Lebanese PM says Israel is killing unarmed civilians as US president says country is not included in provisional ceasefireIsrael hits Lebanon with massive strikes amid ceasefire uncertaintyHegseth claims Iran ‘begged’ for ceasefireA genocidal threat, and then the US president, Donald Trump, blinked – without any apparently meaningful concessions from Iran. As in so much concerning the second Trump administration, the two week ceasefire “deal” that will see the strait of Hormuz reopened – if it can be described as such – is maddeningly vague and short on detail, apparently kicking the can on key issues down the road.Iran’s nuclear issue, Trump said, would be solved “perfectly.” “It was a big day for world peace”, Trump posted on Truth Social. “Iran can start reconstruction” he added. “Big money” could be made. Yada. Yada. Yada. Continue reading...
Middle East crisis live: Trump says Lebanon is ‘separate skirmish’ to Iran as Israel launches massive strikes on country
Lebanese PM says Israel is killing unarmed civilians as US president says country is not included in provisional ceasefire Israel hits Lebanon with massive strikes amid ceasefire uncertainty Hegseth claims Iran ‘begged’ for ceasefire A genocidal threat, and then the US president, Donald Trump, blinked – without any apparently meaningful concessions from Iran. As in so much concerning the second Trump administration, the two week ceasefire “deal” that will see the strait of Hormuz reopened – if it can be described as such – is maddeningly vague and short on detail, apparently kicking the can on key issues down the road. Iran’s nuclear issue, Trump said, would be solved “perfectly.” “It was a big day for world peace”, Trump posted on Truth Social. “Iran can start reconstruction” he added. “Big money” could be made. Yada. Yada. Yada. Continue reading...
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Oil prices plunge and shares jump on US-Iran ceasefire plan
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Congress must take up war powers resolution to curb action on Iran, says top House Democrat – US politics live
‘We need a permanent end to Donald Trump’s reckless war of choice,’ says Hakeem Jeffries as he calls for immediate vote Sign up for the Breaking News US email Pete Hegseth repeated Donald Trump’s social media comments that Iran will cease uranium enrichment – a condition that Tehran has previously refused to budge on. “Any material they should not have, will be removed right now,” Hegseth said. “The president has been clear from the beginning, there will be no Iranian nuclear weapons.” Continue reading...
Starmer warns ‘lot of work to do’ to make ceasefire permanent at start of talks in Gulf - UK politics live
PM will meet leaders in the region to discuss diplomatic efforts to support the ceasefire agreed between the US and Iran OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, is proposing the extension of the four-day working week, as a response to AI taking over some of the work done by humans. But for the Conservative party the four-day working week, at least in the public sector, is viewed as a menace. Officially, that’s a value-for-money position, but it also overlaps with their opposition to civil servants working from home, which has some of the traits of a culture war obsession. Today the Conservatives have announced that, if they were in government, they would ban councils from letting staff work a four-day working week on full pay. Explaining why, the Tories say in a news release: The four-day working week, as introduced by Liberal Democrat-run South Cambridgeshire district council, has left residents with more council tax for less public service. Bin collectors and social housing officials receive 100 per cent of their pay for around 80 per cent of their originally contracted hours. The Labour government have failed to act. As communities secretary, Angela Rayner scrapped [Whitehall opposition to the South Cambridgeshire policy]. Labour are refusing to legislate against a four-day week, giving councils an effective green light to get away with charging more for less work. Consequentially, Labour-run Cambridge City Council has become the second council to sign up to the four-day week. Those areas which saw a statistically significant improvement include: the percentage of calls answered by the contact centre; the average number of days taken to update housing benefit and council tax support claims; the average number of weeks for householder planning applications to be decided; the percentage of planning applications (both large and small) decided within target or agreed timescales; the percentage of council house repairs complete within 24 hours; [and] the percentage of complaints responded to on time. If performance variations caused by Covid are discounted, every single service monitored either got better or stayed the same. Continue reading...
Chris Taylor wins Wisconsin state supreme court election giving liberal judges a 5-2 majority
Taylor defeated conservative rival Maria Lazar, providing another gauge of Democrats’ durability in midterms Wisconsin voters sent another liberal justice to the state supreme court, with Chris Taylor beating conservative Maria Lazar and giving liberals a 5-2 edge on the high court. The retirement of Justice Rebecca Bradley, a conservative, gave liberals a chance to further consolidate their hold on the high court ahead of the next presidential election, when the swing state is sure to see challenges to election results. Continue reading...