Page 2549 - Politics
Kremlin says Mueller probe not Russia's problem after Sessions sacked
The Kremlin said on Thursday that the Washington investigation into alleged interference by Moscow in the 2016 US election was not Russia's problem, after President Donald Trump sacked Attorney General Jeff Sessions. "This investigation is a headache for our American colleagues, it has nothing to do with us," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists when asked if Session's firing would influence the probe by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Moscow has repeatedly denied accusations it attempted to influence the vote that elevated Trump to the White House. "What Mueller's commission has produced up to now has hardly been able to stand up to serious critical assessment," Peskov added. On Wednesday Sessions became the first casualty of a cabinet shakeup that had been expected from Trump following midterm elections the day before. Trump had repeatedly publicly assailed Sessions for not taking a tougher approach to illegal immigrants. Trump also accused him of protecting Mueller's ...
White House suspends press credentials of CNN senior journalist after spat with Trump
In an unprecedented move, the White House has suspended the credentials of a senior CNN journalist for his "disgusting and outrageous" behaviour, hours after he had a testy exchange with President Donald Trump during a marathon news conference. The move came just hours after CNN's chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta drew the ire of Trump by persisting with questions about his views on a caravan of Central American migrants making its way to the US border and refused to the President's orders to sit down and clung to the microphone. The removal of Acosta's pass is a sharp escalation of tensions between the Trump administration and the media. At the news conference, which lasted 1 hour and 26 minutes, Trump snapped at the press corps, called reporters "rude" for asking questions, and made baseless claims about political polling. Acosta was one of the first reporters Trump called on. "Thank you, Mr. President," he said. "I want to challenge you on one of the statements that you ...
Telangana polls: BJP sends proposals for Modi's public meetings
: The BJP's Telangana unit has sent proposals to its high command for organising three public meeting to be addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the forthcoming Assembly elections, the party's state president K Laxman said Thursday. Speaking to reporters here, he said the partys national president Amit Shah is also expected to address a few more public meetings before the elections. Polls will be held on December 7 for the Telangana Assembly. "Arrangements are underway for three public meetings of Modi. Amit Shah is also expected once again. We requested the Prime Minister to participate at least in four meetings. Proposals have been sent for three meetings," Laxman said. He claimed that the Congress-led grand alliance is marching towards "grand defeat" and the Amit Shah-led party is the only alternative to the people of Telangana for betterment. "The grand alliance under the leadership of Congress is marching towards grand defeat. Parties with opposite ideologies are coming .
Taiwan navy gets two new warships as China tensions grow
Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen vowed Thursday that the island would not "concede one step" in defending itself as she inaugurated two frigates bought from the United States aimed at boosting Taipei's naval capabilities against China. Rival China has upped military drills including a live fire exercise in the Taiwan Strait in April, declaring its willingness to confront the island's "independence forces". Beijing still claims self-ruled Taiwan as part of its territory awaiting reunification, by force if necessary, even though the two sides have been ruled separately since 1949 after a civil war. China has also been incensed by recent warming ties between Washington and Taipei, including the US State Department's approval of a preliminary licence to sell submarine technology to the island. The two Perry-class guided missile frigates were officially commissioned in a ceremony at Zuoying base in southern Kaohsiung city. "We want to send a clear and firm message from Taiwanese people to .
MP polls: Cong fields Chouhan's brother-in-law
Days after he joined the Congress, Sanjay Singh Masani, the brother-in-law of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, has been allotted a ticket by the party from Waraseoni assembly seat in Balaghat district. While joining the Congress last Saturday, Masani -- the brother of Chouhan's wife Sadhna Singh -- had said the state needed a leader like Kamal Nath, who is the state's Congress president, and not Chouhan. Waraseoni seat is currently represented by Yogendra Nirmal of the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP). A native of Maharashtra, Masani's name figured on the fourth list of 29 candidates released by the Congress on Wednesday. With the latest list, the Congress has so far announced names of 213 candidates out of a total 230 seats for the November 28 elections. In the latest list, the Congress has changed the candidature of Ashok Tyagi with Masarrat Shahid, a confidante of senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh, and Hamid Kazi with Ravindra Mahajan from Sironj and ...
T'gana polls: BJP sends proposals for Modi's public meetings
: The BJP's Telangana unit has sent proposals to its high command for organising three public meeting to be addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the forthcoming Assembly elections, the party's state president K Laxman said Thursday. Speaking to reporters here, he said the party's national president Amit Shah is also expected to address a few more public meetings before the elections. Polls will be held on December 7 for the Telangana Assembly. "Arrangements are underway for three public meetings of Modi. Amit Shah is also expected once again. We requested the Prime Minister to participate at least in four meetings. Proposals have been sent for three meetings," Laxman said. He claimed that the Congress-led grand alliance is marching towards "grand defeat" and the Amit Shah-led party is the only alternative to the people of Telangana for betterment. "The grand alliance under the leadership of Congress is marching towards grand defeat. Parties with opposite ...
BJP's defeat in bypolls signals 'acche din' for Cong: Sena
Taking a dig at its ally BJP over the recent debacle in Karnataka bypolls, the Shiv Sena Thursday said the poll outcome indicates that "acche din" (good days) will return for the Congress in 2019, when general elections are due. The Uddhav Thackeray-led party also said the BJP's defeat in a string of Lok Sabha and assembly bypolls in the country would infuse a "fresh lease of life" in the Congress ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. In an editorial laced with sarcasm in the party mouthpiece "Saamana", the Sena also said the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) probably lost in Karnataka for ignoring poll promises like construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya and for "imposing some other agenda". Mocking the BJP, the edit said the party should think why its "losing streak" is continuing unabated even as some "revolutionary changes" are taking place in the country under the BJP-led government by its own admission. In a major setback to the BJP, the JD(S)-Congress coalition candidates Tuesday won .
Left, JD(U) call demonetisation monumental disaster
Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Sitaram Yechury on Thursday called Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government's demonetisation move an unmitigated monumental disaster.On the second anniversary of demonetisation, Yechury told ANI: "The move of demonetisation was nothing more than a terrible disaster." On the government's plan to release a large portion of the Reserve Bank of India's cash reserve, he elucidated, "This move will be terrible as the fund of the central bank is the basis on which the fundamentals of the economy are based upon. Dissipating funds would even be worse than selling country's gold.He further added, "The government is facilitating the loot and destruction of the Indian economy. The government is doing the worst vote bank politics in India by seeking to consolidate Hindutva vote by dividing social unity and facilitating the loot of people's wealth."Speaking to ANI, Janata Dal-United (JD-U) national spokesperson Pavan Varma said, "If the ...
Democrats capture House but Trump says midterm poll results 'tremendous success'
US President Donald Trump has described the midterm election results as a "tremendous success" even as opposition Democrats wrested the House of Representatives from the ruling Republican party, which managed to retain its majority in the Senate in the highly polarised polls. Trump, who campaigned aggressively in the last several weeks, Wednesday offered an olive branch to Democrats, saying he wanted to work together with the Democratic leadership to continue delivering for the American people, including on economic growth, infrastructure, trade, lowering the cost of prescription drugs. "Last night the Republican Party defied history to expand our Senate majority while significantly beating expectations in the House for the midterm year," Trump told reporters, hours after the Republicans lost control of the House for the first time in eight years. "These are some of the things that the Democrats do want to work on, and I really believe we'll be able to do that. I think we're going to .
US grants Iraq sanctions waiver to buy Iranian electricity
The United States has granted Iraq a waiver to allow it to keep importing electricity from neighbouring Iran despite renewed American sanctions on Tehran, a US official said Wednesday. Baghdad relies heavily on Tehran to provide it natural gas and Iranian-generated electricity, and feared that supply would be endangered by Washington's measures against Iran's energy sector. The US State Department's representative on Iran said Wednesday that Iraq had been granted a special permission. "We granted Iraq a waiver to allow it to continue to pay for its electricity imports from Iran. We are confident that this will help Iraq limit electricity shortages in the south," Brian Hook told reporters in Washington. "Iraq is a friend and a partner, and we are committed to its stability and prosperity." Iraq is now expected to demonstrate to the US how it would wean itself off Iranian gas, a well-informed Iraqi source told AFP. "The US gave us 45 days to give them a plan on how we will gradually ...
MP polls: BJP releases 3rd list of 32 candidates
The BJP Thursday released its third list of 32 candidates for the Madhya Pradesh Assembly election slated for November 28, fielding Akash Vijayvargiya, the son of the party's national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya, from Indore-3 seat and former minister Rakesh Choudhry from Bhind. With this list, the party has so far released the names for 226 seats in the 230-member MP House. The party has fielded former Bhopal Mayor Krishna Gaur from Govindpura seat of Bhopal in place of former chief minister and her father-in-law, Babu Lal Gaur. It has denied a ticket to minister of state Surya Prakash Meena from Shamshabad seat in Vidisha district. Akash Vijayvargiya is contesting his maiden election, and has been fielded from the tough Indore-3 seat which has a sizable population of the minority community. The party's fiery leader, Usha Thakur, who had wrested the Indore-3 seat from the Congress in 2013 Assembly polls has been shifted to Mhow seat, also in Indore district. Mhow seat is ..
When will Maha CM rename Aurangabad and Osmanabad? asks Raut
Close on the heels of the Uttar Pradesh government's decision to rechristen Allahabad and Faizabad, Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut Thursday sought to know when will the Maharashtra government rename the state's Aurangabad and Osmanabad cities. The Yogi Adityanath government in UP had last month renamed Allahabad as "Prayagraj", and on Tuesday announced that Faizabad district will henceforth be known as Ayodhya. Raut in a tweet said, "Yogi Adityanath renamed Faizabad as Ayodhya, Allahabad as Prayagraj. When will (Maharashtra) Chief Minister Devendraji (Fadnavis) rechristen Aurangabad to Sambhaji Nagar and Osmanabad to Dharashiv." Shiv Sena spokesperson Manisha Kayande said their demand to rename Aurangabad and Osmanabad is not new. "This has been our long standing demand and was raised several times, but the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) opposed it (when the parties were in power) to appease Muslim voters," she said. The Gujarat government had also recently ..
Exclusive: Saudi Arabia makes $1 billion bid for partnership with South Africa defence group Denel
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia has made a $1 billion bid for a broad partnership with South African state-owned defence group Denel that would include acquisition of a minority stake in a joint venture with Germany's Rheinmetall, a source familiar with the offer said.
Maha: Cong to hold 3-day deliberations for upcoming LS polls
The Maharashtra Congress will hold deliberations for three days from November 15 for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. A statement issued by the party informed that state Congress president Ashok Chavan and party general secretary in charge of Maharashtra Mallikarjun Kharge will take stock of the political situation in all 48 Lok Sabha constituencies of the state. The statement added that seats of Marathwada and Western Maharashtra regions will be deliberated upon on the first day, those in Vidarbha and North Maharashtra on the second day and that of Konkan region on the third day. The meet comes days after the Congress and the NCP inched closer to stitching an alliance for next year's Lok Sabha polls, with both parties reaching a consensus on 38 of the 48 seats in Maharashtra. Last week, NCP chief Sharad Pawar had reportedly said in Aurangabad that a consensus has been arrived at for 40 seats. Talking to PTI, a senior Congress leader, who is part of the seat-sharing talks, ...
Modi, opposition leaders greet Advani on birthday
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and opposition leaders on Thursday greeted veteran BJP leader L.K. Advani on his 91st birthday, with Congress leader Siddaramaiah
LS Secy Gen gets one-year extension
The tenure of Snehlata Shrivastava, the first woman Secretary General of the Lok Sabha, has been extended by Speaker Sumitra Mahajan for one year. The 1982-batch retired IAS officer of the Madhya Pradesh cadre who was appointed last year in rank and status of a Cabinet Secretary was scheduled to retire on November 30. According to a Lok Sabha secretariat notification, "The speaker is pleased to extend the tenure of Snehlata Shrivastava... in the rank and status of Cabinet Secretary for a period of one year with effect from December 1, 2018 up to November 30, 2019." Shrivastava, with 35 years of rich and varied administrative experience, has held several important positions in the Madhya Pradesh government as well as at the Centre. She has served as Secretary in the Ministry of Law and Justice and as Special/Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Finance. She has also held several senior positions in the Madhya Pradesh government, including Principal Secretary in the departments of ...
Pence to visit Japan, discuss North Korea with Abe
US Vice President Mike Pence is set to visit Japan next week and discuss issues related to North Korea with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, it was announced here on Thursday.
Asia Bibi still in Pakistan after prison release, says government
Pakistani Christian woman Asia Bibi, who was released from prison a day earlier after being acquitted of blasphemy charges, has not fled the country, the government said on Thursday.
U.S., China should ensure G20 talks go well, senior diplomat says
BEIJING (Reuters) - The United States and China must work to ensure that talks between their leaders at a G20 summit this month go well and they manage differences, a top Chinese diplomat said, as the two countries try tentatively to get ties back on track.
Demonetisation helped convert black money into white: CPI-M
The Modi government's "disastrous demonetisation" devastated crores of people dependent on daily cash transactions and helped to convert black money into white, the CPI-M said on Thursday.