The Portuguese incursion was an equally crucial turning point in the Chinese history of the world. In fact, it would alter the course of China’s history more drastically than anything that came before, with the possible exception of the original Qin unification in 221 B.C. It was one of those rare moments in time when two historical narratives that had been meandering along quite separately suddenly came crashing into each other. They quickly became entangled, and would never again be unwound.The Chinese couldn’t have known any of this in 1517. To them, the Portuguese seemed just like any other trade-hungry barbarians who had ventured to China by boat, horse, and camel over many centuries—whether Sogdian, Indian, Persian, or Japanese.The Portuguese brought from Europe very different notions of trade and diplomacy than the Chinese had encountered before. More than that, though, the Portuguese were carrying on their wooden caravels an entirely unfamiliar culture from those the Chinese had previously met. Unlike the usual barbarians, who tended to adopt, at least in part, Chinese cultural practices, or participate in the rules and norms of the Chinese world order, the Portuguese and the Europeans who followed them to Asia thought their own civilization was superior. A clash was coming between peoples who each believed their civilization to be better than all others. The Chinese were simply unaccustomed to and unprepared for this sort of challenge from outsiders.Foreign barbarians could defeat China militarily, and even overrun the empire, but, in Chinese eyes, the Mongols, Xiongnu, and other foreign pests never upset the Chinese self-perception of exceptionalism. Many of the supposed conquerors seemed more like the conquered. The Europeans, fully confident in the value of their own civilization, would present a wholly new threat to the Chinese world order.There were already signs of what was to come from the earliest days of the Portuguese presence in Asia. When da Gama and his successors sailed into the Indian Ocean, they entered a world of well-established, multicultural trading networks and practices that had existed for eons. In the past, new entrants had simply joined the fray—including the Chinese. Zheng He, for example, wished to impress the world with Chinese power but didn’t seek to dominate the region and its trade. Wherever the Portuguese made landfall in Asia, the Chinese had already been. In southern India, da Gama was told tales of light-skinned, bearded men who had visited the coast generations earlier—references to Zheng He’s fleets, which had sunk their anchors off the coast almost a century prior.The Portuguese, though, were bred amid the mercantilist brutality of Europe, where separation among trade, war, and power was barely perceptible. They intended not to simply participate in the trade between East and West, but to control it. And they used new, aggressive tactics and superior weaponry to impose their will. When they reached the flourishing entrepôt at Malacca in Southeast Asia, the Portuguese sought to conquer, which they did in 1511. The maritime states of South and East Asia had never seen anything quite like the Portuguese before. Bottled up by the paranoid Ming, the Chinese were not quite aware of who they were dealing with and what they were up to, either.

NASHVILLE, Tennessee -- Amid brewing tensions in Washington among congressional Democrats and the White House, former FBI Director James Comey said that the House of Representatives "has no choice" but to move forward with an impeachment inquiry into Donald Trump after the president's overtures to his Ukrainian counterpart to investigate Joe Biden and his son, Hunter."The House has no choice but to pursue an impeachment inquiry. All I know about the facts are coming from news accounts," Comey said during a wide-ranging interview at Politicon, an annual, non-partisan political convention that aims to bring "Republicans, Democrats and people of all political stripes" together.Trump's call with Ukraine's president "might be" enough to impeach the president, Comey added, before urging, "It's certainly powerful grounds to investigate."As he unleashed a blistering rebuke of Trump's alleged conduct, Comey added, "If the news accounts are accurate, the president engaged in a shocking abuse of power."Comey also said if he still ran the FBI he "might" open a criminal investigation into whether or not Trump engaged in bribery or quid pro quo dealings during his phone call with the Ukrainian president.But Comey warned that he seeks to ultimately "withhold judgment" on whether Trump should be impeached until "we have a chance as a country to see and public testimony to get the transparency we deserve.""Show us -- this what happened in the summer of 1974. Show the American people what the evidence is. It rocked the American people's world in the summer of 1974," he said. "And history doesn't repeat itself, but they say it rhymes. I think we may see something similar with public hearings here."In 1974, President Richard M. Nixon announced he'd be resigning from office in the wake of the Watergate scandal.Last month, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that she, without a vote, was launching "a formal impeachment inquiry" after months of resisting pressure from some fellow Democrats following the completion of former special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.At the crux of the Democrats' impeachment inquiry is whether the president withheld aid from Ukraine to pressure the country to investigate his political rival's family and a conspiracy theory related to the 2016 presidential election.Comey conceded that Mueller's nearly two-year investigation, which culminated in a redacted summary report released by the Justice Department, "laid out an extraordinary series of acts by the president that would have resulted in anyone in this room already being in jail for obstruction of justice."Since the close of Mueller's probe, Comey said his own thinking on impeachment have evolved, asserting, "I was against the idea of impeachment when it was just about Mueller material.""My view now is I don't know how, as a member of Congress, you can look yourself in the mirror and say, 'I'm abiding the oath I swore to this Constitution of the United States,'" he added.Comey also criticized Attorney General William Barr for the Justice Department shifting a review into the origins of the investigation into Russia's interference in the 2016 election into a criminal investigation, in which U.S. Attorney John Durham, who is running the investigation, can subpoena witnesses, impanel a grand jury and bring criminal charges."I can't tell what's going on with the attorney general and that investigation," he said. "I was deeply concerned by some things he said early on. ... I don't know what they're looking at. So I'm not really in a position to say you shouldn't investigate.""I would hope that Mr. Durham will do everything possible to protect his reputation from being damaged by those in leadership, and the most important way you can do that is give us transparency," Comey added. "Gather the facts, write a report and share it with the American people."Regardless of the outcome of an impeachment inquiry, Comey said he's "optimistic" that "the American people are going to pass judgment on what kind of country we want to be.""Our leaders must reflect the glue that holds us together. They can't be people who lie all the time," he said. "And I want people to see that's true, whether they're Republicans or Democrats."But when asked if he would feel differently if Trump won reelection, Comey joked, "I will be, from my new home in New Zealand, I still would believe in America."Comey also was asked if he would ever run for political office."I'm never going to run for office," he said. "I hope to be useful without running for office."ABC News' Benjamin Siegel, Katherine Faulders and John Parkinson contributed to this report.

In my neighborhood, at least, a fair percentage of Amazon deliveries are made by contractors who participate in the company’s Uber-esque Flex program. These couriers pick up items for delivery from local Amazon fulfillment centers, wear utilitarian safety jackets, and drive unmarked, sometimes vaguely disreputable-looking vehicles with packages piled atop their dashboards.Starting soon, however, some of those items might be dropped off by someone decked out in a sporty Amazon-branded uniform and driving a Mercedes-Benz Sprinter truck with big Amazon Prime logos on its sides. That someone will be neither a Flex contractor nor an Amazon employee—but rather an employee of a local business set up expressly to deliver for Amazon.The company calls the concept Delivery Service Partners, and on Wednesday, senior VP of worldwide operations Dave Clark hosted a small event in Seattle to brief reporters on the plans. Amazon aspires to help hundreds of entrepreneurs across the U.S. create these businesses, with startup costs as low as $10,000. For all the ways this sounds like a way to scale up the last-mile transportation network Amazon started building with Flex, it also sees the plan as being akin to Amazon Marketplace, the 15-year-old program that lets small businesses sell their wares on its platform and, optionally, using its fulfillment system. These merchants sold more than half of all items ordered on Amazon last year; more than 140,000 of them did at least $100,000 in revenue.While the idea with Delivery Service Partners is to help Amazon’s distribution network grow, the company thinks it’s best if each of the delivery companies it’s hoping to help birth doesn’t get too big. “Our experience says that about 20-40 vehicles is about the right size company to still be a hands-on owner/operator,” Clark told me. “It makes it manageable. It doesn’t extend the person out too far in terms of the number of people they have to hire or the amount of management required. We think it sets people up for success.”Experience in delivery is not required. “Predominantly, we’re really looking for people who have the right cultural, leadership kind of frame,” Clark says. “We want people who are people people . . . who enjoy being out in their community.” Amazon thinks that it’s an especially good opportunity for military veterans—and to encourage qualifying vets to take up the challenge, it’s setting aside $1 million so it can give them $10,000 apiece to cover startup costs.Once a Delivery Service Partner is up and running, Amazon will provide not only stuff to deliver but also the back-end infrastructure needed to manage it; assistance with issues such as training, taxes, and payroll processing; and discounts on insurance, fuel, and truck leasing. The company will sign each firm to a contract based on goals for delivery volume and says that it will be possible to turn $300,000 in profit a year from such a business.At the Seattle event, Clark introduced Ola Abimbola, an immigrant from Nigeria who had a technical desk job but found he “didn’t want to be cooped up behind a computer.” Abimbola began driving for Amazon Flex and, as part of the Delivery Service Partners beta test, started his own delivery company. Five months later, his Aurora, Colorado-based business has almost 40 full-time and part-time workers. Thanks to Amazon’s never-ending delivery needs, he said, “my employees, all they have to do is show up for work, and there is always work to do–great, steady income.”Being entirely dependent on Amazon for revenue isn’t without its risks; some Marketplace merchants have long complained that the company can treat them capriciously and has the power to shut down their businesses in a heartbeat. Still, if Delivery Services Partners lives up to Amazon’s vision, it will remove some of the traditional hassles of running a small company. “Our entrepreneurs don’t have to fight for customers,” Clark said at the event. “They don’t have to fight for sales. They get the opportunity, with our demand, to have a good consistent volume and to grow with Amazon as we grow.”Though this model may appeal to prospective Delivery Service Partners, the asymmetry of the relationships also lets Amazon call the shots in a way it can’t do when negotiating terms with a giant like FedEx or UPS. Or with the U.S. Postal Service, which the president of the United States keeps declaring isn’t charging Amazon enough to deliver its goods (justifiably or not).An Amazon courier in the company’s new delivery duds. [Photo: Harry McCracken]A job, not a gigAs with many gig-economy jobs, driving for Amazon Flex as a free agent–which Amazon pitches as side work rather than a career–involves lots of scrambling to make a buck and doesn’t include niceties such as health insurance and paid vacations. Even before launching the Delivery Service Partners program, Amazon has been using the Flex system to outsource delivery to local companies. Last year, Gizmodo’s Bryan Menegus reported on these arrangements, which, at least in some instances, also appear to be pretty hardscrabble for the couriers involved.In principle, at least, working for an Amazon Service Partner company sounds like an upgrade. While Amazon says it won’t be intimately involved in telling owners how to operate their businesses, it will set standards for minimum salaries and stipulate that positions offer benefits and paid time off. The services it will provide and the discounts it has negotiated might help these delivery firms provide better jobs than the typical tiny company can.Putting more responsibility in the hands of locals who run their own businesses might also be good for Amazon customers. Among the many sobering points in Alana Semuels’ recent Atlantic story on the Flex program is that when things go wrong, the contractors don’t have a manager to help set them right. (In my own wholly unscientific experiences as an Amazon customer in the Flex era, the company has gotten dramatically better at delivering the average package in less time—but the instances in which it fails to meet its self-imposed deadline have gone up.)According to Clark, “the level of ownership with people who own those businesses is super-impressive.” He adds that Delivery Service Partners are “using our technology and using our devices, so we can understand how their on-road safety is. We have lots of audit mechanisms associated with the supplier code of conduct to ensure that they’re treating their people fairly. We have a ton of customer metrics that let us know whether we have a great customer experience or not. We think the quality control is very high.”I asked him whether the advent of Delivery Service Partners reflects the limitations of the Flex approach to delivery. Not really, he said: “We are kind of an all-of-the-above place. We need all forms and manner of supply chain tools to accomplish our mission.”If Amazon needs “all of the above” to deliver its own goods–worldwide, it shipped 5 billion Prime items last year–imagine the resources it would require if it chose to take on FedEx, UPS, and the USPS by delivering packages for other folks. That scenario seems increasingly inevitable. And these new local delivery businesses could play a critical role in making it feasible–which would make their success as important to Amazon’s future as it is to their own.

Shops in Germany are saying guten tag to a growing number of customers.Retail sales in Europe’s largest economy bounced 13.9% in May from the previous month, according to seasonally adjusted data from the Federal Statistics Office. Sales were also up 3.9% from a year earlier—a simpler time when most people didn’t know what a coronavirus was. While Germany’s retail sales figures are highly volatile and could be revised, the data suggests the country’s consumption is on the mend.Germany has benefitted from “more track and trace, fewer infections, shorter lockdowns and oddly, a sudden shopping craze,” Kit Juckes of Societe Generale wrote in an email. While it’s possible that data revisions will show that shoppers were less exuberant than first thought, Juckes noted that there’s also a growing chance the German economy could have more momentum than economists expected.

Talk about awkward timing.Meanwhile, the 2019 novel coronavirus has spread to dozens of countries and killed thousands in one of the most disturbing viral outbreaks in recent memory, wreaking especially intense havoc in Amazon’s home city of Seattle.According to CNBC, Amazon Web Services (AWS), the cloud computing subsidiary that drives much of company’s profits, houses a secretive group dubbed “Grand Challenge” that focuses on far-flung technological and scientific ideas. A team therein is reportedly working on developing a vaccine for the common cold.Bezos’ company has long expanded into what might have been unexpected areas. It started as an online bookstore, branched into manufacturing its own products (including proprietary books), and even became a major competitor for military contracts. Along the way, the company all but invented cloud computing with AWS.A cure for the common cold would make for another big notch in Bezos’ belt. Last month, he pledged to spend $10 billion on combating climate change via a new charity, the Bezos Earth Fund. He’s also the owner of the storied Washington Post newspaper and a spaceflight company Blue Origin. Bezos reportedly spends $1 billion per year on the aerospace venture, which is headquartered at a vast West Texas ranch that also serves as a potential launch site. In recent weeks, however, Amazon and its peers have battled problems sprouting from the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, which has killed at least 15 Americans. Amazon sellers raised prices to astronomical levels on essential products like hand sanitizer, and hawked merchandise using dubious health claims, requiring the company to pull a million items from its digital shelves. Washington, Amazon’s home state, is battling the worst COVID-19 outbreak in the country, with 14 deaths. The virus belongs to the family of infections known as coronaviruses, some of which actually cause illnesses that resemble the common cold. A relative, the rhinovirus family, causes roughly 75 percent of common colds, and there are roughly 160 strains of rhinovirus in circulation. The new virus has affected Amazon's own employees, too: At least one has been infected, and the company has asked staff to work from home at its Seattle HQ.

Several Democratic presidential candidates spoke up when the actor Jussie Smollett described a hateful attack based on his race and sexual orientation in January.Not as many have spoken up since the police said the assault had been staged.Mr. Smollett surrendered to face a felony charge of filing a false police report on Thursday, after the police in Chicago said he hired two brothers for the assault. Mr. Smollett denies the accusation, and his legal team said Thursday that he “feels betrayed by a system that apparently wants to skip due process and proceed directly to sentencing.”[Latest update — For Jussie Smollett, how a life of arts and activism is upended.]At first, several Democratic presidential candidates expressed support for Mr. Smollett, who stars on the show “Empire.” Senators Kamala Harris and Cory Booker both called the reported assault a “modern day lynching,” comments that Republicans are now criticizing them for.In a Facebook post on Thursday, Ms. Harris said she was “sad, frustrated and disappointed” by the reports about Mr. Smollett. But other candidates have not publicly revisited their initial views of the case.President Trump, who initially told reporters the alleged attack was “horrible,” criticized Mr. Smollett on Twitter on Thursday for what he called “racist and dangerous comments.”Here are the responses — and lack thereof — of Democratic presidential contenders on social media. Several candidates have not said anything.Updated statements on ThursdayTwo candidates who made statements in January offered new thoughts on Thursday: Ms. Harris and Representative Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii.On Jan. 29, Ms. Harris called Mr. Smollett “one of the kindest, most gentle human beings I know.”But in her Facebook post on Thursday, she said a false claim to the police “not only diverts resources away from serious investigations but it makes it more difficult for other victims of crime to come forward.” She then pivoted to a discussion of hate crimes, citing F.B.I. statistics showing a 17 percent increase last year.“Part of the tragedy of this situation is that it distracts from that truth, and has been seized by some who would like to dismiss and downplay the very real problems that we must address,” she said.On Jan. 29, Ms. Gabbard called the described assault “heartbreaking.”On Thursday, she said in a series of tweets that, if guilty, Mr. Smollett “needs to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law to send a strong message to any potential future ‘hoaxers.’”Spoke out in January but not after charges were filedMr. Booker, Julian Castro, Kirsten Gillibrand and Joseph R. Biden Jr. — who is thought to be considering a presidential run but has not announced one — spoke up on Jan. 29 but have not put out new statements.Mr. Booker used the alleged assault to promote an anti-lynching bill. He said this week he would withhold further comment “until all of the information actually comes out from on-the-record sources”; a spokesman did not immediately respond to a message on Thursday.Mr. Castro, the former housing secretary and mayor of San Antonio, was the only candidate to hedge his statement on Jan. 29, prefacing it with “If the reports of Jussie Smollett’s attack last night are true.”But later in the day he tweeted more definitively about Mr. Smollett. “In 2019, he was violently attacked because of his race and sexual orientation,” he wrote. A spokeswoman said Thursday that Mr. Castro had no new comment.Initially, Ms. Gillibrand, a New York senator, called the reported assault “a sickening and outrageous attack” and said she was “praying for Jussie and his family.” She told CNN this week she would “wait to find out the facts before I make another statement”; a spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a message on Thursday.Mr. Biden, the former vice president, said “we are with you, Jussie” after the reported attack. A spokesman did not immediately respond to a message on Thursday.

Hong Kong police fired tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannons on Saturday, while protesters launched Molotov cocktails, as anti-government demonstrations that have roiled the territory for months once again turned violent.Police fired round after round of tear gas as protesters took cover behind umbrellas between the local headquarters of China's People's Liberation Army and government HQ. Protesters also pointed lasers and threw bricks at police.Fears of clashes were running high ahead of the demonstrations, aimed at marking the fifth anniversary of a decision by China to curtail democratic reforms in the former British colony.Police rejected a permit application for protesters to hold the rally and also detained and released two prominent protest organizers ahead of Saturday's march — a move which international human rights group Amnesty International called "an assault on their rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly."Official protest organizers told NBC News on Friday that they were pulling out of demonstrations but both protest organizers and police said an assembly of activists was still expected and could turn violent.Joshua Wong, one of the protesters who was released on bail Friday, spoke out against police and the government in a series of tweets defending his actions. "Our freedom of assembly and other fundamental rights are eroded," he said. "Hongkonger, together we stand! We shall never surrender!"Let our news meet your inbox. The news and stories that matters, delivered weekday mornings.On Saturday, demonstrators — many wearing black and face masks — marched in disparate groups throughout Hong Kong in the rain communicating with different hand signals and chanting "stand with Hong Kong" and "fight for freedom."Although the event began peacefully with families, including young children participating, clashes eventually broke out with police.Water cannons sprayed at the protesters to disperse crowds contained blue and red dye — a tactic local media said would help police identify people who participated in the banned rally.Police fought running battles with protesters, beating them with truncheons.The city's subway operator suspended some services and shut station exits because of likely "public activities."The House Committee on Foreign Affairs released a bipartisan statement Saturday condemning China for having "undermined the autonomy of Hong Kong, exacerbated existing grievances" while calling the actions of protesters "admirable."The statement, issued by Rep. Eliot Engel, D-NY, and Rep. Michael McCaul, R-TX, also called on authorities to release anyone detained on politically motivated charges and stop the use of excessive force against protesters."We urge authorities to exercise restraint and both sides to refrain from violence and seek a peaceful accommodation that addresses the legitimate concerns of the people of Hong Kong," Engel and McCaul said.The demonstrations that have plunged the former British colony into a political crisis began in June after Hong Kong's chief executive Carrie Lam proposed a controversial extradition bill.The bill raised fears that the rights of Hong Kong's 7 million residents were being eroded under Beijing's rule, as it would allow suspects to be sent to China.Hong Kong became a special administrative region of China in 1997. Unlike those living in the mainland, residents of the territory can freely surf the internet and participate in public protests.Demonstrations have since morphed from calling for the withdrawal of the extradition bill to include demands that Lam resign and allegations of police brutality be investigated.Many have feared Beijing could intervene in the unrest as the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China looms on Oct. 1.Its People's Liberation Army troops in the territory were rotated on Thursday.

But the Iranian government may have inadvertently offered a new clue recently. In a filing to the United Nations, it referred to an “ongoing case” against him before Iran’s Revolutionary Court. The Trump administration, meanwhile, raised the potential reward for information leading to his whereabouts to a total of $25 million.This fall, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif hinted that he was looking for another prisoner exchange, saying he had submitted a list to the U.S. of Iranians he hoped would be freed from American jails. The U.S. side gave no public indication of interest at the time. But in a background phone call with reporters this morning, a senior administration official celebrated Wang’s release and said that the administration would continue to work for the freedom of other American hostages around the world. Wang’s release, the official said, should be viewed by other families as a hopeful sign. “We haven’t forgotten them,” the official said.Meanwhile, the administration continues to squeeze Iran financially in pursuit of a broad set of objectives that include not only prisoner releases but also a halt to backing regional proxies, an end to ballistic-missile testing, and expanded restrictions on its nuclear program. More recently, as protests have swept the country, the administration has cheered the protesters and condemned the regime’s violent crackdown in response. On Thursday, Brian Hook, the U.S. special representative for Iran, declared that the protests demonstrated the regime’s loss of legitimacy among broad segments of the population. He also indicated that there would be still more pressure, and that the State Department sought to sanction two Iranian prisons he said were guilty of gross human-rights abuses in their detentions of protesters.It’s unlikely that Wang’s release will change this broader campaign to squeeze the Iranian government, or even that it was intended to, especially while other Americans remain behind bars. And if, in fact, Wang’s release was a response to the administration’s economic pressure campaign, the administration may be encouraged to double down in hopes of getting even more concessions. In congressional testimony earlier this month, family members of some Western hostages called for still more pressure on the regime over their loved ones’ cases. But critics of the overall sanctions program have said that it will only encourage Tehran to lash out more in the region, as it apparently did over the summer with attacks on shipping and the shooting down of a U.S. drone.As for Wang, he will, after three years, finally be reunited with his wife, Hua Qu, and his son, Shaofan, who was only 3 when his father disappeared. At a press conference over the summer, Qu noted that her son was now 6, meaning his father had spent half of the boy’s life behind bars in Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison.At her Washington, D.C., appearance in August, Qu described the conditions of his confinement, wistfully noting that he was still a “nerd” and that he had asked her to send academic books when she could. “Even now, books, when he gets hold of them, [give a] few moments of comfort amid the horrible conditions of Evin Prison,” she said.Today she said in a statement, “Our family is complete once again.” Kathy Gilsinanis a contributing writer atThe Atlantic.Connect Twitter

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The Holy fire was raging through southern California’s Cleveland national forest, and his family had already complied with a mandatory evacuation order, but Daniel Perez decided to take the risk anyway.At lunchtime on Thursday 9 August, Perez convinced public officials to allow him to return to his evacuated neighborhood for one last thing: to turn on his home security cameras, connect them to the internet, and point them in the direction of the oncoming flames.“I went back to work, went about my day, occasionally checking my phone,” Perez recalled. “Then, around 4.45pm, I noticed that my cameras went into night vision.”Through the dark pink tint of the night vision lens, Perez watched as “little glowing things” – burning embers, he soon realized – blew toward his house.“When they landed, they stayed glowing, and I said, ‘OK, here we go,’” Perez said. “I just watched live as everything went from normal to up in flames, and I’m just sitting at work, shaking.”As internet-connected home security cameras grow in popularity and climate-change fueled natural disasters continue to ravage communities around the globe, a new phenomenon has emerged: witnessing your worst nightmare, remotely.“I had my co-workers next to me, and they couldn’t believe it,” Perez said. “I was looking at my hands. That was a moment I’ll never forget. Just knowing that that’s your house, and you don’t know what could happen at any second – it was a frightening experience.”A neighbor of Perez, Frank Grosso, had only moved into his new house in a small community about 45 miles south-east of Los Angeles one month before the Holy fire threatened.Grosso, his wife, and their dog evacuated to a family member’s home in Orange county, and Grosso, who said he always had security cameras in his homes, made sure that one of his eight cameras was pointing toward the canyon out the back.“All day, I was watching the fire march toward my house,” Grosso recalled. “Then all of a sudden, I got notified that someone was coming toward my door” – a notification that arrived on his smartphone.The visitor was a firefighter checking to see if anyone was home, and using his wifi-connected, video doorbell, the 40-year-old Grosso was able to respond.“I was just saying, ‘I’m not there, I’m okay, don’t break the door,’” Grosso said. When the firefighter left to battle the flames, Grosso and his wife followed along, switching from camera to camera on his smartphone to see the firefight in action.“It was just crazy just watching it live, and all the emotions,” Grosso said. “I watched it all from my phone.”Both Grosso and Perez were lucky: the firefighters saved their homes. Grosso has established a GoFundMe campaign to raise money for county firefighters in thanks for their work. The Holy fire, which officials believe was started intentionally, swept through nearly 23,000 acres and is now largely contained.Both men said they were happy to have been able to witness the disaster, though Perez was conflicted about whether he should have told his wife what was happening.“I’m the type of person who would rather know,” he said. “I’d rather see it. I saw it. And now I know what to expect.” Topics California Wildfires Natural disasters and extreme weather news

Alexei Navalny, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s most outspoken critic, has come out of the medically induced coma he’s been in since he was poisoned three weeks ago with a nerve agent the Kremlin has long been suspected of using against political dissidents. “The patient has been removed from his medically induced coma and is being weaned off mechanical ventilation,” the Charité hospital in Berlin, where Navalny is being treated, said in a Monday statement. “He is responding to verbal stimuli,” the statement said, but added, “It remains too early to gauge the potential long-term effects of his severe poisoning.”Still, it’s good news for Navalny, his wife, his team, and his millions of supporters, as it appears he’ll survive the suspected attack. That prospect was somewhat in doubt when the German government last week revealed a toxicology report showing evidence of the nerve agent Novichok in Navalny’s system. Novichok is one of the world’s most lethal nerve agents. It was developed by the Soviet Union and was used on a Russian double agent in the UK two years ago.The use of the deadly nerve agent increases the likelihood that the Russian government was behind Navalny’s poisoning, as many have suspected, and led to condemnations from world leaders like German Chancellor Angela Merkel and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. President Donald Trump, however, has yet to significantly rebuke the Kremlin or President Putin for Navalny’s condition.Which means the fallout from the suspected murder attempt might further split ties between a Europe united in its disdain for Russia’s actions and an America unwilling to chastise Moscow for the heinous act.On August 20, Navalny drank tea at a Siberian airport before boarding a flight to Moscow. He became ill on the aircraft, with a video purportedly showing the politician moaning and needing immediate medical attention. The plane made an emergency landing in Omsk, near Kazakhstan, where an ambulance waited to take him to a local hospital. But Navalny’s condition worsened, and he fell into a coma before he arrived at the facility. Russia’s Omsk Emergency Hospital No. 1, where Navalny was first treated, became the site of a frustrating standoff between Navalny’s family and supporters and the doctors overseeing his care. Navalny’s wife and team alleged the doctors were controlled by the Kremlin and tried to cover up the poisoning attack instead of properly treating their patient. The physicians at the time said Navalny wasn’t poisoned but instead suffered from a “metabolic disorder” that led to low blood sugar. “Poisons or traces of their presence in the body have not been identified,” Anatoly Kalinichenko, the deputy chief doctor at the Omsk emergency hospital, told reporters on Friday. “The diagnosis of ‘poisoning’ remains somewhere in the back of our minds, but we do not believe that the patient suffered poisoning.” But Navalny’s team — including his wife Yulia Navalnaya, who was barred from seeing her husband in the Russian hospital, according to a spokesperson — suspected foul play. They had good reason to believe that: The Kremlin has a long, sordid history of poisoning political dissidents, defectors, and other enemies of the state. “The medics are being totally commanded by the FSB and hardly release anything,” Vladimir Milov, a close Navalny associate, told me last week, using the acronym for Russia’s Federal Security Service, the successor agency to the Soviet-era KGB responsible for internal security, among other things. “We of course cannot trust this hospital and we demand for Alexei to be given to us, so that we could have him treated in an independent hospital whose doctors we trust,” Navalnaya said in another press conference on August 21.A medical plane sent by the Berlin-based humanitarian group Cinema for Peace Foundation arrived in Omsk on Friday to take the opposition leader to Germany for treatment. The Russian doctors initially blocked the transfer, saying Navalny wasn’t stable enough to travel, before finally allowing the German physicians to take a look at the patient’s condition.Navalnaya wrote a letter to Putin, pleading for him to allow the transfer, and EU leader Charles Michel raised the issue and expressed concern about the situation in a Friday call with Putin. Late that Friday, the Russian physicians granted the transfer request, and Navalny arrived in Berlin over the weekend. Hanging over all the drama is one pressing question: Did Putin have anything to do it? As of right now, we don’t have a definitive answer to that question — and we may never get it. Turns out, that may be exactly the point. Ask people familiar with how the Russian government handles dissidents, and they unanimously note that what likely happened to Navalny is part of a long-standing Russian government playbook — one that Putin follows.“Killing or intimidating ‘enemies of the people’ has been a staple of Kremlin policy for over 100 years,” said John Sipher, who ran CIA operations in Russia during his 28-year intelligence career before retiring six years ago. “Putin has continued this tactic of killing his enemies at home and abroad, and has created a system where those who wish to earn the Kremlin’s support need to do [his] bidding,” Sipher said. “Whether or not Putin personally ordered the poisoning, he is behind any and all efforts to maintain control through intimidation and murder.”Poisoning people is kind of the Kremlin’s thing. In 2004, Viktor Yushchenko campaigned against a Putin ally for the presidency of Ukraine. But then he fell ill, with his face mysteriously and suddenly blotchy and the left side paralyzed. He also suffered immense abdominal and back pain. He said he had been poisoned — with dioxin, a toxic chemical, no less — but Russian officials have long denied having anything to do with what happened to him. (Oh, and Yushchenko ended up winning the presidency.)In 2006, two Russian agents put polonium-210 — a highly radioactive chemical — in former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko’s tea at a London hotel bar (he had defected to the UK). It took weeks for Litvinenko to die, and he blamed Putin for orchestrating the attack.“You may succeed in silencing one man,” Litvinenko said from his hospital bed, “but the howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr. Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life.” Russia continues to deny any involvement in Litvinenko’s death.In 2018, the UK determined that Russian operatives poisoned a former Russian double agent and his daughter in Britain with Novichok, one of the world’s most lethal nerve agents (that just so happens to have been developed by the Soviet Union), putting both victims in the hospital in serious condition. They both recovered from the attack and are now in an unknown location — hiding out of fear of another potential attack.And while poison is one of the most commonly used assassination tools, the Kremlin isn’t above using more prosaic methods. Boris Nemtsov, for instance, was shot near the Kremlin in February 2015. Nemtsov had been digging up dirt on the government’s misdeeds, which may have prompted Putin allies to want him dead. A man was sentenced to 20 years in prison for the murder, but many critics believe the whole trial was a sham and a cover-up by the president’s team.The common thread among all of these episodes, as Sipher alluded to, is that it’s unclear just how directly Putin may or may not have been involved. Plausible deniability is baked into the cake of his authoritarian system. Everyone who works in the government knows what Putin wants without him having to explicitly ask. That means Kremlin operatives have the green light to pursue some of those goals — like knocking off a political rival — while officially keeping Putin out the loop.That, in a sense, is how he gets what he wants without having his fingerprints on the government’s dirtiest actions.So Putin could have ordered Navalny dead himself, but it’s equally possible that someone who wanted to make Putin happy did it on their own initiative. “Navalny has lots of enemies,” said Judy Twigg, a Russia expert at Virginia Commonwealth University. Navalny has been repeatedly jailed for instigating protests against Putin and was twice attacked with an antiseptic green dye in 2017. “It looks funny but it hurts like hell,” Navalny tweeted about the attacks. And last summer, while Navalny was serving a 30-day prison sentence for leading anti-government protests, he was taken to the hospital with symptoms of facial swelling, itching, and a rash. As the Guardian reported at the time, doctors at the hospital said Navalny was experiencing an allergic reaction to something but didn’t say what that something was. One of Navalny’s personal doctors also examined him, though, and she said he was suffering from “the result of harmful effects of undefined chemical substances ... induced by a ‘third person.’” In other words, poison. There’s still no official proof of foul play (of course).But beyond this very suggestive history, there are two other potential context clues that point the finger in Putin’s direction in this latest incident.First, if the FSB did indeed put pressure on the Omsk hospital, as the Navalny associate Milov alleged, that would imply that Putin or someone close to him cares deeply about how Navalny’s situation is handled. Twigg told me it’s certainly possible the FSB was involved. “The FSB would surely be highly engaged in a situation where there’s contact with foreigners,” said Twigg, especially since employees of the state — which includes most Russian medical staff — must report their contacts with international visitors, such as the German doctors.Of course, any state security officials that were involved may have just been following protocol by inserting themselves into a situation that would clearly garner global attention. But their suspected role in keeping the German doctors from initially seeing Navalny, if true, could mean they were trying to hide something — like, say, any evidence of poison coursing through the opposition figure’s veins.Second, things aren’t looking too great for Putin right now. He’s overseeing one of the world’s worst coronavirus outbreaks, facing protests that question his leadership, and watching as his ally in Belarus faces nationwide calls to step down. With all that instability, Putin may have wanted to target his main political rival to send a strong message.“This is an escalation and a sign that the regime is anxious and eager to clamp down once and for all,” Alina Polyakova, the president of the Center for European Policy Analysis, told me. If that was the plan, it’s unclear whether it will actually work. If Navalny fully recovers, he may have even more credibility to form a larger opposition movement against Putin as a result of the suspected attack, experts say. Instead of getting rid of his biggest political rival, Putin (or whoever might be responsible) may have just made him more powerful. Whether or not Navalny bounces back and is able to wield that power is what many inside and outside Russia — and certainly many inside the Kremlin — will be waiting to see.Help keep Vox free for allMillions turn to Vox each month to understand what’s happening in the news, from the coronavirus crisis to a racial reckoning to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower you through understanding. But our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources — particularly during a pandemic and an economic downturn. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work, and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.

Most people pay little attention to the chain of production that brings food to their plates. Americans eat tonnes of chicken every year, unaware of, or unconcerned by, the chemical rinse applied to its pre-cooked carcass. British consumers might also eat chlorine-washed chicken if they had acquired the habit, but since they haven’t the idea is unappetising. This is a problem in transatlantic trade talks because US agribusiness wants access to UK dining tables. The politics of serving food prepared to US safety standards is tricky on a number of levels. Alongside chlorinated chicken, the use of growth-promoting hormones and antibiotics in meat production are more tightly regulated in Europe than in many countries that want to export their surplus meat. After Brexit, the UK can abandon EU standards, but if it does so it will find its produce barred from continental markets.The EU has been less ambiguous. Michel Barnier insists that the application of common standards across the single market will not be compromised as a favour to Britain. Access depends on alignment and, as Mr Barnier noted this week, the geographical proximity of the UK to the rest of Europe makes the enforcement of standards across post-Brexit borders all the more important. As the European commission sees it, such a near neighbour could easily become an entrepôt for substandard produce. That explains EU frustration at Tory MPs’ habit of downplaying or dismissing the requirement for controls at Irish Sea ports. The preservation of an all-Ireland regulatory space under the withdrawal agreement makes such checks necessary once mainland Britain diverges from EU rules. Northern Ireland’s Unionists hate that idea and Mr Johnson hates admitting that he let them down, but those are not grounds to renege on a treaty.The prime minister can try persuading Mr Barnier to turn a blind eye to changes in UK food standards; he can try persuading British consumers to eat chlorinated chicken; he can try persuading farmers to accept being undercut by American imports. But he will struggle in two ways. First, standards are settled by law, not trust. Second, Mr Johnson has proved that he cannot in any case be trusted. The prime minister keeps serving up rehashed Brexit promises, but they get ever harder to swallow.

A. "Yes" is the likely answer. Your question asks to prove a negative, which is not possible. But I did ask for examples and the two answers posted so far do not contain any such... B. Investigation of what? Despite steady growth, Amazon is not a monopoly — not in retail in general, nor in the diapers market in particular. C. Facetious. D. "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner [and diapers -mi], but from their regard to their own self-interest.” — Adam SmithA. Hate to butt in here but, you're posting on a tech news site frequented by programmers. Proof by contradiction is a mathematical/logical proof that is valid especially in dealing with set theory. That's what Duhavid is asking for. https://tutors.com/math-tutors... [tutors.com] Duhavid literally asking for 1 example to prove/disprove if there are any examples of any company that needs regulation. The "can't prove a negative" is only valid when the burden of proof is on validating each example in a set of infinite (or

Firearms exports from Austria to Brazil have surged by more than 377% in the first half of this year as gun ownership increases under the South American country’s rightwing president, Jair Bolsonaro.Official data from Brazil’s trade ministry seen by the Guardian shows the renowned Austrian weapons manufacturer Glock exported more than $14.8m of guns from Austria to Brazil in the first six months of 2020, compared with about $3.1m in the same period last year. Glock is Austria’s sole gun exporter to Brazil.The jump came as gun ownership soared following a series of presidential decrees that have made it easier for Brazilians to buy larger numbers of weapons, ammunition and increasingly powerful guns, including semi-automatic assault rifles.A recent report by the Brazilian broadcaster TV Globo said nearly 140,000 new guns had gone into circulation in Brazil in the first half of 2020 compared with just over 138,000 in the whole of 2018, and fewer than 84,000 in 2016.Federal police figures obtained by the Guardian show that in the first quarter of this year about 60% of newly registered guns in its database were for civilian use.Bolsonaro’s highly controversial relaxation of gun laws – a key pledge in his 2018 campaign – is fuelling fears among experts and campaigners that such moves will add to already shocking levels of violence. Last year there were more than 40,000 murders in Brazil.“Bolsonaro’s moves to make it easier for Brazilians to own guns is a disaster because it floods an already violent society with its main tool for homicides,” said Ivan Marques, an independent arms control expert who chairs the Control Arms Coalition campaign.Carolina Ricardo, executive director of the anti-violence group Instituto Sou da Paz, said legally purchased weapons could easily end up in the illegal market. “Guns at home also tend to increase domestic violence. We already see more femicides,” Ricardo added.One of the former army captain’s key campaign promises was to loosen gun controls and expand the right to bear arms for those he considers “upstanding citizens”.Upon election, the far-right populist kept his word, with more than a dozen decrees that sought to make gun ownership easier.One such order increased the number of weapons collectors and shooters could buy – including handguns, rifles and semi-automatic assault rifles – from 16 to 60 a person.In May 2019, Bolsonaro signed an order that changed existing laws about access to firearms and relaxed regulations for gun imports, breaking the quasi-monopoly of the Brazilian manufacturer Taurus, one of the largest small-arms manufacturers in the world.Foreign firms jumped at the chance to access Brazil’s lucrative arms market. Before last year’s decree, a request to import a foreign gun would be denied if a national manufacturer, such as Taurus, offered the same or a similar model. This limited market access for foreign competitors.But the political tone has changed dramatically under Bolsonaro. Between his inauguration in January 2019 and April this year administration officials have reportedly met representatives of gun manufacturers more than 70 times.During a cabinet meeting in late April, the president – who frequently makes a gun sign with his fingers when posing for pictures – made his intentions clear, telling ministers he wanted “everyone armed”, since “armed people will never be enslaved”.Ricardo said it was clear Bolsonaro saw guns not only as a form of self-defence but also a way of allowing citizens to violently push for political goals.“When you have more arms, a more plural market, with less control, weapons with more power, the risks become higher. Both for public security – and for democracy,” she warned.With the relaxation of regulations, the demand for high-quality weapons from abroad, such as Glock pistols, has soared. Brazil’s trade ministry says that in the first half of this year 31% of gun and ammunition imports came from Austria, where they are produced in Glock’s headquarters, about 12 miles from the capital, Vienna. The increased trade of Austrian handguns represents more than just a shift in market share between different producers. Not only are more guns imported to Brazil, but they have also become more accessible for civilians.Gun ownership had already risen considerably after Bolsonaro took office in January 2019, but in 2020 it exploded. Federal police data shows that more than 48,000 new firearms were registered between January and April this year. In the same period in 2019, the total registration of new firearms came to about 13,500.Austrian trade statistics confirm the tendency towards civilian purchases. A spokesperson for the Austrian ministry of digital and economic affairs – which monitors the country’s arms exports – said about half of the Glock pistols being exported to Brazil were bought by civilians, and half by public agencies such as the police.Manuel Martínez Miralles, a researcher at the UN Institute for Disarmament Research, said he was worried many weapons could fall into the hands of criminals.“These changes may have a negative impact on Brazilian security – and on the Latin American region in the long term,” he said. Topics Brazil Austria Americas news

An escalation of rhetoric between Donald Trump and China over the coronavirus pandemic has sparked concerns that a trade deal between the nations is in peril, as Chinese state media dismissed as “lunacy” a suggestion by the US president that he could “cut off relations” with Beijing.The US president said he was very disappointed with China’s failure to contain Covid-19 in an interview with Fox Business news. Trump said the pandemic had cast a pall over his January trade deal with Beijing and that he had no interest in speaking to President Xi Jinping at the moment.“They should have never let this happen,” Trump said. “So I make a great trade deal and now I say this doesn’t feel the same to me. The ink was barely dry and the plague came over. And it doesn’t feel the same to me.”Trump has previously often said he has a good relationship with Xi, and has been reluctant to single him out personally for criticism over coronavirus. “But I just, right now I don’t want to speak to him,” Trump said.Asked what measures he intended to take against China, he said: “There are many things we could do … We could cut off the whole relationship.”“Now, if you did, what would happen? You’d save $500bn,” Trump said, referring to estimated US annual imports from China, which he has previously referred to as lost money.The state-backed Global Times responded with an editorial titled: “Trump turns up election strategy nonsense with China ‘cut-off’ threat.”“The very idea should not come as a surprise for those who remember when Trump speculated if disinfectants could be used on humans ‘by injection’ to wipe out the novel coronavirus [Covid-19],” it said.“Such lunacy is a clear byproduct, first and foremost, of the proverbial anxiety that the US has suffered from since China began its global ascension,” it said on Friday. “Trump seems insane right now or may have some psychological problems,” another editorial wrote.The escalating row between the two countries came as China marked one month with no deaths from Covid-19 and just four newly confirmed cases in the 24 hours to Friday. Global cases have passed 4.438 million, with more than 302,000 deaths. The US ranked first in cases (1.47 million) and deaths (85,884), according to the Johns Hopkins university tracker.Analysts fear the increasingly heated rhetoric on both sides could endanger the US-China trade deal.“What we may be watching is the convergence of the more hawkish [US] national security stream with the domestic political stream that now sees more value in blowing up the trade deal than keeping it,” said China-watcher, Bill Bishop, from Sinocism.Scott Kennedy from Washington’s Centre for Strategic and International Studies think tank called Trump’s remarks “dangerous bravado”.The growing war of words between China and the US came as Brazil passed the grim milestone of 200,000 infections, with just under 14,000 deaths. President Jair Bolsonaro urged business leaders to push for the lifting of lockdown orders in financial centre of Sao Paulo to help the economy. He has been widely criticised for his approach to the pandemic.Mexico also reported a deteriorating situation, with 2,409 new infections, the biggest one-day rise in cases since the pandemic began. It also confirmed 257 additional coronavirus deaths, bringing the total to just under 4,500. More than 42,595 people have been infected.In Russia, which currently has the second most infections worldwide with 252,245, authorities in Moscow said clinics would begin mass random testing of residents for coronavirus antibodies on Friday. There have been doubts over the official death toll from the virus of 2,305, after authorities ascribed the deaths of more than 60% of coronavirus patients in April to other causes.The Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, on Russia’s western edge, opened their borders to each other at the stroke of midnight on Friday, creating the first “travel bubble” within the European Union in a bid to jump-start economies broken down by the coronavirus pandemic.Citizens and residents of the three generally sparsely populated countries will be free to travel within the region, though anyone entering from outside will need to self-isolate for 14 days.“The Baltic travel bubble is an opportunity for businesses to reopen, and a glimmer of hope for the people that life is getting back to normal,” Lithuanian prime minister Saulius Skvernelis said in a statement.Other coronavirus developments include: Qatar has made wearing a face mask compulsory for anyone who steps outside their home, with violators facing jail time and fines of up to $55,000. Vietnam reported 24 new coronavirus infections on Friday, all of which were imported cases involving Vietnamese citizens returning from Russia who were placed under quarantine on arrival, the country’s health ministry said. Coronavirus has reached one of the world’s biggest refugee camps in Bangladesh. The US has voiced alarm at the targeting of religious minorities in India and Pakistan, warning against a search for internal scapegoats during the pandemic. Residents in Australia’s most populous state of New South Wales experienced slightly relaxed Covid-19 restrictions, with outside gatherings of 10 people permitted, up from two. Bars, cafes and restaurants have reopened, but only 10 people can be inside at any one time, with strict distancing rules enforced. New Zealand residents have embraced newfound freedoms, including eating out, seeing friends, and a lot of haircuts, after restrictions were reduced. Topics Coronavirus outbreak China Xi Jinping Trump administration Donald Trump International trade Asia Pacific

HONG KONG (AP) — Protesters in Hong Kong threw gasoline bombs at government headquarters and set fires in the streets on Saturday, while police stormed a subway car and hit passengers with batons and pepper spray in scenes that seem certain to inflame tensions further in a city riven by nearly three months of pro-democracy demonstrations.Police had denied permission for a march to mark the fifth anniversary of a decision by China against fully democratic elections in Hong Kong, but protesters took to the streets anyway, as they have all summer. They provoked and obstructed the police repeatedly but generally retreated once riot officers moved in, avoiding some of the direct clashes that characterized earlier protests.ADVERTISEMENTLate at night, though, video from Hong Kong broadcaster TVB showed police using batons while on the platform of Prince Edward subway station and swinging batons at passengers who backed into one end of a train car behind umbrellas. The video also shows pepper spray being shot through an open door at a group seated on the floor while one man holds up his hands.It wasn’t clear if all the passengers were protesters. Police said they entered the station to arrest offenders after protesters assaulted others and damaged property inside. The TVB video was widely shared on social media as another example of police brutality during the protests. Angry crowds gathered outside Prince Edward and nearby Mongkok station, where police said they made arrests after protesters vandalized the customer service center and damaged ticket machines.Protests erupted in early June in Hong Kong, a semiautonomous Chinese territory of 7.4 million people. A now-shelved extradition bill brought to the fore simmering concerns about what many in the city see as an erosion of the rights and freedoms that residents are supposed to have under a “one country, two systems” framework.The mostly young, black-shirted protesters took over roads and major intersections in shopping districts on Saturday as they rallied and marched with no obvious destination in mind.Authorities closed streets and a subway stop near the Chinese government office and parked water cannon trucks and erected additional barriers nearby, fearing protesters might target the building. The office would have been the endpoint of the march that police did not allow.Instead, a group of hard-line protesters decided to take on police guarding government headquarters from behind large barriers that ring the building to keep demonstrators at bay.ADVERTISEMENTWhile others marched back and forth nearby, a large crowd wearing helmets and gas masks gathered outside. They pointed laser beams at the officers’ heads and threw objects over the barriers and at them. Police responded with tear gas, and protesters threw gasoline bombs into the compound.Then came the blue water. A water cannon truck fired regular water, followed by repeated bursts of colored water, staining protesters and nearby journalists and leaving blue puddles in the street.The standoff continued for some time, but protesters started moving back as word spread that police were headed in their direction. A few front-line protesters hurled gasoline bombs at the officers in formation, but there were no major clashes as police cleared the area.Protesters regrouped and blocked a major commercial street by piling up barricades and setting a large fire. Smoke billowed into the air as hundreds of protesters waited on the other side of the makeshift barrier, many pointing laser beams that streaked the night sky above them.Firefighters made their way into the congested area on foot to put out the fire. Police in riot gear removed the barricades and moved in quickly. They could be seen detaining a few protesters, but by then, most had already left.As police advanced east down Hennessey Road, protesters made another stand in the Causeway Bay shopping district. They threw gasoline bombs at police, who fired tear gas and water cannons.Protesters built another fire, a smaller one, in front of Sogo department store. Police waited behind their riot shields while firefighters put out the smoldering fire with extinguishers. When police moved in, the protesters had again retreated.Other groups crossed Hong Kong’s harbor to the Tsim Sha Tsui district, where police said they set fires and threw gasoline bombs on Nathan Road.Democratic Party lawmaker Lam Cheuk-ting said Hong Kong citizens would keep fighting for their rights and freedoms despite the arrests of several prominent activists and lawmakers in the past two days, including activist Joshua Wong.Protesters are demanding the full withdrawal of the extradition bill — which would have allowed Hong Kong residents to be sent to mainland China to stand trial — as well as democratic elections and an investigation into alleged police brutality in past battles with hard-line demonstrators.“I do believe the government deliberately arrested several leaders of the democratic camp to try to threaten Hong Kong people not to come out to fight against the evil law,” Lam said at what was advertised as a Christian march earlier Saturday.About 1,000 people marched to a Methodist church and police headquarters. They alternated between singing hymns and chanting slogans of the pro-democracy movement. An online flyer for the demonstration called it a “prayer for sinners” and featured images of a Christian cross and embattled Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam, who had proposed the extradition bill.The Civil Human Rights Front, the organizer of pro-democracy marches that have drawn upward of a million people this summer, canceled its march after failing to win police approval. Police said that while previous marches have started peacefully, they have increasingly degenerated into violence in the end.The standing committee of China’s legislature ruled on Aug. 31, 2014, that Hong Kong residents could elect their leader directly, but that the candidates would have to be approved by a nominating committee.The decision failed to satisfy democracy advocates in Hong Kong and led to the 79-day long Occupy Central protests that fall, in which demonstrators camped out on major streets in the financial district and other parts of the city.The participants in the religious march Saturday were peaceful and mostly older than the younger protesters who have led this summer’s movement and, in some cases, blocked streets and battled police with bricks, sticks and gasoline bombsReligious meetings do not require police approval, though authorities said late Friday that organizers of a procession with more than 30 people must notify police.___Associated Press videojournalists Alice Fung and Johnson Lai contributed to this report.

Today (Aug. 31) marks the 13th week of protests in Hong Kong and the five-year anniversary of a decision that sparked 2014’s pro-democracy Umbrella Movement, making the date especially poignant. Protesters took to the streets, despite being denied a permit to rally, and—as ever—police were present to meet them.The clashes between demonstrators and authorities were violent, with some protestors throwing bricks and Molotov cocktails, and cops responding with tear gas, beatings, and even shots. Police have fired at least one live round of bullets into the air as a warning to protesters, the South China Morning Post reports, a development that was unheard of until last Sunday, when an officer fired a live round skyward after being chased and beaten by protesters wielding iron poles.In another new development, police today also marked protesters with blue-dyed water shot from cannons, making demonstrators easy to spot for possible arrest later (or worried they will be). The dye, which has not been used against protestors until today, left the streets awash in blue.However, as Hong Kong-based Quartz reporter Mary Hui noted on Twitter, the protestors are arming themselves with baking soda and alcoholic wipes, and leaving such cleanup supplies in public locations.The demonstrations first began in opposition to a Chinese extradition bill, which has since been shelved but not scrapped altogether. But they quickly evolved, with protestors reviving the demands of the earlier Umbrella Movement and calling for genuinely democratic elections for the city’s leadership. Hong Kong is led by a chief executive—currently Carrie Lam—who is elected from a restricted pool of candidates (all supporting China’s central government) by a 1,200-member committee, an electoral college of private citizens, and certain special interest groups. Protestors want genuinely democratic leadership based on their votes, and their demonstrations have now outlasted the earlier Umbrella Movement.So far, there’s no sign that Hong Kong will see peace anytime soon. Protestors are growing bolder, while police increasingly use violent tactics to attempt to control the demonstrations. After midnight Hong Kong time, the conflict was still going strong, and Lam condemned police for attacking and beating passengers inside a train at a station. Around the same time, outside the Mong Kok police station, demonstrators tore down netting surrounding the building, exposing officers in riot gear who stood behind the curtain guarding it.The blue dye may soon be washed off the streets and protestors, but it’s evident that the stain on Hong Kong from this summer of discontent will remain for some time.

Venezuela’s embattled president, Nicolás Maduro, has accused the White House of playing a direct role in an attempt to assassinate him and claimed “ultra-right locos” within Brazil’s incoming government were plotting to invade his country.At a press conference in the presidential Miraflores palace in Caracas, Maduro said he had “no doubt” that the US government had ordered and authorized the botched strike against him last August with explosive-laden drones and continued to plot against him. He offered no evidence to support the allegations.Maduro claimed the US hoped to install a rightwing dictatorship in Venezuela and accused the US media of waging an “incessant” media campaign against his government in order to justify a foreign military intervention in Venezuela.The US national security adviser, John Bolton, had personally hatched a plan “to fill Venezuela with violence”, Maduro alleged, urging Donald Trump to abandon the supposed conspiracy and turn away from “conflict and confrontation”.In November Bolton described Venezuela as part of a Latin American “troika of tyranny” that had “finally met its match”.Last year Trump told reporters there were “many options” to resolve the Venezuelan crisis including a military one. In December the US defense secretary, James Mattis, called Maduro “an irresponsible despot” who would ultimately “have to go”.Maduro vowed to resist what he called the “neo-fascist madness” of his foreign foes and called on the international community to denounce the alleged plot against him. “Our message to the world is: it’s time to defend Venezuela!” he said. “Venezuela will not be a victim of a neo-fascist aggression.”“We will not retreat, we will not be brought to our knees, we will not give up. We will fight and we will guarantee Venezuela peace … whatever the price,” Maduro added.“We don’t want violence, or international conflicts, or war, or coups. No, no, no, no. The people want progress, prosperity and coexistence.”Venezuela’s president also lashed out at Brazil’s incoming president, Jair Bolsonaro, and his vice-president, Hamilton Mourão, who he claimed was obsessed with the idea of invading Venezuela.“[This guy] has the face of a madman,” Maduro said of Mourão. “Saying a Brazilian military force is going to enter Venezuela is crazy talk.”“Nobody in Brazil wants the incoming government of Jair Bolsonaro to get involved in a military adventure against the Venezuelan people,” he said.Bolsonaro, who takes power on 1 January, has made no secret of his loathing of Maduro and last year vowed to “do whatever is possible to see that government be deposed”.But in a recent interview with the Brazilian magazine Piauí, Mourão struck a more moderate tone: “It’s the Venezuelans who have to solve the Venezuelans’ problems,” he said.

Donald Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon has described the Trump Tower meeting between the president’s son and a group of Russians during the 2016 election campaign as “treasonous” and “unpatriotic”, according to an explosive new book seen by the Guardian.Bannon, speaking to author Michael Wolff, warned that the investigation into alleged collusion with the Kremlin will focus on money laundering and predicted: “They’re going to crack Don Junior like an egg on national TV.”Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, reportedly based on more than 200 interviews with the president, his inner circle and players in and around the administration, is one of the most eagerly awaited political books of the year. In it, Wolff lifts the lid on a White House lurching from crisis to crisis amid internecine warfare, with even some of Trump’s closest allies expressing contempt for him.Bannon, who was chief executive of the Trump campaign in its final three months, then White House chief strategist for seven months before returning to the rightwing Breitbart News, is a central figure in the nasty, cutthroat drama, quoted extensively, often in salty language.He is particularly scathing about a June 2016 meeting involving Trump’s son Donald Jr, son-in-law Jared Kushner, then campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya at Trump Tower in New York. A trusted intermediary had promised documents that would “incriminate” rival Hillary Clinton but instead of alerting the FBI to a potential assault on American democracy by a foreign power, Trump Jr replied in an email: “I love it.”The meeting was revealed by the New York Times in July last year, prompting Trump Jr to say no consequential material was produced. Soon after, Wolff writes, Bannon remarked mockingly: “The three senior guys in the campaign thought it was a good idea to meet with a foreign government inside Trump Tower in the conference room on the 25th floor – with no lawyers. They didn’t have any lawyers.“Even if you thought that this was not treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad shit, and I happen to think it’s all of that, you should have called the FBI immediately.”Bannon went on, Wolff writes, to say that if any such meeting had to take place, it should have been set up “in a Holiday Inn in Manchester, New Hampshire, with your lawyers who meet with these people”. Any information, he said, could then be “dump[ed] … down to Breitbart or something like that, or maybe some other more legitimate publication”.Bannon added: “You never see it, you never know it, because you don’t need to … But that’s the brain trust that they had.”Bannon also speculated that Trump Jr had involved his father in the meeting. “The chance that Don Jr did not walk these jumos up to his father’s office on the twenty-sixth floor is zero.” Special counsel Robert Mueller was appointed last May, following Trump’s dismissal of FBI director James Comey, to investigate Russian meddling in the 2016 election. This has led to the indictments of four members of Trump’s inner circle, including Manafort and former national security adviser Michael Flynn. Manafort has pleaded not guilty to money laundering charges; Flynn has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. In recent weeks Bannon’s Breitbart News and other conservative outlets have accused Mueller’s team of bias against the president.Trump predicted in an interview with the New York Times last week that the special counsel was “going to be fair”, though he also said the investigation “makes the country look very bad”. The president and his allies deny any collusion with Russia and the Kremlin has denied interfering.Bannon has criticised Trump’s decision to fire Comey. In Wolff’s book, obtained by the Guardian ahead of publication from a bookseller in New England, he suggests White House hopes for a quick end to the Mueller investigation are gravely misplaced.“You realise where this is going,” he is quoted as saying. “This is all about money laundering. Mueller chose [senior prosecutor Andrew] Weissmann first and he is a money-laundering guy. Their path to fucking Trump goes right through Paul Manafort, Don Jr and Jared Kushner … It’s as plain as a hair on your face.”Last month it was reported that federal prosecutors had subpoenaed records from Deutsche Bank, the German financial institution that has lent hundreds of millions of dollars to the Kushner property empire. Bannon continues: “It goes through Deutsche Bank and all the Kushner shit. The Kushner shit is greasy. They’re going to go right through that. They’re going to roll those two guys up and say play me or trade me.”Scorning apparent White House insouciance, Bannon reaches for a hurricane metaphor: “They’re sitting on a beach trying to stop a Category Five.”He insists that he knows no Russians, will not be a witness, will not hire a lawyer and will not appear on national television answering questions.Fire and Fury will be published next week. Wolff is a prominent media critic and columnist who has written for the Guardian and is a biographer of Rupert Murdoch. He previously conducted interviews for the Hollywood Reporter with Trump in June 2016 and Bannon a few months later.He told the Guardian in November that to research the book, he showed up at the White House with no agenda but wanting to “find out what the insiders were really thinking and feeling”. He enjoyed extraordinary access to Trump and senior officials and advisers, he said, sometimes at critical moments of the fledgling presidency.The rancour between Bannon and “Javanka” – Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump – is a recurring theme of the book. Kushner and Ivanka are Jewish. Henry Kissinger, the former secretary of state, is quoted as saying: “It is a war between the Jews and the non-Jews.”Trump is not spared. Wolff writes that Thomas Barrack Jr, a billionaire who is one of the president’s oldest associates, allegedly told a friend: “He’s not only crazy, he’s stupid.” Barrack denied that to the New York Times. Topics Donald Trump Trump administration Trump-Russia investigation Steve Bannon Donald Trump Jr Jared Kushner Paul Manafort news