List of All Articles with Tag 'world'

An Obama-era White House email transmitting then-vice president Joe Biden’s schedule to his son, Hunter Biden, was sent during planning for a Biden family gathering to mark the one-year anniversary of Beau Biden’s death, The Independent has learned. The communications between an aide for the then-vice president and his youngest and sole surviving son are part of a House Oversight Committee request for Obama-era records sent to the National Archives. The oversight committee chairman, Representative James Comer, said in a letter to the archives released on Thursday that it was “concerning” to the Republican-led panel that Hunter Biden was a recipient of a 26 May 2016 email showing that the then-vice president was scheduled to speak with then-Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko the next day. Republicans have spent the last several years insinuating — without evidence — that then-vice president Biden abused his authority to help Hunter Biden’s business interests. One long-running but oft-disproven allegation states that Mr Biden ordered the firing of a Ukrainian prosecutor to disrupt an investigation into a Ukrainian energy firm that employed his son on its board. In reality, the decision to push for the prosecutor’s sacking was official US policy driven by the prosecutor’s failure to pursue corruption cases, and it was supported by the EU, the IMF, World Bank and other stakeholders. In his letter to the Archives, Mr Comer has asked for unredacted copies of four emails that had been released in redacted form pursuant to a Freedom of Information Act request. The Independent reviewed copies of the emails that have been publicly available on a website hosting the contents of a hard drive purportedly abandoned by Hunter Biden at a Delaware computer shop. According to the redacted versions of the emails, certain information was blocked out because it contained personal information about the then-vice president’s schedule. But the unredacted versions purportedly from Hunter Biden’s computer show that following the call with Mr Poroshenko, the then-vice president returned home to Delaware. The day of the call — and Mr Biden’s trip home — was 27 May 2016, nearly one year to the day since Mr Biden’s eldest son, then-Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden, passed away after a long battle with brain cancer. Mr Biden’s public schedule from those days is available on archives of the Obama White House website, and they reveal that he had no public events for the period of 28 May 2016 to 30 May 2016. But another email from the purported Hunter Biden laptop, dated 30 May 2016, shows that the then-vice president’s staff coordinated movements of 23 Biden family members to and from a private memorial gathering that day, the exact anniversary of Beau Biden’s death. Hunter Biden, who was not present for the gathering, wrote in his recent memoir Beautiful Things that he spent that weekend in Monte Carlo for a meeting of Burisma’s board. But the younger Biden’s children — the then-vice president’s grandchildren — were listed as attending the gathering, which would have provided a reason for Hunter Biden to be kept aware of his father’s schedule. The day after the gathering, 31 May 2016, was also Memorial Day. That day, Joe Biden resumed his public schedule when he commemorated his late son at a ceremony to rename Delaware’s National Guard headquarters in Wilmington as the Major Joseph R “Beau” Biden III National Guard/Reserve Center. The late Delaware attorney general was an Iraq war veteran who had served a Major in the Army National Guard’s Judge Advocate General’s Corps. The White House and a representative for Mr Comer did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Independent. Read More Hunter Biden lawyer asks to withdraw from case after special counsel named to investigate president’s son Prosecutors in the Hunter Biden case deny defense push to keep gun charge agreement in place Trump and Hunter Biden legal blockbusters rock Washington – but offer a contrast Hunter Biden lawyer asks to withdraw from case after special counsel named in probe Prosecutors in the Hunter Biden case deny defense push to keep gun charge agreement in place Hunter Biden’s lawyer fight to keep plea deal

Former President Donald Trump reposted a meme of the DC National Guard stationed outside of the Lincoln Memorial in an effort to slam President Joe Biden—but as it turns out, that photo was taken during his own administration. “If you need 10,000 armed soldiers to protect your inauguration from the people then you probably weren’t elected by the people,” the Truth Social meme says, suggesting that Mr Biden lost the election that brought him to power. Mr Trump “re-Truthed” a post by @Godloving, who wrote on Wednesday, “From the campaign to the election, vote certification, inauguration, and administration...it all screams FRAUDULENT ELECTION!! Everybody knows it, no one does anything about it! There is only one leader with the courage and plan to fix this and it’s President Trump!! In fact, there is no other leader, anywhere!!” Despite pairing the emphatic words with the haunting photo in an attempt to blast Mr Biden, the image was actually captured in 2020 amid protests after George Floyd was killed by police. The photo went viral at the time because of the striking contrast depicted in the scene. The Lincoln Memorial was built to honour a president who famously issued the Emancipation Proclamation; the site was also where Martin Luther King Jr delivered his “I have a Dream” speech. Having troops dressed in military gear perched resolutely on the landmark’s steps evokes a different feeling entirely. The re-post from Mr Trump comes shortly after he was indicted—both federally and in the state of Georgia—for his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. Even after numerous legal efforts failed to prove any evidence of election fraud, the 2024 GOP frontrunner still continues to maintain that the election was “rigged.” Following the Georgia indictment, which was brought on Monday evening, the former president wrote on Truth Social: “Can you believe it? This failed District Attorney from Atlanta, Fani Willis…is charging me with 2020 Presidential Election Interference. No, Fani, the only Election Interference was done by those that Rigged and Stole the Election. Those are the ones you should be going after, not the innocent people that are fighting for Election Integrity!” He faces 13 felony counts in Georgia, including racketeering, conspiracy to impersonate a public officer, two counts of conspiracy to commit forgery, two counts of conspiracy to make false statements under oath, two counts of conspiracy to file false documents, two counts of solicitation of a public officer, filing false documents, conspiracy to solicit false statements, and making false statements. He is joined by 18 others who were indicted, including Rudy Giuliani, Mark Meadows, Kenneth Chesebro, John Eastman, Jenna Ellis, and Sidney Powell. Read More Ramaswamy dismisses ‘professional politician’ DeSantis after ‘sledgehammer’ strategy for debate revealed Trump slammed for ‘racist’ Georgia indictment post using term ‘riggers’ as jail booking nears – live updates Will Donald Trump go to prison?

The US Securities and Exchange Commission can seek the South Korean government’s assistance to question Do Kwon’s Terraform

Police in Georgia are investigating online threats to members of a grand jury that voted to indict Donald Trump and 18 of the former president’s allies accused of conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in a sprawling criminal case. The Fulton County Sheriff’s Office is “aware that personal information from members of the jury” has been shared across social media platforms, the agency announced on 17 August, less than three days after a sweeping charging document was unsealed. As required under state law, the names of the jurors are listed in the 98-page indictment. The sheriff’s office is working with local, state and federal law enforcement agencies to “track down” the origins of the threats in the county and in other jurisdictions, according to the statement. The former president’s supporters have published the jurors’ names, social media profiles, addresses and phone numbers as part of an apparent harassment campaign following right-wing outrage over a sweeping criminal indictment, the fullest accounting yet of an alleged effort among Mr Trump and his allies to coerce officials into a fraudulent scheme to subvert the votes of millions of Americans. Far-right message boards and platforms dominated by pro-Trump users such as Gab and Truth Social have been flooded with comments and posts surrounding the case and the jurors, with pledges to “doxx” or publish a person’s personal information online with the intent to harass them. Accounts on fringe far-right message boards such as 4chan and The Donald have threatened to follow jurors home and “photograph their faces,” labelled their names a “hit list,” posted images of jurors’ alleged profiles on Facebook and LinkedIn, tried to determine their political affiliations and religious and ethnic backgrounds, and promoted violence against them. The Independent’s review of posts across Truth Social, where users vie for the audience of the former president himself, shows users rushing to Mr Trump’s defence while trying to identify and smear members of the jury who indicted him. Users on the far-right, pro-Trump message board The Donald, frequently a hotbed for violent rhetoric targeting political opponents, have promoted the killing of jurors and suggested igniting civil war. This is a developing story Read More Trump insists Democrats are angry at his indictment too as Georgia jail booking nears – live updates Will the Georgia gang of 18 turn on Trump? Trumpworld hanging by a thread as co-accused pressured to flip on ex-president Who is Fani Willis, the Georgia prosecutor who could take down Trump

This story is the first of Bloomberg’s Open House series, featuring some of Hong Kong’s most interesting homes.

China Evergrande Group sought Chapter 15 bankruptcy protection in New York on Thursday, a move that protects its

Rishi Sunak’s government said UK banks could face fines if they don’t preserve easy and free access to

China is close to unleashing its strongest ever guidance to push back yuan bears via its daily reference

A songwriter and model who co-wrote one of Katy Perry’s hit songs has mysteriously vanished and her loved ones fear someone is holding her captive. Swedish-born Camela Leierth-Segura, 48, was last seen in the Beverly Hills area back on 29 June, according to the California Department of Justice’s missing persons page. Her longtime friend Cecilia Foss told The Independent that it’s not like her to just vanish without a trace and the fact that her beloved 19-year-old cat Morris is also missing has made it even more of a mystery. “My worst fear is that someone has her, and is hurting her,” Ms Foss said, adding that Ms Leierth-Segura is not someone who would just disappear for seven weeks without responding to anyone. “If she was going for a drive to clear her head, I get it,” Ms Foss said. “But it’s been seven weeks. And no one has heard from her. Nobody goes for a seven-week drive.” Ms Leierth-Segura had already been missing for several weeks before her friends and family put the pieces together. “She was always so busy with projects but when 10, 20, 50 of us discovered none of us had heard from her, we got really worried,” Foss said. She said their friend Liz Montgomery called for a welfare check and Beverly Hills police responded to her apartment where the landlord informed them she had been evicted. Neighbours have told local news they hadn’t seen her in weeks, pointing out that the usually well-tended plants on her balcony are now dead. Ms Montgomery filed a missing person report and has been in contact with her family. Beverly Hills Police have alerts out for Camela, her black cat Morris and her car. It’s not known if the cat is with Camela. Ms Foss and their friend Liz Montgomery are in close contact with Camela’s family in Sweden. “They are devastated and overwhelmed,” Ms Foss said. “With them there and Camela here, I think it’s just very hard for her family to even comprehend that she is missing.” Ms Leierth-Segura’s last text message was sent on 29 June, and her Ford Fusion car was last seen on police cameras leaving Beverly Hills the following afternoon, 30 June. But it’s not clear who was driving the vehicle. “She had mentioned it to all of us that she was having trouble; Covid definitely was not helpful for her because she’s a musician, model, actress, all that stuff,” Ms Montgomery told The Los Angeles Times. “And there was no money coming in.” It is not clear when exactly she was evicted or where she was staying afterwards. In an Instagram post, Ms Montgomery also urged for help in tracking down the missing woman. “This is a personal friend of mine. A best friend. People are asking so, YES! PLEASE SHARE - HELP NEEDED! My dear friend of over 25 years is missing. LAST SEEN IN BEVERLY HILLS ON JUNE 29,2023,” she wrote. “We are extremely worried about her safety, and despite our best efforts, the local authorities have not been able to locate her. If you have any information, even the smallest detail can help, please reach out immediately.” She added: “She means the world to us and time is of the essence. Her family in Sweden is pleading for your assistance. PLEASE spread the word, SHARE this post, and help us bring Camela home safely. Thank you for your support and assistance in this critical matter.” “I’d like to think that nothing bad happened, but do I think something bad happened? Yeah,” she said. A GoFundMe has been created by her sister Lisa and loved ones are hoping money will help bring in information to find her. Read More Maryland police to announce ‘potential suspect’ in Rachel Morin murder investigation Camela Leierth-Segura – update: Search for missing Katy Perry songwriter after mysterious disappearance Musician who wrote Katy Perry hit song mysteriously vanishes from Beverly Hills

Former President Donald Trump said if reelected, he would not reappoint Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell when the

Donald Trump is currently negotiating the terms of his voluntary surrender with the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office in Georgia after receiving his fourth criminal indictment of the year on Monday, according to CNN. Mr Trump and 18 co-conspirators – lawyers Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman and Jenna Ellis and ex-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows among them – were formally charged with racketeering by Atlanta prosecutor Fani Willis over their alleged attempts to alter the presidential election result in the swing state in 2020 after it turned blue for Joe Biden, sealing the Democrat’s win. The ousted former president, still the front-runner for the Republican 2024 nomination despite his array of legal problems, is charged with 13 of the 41 counts in Ms Willis’s indictment and faces up to 70 years in prison if convicted. He now has until noon on Friday 25 August to be booked at the Fulton County Jail in Atlanta and arraigned at its courthouse before Judge Scott McAfee, where he is again expected to enter not guilty pleas to all charges, as he has at his three previous arraignments in New York, Miami and Washington DC. A bond agreement is likely to be forged to spare Mr Trump having to stay overnight in jail, as is the usual custom, and he is again unlikely to be seen in handcuffs or forced to pose for a mugshot, although county sheriff Pat Labat has previously insisted he intends to apply the same “normal practices” to the politician and his co-accused as he would any other defendants. It is just as well for Mr Trump, a well-known germaphobe, that he will not have to spend an evening at Fulton County Jail, also known by the nickname “Rice Street” as it is notoriously overcrowded and in poor repair, with a reputation for “unhygienic living conditions”. “It’s miserable. It’s cold. It smells. It’s just generally unpleasant,” veteran defence attorney Robert G Rubin told The New York Times this week. “Plus, there’s a high degree of anxiety for any defendant that’s in that position.” The facility was considered state of the art when it was built in 1985 to hold 1,300 inmates. In recent years, it has been forced to house closer to 3,000 people, with an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) report from September 2022 observing that hundreds of people were being held at Fulton County Jail for longer than 90 days because they had not yet been formally charged or could not afford to pay off their bail bond. Another 117 had been held for more than a year because they had not been indicted and two more for over two years for the same reason, the report said. Fallon McClure, deputy director of policy and advocacy at the ACLU of Georgia, told the BBC the jail had “essentially been overcrowded since it was built”. “This has just been a perpetual cycle over and over for years,” she added, expressing pessimism that a long-touted $1.7bn replacement containment facility would ever be built. “There’s been a lot of talk of cleaning it up. We have not really seen or heard anything particularly significant. It seems like a lot of posturing.” Another recent report by the Southern Center for Human Rights recounted outbreaks of Covid-19, lice, scabies and cachexia, an affliction otherwise known as wasting syndrome, which hits those who are “significantly malnourished”. Six people have died in Fulton County custody this year, according to the BBC, including 19-year-old Noni Battiste-Kosoko in July (an autopsy report is still being carried out) and a 34-year-old man who was found unconscious in a medical unit cell last week. In September last year, another inmate, Lashawn Thompson, 35, died after being housed in a cell his lawyer likened to a “torture chamber”. The prisoner had spent three months in the jail’s psychiatric ward before he passed away and an independent medical review concluded that while his “untreated decompensated schizophrenia” had played a role in his death, so had dehydration, malnutrition and severe body infestation with insects, including lice and bed bugs. “We’re just letting people literally rot away there,” Sarah Flack, another local defence attorney, lamented to Insider. Read More Trump slammed for ‘racist’ Truth Social as he prepares to be booked into Fulton County Jail – live updates Trump attacks Fox News for using ‘worst’ photos of him: ‘Especially the big orange one’ Arrest, mugshot, cameras in court? What’s next for Donald Trump after his Georgia indictment Can Donald Trump still run for president after charges over 2020 election?

On the night of 29 July, 2016, a 911 operator near Houston received a call from a concerned teenager. The young man told the operator that he heard gunshots at his home. When police arrived to check on the teenager, they found that both of his parents had been shot in the head while sleeping in their beds. The boy's mother, Dawn Armstrong, was pronounced dead at the scene. His father, former NFL linebacker Antonio Armstrong Sr, was rushed to a hospital where he died from his wounds. When police searched the house, they found the murder weapon — a .22 calibre pistol belonging to Mr Armstrong Sr — and a terrifying note. "I have been watching you for a long time. Come get me," the note read. But there was no shadowy killer waiting to play cat and mouse with the Houston police. Instead — at least so far as a Texas grand jury is concerned — the teenager who made the call, Antonio "AJ" Armstrong Jr, pulled the trigger, planted the gun, and wrote the threatening note on the night of his parents' deaths, according to the New York Post. Armstrong Jr, now 23, was found guilty on Wednesday and was sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his parents when he was 16 years old. He stood quietly in the courtroom when his verdict and sentencing were read out. His wife — who was dating him at the time of the murders — sobbed. Jurors spent approximately 10-and-a-half hours deliberating before ultimately deciding Armstrong Jr was guilty. It was his third time at trial; the first two ended with hung juries, resulting in the need for retrials. Armstrong Jr has been wearing an ankle monitor since 2017 as a result. Since the night of the murders in 2016, Armstrong Jr has married his high-school sweetheart, Katie, and became a father. Now he will spend the rest of his life interacting with them through prison glass. During the trial, prosecutors revealed that a week before the murders, Armstrong Jr had used the murder weapon to shoot a pillow and a blanket inside his bedroom. The bullet lodged in his bedroom floor. They said he also lit a fire outside his parents' bedroom door two nights before he killed them. The evidence against Armstrong Jr did not end there; prosecutors revealed the teenager had searched for instructions on building a car bomb using his iPad. Investigators also doubted a story he told them about a masked intruder entering his home on the night of the murders. He reportedly told investigators that he saw a 6-foot-tall man in a mask flee his home on the night his parents were killed. However, he did not include that information in his initial reports, and data pulled from the home's security system showed no records of anyone entering the house on the night of the murders. Prosecutors argued that the teenager was lashing out after his parents scolded him for getting kicked out of his high school. The defence rejected that argument, and pointed to his mental health issues, which included paranoia and schizophrenia. After killing his parents, Armstrong Jr was placed in psychiatric hospitals, where a doctor testified for the defence that the teenager believed he was both a god and a devil. His defence plans to appeal the verdict. Read More Jared Bridegan: Prosecutors to announce major break in case of murdered Microsoft executive US Army soldier accused of killing his wife in Alaska faces court hearing Mississippi judge declares mistrial for two white men charged with shooting at Black FedEx worker