European Union leaders have agreed that the bloc’s coronavirus economic recovery plan should take heed of its aim to fight climate change. Following a six-hour video conference, the 27 EU leaders agreed late on Thursday to coordinate a coronavirus economic recovery plan. The leaders agreed that it should be consistent with the “green transition,” the phrase the EU uses to describe the aim of reducing emissions [...]
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Iran has now been officially struggling with COVID-19 for over a month. Even before SARS-CoV-2 (known as coronavirus) made its grand entrance into Iran, the country was embattled by a series of crises. In the first week of 2020, the assassination of Qassem Soleimani shook the nation. Besides that, the “accidental” shooting of the Ukrainian airplane by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps spawned a government cover-up, [...]
Leaders from the Group of 20 major economies will speak by video link on Thursday about combating the coronavirus pandemic and its economic impacts. Global infections top 471,000 with more than 21,000 dead, according to Reuters. G20 finance ministers and central bankers agreed this week to develop an “action plan” to respond to the outbreak, which the International Monetary Fund expects will trigger a global recession. [...]
Heads of state will meet for a ‘Virtual G20’ summit in a few hours to work out a global response to the Covid-19 pandemic. It comes as markets crash, supply chains falter, and a worldwide economic downturn looms. For the first time in history, there will be no government planes touching down in the host city, no police blocking roads, no hotels full to the brim [...]
The worsening tit-for-tat exchange of blame for the spread of coronavirus between Washington and Beijing continues, as on Wednesday Secretary of State Mike Pompeo slammed China’s “intentional disinformation campaign” behind the “Wuhan virus” — something Pompeo says was discussed among the Group of Seven (G7) big economies in a virtual meeting. Pompeo not only emphasized China’s ‘propaganda’ but that it fueled the pandemic by intentionally and recklessly delaying crucial information [...]
A new EU report on the 2016 deal with Turkey on migrants is due out this Thursday, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell told an online press conference after a videoconference with European foreign ministers on Monday. The diplomatic service document will analyze the prospects of future EU-Turkey ties based on the March 2016 agreement, including the topics of visa liberalization and the customs union, issues [...]
The Yemeni armed forces in support of the Houthi movement announced yesterday that it will offer financial rewards for information leading to the arrest of mercenary leaders loyal to the Saudi-led coalition or soldiers of foreign nationalities. “Everyone who contributes to the arrest of any local or foreign coalition mercenary commander, regardless of his rank, will receive care and attention, in addition to a large financial [...]
Political leaders “underestimated” the magnitude of the danger posed by the coronavirus, Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission has admitted. Her statement came as the EU shut its borders. “I think that all of us who are not experts initially underestimated the coronavirus,” she told Germany’s Bild newspaper in an interview published Wednesday. “But now it is clear that this is a [...]
Saudi Arabia said on Tuesday that mosques would no longer be open for the customary five daily prayers or Friday congregations, an exceptional move to limit the spread of the coronavirus which has infected 171 people in the kingdom. Saudi Arabia, which chairs the Group of 20 major economies, announced an extraordinary virtual leaders summit next week “to put forward a coordinated set of policies to [...]
President of the European Council Charles Michel has announced EU’s external borders will be closed for 30 days to combat the spread of the coronavirus. It’s up to member states to implement the ban. “The EU and its member states will do whatever it takes to address the current challenges,” Michel announced. President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen made the recommendation for the [...]
![MBS and MBZ bloody Yemeni war - Cartoon [Sabaaneh/MiddleEastMonitor]](https://1buv.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/despotic-leaders-are-more-deadly-than-the-coronavirus-middle-east-monitor.jpg)
I am in no way belittling the gravity of the coronavirus which the World Health Organisation classed as a pandemic, however, people have been intimidated by this virus and the news spreading with it. There have been many conspiracies about how it began, the most prominent of which is that it is a type of biological welfare launched by the US against its largest economic competitor, [...]
Turkish, German, British and French leaders discussed the Syria crisis and migrant issue as well as joint action against coronavirus in a videoconference, Turkish presidency said on Tuesday. It issued a statement saying that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson also discussed methods of humanitarian aid to Syria’s northwestern Idlib province, Reuters reports. [...]
Authored by Soeren Kern via The Gatestone Institute, The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has now reached more than 45 countries in Europe, where (as of March 12) more than 30,000 people have tested positive for the disease, according to a Gatestone Institute tally based on calculations from European health ministries. The disease is spreading fast: more than 28,000 coronavirus cases (93% of all cases) in Europe [...]
Authored by Tomas Pueyo via Medium.com, With everything that’s happening about the Coronavirus, it might be very hard to make a decision of what to do today. Should you wait for more information? Do something today? What? Here’s what I’m going to cover in this article, with lots of charts, data and models with plenty of sources: When you’re done reading the article, this is what [...]
Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will hold talks about solving a brewing migration crisis, with French and German leaders next week, by teleconference rather than at a summit as originally planned, according to a Turkish official. The decision comes as countries grapple with the spread of Covid-19. Erdogan has postponed his own foreign visits for an unspecified period of time, Reuters reported, citing his spokesman. Earlier this [...]
The Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthi movement in Yemen have blocked southern separatist leaders from returning to Aden city, Reuters quoted Yemeni officials as saying on Thursday. The separatists are part of a Sunni Muslim coalition that intervened in Yemen in March 2015 to try to restore the government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, ousted in 2014 from the capital, Sanaa, by the Houthis. Last year, [...]
Following last night’s Oval Office unveiling of a 30-day travel ban affecting roughly two dozen European countries, though not the UK, which confirmed its 7th death from the outbreak. Notably, the ban will only affect the movement of people (and American citizens are of course exempt) but not trade in goods, as the White House hastily clarified when they saw the market’s initial reaction, and will [...]
Democrat and Republican House leaders have paused their partisan sniping to do the real work of governing: keeping unpopular surveillance programs, including roving NSA wiretaps and access to metadata, alive indefinitely. With just four days to go before congressional authorization for the controversial provisions expires, a bipartisan contingent has swooped in to save the NSA from experiencing one second of separation anxiety from Americans’ private communications. [...]
The migrant agreement between Turkey and the European Union signed in 2016 needs to be updated, taking into account developments in Syria, Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told the Anadolu Agency today. The conditions have changed since March 2016, when Turkey and the EU first forged a deal on migrants, he said. “We will discuss with the EU what we can do on refugees under the [...]
Former UAW President Gary Jones, a labor leader who until recently held the same job that made Jimmy Hoffa a national icon (before his untimely murder/disappearance) has been charged by federal prosecutors with conspiring to embezzle union funds, WSJ reports. Prosecutors claimed Jones used union funds to finance “trips, liquor and other luxuries” despite presenting himself as a labor leader and man of the people who [...]
There’s only one thing able to unite Russia’s notoriously divided ‘non-systemic’ opposition: hostility to Vladimir Putin and his Kremlin. Thus, they may take his faint praise for their activities with a pinch of salt. Speaking to TASS news agency, Putin lauded the positive contribution the activists make to the life of the country. “May God bless them,” the president said. “I feel that these people are [...]
Seyyed Mohammad Mirmohammadi, a long-standing member of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Expediency Discernment Council, has reportedly died from a novel coronavirus infection. He was being treated at the Masih Daneshvari Hospital in Tehran when he succumbed to the Covid-19 infection. Mirmohammadi’s mother, sister of senior cleric Ayatollah Shobeiri Zanjani, also died from a coronavirus infection on Monday. Mirmohammadi was a member of the sixth and [...]
Authored by Jonathan Turley, As we have been discussing, establishment figures in the Democratic party and the media have been preparing to block any nomination of Bernie Sanders, including using the “superdelegates” to hand the nomination to another candidate. The New York Times reported Thursday that the Democratic establishment was preparing for open warfare over blocking Sanders, even if it shatters the unity of the party. If Sanders does [...]
Dozens of former European foreign ministers and leaders have slammed the Trump administration’s so-called “deal of the century”, describing its details as akin to “apartheid”. In a joint letter published today by the Guardian, the 50 European figures – including former prime ministers and senior ministers – urged action to oppose the plan. “As Europeans dedicated to promoting international law, peace and security worldwide, we express [...]