PHILADELPHIA: New York media mogul Michael Bloomberg assailed fellow billionaire Donald Trump on Wednesday, calling his US presidential race a “con” and ripping into his history of bankruptcies and lawsuits.
“Trump says he wants to run the nation like he’s running his business? God help us,” Bloomberg told the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia to roaring applause. “I’m a New Yorker and I know a con when I see one.”
Formerly a Republican and now an independent, Bloomberg was for the most part greeted warmly by the audience in the Wells Fargo Center arena where he threw his support behind the Democrats’ presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton.
The owner of the Bloomberg media empire and a former New York City mayor, Bloomberg was an odd choice for a speaker at the Democratic conclave, where many party progressives have railed against the influence of billionaires in politics.
“Let me thank all of you for welcoming an outsider here, to deliver what will be an unconventional convention speech,” he said when he took the stage, eliciting cheers. “I am not here as a member of any party. I am here for one reason: to explain why I believe it is imperative that we elect Hillary Clinton as the next president of the United States.”
Bloomberg had considered running for the White House as an independent this year but dropped the idea in March, saying it could increase the chances Trump would win.
Bloomberg has known Trump casually for years and twice appeared on Trump’s reality TV show “The Apprentice.”
But since Trump entered the race for president in June 2015, Bloomberg has taken issue with him, lashing out at his policies and fiery rhetoric, especially his call to ban Muslims from entering the country and his promise to wall off the Mexican border and deport millions of undocumented foreigners.
On Wednesday, he went a step further and favorably compared his own business record to Trump’s. “I’ve built a business, and I didn’t start it with a million-dollar check from my father,” Bloomberg said.
Forbes lists Bloomberg, 74, as America’s sixth wealthiest American, with a fortune amounting to $47.7 billion.
Trump, 70, who often boasts about his extravagant wealth and success in the real estate business, is listed 113th with $4.5 billion, though that figure has been widely challenged.
A Reuters review of Trump’s federal filings showed he had cash and other liquid investments worth between $60 million and $180 million in May, far short of the amount he would need to self-fund his campaign.
In clash of billionaires, Bloomberg calls Trump White House race ‘a con’
In clash of billionaires, Bloomberg calls Trump White House race ‘a con’
Moscow says ‘part’ of its diplomatic personnel in Syria evacuated by plane
- His fall from power was a serious setback for Moscow, which was along with Iran the main ally of the former Syrian president and which had intervened militarily in Syria since 2015
MOSCOW: Russia’s foreign ministry said it has evacuated some of its diplomatic staff from Syria Sunday, a week after the fall of Bashar Assad.
“On December 15, the withdrawal of part of the personnel of the Russian (diplomatic) representation in Damascus was carried out by a special flight of the Russian Air Force from the Hmeimim air base” in Syria, the ministry’s crisis situations department said on Telegram.
The ministry said the flight arrived at an airport near Moscow, without specifying how many people were aboard.
The flight also carried members from the diplomatic missions of Belarus, North Korea and Abkhazia, a Moscow-backed separatist region of Georgia, the department said.
“The Russian embassy in Damascus continues to function,” said the press release published on Telegram.
Following an 11-day offensive, a rebel coalition dominated by Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) overthrew Assad, who fled to Russia along with his family.
His fall from power was a serious setback for Moscow, which was along with Iran the main ally of the former Syrian president and which had intervened militarily in Syria since 2015.
The fate of Russia’s two military bases in Syria — the Tartus naval base and the Hmeimim military airfield — is now uncertain.
The sites are key to Russia maintaining its influence in the Middle East, in the Mediterranean basin and as far as Africa.
On Wednesday, a Kremlin spokesperson said Moscow was in contact with the new authorities in Syria regarding the bases’ future.
Britain has had ‘diplomatic contact’ with Syria’s HTS group
- “HTS remains a proscribed organization, but we can have diplomatic contact and so we do have diplomatic contact as you would expect,” Lammy said
LONDON: Britain has had diplomatic contact with the Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) group that swept Syrian President Bashar Assad from power last week, British foreign minister David Lammy said on Sunday.
“HTS remains a proscribed organization, but we can have diplomatic contact and so we do have diplomatic contact as you would expect,” Lammy told broadcasters.
“Using all the channels that we have available, and those are diplomatic and, of course, intelligence-led channels, we seek to deal with HTS where we have to.”
On Saturday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States has had direct contact with HTS.
Swiss court mulls closing Assad uncle war crimes case
- His part in February 1982 massacre in Hama, which left between 10,000 and 40,000 dead, earned him the nickname of “the Butcher of Hama”
- Tribunal said the defendant in his 80s was suffering from ailments preventing him from traveling and taking part in his trial
GENEVA: Switzerland’s Federal Criminal Court is considering dropping a case charging an uncle of deposed Syrian president Bashar Assad with alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, newspapers reported on Sunday.
Rifaat Assad is accused by Swiss prosecutors of a long list of crimes, including having ordered “murders, acts of torture, inhumane treatment and illegal detentions” while an officer in the Syrian army.
His part in the notorious February 1982 massacre in the western town of Hama, which left between 10,000 and 40,000 dead, earned him the nickname of “the Butcher of Hama.”
The date of the former vice president’s trial has not been announced.
On November 29, just a few days before his nephew’s overthrow by militants, the Federal Criminal Court informed the victim plaintiffs that “it wished to close the proceedings” into Rifaat Assad, according to the Swiss Sunday newspapers Le Matin Dimanche and SonntagsZeitung.
The tribunal said that the defendant in his 80s was suffering from ailments preventing him from traveling and taking part in his trial, the papers reported.
The federal public prosecutor’s office opened the criminal proceedings in December 2013 following a report by the Swiss non-governmental organization Trial International.
Alerted by Syrians living in Geneva, the rights group traced Assad to a major Geneva hotel.
“Trial confirms the intention expressed by the court to the parties to close the case. But the formal decision has not yet been taken,” Benoit Meystre, the NGO’s legal adviser, told AFP on Sunday.
“If the case is closed, the possibility of an appeal will be examined, and it is highly likely that this decision will be contested,” Meystre said, adding that any appeal would have to be brought by the plaintiffs and not the NGO.
Swiss prosecutors opened the proceedings on the grounds of universal jurisdiction in crimes against humanity and war crimes cases.
Assad went into exile in 1984 after a failed attempt to overthrow his brother, the country’s then-ruler Hafez Assad.
He then presented himself as an opponent of Bashar Assad, traveling to Switzerland and later France.
He returned to Syria after 37 years in exile in France to escape a four-year prison sentence for money laundering and misappropriation of Syrian public funds.
Israel says it will close Dublin embassy, citing ‘extreme anti-Israel policies’
- Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the decision was deeply regrettable
- “I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-International law,” he said in a post on X
JERUSALEM: Israel will close its Dublin embassy due to the “extreme anti-Israel policies of the Irish government,” Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on Sunday, citing its recognition of a Palestinian state and support for legal action against Israel.
Israel’s ambassador to Dublin was recalled following Ireland’s decision on a Palestinian state in May, Saar’s statement added. Last week, Dublin announced its support for South Africa’s legal action against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), accusing Israel of genocide.
Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the decision was deeply regrettable. “I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-International law,” he said in a post on X.
“Ireland wants a two state solution and for Israel and Palestine to live in peace and security. Ireland will always speak up for human rights and international law.”
Irish Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said in March that while it was for the World Court to decide whether genocide is being committed, he wanted to be clear that Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and what is happening in Gaza now “represents the blatant violation of international humanitarian law on a mass scale.”
A statement from Israel’s foreign ministry also announced the establishment of an Israeli embassy in Moldova.
Bangladesh inquiry recommends feared police unit shut over rights abuses
- The police unit was launched in 2004, billed as a way to provide rapid results in a country where the judicial system was slow
- But the unit earned a grim reputation for extrajudicial killings and was accused of supporting ec-PM Hasina’s political ambitions
DHAKA: A Bangladesh commission probing abuses during the rule of toppled leader Sheikh Hasina has recommended a much-feared armed police unit be disbanded, a senior inquiry member said Sunday.
Hasina, 77, fled by helicopter to neighboring India on August 5 as a student-led uprising stormed the prime minister’s palace in Dhaka.
Her government was accused of widespread human rights abuses, including the extrajudicial killing of hundreds of political opponents and the unlawful abduction and disappearance of hundreds more.
The Commission of Inquiry into Enforced Disappearances, set up by the caretaker government, said it found initial evidence that Hasina and other ex-senior officials were involved in the enforced disappearances alleged to have been carried out by the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB).
The RAB paramilitary police force was sanctioned by the United States in 2021, alongside seven of its senior officers, in response to reports of its culpability in some of the worst rights abuses committed during Hasina’s 15-year-long rule.
“RAB has never abided by the law and was seldom held accountable for its atrocities, which include enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and abductions,” Nur Khan Liton, a member of the commission, told AFP.
The commission handed its preliminary report to the leader of the interim government Muhammad Yunus late Saturday.
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), one of the country’s largest political parties, also called for RAB’s abolition.
Senior BNP leader M. Hafizuddin Ahmed told reporters that the force was too rotten to be reformed.
“When a patient suffers from gangrene, according to medical studies, the only solution is to amputate the affected organ,” he said.
The elite police unit was launched in 2004, billed as a way to provide rapid results in a country where the judicial system was notoriously slow.
But the unit earned a grim reputation for extrajudicial killings and was accused of supporting Hasina’s political ambitions by suppressing dissent through abductions and murders.
