Prime minister puts faith in ‘pragmatic’ solutions, while US president drops one diplomatic bomb after another
In his account of Tony Blair’s years in power, The New Machiavelli, Jonathan Powell sets out two opposing strategies for any British prime minister in dealing with their counterpart in the White House.
The first, he says, is “cutting a bella figura” – parading for show – by openly criticising the US president, for which he gives the example of the French. The other, and the approach preferred by Powell, is to do diplomacy in private and build a close relationship, in the hope of having greater influence.
Authorities believe that in 2022 Austin Thompson, then 15, went on killing rampage, beginning with his older brother
An 18-year-old plans to plead guilty to a 2022 mass shooting in North Carolina that left five people dead – including his older brother – avoiding a trial in February, his attorneys have said.
A written notice filed in Wake county court by the lawyers for Austin Thompson said their client intends to plead guilty to all charges against him.
PM’s spokesperson insists government’s position is unchanged and that the US still supports the deal
The UK will press ahead with plans to hand the Chagos Islands back to Mauritius despite Donald Trump calling it an “act of great stupidity” and suggesting it was among the reasons he wants to take over Greenland.
The US president said ceding sovereignty of the British Indian Ocean Territory, which includes the Diego Garcia military base, was a sign of “total weakness” by the UK.
European football leaders are increasingly concerned about Donald Trump’s wish to annex Greenland, and they have held initial discussions about how the sport could respond.
The Guardian understands the implications for the World Cup this summer were among the topics raised among about 20 football association heads in Budapest on Monday. Talks about the Greenland crisis were held informally on the sidelines of an event organised to celebrate the Hungarian football federation’s 125th anniversary, in the knowledge that a unified European response may be required should Trump seek to escalate the situation.
Leaders of EU, France and Canada stake out positions on Greenland ahead of US president’s speech to World Economic Forum
“There’s no diplomacy with Donald Trump: he’s a T rex. You mate with him or he devours you.” Debate at the World Economic Forum annual meetings high in the Swiss Alps is usually scrupulously polite, but as this year’s gathering got under way in Davos on Tuesday, California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, had this blunt advice for handling the week’s star speaker.
The US president was yet to arrive but throughout the blond wood congress centre the hottest topic among the global elite of business and politics – on and off conference stages – was Trump’s intemperate attack on European allies, threatening punitive tariffs if they fail to let him annex Greenland.
US president says there is ‘no going back’ on goal of controlling Arctic territory as Emmanuel Macron leads European resistance
European leaders have lined up to condemn Donald Trump’s “new colonialism” and warn that the continent was facing a crossroads as the US president said there was no going back on his goal of controlling Greenland.
After weeks of aggressive threats by Trump to seize the vast Arctic island, which is a largely autonomous part of Denmark, Emmanuel Macron, the French president, said on Tuesday he preferred “respect to bullies” and the “rule of law to brutality”.
If history teaches us anything, it is that making lists of Jews, no matter the ostensible purpose, is often a prelude to their and others’ persecution
This month, a judge ordered the University of Pennsylvania to justify its refusal to collect and disclose the names and personal contact information of Jewish faculty, staff and students to the federal government. Late last year, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) sued Penn to force compliance with this chilling demand, made in the name of fighting antisemitism. Jewish and non-Jewish community members at Penn and beyond have united to support the university’s resistance to compiling and releasing data about members of campus Jewish organizations, the Jewish studies department, and individuals who participated in confidential listening sessions and surveys about antisemitism.
US says it no longer supports SDF, which left camp as it loses swathes of territory to government forces
Kurdish-led forces in Syria have announced a withdrawal from a detention camp in north-east Syria housing tens of thousands of Islamic State-linked detainees, as the US declared it was no longer supporting them.
The fate of al-Hawl, which houses among others the most radical foreign women suspected to have been members of IS and their families, is of great concern to neighbouring states and the international community.
Comedian, 50, appeared via video link from US over charges of rape and sexual assault in relation to two women
Russell Brand has appeared in a UK court via video link from the US charged with two further sexual offences, including rape.
The 50-year-old comedian was charged in December with one count of rape and one count of sexual assault in relation to two women. The two alleged offences took place in 2009.
Increasingly unpopular at home, a president obsessed by his legacy has turned his scattergun on the world stage
One year into the second Trump administration, an actual US foreign policy remains just a nice idea. Instead, the world has been forced to adapt to the world according to Donald Trump: one increasingly shaped by his erratic shifts and unpredictable decisions, his fury at perceived slights and his growing desire to stamp his legacy in the model of an imperial leader from centuries past.
Think of it as the mad king’s court, where every day is a carnival.
Streaming company says proposal speeds up completion and allows WBD investors to vote as soon as April
Netflix has sweetened its $82.7bn (£61.5bn) offer for the studios and streaming businesses of Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) by making it an all-cash deal, streamlining its potential completion in the face of a hostile bid from Paramount Skydance.
The streaming company had originally secured the unanimous backing of the WBD board last month with a cash-and-shares proposal that valued the business at $27.75 a share.
The idea that the liberal rules-based order can survive his presidency now seems complacent. This is a historic moment – and a time to act
A European-wide chorus of resistance, led this morning by Keir Starmer, has greeted Donald Trump’s plan to take over Greenland, by force if necessary, and to start a tariff war if any country stands in his way. Have no doubt, this is a moment: if pursued as a non-negotiable demand, Trump’s plan ends any lingering hope that the liberal rules-based order can stumble on through his remaining time in office. The real question now is whether the 2020s will be defined by the complete collapse of the order’s already crumbling pillars and the atrocities accompanying it, or whether an international coalition of the willing can come together to build a new global framework in its place.
For, in quick succession, the US has abandoned its longstanding championing of the rule of law, human rights, democracy and the territorial integrity of nation states. Gone is its erstwhile support for humanitarian aid and environmental stewardship. Gone, too, is the founding principle of the postwar settlement: that countries choose diplomacy and multilateral cooperation over aggression and unilateral action. We cannot doubt any longer that the president meant it when he said he doesn’t “need international law”, and that the only constraint on his exercise of power would be “my own morality, my own mind”.
Gordon Brown is the UN’s special envoy for global education and was UK prime minister from 2007 to 2010
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