he is convinced that the “swift justice that has been dispensed in our courts” will discourage rioters from returning to the streets this weekend.
King Charles III applauds people who stood against racism during recent unrest in the UK
https://arab.news/vkecz
King Charles III applauds people who stood against racism during recent unrest in the UK
- Charles held telephone audiences with Prime Minister Keir Starmer and law enforcement officials
High waves cause damage on Sydney waterfront
- Several homes were evacuated at Botany Bay in Sydney’s south around midnight as waves surged across the coast
- Further north at Sydney’s premier Bondi Beach, the coast was lashed by a 5.5-meter swell, officials said
SYDNEY: Sydney beachfront properties were flooded and coastal infrastructure damaged after a large swell combined with a king tide to batter the Australian shore, officials said Thursday.
Several homes were evacuated at Botany Bay in Sydney’s south around midnight as waves surged across the coast, according to New South Wales State Emergency Service spokesman Andrew Edmunds.
Further north at Sydney’s premier Bondi Beach, the coast was lashed by a 5.5-meter (18-foot) swell, officials said.
Windows were shattered at Bondi Icebergs Swimming Club, a waterfront pool, gymnasium and restaurant complex. CCTV footage showed waves bursting through glass doors after 11 p.m. on Tuesday.
“It has just been devastating,” club general manager Bob Tate said. “I’ve been a member for 50 years at Bondi. I’ve never seen this sort of thing before. You know, the sheer magnitude of the level of water and the power of the water coming through must’ve just been horrendous.”
Tate added that on the pool deck around 15 glass panels were splintered, floors were damaged, and cupboards and firehoses were ripped off the walls. It was “quite extraordinary,” he said.
South of Botany Bay at Cronulla Beach, lifeguard Steve Winner said the beach, along with parts of the pavement behind it and electrical infrastructure, had been damaged by 4-meter (13-foot) waves.
Authorities warned on Thursday of further hazardous surf with the potential to cause coastal erosion and damage from the Illawarra region south of Sydney to the Hunter region north of Sydney.
Europe will respond proportionately to likely Trump tariffs, French industry minister says
“Europe has always been on the side of negotiation and calming things down, because trade wars, you know, only produce losers,” Ferracci told RMC radio.
US President Donald Trump will announce sweeping new reciprocal tariffs on global trading partners on Wednesday, raising concerns about price increases and likely prompting retaliation from other countries.
Trump to escalate global trade tensions with new reciprocal tariffs on US trading partners
- Details of Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariff plans still being formulated and closely held ahead of an announcement ceremony
- The new duties are due to take effect immediately after Trump announces them, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump was poised to impose sweeping new reciprocal tariffs on global trading partners on Wednesday, upending decades of rules-based trade, threatening cost increases and likely drawing retaliation from all sides.
Details of Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff plans were still being formulated and closely held ahead of a White House Rose Garden announcement ceremony scheduled for 4 p.m. Eastern Time (2000 GMT).
The new duties are due to take effect immediately after Trump announces them, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said on Tuesday, while a separate 25 percent global tariff on auto imports will take effect on April 3.
Trump for weeks has said his reciprocal tariff plans are a move to equalize generally lower US tariff rates with those charged by other countries and counteract their non-tariff barriers that disadvantage US exports. But the format of the duties was unclear amid reports that Trump was considering a 20 percent universal tariff.
A former Trump first-term trade official told Reuters that Trump was more likely to impose comprehensive tariff rates on individual countries at somewhat lower levels.
The former official added that the number of countries facing these duties would likely exceed the approximately 15 countries that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had previously said the administration was focused on due to their high trade surpluses with the US
Bessent told Republican House of Representatives lawmakers on Tuesday that the reciprocal tariffs represent a “cap” of the highest US tariff level that countries will face and could go down if they meet the administration’s demands, according to Republican Representative Kevin Hern.
Ryan Majerus, a former Commerce Department official, said that a universal tariff would be easier to implement given a constrained timeline and may generate more revenue, but individual reciprocal tariffs would be more tailored to countries’ unfair trade practices.
“Either way, the impacts of today’s announcement will be significant across a wide range of industries,” said Majerus, a partner at the King and Spalding law firm.
Stacking tariffs
In just over 10 weeks since taking office, the Republican president has already imposed new 20 percent duties on all imports from China over fentanyl and fully restored 25 percent duties on steel and aluminum, extending these to nearly $150 billion worth of downstream products. A month-long reprieve for most Canadian and Mexican goods from his 25 percent fentanyl-related tariffs also are due to expire on Wednesday.
Administration officials have said that all of Trump’s tariffs, including prior rates, are stacking, so a Mexican-built car previously charged 2.5 percent to enter the US would be subject to both the fentanyl tariffs and the autos sectoral tariffs, for a 52.5 percent tariff rate – plus any reciprocal tariff Trump may impose on Mexican goods.
Growing uncertainty over the duties is eroding investor, consumer and business confidence in ways that could slow activity and drive up prices.
Economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta said a recent survey showed corporate financial chiefs expected tariffs to push their prices higher this year while cutting into hiring and growth.
Rattled investors have sold stocks aggressively for more than a month, wiping nearly $5 trillion off the value of US stocks since mid-February. Wall Street ended mixed on Tuesday with investors stuck in limbo awaiting details of Trump’s announcement on Wednesday.
Retaliatory measures
Trading partners from the European Union to Canada and Mexico have vowed to respond with retaliatory tariffs and other countermeasures, even as some have sought to negotiate with the White House.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum spoke on Tuesday about Canada’s plan to “fight unjustified trade actions” by the US, Carney’s office said.
“With challenging times ahead, Prime Minister Carney and President Sheinbaum emphasized the importance of safeguarding North American competitiveness while respecting the sovereignty of each nation,” Carney’s office said in a statement.
US companies say a “Buy Canadian” movement is already making it harder for their products to reach that country’s shelves.
Trump has argued that American workers and manufacturers have been hurt for decades by free-trade deals that have lowered barriers to global commerce and fueled the growth of a $3 trillion US market for imported goods.
The explosion of imports has come with what Trump sees as a glaring downside: Massively imbalanced trade between the US and the world, with a goods trade deficit that exceeds $1.2 trillion.
Economists warn his remedy – hefty tariffs – would raise prices at home and abroad and hammer the global economy. A 20 percent tariff on top of those already imposed would cost the average US household at least $3,400, according to the Yale University Budget Lab.
US approves $5.58 billion F-16 fighter jet sale to Philippines
- News follows months of escalating confrontations between the Philippines and China in the South China Sea
- Manila and Washington have deepened their defense cooperation since President Ferdinand Marcos took office in 2022
WASHINGTON: The United States said Tuesday it has approved the possible sale of $5.58 billion in F-16 fighter jets to the Philippines, as Washington backs its ally in rising tensions over China.
The State Department said it was green-lighting a sale that includes 20 F-16 jets and related equipment to the Philippines, a treaty-bound ally of the United States.
The sale would “improve the security of a strategic partner that continues to be an important force for political stability, peace and economic progress in Southeast Asia,” a State Department statement said.
It would also boost “the Philippine Air Force’s ability to conduct maritime domain awareness” and “enhance its suppression of enemy air defenses,” the statement said.
The news follows months of escalating confrontations between the Philippines and China in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims almost in its entirety despite an international ruling that its assertion has no merit.
A State Department spokesperson said the deal would be final only after “a signed Letter of Offer and Acceptance” was received from the “purchasing partner.”
Philippine defense department spokesman Arsenio Andolong said he had “not received any official notice of such a decision.”
But the Philippines has publicly expressed interest in acquiring F-16s since at least the administration of former president Benigno Aquino which ended in 2016.
Manila and Washington have deepened their defense cooperation since President Ferdinand Marcos took office in 2022 and began pushing back on Beijing’s sweeping South China Sea claims.
In December, the Philippines angered China when it said it planned to acquire the US mid-range Typhon missile system in a push to secure its maritime interests.
Beijing warned such a purchase could spark a regional “arms race.”
President Donald Trump’s administration has sought to redirect US military efforts to Asia to face a rising China, especially as tensions rise over Taiwan, and to lessen involvement in Europe despite Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
On Tuesday, as Chinese ships and warplanes surrounded Taiwan in a simulated blockade, Philippines military chief General Romeo Brawner said his country would “inevitably” be involved should the self-ruled island be invaded.
“Start planning for actions in case there is an invasion of Taiwan,” he told troops in northern Luzon island, without naming the potential invader.
“Because if something happens to Taiwan, inevitably we will be involved.”
He also said that the bulk of this month’s joint US-Philippine “Balikatan,” or “shoulder to shoulder,” military exercises would be conducted in northern Luzon, the part of the Philippines nearest Taiwan.
“These are the areas where we perceive the possibility of an attack. I do not want to sound alarmist, but we have to prepare,” he added.
On a visit to Manila last week, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth vowed to “reestablish deterrence in the Indo-Pacific region” in light of “threats from the Communist Chinese.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has also reiterated US defense commitments to the Philippines, a contrast to the Trump administration’s frequent talk of “freeloading” off the United States by allies in Europe.
Trump faces first electoral setback after Wisconsin Supreme Court vote
- Liberal judge Susan Crawford won despite Trump’s usual extreme rhetoric and Elon Musk pouring in millions in support of conservative candidate
- Wisconsin win a cool relief for Democrats, whose candidates lost badly in Florida special elections for 2 vacant House seats
WASHINGTON: Donald Trump’s second presidency was dealt a spinning blow by voters in Wisconsin Tuesday as they elected a liberal to the state’s Supreme Court, despite his powerful adviser Elon Musk pouring millions into the race to sway the polls.
Two months into his barnstorming return to the White House, Trump celebrated victory in a pair of House races in Florida which remained in Republican hands.
But in the first real electoral test of his polarizing presidency, his all-out effort to lodge a new Republican on the Wisconsin Supreme Court fell flat, as liberal judge Susan Crawford came out ahead of the Trump-backed Brad Schimel, according to US media.
Trump had earlier pushed for the conservative judge running for the spot on Wisconsin’s top court, saying on social media that Schimel was a “Patriot” while Crawford was a “Radical Left Liberal.”
Echoing his usual extreme rhetoric, Trump claimed Crawford has a “History of letting child molesters and rapists off” and that a win by her would be a “DISASTER.”
Musk, who has spearheaded Trump’s radical attempts to gut much of the US government in a right-wing cost-cutting drive, went himself to Wisconsin to drum up support for Schimel.
“It’s like one of those strange situations where a seemingly small election would determine the fate of Western civilization here,” Musk said in a discussion on his social media platform X on Tuesday.
The highlight of his weekend visit to the upper Midwestern state reprised a tactic seen during his efforts to help Trump defeat Democrat Kamala Harris in November — handing out money to anyone who signed a petition against so-called “activist judges.”
Senator Bernie Sanders, a major force on the left of the Democratic Party, told supporters on X they had “the power to REJECT Musk and the oligarchy buying our elections.”
Beyond testing the public mood, the Wisconsin result will decide whether the state’s Supreme Court — which rules on things like voting district boundaries — tilts majority left or right.
In Florida, two seats to the US House of Representatives were up for grabs to fill vacancies in Republican strongholds, left by Trump’s National Security Adviser Mike Waltz and failed nominee for attorney general, Matt Gaetz.
On Tuesday evening, media called the race for Florida’s sixth district in favor of Republican Randy Fine, with Trump tweeting: “Congratulations Randy, a great WIN against a massive CASH AVALANCHE.”
Shortly after, media outlets also called the special election in Florida’s first district for Trump-backed Republican Jimmy Patronis.
Trump took credit for his party’s victory in both deep red districts, posting on social media that “the Trump endorsement, as always, proved far greater than the Democrats forces of evil.”
Democrats have been adrift since losing the presidency to Trump and both chambers of Congress in November, and had hoped that a decent showing in Florida and a win in Wisconsin could be the spark.
In Florida, they were defeated by double-digit percentage margins in both special elections.
Illustrating the stakes of the contest in Wisconsin, the race has set a spending record — much of that in advertising and attempts, particularly by Musk, to drive turnout.
Musk, who spent roughly $277 million on Trump’s 2024 election campaign, presented checks of $1 million to two voters and $100 each to other voters who signed his petition.
According to the Brennan Center for Justice, more than $53.3 million has been spent by Schimel and his backers, including $12.2 million from Musk’s America PAC.
Crawford’s campaign and those backing her have spent an estimated $45.1 million.
The spending has made the Wisconsin race the most expensive in US judicial history, the center said.
Billionaire Musk’s Green Bay rally on the weekend had an enthusiastic crowd, but the South African-born oligarch’s role in Wisconsin elections has provoked as much resistance as support.
At a pro-Crawford rally, 65-year-old retired electrical engineer Rob Patterson held up a sign showing Musk giving a straight-armed salute.
“Our Supreme Court is not for sale,” the sign read.
