List of All Articles with Tag 'politics'

Iraq’s prime minister held talks Sunday with Syrian President Bashar Assad in Damascus during the first trip of its kind to the war-torn country since the 12-year conflict began. Iraq and Syria have had close relations for years even after many Arab countries withdrew their ambassadors for Damascus and Syria’s membership in the 22-member Arab League was suspended because of the crackdown on protesters in 2011. Assad received Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, who was heading a high-ranking delegation, at the presidential palace in Damascus. They discussed mutual relations and cooperation between the two neighboring countries among other issues, according to the office of Syria’s president. Al-Sudani’s office said in a statement that talks revolved around ways of expanding cooperation in the fields of trade, economy, transportation, tourism, how to combat climate change and collaboration to fight terrorism. Security cooperation against extremist groups was likely to be on top of the two-day visit's agenda. The two countries, where Iran enjoys wide influence, have a joint 600 kilometers-long (373 miles) border. In June 2014, the Islamic State group declared the establishment of a self-styled “caliphate,” a traditional model of Islamic rule, in wide areas under its control in Iraq and Syria. After a yearslong campaign that left tens of thousands dead in both countries, IS was defeated in Iraq in 2017 and in March 2019 in Syria. Over the past years, Syrian government forces regained control of much of Syria with the help of Russia and Iran. Earlier this year, Syria’s membership in the Arab League was reinstated and Assad attended the Arab summit that was held in Saudi Arabia in May. Al-Sudani was invited to visit Damascus during a trip by Syria’s Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad to Baghdad last month. The U.S. has a presence in both Syria and Iraq and Syrian officials have been calling for the withdrawal of American troops from the country who first arrived in 2015. On any given day there are at least 900 U.S. forces in Syria, along with an undisclosed number of contractors attempting to prevent the resurgence of the Islamic State group. U.S. special operations forces also move in and out of the country but are usually in small teams and are not included in the official count. U.S.-led coalition forces have officially ended their combat mission in Iraq, but continue to play an advisory role to Iraqi forces in the fight against the Islamic State extremist group. Read More Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide

2024 is shaping up to be the kind of election Joe Biden could lose primarily because of a third-party candidacy.

British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said Sunday he plans to resign at the next Cabinet reshuffle after four years in the job. Wallace has served as defense secretary under three prime ministers and played a key role in the U.K.'s response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. He told The Sunday Times his departure was due to the strain his job had put on his family. He also said he would stand down as a lawmaker at the next general election. Wallace is the longest continuously serving minister in government. He was security minister under former Prime Minister Theresa May, before being promoted to defense secretary by her successor Boris Johnson. Wallace drew criticism last week when he suggested that Ukraine should show “gratitude” for the West's military support. He made the remark at the NATO summit in Lithuania after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expressed frustration about when his country could join the military alliance. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak distanced himself from Wallace's comments, saying Zelenskyy had “expressed his gratitude for what we've done on a number of occasions.” Read More Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide

Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis posted a strong fundraising total of $20 million in his bid for the GOP nomination for the quarter ended June 30, according to his filing Saturday with the Federal Election Commission. But the Florida governor is relying on larger donors to fuel his campaign and saw the pace of contributions slow after his initial announcement.

Donald Trump branded the US a “third-world hellhole” run by “perverts” and “thugs” in his latest 2024 campaign speech. The one-term president told the Turning Point Action Conference in Florida that the American dream was “dead” under Joe Biden as he relentlessly mocked his predecessor “The election will decide whether your generation will inherit a fascist country or a free country, “ Mr Trump told the conference of younger conservative activists on Saturday. “Millions of illegal aliens have stormed across our borders, it is an invasion, like a military invasion. Our rights and liberties are being torn to shreds. “Your country is being turned into a third-world hellhole, run by censors, perverts criminals and thugs.” And Mr Trump continued to paint a bleak picture of America in the year before the next presidential election. “We are in big trouble, today the greatest threat is not for the outside the greatest threat. It is the sick, sinister and evil forces are trying to destroy our country from within,” he claimed. “If you have the right leadership China is not a problem, if you have the right leadership Russia would not be a problem. They would not have done what they did, believe me, they would never have done it.” And he added: “Your task, your calling, your historic mission is to liberate America from these communists, racists, Marxists, globalists and warmongers who want to plunder the future of our country.” And Mr Trump also claimed that he intended to “reclaim colleges” and “choke off the money” to universities that are leading a “Marxist assault” on “Western civilization itself.” “After 50 years of leftist domination in the universities, I will take bold action to reclaim our colleges from the Communist left…anti-American radicals will no longer be given a free hand to dominate our institutions of higher learning.” And he added: “The days of subsidizing communist indoctrination … are over.” Mr Trump also told the crowd at the event that he viewed his indictments as a “great badge of honour.” “Every time the radical left Democrats indict me, I consider it to be a great badge of honour and courage. I am doing it for you. I am being indicted for you. Better me than you and I believe the you is more than 200 million people,” he said. Read More Trump news – live: Trump headlines Turning Point event with Tucker and GOP allies as investigations close in DeSantis would consider Iowa's Reynolds as running mate, calls Trump's attack of her 'out of hand' Fundraising takeaways: Trump and DeSantis in their own tier as Pence and other Republicans struggle US support for Ukraine emerges as key dividing line between GOP 2024 hopefuls in Tucker Carlson-hosted forum The Iowa caucuses are six months away. Some Republicans worry Trump may be unstoppable DeSantis would consider Iowa's Reynolds as running mate, calls Trump's attack of her 'out of hand' Fundraising takeaways: Trump and DeSantis in their own tier as Pence and other Republicans struggle Trump headlines Turning Point event with Tucker and GOP allies – latest

Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday will urge the Senate to quickly advance the dozens of State Department nominees that remain pending due to holds put into place by Republican senators, a State Department official told CNN.

A number of high-profile Jewish groups are denouncing Democratic presidential contender Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s false remarks that "Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese" people are "most immune" to Covid-19.

Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie raised $1.65 million over the first 25 days of his candidacy through June 30, according to the former New Jersey governor's latest fundraising report.

Anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F Kennedy Jr has revived an antisemitic conspiracy that blames Jewish people for the emergence of Covid-19, a claim that follows a string of offensive statements and falsehoods elevated by the long-shot candidate for the US presidency. During a press event in New York City on 11 July, Mr Kennedy baselessly stated that “there is an argument to be made” that the disease is “ethnically targeted”. “Covid-19 is targeted to attack Cucasians and Black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese,” he said, according to video of the event from The New York Post. “We don’t know whether it was deliberately targeted or not but there are papers out there that show the racial or ethnic differential and impact.” His remarks follow antisemitic conspiracy theories that circulated at the onset of the pandemic, and follow other statements from the candidate elevating spurious conspiracy theories surrounding Covid-19 and vaccines that have fuelled his campaign. “The claim that Covid-19 was a bioweapon created by the Chinese or Jews to attack Caucasians and Black people is deeply offensive and feeds into sinophobic and antisemitic conspiracy theories,” according to a statement from the Anti-Defamation League. “Layer upon layer of antisemitism,” wrote Jonathan Weisman, author of (((Semitism))): Being Jewish in America in the Age of Trump. “If you still think there is a left or even non-insane case for supporting or even indulging RFK Jr then you have been conned or have conned yourself,” wrote MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan. “Madness. Racist, conspiratorial, dangerous madness.” “We have no words for this man’s lunacy,” wrote nonprofit US watchdog Stop Antisemitism. Mr Kennedy responded to the reporting on Saturday morning, and a statement from a campaign spokesperson to The Independent claimed that the Post “got it wrong”. “I have never, ever suggested that the Covid-19 virus was targeted to spare Jews,” Mr Kennedy wrote on Twitter before echoing his claim that the US and other governments are “developing ethnically targeted bioweapons”. He pointed to a 2020 National Institutes of Health study finding that the impacts of the disease are disproportionately felt among Black people and people with cardiovascular and pulmonary conditions, cancer and other risk factors. “In that sense, it serves as a kind of proof of concept for ethnically targeted bioweapons,” Mr Kennedy stated. “I do not believe and never implied that the ethnic effect was deliberately engineered.” Mr Kennedy’s campaign, an insurgent effort for the Democratic nomination boosted by right-wing media to drive a wedge among Democratic voters, has painted a dark and conspiratorial worldview amplifying debunked and misleading claims and outright falsehoods. Earlier this year, US Holocaust Memorial Museum shot down his suggestion that life is worse for people today than it was for Anne Frank. “Making reckless comparisons to the Holocaust, the murder of six million Jews, for a political agenda is outrageous and deeply offensive,” the organisation said. “Those who carelessly invoke Anne Frank, the star badge, and the Nuremberg Trials exploit history and the consequences of hate.” Mr Kennedy and his organisation Children’s Health Defense also have promoted James Corbett, a prominent conspiracy theorist who has claimed that “Hitler was a Rothschild” and “Hitler and the Nazis were 100 per cent completely and utterly set up” by the “international banking community and the international crony capitalists.” His connections to Mr Corbett join a long list of associations with and appearances on right-wing media platforms with far-right pundits. Read More Who is running for president in 2024? Robert F Kennedy Jr calls interviewer ‘unfair’ for spelling out his laundry list of conspiracy theories White House rejects Lauren Boebert’s claim that antisemitism plan will be used ‘go after conservatives’

Anyone who spends time following American politics is bound to encounter reports about polling. With the 2024 election just around the corner, here are tips from CNN's director of polling and election analytics on what to look out for and avoid.

Donald Trump hasn't yet committed to the first Republican presidential primary debate in August -- but some of the former president's most vocal critics within the party's 2024 field are still working to qualify for the stage.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the Wagner private military company “simply doesn't exist” as a legal entity, in comments adding to the series of often bizarre twists that have followed the group’s abortive revolt last month — the most serious threat to Putin’s 23-year rule amid the war in Ukraine. “There is no law on private military organizations. It simply doesn’t exist,” Putin told a Russian newspaper late Thursday, referring to the Wagner group. Putin recounted to Kommersant his own version of a Kremlin event attended by 35 Wagner commanders, including the group's chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, on June 29. That meeting came just five days after Prigozhin and his troops staged a stunning but short-lived rebellion against Moscow authorities. The meeting was revealed earlier this week by a Kremlin official. Putin said that at the talks, Wagner rejected an offer to keep its troops in Ukraine, where they have played key battlefield roles, under the leadership of their direct commander. “All of them could have gathered in one place and continued to serve,” Putin told the newspaper, “And nothing would have changed for them. They would have been led by the same person who had been their real commander all along.” Putin has previously said that Wagner troops had to choose whether to sign contracts with the Russian Defense Ministry, move to neighboring Belarus or retire from service. According to Putin, although “many nodded” when he made his proposal, Prigozhin rejected the idea, responding that “the boys won’t agree with such a decision.” This, Putin said, was one of “several employment options” put forward at the meeting. During the revolt that lasted less than 24 hours, Prigozhin’s mercenaries quickly swept through the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and captured the military headquarters there without firing a shot, before driving to within about 200 kilometers (125 miles) of Moscow. Prigozhin described the move as a “march of justice” to oust the military leaders, who demanded that Wagner sign contracts with the Defense Ministry by July 1. The fate of Prigozhin and the terms of a deal that ended the armed rebellion by offering amnesty for him and his mercenaries, along with permission, to move to Belarus remain cloudy. Wagner mercenaries are completing the handover of their weapons to the Russian military, the Defense Ministry said Wednesday. Their disarming of Wagner reflects efforts by Russian authorities to defuse the threat they posed and also appears to herald an end to the mercenary group’s operations on the battlefield in Ukraine, where Kyiv’s forces are engaged in a counteroffensive. ___ Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine Read More Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Putin says Wagner Group has no legal basis and therefore simply doesn’t exist Tucker Carlson and Mike Pence clash in heated exchange over Ukraine at GOP 2024 forum Russian antiwar activist allowed into Serbia after spending more than a day at the Belgrade airport