A Tory peer and former aide to David Cameron accused Boris Johnson of “moral emptiness”, casual racism and “courting fascism” as division over the former foreign secretary’s comments about Muslim women threatened to develop into a full-blown crisis for Theresa May and her party.The comments by Lord Cooper, a former pollster who worked for Cameron at No 10, came after Jacob Rees-Mogg, leader of the party’s anti-EU right wing, criticised the prime minister for backing an investigation into Johnson’s remarks, in which he compared women wearing burqas to “letterboxes” and “bank robbers”. Rees-Mogg said May had countenanced a “show trial” of Johnson because of her “personal rivalry” with him.As different wings of the party split into rival camps, amid rumours that Johnson is preparing a leadership bid in the autumn, new evidence emerged suggesting that a series of hate crime attacks on Muslim women had been perpetrated as a direct result of Johnson’s remarks in his Daily Telegraph column last Monday.An abnormal spike in anti-Muslim abuse aimed at women wearing the hijab and niqab has been recorded by the government-backed hate crime monitoring group Tell Mama.In a tweet, Cooper offloaded the frustrations of the party’s anti-Johnson wing, which mainly consists of people who opposed the UK leaving in the EU in the June 2016 referendum. After Johnson, who returned from holiday abroad on Saturday, refused to apologise, Cooper said: “The rottenness of Boris Johnson goes deeper even than his casual racism and his equally casual courting of fascism. He will advocate literally anything to play to the crowd of the moment. His career is a saga of moral emptiness and lies; pathetic, weak and needy; the opposite of strong.”A close friend of Johnson told the Observer that he was “as likely to ride naked down Blackfriars cycle lane waving an EU flag” as he was to apologise. His father, Stanley, writing in the Sunday Telegraph today, said that his son was “spot on” in his comments on the burqa, but should have gone further and called for a ban in certain circumstances.While Johnson was deluged with support in the letters pages of the Daily Telegraph, further criticism of him came on Saturday from the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), which said support for him from Tory MPs and others “shone a light on the underbelly of Islamophobia” in the party.In a statement, Harun Rashid Khan, the MCB’s secretary general, said: “The impact of Boris Johnson’s comments is real and worrying, and indicates the importance of a full, transparent and independent investigation into his conduct, in particular given the lack of action in previous cases of Islamophobia in the party.”Johnson is, according to senior Tories, unlikely to lose the whip or face official censure as a result of the internal investigation – though he may be asked to take diversity training, an offer he is unlikely to accept without a fight.No 10 is concerned that the row could do lasting damage to the Tory party’s relations with the Muslim community, as well as enthuse Johnson’s support base for any potential leadership contest. The majority of niqab-wearing victims who have called Tell Mama’s helpline since the article appeared said the perpetrator either used phrases such as “letterbox” or referred to Johnson. One victim said she was considering leaving the UK after detecting increased hostility post Johnson’s intervention in the debate on face veils in public. In the week before Johnson’s comments, Tell Mama reported no incidents against women wearing a niqab. Yet, following his comments, a London woman wearing a niqab reported being abused on Wednesday; with another three incidents reported in the capital and Luton the following day, and another taking place in London on Friday. Anti-Muslim abuse directed at women wearing the hijab also rose significantly with five incidents reported in Guildford, Leicester and London on the day that Johnson’s column was published, equalling the total number of incidents reported during the entire week before Johnson aired his views on face-covering veils in public places. Another two incidents involving hijabis were reported on Wednesday, followed by annother on Thursday and another on Friday.One of the victims, who lives in the West Midlands, said: “Johnson’s recent comments have made me feel much more on edge and it has definitely made me fearful of even going to work or to walk in town without my husband or someone who can stand up for me. “Myself and my husband are considering moving to an Arab country where we would feel more comfortable and do not have to put up with abuse.’Iman Atta, director of Tell Mama, said it was no surprise that Johnson’s comments had motivated individuals to commit crimes against Muslim women.Atta said: “Comments and political statements have impacts. Boris Johnson is a privileged white male who has had a route to power and influence that many from black and ethnic minority groups could not even dream of. In this privileged position he calls Muslim women were wear the burqa, ‘letterboxes’ and ‘bank robbers’. “These are some of the most marginalised women, who cannot find employment and in some instances, have few choices. Topics Boris Johnson The Observer Islamic veil Conservatives Conservative leadership news

Virginia Democratic Governor Ralph Northam has defended calling slaves "indentured servants" in his first TV interview since a racism scandal broke.Mr Northam, who has admitted to wearing blackface, told CBS a historian told him "indentured" was a more accurate term for America's first slaves.Plans have meanwhile stalled to impeach Virginia's Lt Gov Justin Fairfax, who is accused of sexual assault.The state capitol has been plunged into turmoil by the twin scandals. How school yearbooks have the power to destroy lives Virginia's painful 'blackface' past and present How should politicians apologise? During the CBS interview aired in full on Monday, Mr Northam was grilled over his college yearbook photo, which shows two people - one wearing blackface makeup and the other in Ku Klux Klan robes.Mr Northam was asked why he initially apologised for the photo before backtracking and denying he was either in the picture."When you're in a state of shock like I was, we don't always think as clearly as we should," Mr Northam said, adding that he had "overreacted" by issuing an immediate apology. "I will tell you that later that night I had a chance to step back, take a deep breath, look at the picture and said, 'This is not me in the picture'," he said. Mr Northam has already admitted that he once "darkened his face as part of a Michael Jackson costume" on a separate occasion in 1984.Asked whether he would resign, Mr Northam said: "I'm not going anywhere."The governor's damage-limitation efforts risked making matters worse when he told the interviewer that 400 years has passed since the "first indentured servants from Africa landed on our shores".CBS presenter Gayle King, who is African American, said: "Also known as slavery."According to Encyclopedia Virginia, which is produced in partnership with the Library of Virginia, the first Africans to arrive in Virginia were sold in exchange for food in August 1619 from the English ship White Lion.Unlike indentured servants, who were typically released after paying off the debt of their voyage to America, black slaves were rarely freed.After the interview aired on Monday, Mr Northam released a statement defending his word choice.He said that during a recent speech he "referred to them in my remarks as enslaved"."A historian advised me that the use of indentured was more historically accurate. The fact is, I'm still learning and committed to getting it right."The scandals have rocked the state's capitol, Richmond, which was also the capitol of the pro-slavery Confederacy during the US Civil War.Mr Northam's deputy, Lt Governor Justin Fairfax, has been accused of sexual assault by two separate women.On Monday a Democratic-led impeachment effort against Mr Fairfax, who is black, appeared to stall after lawmakers announced that they would hold off for until further consultations are completed.Virginia Delegate Patrick Hope, who wrote draft impeachment articles, said on Monday that he had spoken to his colleagues who helped him determine that "additional conversations need to take place before anything is filed".Democratic Delegate Marcus Simon, who has called on Mr Fairfax to resign, told the Wall Street Journal that he believes there is no precedent in Virginia history to impeach a governor, and that more research must be done on the legal process."Frankly, a lot of us feel sort of helpless to do anything about the chaos around here. I just don't know this is the right thing to be doing," Mr Simon said.Over the weekend Mr Fairfax, who denies the allegations, called for an FBI investigation into the accusations.The number three in Virginia's government, Democratic Attorney General Mark Herring, is also in hot water after admitting to wearing blackface to a university party in 1980.

BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thailand launched a Huawei Technologies 5G test bed on Friday, even as the United States urges its allies to bar the Chinese telecoms giant from building next-generation mobile networks. Huawei products are seen in a shop in Bangkok, Thailand, January 30, 2019. Picture taken January 30, 2019. REUTERS/Athit PerawongmethaHuawei, the world’s top producer of telecoms equipment and second-biggest maker of smartphones, has been facing mounting international scrutiny amid fears China could use its equipment for espionage, a concern the company says is unfounded. The 5G test bed in Thailand, the United States’ oldest ally in Asia, will be Huawei’s first in Southeast Asia. Thailand’s cooperation with Huawei on the test bed does not mean it is not concerned about security issues, Minister of Digital Economy Pichet Durongkaveroj told Reuters at the launch. “We keep a close watch on the allegations worldwide. However, this 5G test bed project is a testing period for the country,” Pichet added. “We can make observations which will be useful to either confirm or disconfirm the allegations.” Pichet was speaking at the test site in Chonburi, the heart of the Thai military government’s $45 billion economic project - the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC)- about 90 km (55.92 miles) southeast of Bangkok. Vendors like Nokia, Ericsson and Thai telecoms operators have also set up 5G labs at the site. Huawei, which gets nearly half of its revenue from outside China, says it has secured more than 30 commercial 5G contracts globally. But it has not yet signed a 5G contract in Thailand. Huawei is in talks with telecoms operators, such as Advanced Info Service Pcl and TRUE, to secure local partnerships ahead of a national rollout scheduled for December 2020, industry sources with knowledge of the matter said. Asked if the United States had reached out to Thailand about barring Huawei, Pichet said: “I have no knowledge of that”. Huawei has repeatedly denied U.S.-led allegations that its equipment could be used by Beijing for spying. “There is no evidence indicating that our equipment posed a security threat, no matter in Thailand or globally,” Huawei Thailand said in a statement to Reuters on Friday. Cybersecurity has been made into a “political and maybe ideological issue” which is “not fair” for a technology company, Huawei added in its statement. Earlier, a U.S. embassy spokesperson in Bangkok said the United States “advocates for secure telecoms networks and supply chains that are free from suppliers subject to foreign government control or undue influence that poses risks of unauthorized access and malicious cyber activity”. “We routinely urge allies and partners to consider such risks and exercise similar vigilance in ensuring the security of their own telecoms networks and supply chains, including when awarding contracts,” the spokesperson added. Ties between the United States and Thailand have cooled since the Thai military took power in a 2014 coup. Relations between Bangkok and Beijing, on the other hand have, warmed in recent years as evident from a pick up in defense trade and Chinese investment in the Southeast Asian nation. Huawei has previously set up a cloud data center worth $22.5 million in Thailand’s EEC, a centerpiece of the government’s policy to boost growth in the country that has struggled to attract foreign investors besides the Chinese. Alibaba, Tencent, Kingsoft and JD.com have also pledged to invest in the EEC. This stands in stark contrast to the intense scrutiny being faced by Chinese investment in other parts of the world amid a crippling Sino-U.S. trade war. Reuters reported exclusively on Jan. 30 that the European Commission was considering proposals that would ban Huawei from 5G networks, but that work was at an early stage. Slideshow (6 Images)For Thailand, security concerns over Huawei’s equipment come second to its competitive pricing versus that by U.S. firms, Pranontha Titavunno, Chairman of the Information Technology Industry Club of the Federation of Thai Industries, said. “We don’t think about it because their products are decent and affordable,” Pranontha told Reuters. “There are always surveillance concerns when it comes to China ... But Thailand doesn’t really have anything exciting that might be of interest to Beijing.” Reporting by Patpicha Tanakasempipat; Editing by Himani SarkarOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Hong Kong’s leader has described a extradition bill that has prompted weeks of mass protests as “dead”, but held back from completely withdrawing it, drawing criticism from her opponents who have promised to return to the streets.At a press conference, Carrie Lam used a Cantonese phrase to say the proposed legislation was “reaching the end of its life”. Her government suspended the progress of the bill after demonstrations last month.In the city’s sharpest challenge to Beijing’s rule in decades, millions of Hong Kong residents have taken to the streets in opposition to legislation that would allow extraditions to China.Many see the proposed law as an encroachment on the territory’s autonomy, promised under the “one country, two systems” principle established when the former British colony was returned to China in 1997. Critics worry Beijing will use the law to extradite activists and political enemies to China. “We suspended it and we have no timetable,” Lam said. “What I said today is not very different from before, but maybe people want to hear a very firm response … the bill has actually died. So people won’t need to worry that there will be renewed discussions on the bill in the current legislature.”Protesters rejected her remarks and promised to continue the demonstrations. Figo Chan Ho-wun of the Civil Human Rights Front said: “I urge Carrie Lam not to use words to deceive us. Otherwise the Civil Human Rights Front will plan our next action.”Joshua Wong, a student leader during the mass pro-democracy protests in 2014 and secretary general of the Demosisto party, said: “The core of this political movement is the demand for free elections, because all governance crisis stems from the political inequality. Protests continue.”Others criticised Lam’s refusal to formally withdraw the bill. Lokman Tsui, who teaches journalism at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said: “‘Officially dead’ is not a legal or political term. So it’s still unclear whether it is withdrawn, and we can only assume it is not since she still has not said those words.”Public opinion of Lam, a target of protesters who see her as a lackey for Beijing, has reached a new low and few trust her pledges.One protester, who would only give his surname, Ip, said: “She said the bill is dead but in the legislative rules, there is only ‘postpone’ or ‘withdrawal’. I absolutely don’t trust her verbal promises.”On Facebook, comments posted under a live stream of Lam’s speech were critical. One posted: “So stubborn … she said nothing! Just suspended!!” Another said: “We need withdrawal!”Pronouncing the bill dead while not withdrawing it appears to be a political compromise. Lam, who ultimately answers to Beijing, described the government’s response as the result of “deliberations of the various concerns and factors” and a “practical measure for us to move ahead”.She also refused several of the protesters’ key demands, including her resignation and an independent investigation into police wrongdoing. Protesters and residents have accused the police of using excessive force against demonstrators. Lam has made one concession, however: public discussions with student protesters. Previously she had only agreed to closed-door talks.Claudia Mo, a pro-democracy lawmaker, said: “She is still trying hard to put up this strong leader face, refusing to succumb to the people … that could send a dangerous message to mainland dissent too. Lam thinks she can stop a hill fire using a garden hose, but the young are neither giving in, nor giving up.”Hundreds of protesters clashed with police at the weekend as they blocked streets in the commercial district of Kowloon after a march earlier in the day. Six people were arrested. Activists accused authorities of using excessive force on demonstrators and journalists.The crisis in Hong Kong has spread beyond the territory. China has criticised “British intervention” after the UK foreign secretary, Jeremy Hunt, stressed London’s support for Hong Kong’s freedom.Last week, the outgoing US consul general, Kurt Tong, was barred by the US state department from giving a critical speech on government actions in Hong Kong for fear it would derail a temporary trade truce between Washington and Beijing, according to the Financial Times.According to the report, citing people familiar with the matter, Tong had planned a “kick-ass” speech to be delivered on 2 July at the Asia Society in Hong Kong, describing Beijing’s growing influence over the territory. Instead, the speech was watered down and made off the record at the last minute.On Tuesday Beijing criticised the pro-democracy Hong Kong singer Denise Ho after she called for the UN to remove China from the body’s human rights council for trying to erode the city’s autonomy.Ho was repeatedly interrupted by a Chinese diplomat while she spoke at the UN on Monday. On Tuesday a foreign ministry spokesman told a press briefing Ho was “delusional” and had “overestimated herself”. Topics Hong Kong China Asia Pacific Carrie Lam news

India’s biggest mobile-payments startup, Paytm, has wooed hundreds of millions of users and attracted investment from Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc.The biggest challenge for its charismatic founder, 40-year-old Vijay Shekhar Sharma, lies ahead: Keeping Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Facebook Inc.’s WhatsApp at bay as they push into India, the world’s hottest new market for mobile money.Paytm’s...

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Thousands of school teachers joined an 11th weekend of anti-government protests in Hong Kong on Saturday, as shops pulled down their shutters and braced for another restive summer night. Weeks of increasingly violent demonstrations have plunged the city into turmoil. Water-filled barricades fortify the airport and government offices. Posters showing bloody clashes are stuck on street corners and there is a protest nearly every night. The unrest began in June in opposition to a now-suspended extradition bill, and have since grown to include broader demands. Following an escalation in violence over the past few days, rallies on Saturday and Sunday are a test of whether the movement can retain the broad support it has appeared to enjoy. Saturday’s mostly peaceful protest suggested that it may - though thousands also attended a pro-police counter-rally, and a clearer picture is not likely to emerge until Sunday when a protest is scheduled that could draw tens of thousands. “The government has been ignoring us for months. We have to keep demonstrating,” said CS Chan, a maths teacher at a rally of teachers, which police said up to 8,300 people had attended, in heavy rain. Organisers said 22,000 were present. Demonstrators say they are fighting the erosion of the “one country, two systems” arrangement that has enshrined some autonomy for Hong Kong since China took it back from Britain in 1997. During the past week they have increasingly directed their frustration toward police, who have responded with fiercer determination to clear them from the streets. As storms cleared, anti-government demonstrators also marched through Kowloon - the main built-up area on the mainland side of Hong Kong harbour - while large pro-police crowds rallied in a harbourside park across the bay. “I’m heartbroken to see the city being split up like this,” a retired telecoms technician, Michael Law, 69, told Reuters at the pro-police rally. “What the violent protesters have been doing shows no respect for Hong Kong’s rule of law.” Organisers said 476,000 people attended the pro-police rally, while police said 108,000 attended. Reuters was not able to verify either estimate. Riot police walk past a shop as they chase anti-government protesters down Nathan Road in Mong Kok in Hong Kong, China August 17, 2019. REUTERS/Thomas PeterMany shops in Kowloon had shut early, even on big retail boulevards, in anticipation of clashes that have tended to turn nasty at night as front-line activists attack police. On Saturday, protesters who had surrounded a police station soon vanished when riot officers advanced with shields and batons. Some said they were saving their energy for Sunday, when the pro-democracy Civil Human Rights Front, which organised million-strong peaceful marches in June, has scheduled another protest. The increasingly violent confrontations have plunged one of Asia’s financial capitals into its worst crisis for decades. The unrest also presents one of the biggest challenges for Chinese President Xi Jinping since he came to power in 2012. Hong Kong’s embattled leader, Carrie Lam, has warned activists not tip their home into an abyss. The European Union urged all sides to engage in dialogue, following other calls for restraint as Chinese paramilitary police have run drills close to the Hong Kong border. Police in Australia also warned supporters and opponents of the Hong Kong protest movement to behave after scuffles at a rally in Melbourne. [nL8N25D04J] Chinese officials have likened some actions by protesters to “terrorism” and Chinese state media outlets have urged Hong Kong police to respond more robustly. Protesters have used slingshots to fire marbles at police, shone lasers at them and at times thrown bricks and firebombs. Having fired tear gas to disperse protesters in the streets, and at one point in a subway station, police are warning that they could get tougher. Although their stations have been attacked scores of times during the crisis, they have so far refrained from deploying water cannon, armoured cars or the dog squad. They have made some 750 arrests, charging some protesters with rioting, which can attract a 10-year jail term. Slideshow (20 Images)But many remain on the side of the demonstrators. Yu, a secondary school music teacher in her 40s, said she was determined to show support for protesting students, even though she did not agree with all their actions: “I do appreciate their courage and caring about Hong Kong ... they are definitely braver than our government.” Reporting by Marius Zaharia, Felix Tam, Anne Marie Roantree, Julie Zhu, Donny Kwok and James Redmayne in Hong Kong. Additional reporting by Gabriela Baczynska in Brussels. Writing by Tom Westbrook and Greg Torode; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore and Kevin LiffeyOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Forced into the opposition, the oligarchs formed a political party called Opposition Bloc, which worked with Mr. Manafort and Mr. Gates in 2014, before largely shifting its political consulting and lobbying business to a company started by Mr. Patten and Konstantin V. Kilimnik. He is a Russian national who had worked closely with Mr. Manafort in Ukraine and is suspected by the United States of having ties to Russian intelligence.The company was paid more than $1 million through an offshore Cypriot bank account to advise the party and its members, including a “prominent Ukraine oligarch” between 2014 and this year, according to a court document filed on Friday.Prosecutors contend that Mr. Patten should have disclosed the work, which included lobbying and public relations assistance intended to “influence United States policy,” with the Justice Department pursuant to the Foreign Agents Registration Act.Mr. Patten also attended an unspecified inaugural event with the oligarch, according to prosecutors. They contend that Mr. Patten arranged for the purchase of four tickets for $50,000 by funneling the oligarch’s money through an American “straw” purchaser in violation of rules barring the inaugural committee from accepting money from foreign nationals.Mr. Patten intentionally withheld documents from the Senate Intelligence Committee that could have revealed that foreign money was used to purchase the tickets, according to court filings.Mr. Patten’s lawyer declined to comment after a Friday court hearing in which Mr. Patten entered his guilty plea. He faces up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000. He was released after the hearing and awaits sentencing.Prosecutors did not identify the American who purchased the tickets, the oligarch or Mr. Patten’s Russian business partner by name.

Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang promised to spice up September’s primary debate by doing “something no presidential candidate has ever done before in history” live on television. He kept that promise by announcing in his opening statement that he would give away $1,000 a month — $120,000 a year — to 10 randomly selected people as part of a pilot program for his universal basic income proposal. It’s a ploy that is in equal parts a self-serving voter recruitment push, an eye-catching pilot for his signature universal basic income proposal, and a campaign finance law minefield.“It’s time to trust ourselves more than politicians,” Yang said. “My campaign will now give a freedom dividend of $1,000 a month for an entire year to 10 American families, someone watching this at home right now.” He went on to tell all viewers who “believe you can solve your problems better than any politician” to visit his website to sign up for a chance to receive the money.According to his campaign, that call has already been answered by more than 450,000 people and could attract far more; entries close on September 19. And those who enter won’t have long to wait to find out whether they will soon have $1,000 more a month to work with; the campaign says the 10 recipients will be notified by November 30. Yang’s campaign centers on his proposal for a universal basic income, which the candidate refers to as a “freedom dividend.” As Vox’s Sigal Samuel explained, it would work like this:Yang says that if he becomes president, the government will send a check for $1,000 per month ($12,000 annually) to every American adult above the age of 18. (Whether Congress cooperates is another matter.) Again, no strings attached: You don’t get less money if you score a high-paying job, for example. And if you’re already getting housing assistance or food stamps, you can choose between keeping your current setup and switching over to Yang’s UBI program.The new pilot would work the same way but on a more limited scale. As a campaign aide told Vox ahead of the debate, Yang sees his version of UBI as being about “everything but the money.” The candidate argues that it is actually a tool Americans can use to combat growing automation and help spur homeownership, empower budding entrepreneurs, and reduce stress caused by financial insecurity. Recipients of the money will be able to use it for anything they like, and Yang hopes the newly announced pilot will serve as a proof of concept that will both sway the idea’s detractors and shift his party toward supporting the idea in full, similar to how Sen. Bernie Sanders’s advocacy for Medicare-for-all during the 2016 election season made that proposal a mainstream platform among Democrats.Before it does, however, it’ll bring huge swaths of new voters into his campaign’s orbit, and possibly some extra scrutiny from the federal government.Yang has already begun testing his version of UBI on a small scale, giving $1,000 a month of his own money to families in early voting states Iowa and New Hampshire. In June, he announced the winner of a Twitter contest would be joining those families.Those early experiments with UBI did not raise any red flags with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) or other experts both because he funded them with his own money and made it very, very clear recipients could and should vote for whomever they’d like. But the expansion of the pilot program will work a bit differently: Yang’s campaign will be making the new payouts directly. That fact raised concerns the candidate was breaking federal election rules. Yang’s campaign has argued it has done nothing wrong, given it’s made clear recipients of the money are not expected or required to vote for Yang — essentially, that they are not buying votes. The campaign has also stressed that recipients don’t have to do anything at all, which former FEC commissioner Ann Ravel claims is exactly the problem. “If it’s just given for no work done, for nothing at all, just a gift, that is inappropriate,” Ravel told Time. “You can’t just give cash.”Erin Chlopak, director of campaign finance strategy for the Campaign Legal Center and former acting associate counsel at the FEC, agreed, telling Vox the pilot “seems like an illegal prohibited personal use” of campaign funds. FEC rules state “using campaign funds for personal use is prohibited.” Personal use is defined as any expenditure a candidate would have even if they were not running for office — think things like family groceries, gym memberships, or mortgage payments. Yang’s press secretary told Time that experts who believe the pilot breaks personal use rules are mistaken, because although Yang is obviously personally a believer in UBI, he is not a big enough believer that he would give away $120,000 of his own money as a private citizen. They argue he is disbursing the money only because he is running for president. The campaign has some support from experts in this view. Rick Hasen, a UC Irvine professor of law and political science, for instance, tweeted that as long as no restrictions are placed on who can get the money, the pilot ought to count as a creative form of campaign advertising.But Chlopak disagrees. She told Vox that while it may be true that UBI is central to Yang’s campaign, the pilot can’t count as advertising because there is no requirement that recipients contribute to Yang’s candidacy. To get the money, they do not have to tweet or post or in any way advertise for Yang. They don’t have to tell anyone they are receiving the money at all (although the random drawing’s rules do state recipients must allow the campaign to use recipients’ images royalty-free in promotional materials). “If they were providing some sort of advertising service, perhaps it would be different,” Chlopak said, but recipients are not.Yang himself is very confident he is on firm legal ground. He told CNN his campaign has “an army of lawyers who have signed off on it. And we’re sure that this is perfectly legal.”Ordinarily, there would be a very easy way to find out who is correct: Ask the FEC. But these are not ordinary times. Yang and his critics can’t settle the matter immediately with the FEC because, as the Center for Public Integrity has pointed out, the FEC technically does not exist at the moment. The agency’s rules state that no meetings can be conducted without at least four commissioners present. FEC Vice Chairman Matthew Petersen resigned in August, leaving the agency with just three commissioners. The agency was last fully staffed with six commissioners in 2017. The three commissioners remaining have all completed their terms (Chairwoman Ellen Weintraub’s term expired in 2007), but are serving until they can be replaced. President Donald Trump has nominated one candidate, a lawyer from Texas named Trey Trainor, but despite being put forward two years ago, Trainor has not had the Senate hearing necessary for confirmation. Senate Republicans reportedly want to use the vacancies to appoint commissioners they favor (although no more than three commissioners affiliated with a given political party can serve at one time and there is already one sitting Republican, Caroline Hunter) and have put forward lawyer Shana Broussard, aide to current independent commissioner Steven Walther, as a top choice. But the Trump administration has yet to respond to this suggestion. Chairwoman Weintraub has said the group that remains will continue to work as best it can and that it will work to create a queue that can be speedily addressed once a fourth commissioner is confirmed. But without a quorum, the agency can’t issue any rulings, including any decisions on whether Andrew Yang is following the rules.According to Chlopak, those concerned Yang has broken FEC rules have little recourse. She says in a case like this, the judiciary would likely be involved only after someone had filed a complaint to the FEC that went ignored. That person could then sue the FEC for failing to act on their complaint. But even should a court find in favor of the plaintiff, the FEC would just be ordered to make a decision on the complaint. Even if the FEC were to suddenly begin functioning as normal, however, there could be little clarity on the question of the pilot; even before the agency shut down, decisions were rarely rendered speedily. Now that it has a backlog, a final decision on a complaint filed about the pilot could come after the election was finished. And since by that time the money would have already been distributed, even if the FEC found Yang to be in the wrong it would be too late to really do anything about it. Therefore, while questions about the legality of the pilot remain, there’s nothing to stop it from going forward. While it may not exactly be the paid advertising his campaign claims, the announcement of the program alone has indeed won Yang a great deal of publicity through press, and it will certainly energize the Yang Gang to further spread the universal basic income gospel online. Beyond energizing his base and gaining fresh publicity, Yang’s campaign says his pilot has already paid for itself: It credits the announcement with helping to raise $1 million in the days following the debate.Perhaps even more valuable than that immediate influx of cash, however, is the data Yang has been able to collect. To enter the drawing, one has to submit an email address and zip code. In the four days following the debate, the campaign says it has collected some 450,000 email addresses, 405,000 of which it says it didn’t already have.According to Roll Call, a candidate looking to access that many new emails from a database could expect to pay at least $180,000 (and as much as $1.3 million). And those prices are just to rent a list of emails — for $60,000 less, Yang now owns not only those emails, but knows where their users live, allowing for geographically tailored email marketing and fundraising.These email addresses are key because they are seen as a good way to fundraise and as a particularly good way to pick up smaller donations, something that is key to getting into the Democratic debates. To make it into the September debate, for instances, candidates needed to have 130,000 unique donors across at least 20 states. The same threshold exists for the October debate.For those not willing to rent or buy emails, the traditional way to net new ones has been through digital advertising — specifically through buying Facebook ads.“Facebook ads are a really valuable source for building your email list, and the more emails you have on your list, the more money you’re going to raise online,” Eric Wilson, a Republican digital strategist, told the New York Times. “There’s a direct through line to resources for the campaign.”President Trump has embraced this strategy, spending more than $12.5 million on Facebook ads. His Democratic rivals have as well, but large Facebook spends do not always translate into fundraising or campaign success. Democratic candidate Tom Steyer, for instance, spent more than $4.7 million on Facebook ads ahead of the September debate, and while that number just managed to win him 130,000 donations, it failed to get him on the debate stage.With his $120,000 outlay, Yang has avoided this sort of massive advertising spend and now has the potential to reap more rewards. If even a quarter of his new email addresses were to each lead to a $1 donation, he’d just about break even, and should some of them return $5 or $10, he’d be well ahead.Even if the users behind the addresses give nothing, Yang’s name will now be a constant presence in their inboxes, raising his name recognition, keeping him in their minds ahead of primaries and caucuses. All of this means that although Yang’s pilot was somewhat risky given FEC rules, it is ultimately a very smart play, especially given how hamstrung America’s elections watchdog is. For a relatively small outlay of money (in campaign terms, at least), Yang has simultaneously energized his base, gathered the contact information of potential donors, created a wave of press, and advertised his signature proposal. And should Yang fail to win any primary contests, he’s still helped his party: He could turn over his email list to party officials, allowing them to help fundraise whoever the party’s nominees are in both the national and local races.

(Reuters) - A bankruptcy trustee has filed a lawsuit against Paul Manafort in California alleging that he falsely claimed he was a creditor owed $2.7 million in a failed real estate deal with his former son-in-law. FILE PHOTO Paul Manafort, former campaign manager for U.S. President Donald Trump, departs after a hearing at U.S. District Court in Washington, DC, U.S., April 19, 2018. REUTERS/Brian Snyder/File PhotoThe lawsuit, filed by trustee Thomas Casey on Thursday in the federal bankruptcy court in Santa Ana, California, adds to the legal challenges facing Manafort, who was head of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign for a few months in 2016. A spokesman for Manafort declined to comment on the lawsuit. Manafort has been indicted for money laundering, tax evasion and other charges by a special counsel probing alleged links between the Trump campaign and Russia. Manafort has denied the charges and is preparing for trial. The California lawsuit relates to a $2.7 million deed of trust that Manafort recorded in Los Angeles County that positioned himself as a secured creditor in a luxury property he was developing in partnership with his former son-in-law, Jeffrey Yohai. The deed of trust was recorded Dec. 20, 2016, one day before the company that owned the property filed for bankruptcy protection to stave off foreclosure by lender Genesis Capital LLC, according to property and court records. Casey, whose job as trustee is to liquidate the assets of the bankruptcy estate for the benefit of creditors, alleges in the lawsuit that the money Manafort put into the property was equity and not a loan as Manafort claimed. Casey said the attempt by Manafort to claim the more advantageous position of creditor amounted to a “fraudulent transfer” of assets “made with the actual intent to hinder, delay or defraud”. Manafort signed the deed of trust as “attorney-in-fact” for Yohai, who had granted Manafort the power to act as his attorney on Dec. 1, 2016, according to the lawsuit. Casey, who is seeking to void the deed of trust and “a money judgment against the Defendant in the amount of the Transfer”, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Jim Hinds, a lawyer for Yohai, did not respond to an email seeking comment. Reporting by Nathan Layne in NEW YORKEditing by Christopher CushingOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Friday imposed sanctions on Venezuela’s Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza, saying it would pursue those in President Nicolas Maduro’s government for corruption as well as officials conducting diplomacy on his behalf. Venezuela's Foreign Affairs Minister Jorge Arreaza talks to the media during a news conference in Caracas, Venezuela April 8, 2019. REUTERS/Manaure Quintero Arreaza and a judge in the Court of Appeals for Caracas, Carol Padilla, were targeted in the latest round of U.S. sanctions against Maduro’s government over the crisis in Venezuela, the Treasury Department said. Washington blames Maduro for the country’s economic collapse and for undermining democracy. The Trump administration recognized Venezuela’s opposition leader Juan Guaido as the South American nation’s interim president and has asked Maduro, a socialist in power since 2013, to step down. “The United States will not stand by and watch as the illegitimate Maduro regime starves the Venezuelan people of their wealth, humanity, and right to democracy,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in a statement. “Treasury will continue to target corrupt Maduro insiders, including those tasked with conducting diplomacy and carrying out justice on behalf of this illegitimate regime.” Venezuela’s foreign ministry responded by “energetically” rejecting the sanctions, which it called “unilateral and illegal.” “With these new measures, the Trump administration is trying to silence Venezuela’s voice in the world,” the ministry said. In a separate statement, the U.S. Department of State said Friday’s designation was “a reminder” that Venezuelan authorities have detained Guaido’s top aide, Roberto Marrero, since March and that such actions would have consequences. “If Nicolas Maduro and those aligned with him continue to use imprisonment and intimidation against the legitimate government and people of Venezuela, the United States will respond,” the department said, reiterating the U.S. demand for Marrero’s release. Since the United States recognized Guaido in January, Arreaza has been a regular visitor to the United States, specifically the United Nations in New York, where he has lobbied countries to build support for Maduro. He is married to the eldest daughter of Hugo Chavez, Venezuela’s former president who died in 2013 of cancer. It was not immediately clear whether the sanctions would affect his travel to the U.N. Arreaza has spoken at U.N. Security Council meetings on Venezuela and held lengthy press conferences. On Thursday he addressed a meeting of the 193-member U.N. General Assembly on multilateralism. He met with U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday and discussed the humanitarian situation in the country, a U.N. spokesman said. Arreaza also met with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in New York on Wednesday. He is active on Twitter, directly taking on U.S. President Donald Trump and White House national security adviser John Bolton. Reporting by Susan Heavey, Makini Brice and Lesley Wroughton, and Michelle Nichols at the United Nations; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Jonathan Oatis and Richard ChangOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

FILE PHOTO: Former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort arrives for arraignment on a third superseding indictment against him by Special Counsel Robert Mueller on charges of witness tampering, at U.S. District Court in Washington, U.S., June 15, 2018. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File PhotoWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The judge in the trial of U.S. President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort said on Friday that he would not release the names and addresses of jurors sought by media outlets because he was worried about their “peace and safety.” Judge T.S. Ellis, speaking in court while jurors deliberated for a second day, said he had received threats over the case and is being protected by U.S. marshals. “I had no idea this case would excite these emotions. ... I don’t feel right if I release their names,” he said. Manafort has been charged with bank and tax fraud in the first trial stemming from the probe overseen by U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election. Reporting by Nathan Layne; Editing by Leslie AdlerOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Enlarge this image Michael Flynn, former national security adviser to President Trump, leaves following his plea hearing at the Prettyman Federal Courthouse in Washington, D.C., last December. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Michael Flynn, former national security adviser to President Trump, leaves following his plea hearing at the Prettyman Federal Courthouse in Washington, D.C., last December. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Robert Mueller knows how to keep a secret.As reporters and lawyers for President Trump speculate about the end of the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election, the special counsel threw a curveball this week.In sentencing documents for former White House national security adviser Michael Flynn, authorities reported that Flynn had offered "substantial" and "firsthand" assistance with not only the Russia probe, but also an unspecified ongoing criminal investigation — and, possibly, another matter. National Security Michael Flynn Has Provided 'Substantial Assistance' In Russia Inquiry, Feds Say Defendants typically get credit for that sort of cooperation when they are sentenced. But the memo by prosecutors Brandon Van Grack and Zainab Ahmad suggested that "some of that benefit may not be fully realized at this time because the investigations in which he has provided assistance are ongoing."That news, combined with the disclosure that Flynn had met with government investigators 19 times in the past year, set off a new and frenetic round of guessing about what mysterious other areas the special counsel and others at the Justice Department are examining."Nineteen meetings, that's an awful lot of meetings," said Peter Zeidenberg, a former federal prosecutor and member of the special counsel team that investigated the leak of a CIA operative's identity in the George W. Bush administration. "Look, common sense tells you that Flynn is going to know a great deal of information that's of interest to Mueller. His closeness to Trump and the campaign and the convention ... if there's collusion, those are the kinds of things that are going to be of great interest."Herewith is a partial list of the possibilities.1. TurkeyZeidenberg and others raised the prospect that authorities are looking into how the Trump campaign, and now the Trump administration, has been handling demands from Turkey to transport an elderly cleric from his home in Pennsylvania and into the hands of the Turkish regime, which views him as an enemy. The departments of Justice and State have raised questions about whether there's a legitimate legal basis tying the cleric, Fethullah Gulen, to any illegal activity in Turkey. World Trump Says Extraditing Turkish Cleric Fethullah Gulen Is 'Not Under Consideration' Flynn already has acknowledged lying about his contacts with Turkey, including paid advocacy about the cleric's "removal" from the United States, that he failed to report to the Justice Department."It's much, much harder to suss out what's going on here than in a normal white-collar case," said Samuel Buell, a former federal prosecutor who now teaches at Duke University School of Law. Buell said if Flynn had offered truly bombshell testimony, "I think there probably would have been more charges to begin with." Instead, he said, Flynn pleaded guilty to one false-statements charge.2. MoneyOthers have suggested Flynn may have information to share about the inner workings of the transition as its point man to Russia, perhaps including financing of the campaign or the inauguration.Support for this view comes via a question in last summer's trial of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort. Manafort's lawyer, Kevin Downing, pressed deputy campaign chairman Rick Gates about whether he billed the inaugural committee for some of his personal expenses. National Security Trump: Manafort Pardon Not 'Off The Table' After Briefings From Manafort's Lawyer Downing asked whether Gates had been interviewed by the special counsel about his role in the campaign. Prosecutors swiftly objected, and the judge called both sides to the bench for a private conference about the issue. It did not come up again in the trial. National Security The Russia Investigations: On The Hunt For Duffel Bags Full Of Cash But news reports have suggested that a number of Russians with connections to the Kremlin may have funneled money into the campaign or the inaugural celebrations in early 2017. A number of oligarchs who attended those functions have been questioned by the FBI about them, during travel layovers inside the United States. It's illegal for foreign contributors to donate to inaugural committees. Mary McCord spent more than 20 years at the Justice Department, resigning last year as chief of its National Security Division. She declined to address the nature of the information Flynn had provided authorities. But she added that whatever Flynn had told prosecutors, they seem to have bought it. National Security The 10 Events You Need To Know To Understand The Michael Flynn Story "The sentencing memorandum arguing that a sentence of no jail time is 'appropriate and warranted' indicates that the special counsel found Michael Flynn to be forthcoming, credible and of substantial assistance to the special counsel's investigation," said McCord, who now teaches at Georgetown Law Center. "I would not expect to see this kind of recommendation if Flynn had been reticent or was suspected of withholding information, or if the information he provided was not helpful to furthering the investigation."Flynn's lawyers, Robert Kelner and Stephen Anthony, have consistently declined to comment about him over the past year. But they're expected to break their silence Dec. 11, when they file their own brief urging the judge not to impose a prison sentence on the 33-year military veteran. Flynn is scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 18.

Artificial intelligence has a well-known bias problem, particularly when it comes to race and gender. You may have seen some of the headlines: facial recognition systems that fail to recognize black women, or automated recruiting tools that pass over female candidates.But while researchers have tried hard to address some of the most egregious issues, there’s one group of people they have overlooked: those with disabilities. Take self-driving cars. Their algorithms rely on training data to learn what pedestrians look like so the vehicles won’t run them over. If the training data doesn’t include people in wheelchairs, the technology could put those people in life-threatening danger.For Shari Trewin, a researcher on IBM’s accessibility leadership team, this is unacceptable. As part of a new initiative, she is now exploring new design processes and technical methods to mitigate machine bias against people with disabilities. She talked to us about some of the challenges—as well as some possible solutions.The following has been edited for length and clarity.Why is fairness to people with disabilities a different problem from fairness concerning other protected attributes like race and gender?Disability status is much more diverse and complex in the ways that it affects people. A lot of systems will model race or gender as a simple variable with a small number of possible values. But when it comes to disability, there are so many different forms and different levels of severity. Some of them are permanent, some are temporary. Any one of us might join or leave this category at any time in our lives. It’s a dynamic thing.About one in five people in the US currently have a disability of some kind. So it’s really prevalent but hard to pin down into a simple variable with a small number of possible values. There might be a system that discriminates against blind people but not against deaf people. So testing for fairness becomes much harder.Disability information is also very sensitive. People are much more reluctant to reveal it than gender or age or race information, and in some situations it’s even illegal to ask for this information. So a lot of times in the data you’re much less likely to know anything about disabilities that a person may or may not have. That also makes it much harder to know if you have a fair system.I wanted to ask you about that. As humans, we decided the best way to avoid disability discrimination is to not reveal disability status. Why wouldn’t that hold true for machine-learning systems?Yeah, that’s the first thing people think of: if the system doesn’t know anything about individuals’ disability status, surely it will be fair. But the problem is that the disability often impacts other bits of information that are being fed into the model. For example, say I am a person that uses a screen reader to access the web, and I’m doing an online test for a job application. If that test program isn’t well designed and accessible to my screen reader, it’s going to take me longer to navigate around the page before I can answer the question. If that time isn’t taken into consideration in assessing me, then anybody who’s using that same tool with a similar disability is at a systematic disadvantage—even if the system doesn’t know that I’m blind.So if there are so many different nuances to disability, is it actually possible to achieve fairness?I think the more general challenge for the AI community is how to handle outliers, because machine-learning systems—they learn norms, right? They optimize for norms and don’t treat outliers in any special way. But oftentimes people with disabilities don’t fit the norm. The way that machine learning judges people by who it thinks they’re similar to—even when it may never have seen anybody similar to you—is a fundamental limitation in terms of fair treatment for people with disabilities.What would work a lot better would be a method that combines machine learning with some additional solution, like logical rules that are implemented in a layer above. There are also some situations where more attention to gathering a more diverse data set would definitely help. Some people are experimenting with techniques where you take out the core of the data and try to train for the outliers. Others are experimenting with different learning techniques that might optimize better for outliers rather than the norm.I think it’s only when you start thinking about disability that you start thinking about the diversity of individuals and the importance of outliers. If you don’t have enough gender diversity in your data set, you can fix that. It’s not so easy to fix disability diversity.How do you get over the problem of people being private about their disability status?Yeah, in order to test a system for fairness, you need some data. And people with disabilities providing that data is a social good, but it’s a personal risk. People with disabilities are often easily identified even in anonymous data, just because they’re so unique. So how do we mitigate that? We’re still figuring that out.What are your greatest concerns about this problem?Oftentimes AI systems are optimizing something that is not the wellbeing of the people who are affected by the decisions. That impact needs to have much more prominence in the design process, so that we’re not just introducing a system that looks at how much money we’re saving or how efficiently we’re processing people. We need new ways of measuring systems that incorporate the aspect of impact on the end users, especially if it’s a disadvantaged group.How would we do that?Testing for fairness is one way of measuring that impact. Including the disadvantaged group in the design process and hearing their concerns is another. Even explicitly including some metric for stakeholder satisfaction that you could measure through interviews or surveys—that sort of thing.What are the things that you’re excited about in this area of research?AI technologies are already changing the world for people with disabilities by providing them with new capabilities, like applications that tell you what’s in your field of view when you point your phone.I think that if we do it right, there’s a real opportunity for AI systems to improve on previous human-only systems. There’s a lot of discrimination and bias and misunderstanding of people with disabilities in society today. If we can find a way to produce AI systems that eliminate that kind of bias, then we can start to change the treatment of people with disabilities and reduce discrimination.

PingWest品玩8月9日讯，根据The Verge报道，Magic Leap One正式于美国东部时间2018年8月8日在美国地区发售，售价2295美元（约合人民币15650元）。Magic Leap要求一对一的递送订单，并且在第一次佩戴中手把手教你如何使用，所以这次仅在美国发售。Magic Leap位于佛罗里达，目前为止以及筹集超过23亿美元，主要投资者包括谷歌和摩根大通。图片来源：The Verge Magic Leap One有三个部分组成，分别是一个名为Lightwear的头戴式设备、一个名为Lightpack的小型可穿戴计算机，以及一个手持控制器。Lightwear上面有跟踪摄像头，可以捕捉房间的环境，以及捕捉眼球的动作。镜片的位置是一颗“光学芯片”，这些芯片是在Magic Leap总部生产，其他部分则由第三方生产。图片来源：The Verge Magic Leap One采用英伟达Tegra X2 多核处理器，包含四核ARM A57 CPU，双核Denver 2 CPU和基于NVIDIA Pascal的GPU，具有256个CUDA核心，续航使用时间可达3个小时。

FILE PHOTO - EU's High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini attends a press conference with Prime Minister of Finland Juha Sipila (not pictured) in Helsinki, Finland October 10, 2018. Lehtikuva/Markku Ulander via REUTERS BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union on Monday called for restraint and dialogue to find a way forward as hundreds of Hong Kong protesters smashed up the legislature in a direct challenge to China. “In the wake of these latest incidents, it is all the more important to exercise restraint, avoiding escalatory responses, and to engage in dialogue and consultation to find a way forward,” a spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said in a statement. “The actions today of a small number of people, who attempted to force their way into the Legislative Council premises, are not representative of the vast majority of demonstrators, who have been peaceful throughout successive protests.” Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; Editing by Alissa de CarbonnelOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort has asked a judge to investigate leaks about his case, after a list of questions that Trump could face from prosecutors, published by the New York Times, indicated that authorities may have new information linking Manafort to Russia.Attorneys for Manafort complained in a court filing on Monday evening that “numerous unidentified government officials” had prejudiced his case by leaking information about the inquiry by special counsel Robert Mueller, who has charged Manafort with several crimes.“Such leaks impugn the character of the individual under investigation and substantially undermine a fundamental principle of our judicial system; ie, the right of the defendant to have the case determined by an impartial jury on the facts,” said the filing to a federal court in Virginia, where Manafort is charged with bank fraud and filing false tax returns.Manafort has denied any wrongdoing.As Manafort’s lawyers filed their request, the New York Times published the leaked questions. One question relating to Manafort stood out as a potential indicator of information not yet publicly known.It asked: “What knowledge did you have of any outreach by your campaign, including by Paul Manafort, to Russia about potential assistance to the campaign?”Most of the questions appeared to focus on whether Trump obstructed justice by interfering with the Russia investigation.No direct contact between Manafort and Russian government officials has been alleged in court documents filed so far by Mueller’s team. They have accused Manafort of failing to register as an agent for the then pro-Russian government of Ukraine. Manafort’s former business partner, Richard Gates, is cooperating with investigators.The Times reported that the questions had been read by Mueller’s investigators to the president’s lawyers, who compiled them into a list. “That document was provided to the Times by a person outside Mr Trump’s legal team,” it said.John Dean, a White House counsel to Richard Nixon who was jailed for his part in the Watergate scandal, said the leak could itself amount to an “act of obstruction”, by alerting others to what Mueller was investigating.Dean told CNN late on Monday a Trump ally may have leaked the questions “to try to somehow disrupt the flow of information, the tipping off of witnesses in advance to what the question was going to be”.Ryan Goodman, a law professor at New York University and former special counsel at the defense department, described the Manafort question as the “most interesting” on the leaked list and pointed to a CNN report from August 2017 for possible context.That report said US intelligence agencies had intercepted communications in which suspected Russian spies discussed their efforts to work with Manafort in an attempt to damage Hillary Clinton’s election campaign.“The suspected operatives relayed what they claimed were conversations with Manafort, encouraging help from the Russians,” CNN reported, citing unidentified US officials.Matthew Miller, a former top justice department spokesman, told the Guardian the Manafort question contained the “only new piece of possible evidence” but cautioned that even this might be attributable to an error such as faulty transcription by someone on Trump’s team.Miller said Trump should not take comfort from the lack of previously undisclosed information in the remaining questions on Mueller’s list.“The president would be making a huge mistake if he thought these were the only questions he would be asked,” said Miller. “He should be ready to talk about anything. It’s not an ambush to ask you to tell the truth. “These are broad subject areas that would be followed up with very specific questions based on the evidence Mueller has gathered.”At Tuesday’s White House briefing, press secretary Sarah Sanders repeatedly declined to comment on the leaked questions. “As with all questions of this nature, I would refer you to the president’s outside personal attorneys, Jay Sekulow and Rudy Giuliani,” she said.Asked if the White House was concerned that Democratic congressman Adam Schiff said most of the questions point to obstruction of justice, Sanders shot back: “We here at the White House try never to be concerned with anything dealing Adam Schiff.”Additional reporting by David Smith in Washington Topics Paul Manafort Trump-Russia investigation Donald Trump news

The Islamic State announced through its Amaq News Agency on Friday (May 10) that it has established its first “province” in India, Reuters reports.ISIS called the area, located within India’s northern state of Jammu and Kashmir, “Wilayah of Hind,” or Hind province. It also claimed to have inflicted casualties upon Indian forces in a recent clash in Amshipora, a town in that state. Local police said an ISIS-linked militant, Ishfaq Ahmad Sofi, was killed in an exchange yesterday.Last month, ISIS released a video showing its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, claiming responsibility for the Easter Sunday terrorist attacks in Sri Lanka that killed over 250 people. The video “sought to emphasize the international nature of the struggle” following the group losing its self-styled “caliphate” in Iraq and Syria, wrote Nicolas Hénin, a former ISIS hostage and author of Jihad Academy: The Rise of Islamic State, in the Guardian.ISIS likely sees Jammu and Kashmir, with its long-simmering Muslim-Hindu tensions, as promising territory.A spokesman for the South Kashmir police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Rita Katz, director of SITE Intelligence Group, weighed in on Twitter:The establishment of a “province” in a region where it has nothing resembling actual governance is absurd, but it should not be written off…The world may roll its eyes at these developments (I sure have), but to jihadists in these vulnerable regions, [these] are significant gestures to help lay the groundwork in rebuilding the map of the ISIS’ “Caliphate.” Thus, these regions should be closely watched.

Enlarge this image The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. stands with other civil rights leaders on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn., on April 3, 1968, a day before he was assassinated at approximately the same place. From left are Hosea Williams, Jesse Jackson, King and Ralph Abernathy. Charles Kelly/AP hide caption toggle caption Charles Kelly/AP The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. stands with other civil rights leaders on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn., on April 3, 1968, a day before he was assassinated at approximately the same place. From left are Hosea Williams, Jesse Jackson, King and Ralph Abernathy. Charles Kelly/AP Authorities have investigated the death of Martin Luther King Jr. five times since his murder in April 1968. Congress, district attorneys and the Justice Department all have concluded that James Earl Ray shot King as the civil rights icon stood on a motel balcony in Memphis.That hasn't stopped conspiracy theories from flourishing.Several of King's children said they can't believe a lone gunman killed their father, especially since he had been hounded by the FBI for years before his murder. Others in the civil rights movement that King led have expressed their doubts, too. 1968: How We Got Here When MLK Was Killed, He Was In Memphis Fighting For Economic Justice Three men who have investigated the crime over the past 50 years said they are confident in their conclusions — even if some questions do linger about conspirators who themselves may have died decades ago."You just don't think that these powerful people, these people who are larger than life, can be killed by some nobody with a gun," said former Shelby County, Tenn., assistant district attorney John Campbell. "You know, there has to be more involved. Well, sometimes there's not more involved."Walter Cronkite broke the news to his television audience the night of April 4, 1968."Dr. Martin Luther King, the apostle of nonviolence in the civil rights movement, has been shot to death in Memphis, Tennessee," Cronkite reported. "Police have issued an all points bulletin for a well-dressed young white man seen running from the scene." CBS via YouTube After an international manhunt, British police apprehended James Earl Ray at an airport in London. Ray, a sometime bank robber, pleaded guilty to King's murder in 1969, in part to avoid the death penalty. But Ray back-tracked on the story days later. That has left room for doubt ever since.Eight years after King's death, in 1976, Congress launched its own investigation."Martin Luther King used to say that truth crushed to earth will rise again," then-D.C. Delegate Walter Fauntroy said in his opening statement at the first hearing of his assassination panel. "We are making a serious effort to establish what, in fact, was the truth."Hounded by the FBIDisclosures that King had been targeted by the FBI and its director J. Edgar Hoover for abuse and harassment gave rise to many questions about possible government involvement in his death.The House Select Committee on Assassinations hired engineers to trace the path of the bullet that hit King as he stood on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel. Committee members enlisted forensic experts to study the autopsy report. And they interviewed lots of witnesses. One was the convicted killer, Ray. Enlarge this image House Assassinations Committee chief counsel G. Robert Blakey talks to committee chairman Louis Stokes, D-Ohio, in Washington on Dec. 22, 1978. Dennis Cook/AP hide caption toggle caption Dennis Cook/AP House Assassinations Committee chief counsel G. Robert Blakey talks to committee chairman Louis Stokes, D-Ohio, in Washington on Dec. 22, 1978. Dennis Cook/AP "And so we worried about — was there somebody else involved in King's death?" said G. Robert Blakey, chief counsel to the committee, in a recent interview.The House investigation found Ray had purchased the rifle likely used to shoot King. Blakey said he found no involvement by the FBI or the Ku Klux Klan, but he still wonders whether Ray might have believed he could somehow have gotten a financial windfall by killing King.The dilemma today is there is probably no way to pin down those details."The truth of the matter is that conspiracy investigations need to be made at the time of the crime," Blakey said.Blakey says the FBI could not win approval for wiretaps to snoop on Ray's brothers at the time, and so, a key question lingered, without a decisive answer. 1968: How We Got Here Remembering 1968: LBJ Surprises Nation With Announcement He Won't Seek Re-Election Meanwhile, from prison, Ray continued to maintain his innocence. He attracted allies such as William Pepper, who became his lawyer and who eventually wrote three books on the King assassination.Pepper later told interviewers he spent five hours interrogating Ray behind bars, and came away with the conclusion that Ray didn't do it. They appealed the case. They tried the Supreme Court. No luck."It looked like we were at the end of the road," Pepper recalled years later. "And then I came up with an idea, 'Well, look, why don't we try to have a real trial on television?' "HBO broadcast that mock trial in 1993. The television jury found Ray not guilty.The media interest attracted some new voices, voices like Loyd Jowers, who owned a bar and grill near the motel in Memphis where King was shot. Enlarge this image James Earl Ray took the oath before a committee in Washington, D.C. investigating King's assassination. Keystone/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Keystone/Getty Images James Earl Ray took the oath before a committee in Washington, D.C. investigating King's assassination. Keystone/Getty Images The claim of another shooter In 1993, Jowers told ABC's Sam Donaldson that Ray didn't kill King and that he knew who was paid to do it. That account provoked a new round of questions about King's murder. But Jowers didn't want to say more unless the district attorney granted him immunity from prosecution.James Earl Ray, ailing and serving a 99-year prison sentence, once again pushed for a way to re-open the case. And thus began another investigation.Local prosecutors in Memphis, including John Campbell, were assigned to look at claims by Jowers and others."You know there was a lot of people that all of a sudden, yes, just came out of the woodwork," Campbell said. Photography When King Came To Chicago: See The Rare Images Of His Campaign — In Color Investigators went back and interviewed people who were at Jowers' bar and grill in 1968. Campbell's investigation concluded that many of those people failed to back him up.One witness who was supporting Jowers decades after the killing allegedly told her sister that she was motivated by the prospect of money, in a call that was overheard by investigators. And Jowers himself changed his tune, from what he told the FBI at the time of the murder."Within a couple of weeks, we figured out this first story wasn't going to go anywhere, it wasn't true," Campbell said. NPR via YouTube Something else was happening around that time — the launching of another investigation, this time, by the Justice Department under President Bill Clinton.Veteran civil rights prosecutor Barry Kowalski, who worked on the federal case against the police who beat Rodney King in 1991, led that effort."We conducted a conscientious and a thorough investigation and just like the four official investigations before it, found no credible evidence or reliable evidence that Dr. King was killed by conspirators who framed James Earl Ray," Kowalski told NPR.Justice Department prosecutors interviewed 200 witnesses and reviewed tens of thousands of documents. They found Jowers and the theory of a government directed conspiracy were not credible. And they wrote that they discounted other allegations, claims the murder was somehow linked to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.Kowalski said that none of the subsequent theories or inquiries ever disproved the initial one: that Ray killed King, acting alone."I remain absolutely convinced that those well founded findings were correct," he said. National Security Russians Targeted U.S. Racial Divisions Long Before 2016 And Black Lives Matter Audrey McNamara is an intern with the Washington Desk

Hong Kong has had its third consecutive day of mass protests as demonstrators and riot police firing teargas and rubber bullets clashed in several locations throughout the city.Tens of thousands of protesters, dressed in black and armed with umbrellas and hardhats, defied police orders to keep Sunday’s rally constrained to a park in central Hong Kong and fanned out across the city in the early evening. They streamed west and east, occupying main roads, setting up barricades, and chanting: “Reclaim Hong Kong!”As the city endured a tense calm on Monday, all eyes were on Beijing where it was expected that the Hong Kong and Macao affairs office – China’s highest level body on the former British colony – would be holding a press conference at 3pm local time (0700 GMT).It is believed to be the first time the unit has held a press briefing since Hong Kong was handed over to Beijing in 1997 and comes amid a flurry of condemnation of the protests from China’s state media.In the latest round of editorials, China Daily claimed that “external forces” and “outside meddling” were to blame for the unrest.It comes after the protesters again made Beijing’s representative office in Hong Kong a target for their anger on Sunday.Riot police blocked a contingent of demonstrators on their way to the building and as the crowd grew, police fired tear gas and rubber bullets. The protesters responded by throwing umbrellas, rocks, eggs, and gas canisters back at the police. The protesters created a drum beat using street signs and traffic barriers as they tried to hold their ground.“It lasted a whole minute. It was at least 10 rounds,” said Long, a 25-year-old medical volunteer who said he had helped pull demonstrators back from the frontline when they were stumbling and unable to see.Over the past three days, demonstrators have rallied to condemn an attack last weekend on commuters by suspected triad gangs, an incident that has led to accusations of government collusion, denied by Hong Kong officials.On Saturday, a peaceful march in the town of Yuen Long turned chaotic as police fired teargas, rubber bullets and sponge grenades, and charged protesters in a railway station. Thousands of demonstrators joined aviation workers at the airport for an 11-hour-sit-in on Friday.The former British colony is facing its most serious political crisis since it was returned to Chinese control in 1997. Under the terms of that agreement, the semi-autonomous region was meant to maintain a “high degree of autonomy” through an independent judiciary, a free press and an open market economy, a framework known as: “One country, two systems.”Sunday’s protests marked the eighth consecutive weekend that Hongkongers have taken to the streets in protests that began over an extradition bill that would have allowed wanted suspects to be sent to mainland China.As the police fired continuous rounds of teargas into crowds on Sunday, some protesters fell to ground choking. One group sought refuge in a nearby apartment building when residents opened the gate, ushering them in. Demonstrators collapsed on the stairwell, some of them crying.“Even though the protesters are peaceful, they keep throwing the teargas. I don’t know why they keep throwing,” said Hinton, 16, who had tears in his eyes after being gassed.Police said they used teargas to disperse protesters who were hurling bricks at them but protesters insisted police fired first. “We are trying to protect our own freedom. We are doing this for this place, our place. I’ll be honest, I did throw things because I’m that angry,” said one protester, Angus, 24.The protesters were then pushed back to smaller roads in Sheung Wan, a normally busy neighbourhood turned into a ghost town after shops closed and residents were warned to stay inside. Tourists and residents ran from the scene, covering their eyes and mouths.Before midnight, the police had surrounded the protesters, shielding themselves with wooden boards and street signs. Teargas was lobbed at the protesters from all directions, shrouding the road and forcing the protesters to enter a mass transit station and leave.Some protesters said the police appeared to escalating their tactics, with officers firing on protesters earlier and more frequently. “I can’t even count how many rounds of teargas they used,” said Roy Chan, 39.In a statement, the government said protesters had pushed a cart of burning cardboard at police, “threatening the safety of police officers and members of public”. The government said it would “continue to give full support to police to strictly enforce the law to stop all violent behaviours”.Police said 49 people had been arrested in relation to Sunday’s protest, for suspected unlawful assembly and possession of offensive weapons.Organisers for Sunday’s event had originally planned to march from central Hong Kong to Sheung Wan to condemn the police for firing teargas and rubber bullets on protesters last weekend. The police did not grant a permit for the march – the second time authorities have rejected a protest request – following a ban on the Saturday rally in Yuen Long.Protesters fear authorities will adopt this line more in the future. On Sunday, one of the organisers of the Yuen Long rally, Max Chung, was arrested by police on suspicion of inciting an illegal assembly.Some say the situation risks spiralling out of control as the public doubts the Hong Kong government’s ability to govern and Beijing is likely to pressure Hong Kong authorities to take a harder line on protesters. As protesters continue to clash with police, people have only grown more frustrated, fuelling yet more demonstrations.“There’s a lot of public anger and I don’t think that’s going to go away soon,” said James Yip, 27, part of the group of protesters leaving Sheung Wan. “I think everyone is exhausted on both side, pro-government and pro-democracy.”Exhaustion among protests appears to have set in as well. Amy Yeung, 26, has been attending as many protests as she can. “I am mentally tired. Watching the news, you cry,” she said. “But at least standing here, we are giving the message that we are not alone.”On Sunday, protesters said they were more angry than exhausted and would continue. Jonathan, 19, who was resting on a curb away from the frontline in between rounds of teargas, said: “They see us as a threat because we are having an impact.”Residents have seen Beijing’s influence over Hong Kong grow in recent years, as activists have been jailed and pro-democracy lawmakers disqualified from running or holding office. Independent book sellers have disappeared from the city, to reappear in mainland China facing charges, a point critics of the extradition bill often make.“It seems to us that this is our last chance. If we don’t do this now, we won’t be able to later,” said Eunice Chan, 55, who grew up in Hong Kong before it was returned to Chinese control in 1997. Topics Hong Kong Asia Pacific China news

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (Reuters) - In a break with convention, President Donald Trump weighed in on a criminal trial as the jury considered a verdict on Friday, calling the tax and bank fraud case against Paul Manafort “very sad” and lauding his former campaign chairman as a “very good person.” A federal court jury in Alexandria, Virginia completed its second day of deliberations without reaching a verdict in the first trial stemming from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s 15-month-old investigation of Russia’s role in the 2016 U.S. election. U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis, presiding over the case, said he personally had received threats related to the trial and was being protected by U.S. marshals. Ellis revealed the threats as he rejected a motion by a group of news organizations to make public the names of the jurors, saying he was concerned about their “peace and safety.” “I had no idea this case would excite these emotions ... I don’t feel right if I release their names,” the judge said. In remarks to reporters at the White House, Trump again called Mueller’s investigation, which had cast a cloud over his presidency, a “rigged witch hunt,” but sidestepped a question about whether he would issue a presidential pardon for Manafort. “I think the whole Manafort trial is very sad, when you look at what’s going on there. I think it’s a very sad day for our country,” Trump said. “He worked for me for a very short period of time. But you know what? He happens to be a very good person. And I think it’s very sad what they’ve done to Paul Manafort.” Trump made his comments while the jurors, mulling 18 criminal counts against Manafort, deliberated behind closed doors on Friday morning. As president, Trump has the power to pardon Manafort on the federal charges. He has already issued a number of pardons, including for a political ally, former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio. Asked by a reporter on Friday if he would pardon Manafort, Trump said, “I don’t talk about that now.” The jurors are not sequestered but have been instructed not to watch news reports or talk to others about the case. Deliberations by the six women and six men in the jury were set to resume on Monday morning. PRO-RUSSIAN POLITICIANS FILE PHOTO: Former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort arrives for arraignment on a third superseding indictment against him by Special Counsel Robert Mueller on charges of witness tampering, at U.S. District Court in Washington, U.S., June 15, 2018. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File PhotoProsecutors accused Manafort, 69, of hiding from U.S. tax authorities $16 million in money he earned as a political consultant for pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine to fund an opulent lifestyle and then lying to banks to secure $20 million in loans after his Ukrainian income dried up and he needed cash. Manafort faces five counts of filing false tax returns, four counts of failing to disclose his offshore bank accounts and nine counts of bank fraud. If convicted on all counts, he could spend the rest of his life in prison. The charges largely predate Manafort’s five months working on Trump’s campaign during a pivotal period in the 2016 presidential race, including three months as campaign chairman. It is unusual for a U.S. president to comment about the character of a defendant in an ongoing trial and criticize the legal proceedings. It was not the first time Trump has weighed in since Manafort’s trial began on July 31. On the first day of testimony, Trump said Manafort had been treated worse than 1920s gangster Al Capone. Trump has made previous comments criticizing various federal judges and courts and has been harshly critical of Mueller, a former FBI director who is investigating whether Trump’s campaign colluded with Russia, an allegation the president and Moscow deny. On Friday, he accused Mueller of having “a lot of conflicts,” but said the special counsel should be allowed to finish a report on his investigation. Prohibitions on jurors reading about a case they are deciding are difficult to enforce in the smartphone era, Cornell University criminal law professor Jens David Ohlin said. Slideshow (5 Images)“We trust jurors to be on their best behavior and wall themselves off but that kind of goes against human nature,” Ohlin said. “I think it was very ill-advised for the president to do this. He should have kept his mouth shut,” Ohlin added. The prosecution could request a mistrial, but such a maneuver was very unlikely, Ohlin said. The jury sent a note on Thursday afternoon asking Ellis four questions including one about defining “reasonable doubt.” In a criminal case, a jury must find a defendant guilty “beyond a reasonable doubt.” Reporting by Nathan Layne and Karen Freifeld; Additional reporting by Jan Wolfe and Ginger Gibson; Writing by Will Dunham; Editing by Alistair Bell and Toni ReinholdOur Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.