Britain’s newspapers yesterday said the key to forming a new government after the inconclusive election would depend on how far Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg would bend on electoral reform.
The third-biggest party’s key policy commitment is a switch to proportional representation — which could prove the deciding factor in whether he plumps to back the Conservatives, who topped the polls, or Labour.
The Observer said the Lib Dems must turn to Labour, though British Prime Minister Gordon Brown must quit as their leader for it to work.
“Combined, the Liberal Democrats and Labour have the affinity on policy, the electoral mandate and the unique historic opportunity to usher in a new era of fairer, better governance for Britain,” it said.
The Independent on Sunday agreed, saying Clegg must hold out for a deal on changing the voting system.
“This may be the greatest gamble Mr Clegg will ever make,” it said. “Bet the house on red and the Lib Dems get what they have wanted for generations: A chance to sweep away a corrupt and discredited system, and maybe, just maybe, win the greatest single change to our Constitution in 100 years.”
The Mail on Sunday said Britain needed a new government headed by Conservative leader David Cameron “by tonight.”
“[Brown] is a political zombie lurking in a strange twilight between power and oblivion,” it said.
“The Liberal Democrats will be badly damaged if they hold up the process by behaving in an opportunist and greedy fashion,” it said.
The News of the World, Britain’s most-read newspaper, said of Cameron: “It would be madness, and a huge betrayal of the mandate this country has given him, if he were denied the opportunity to save us from disaster.”
“In this delicate ballet, Mr Clegg will realize that he has the greatest chance of tripping up,” it said.
“Not surprisingly there are Lib Dems who claim a Tory deal would be a suicide note,” it said.
The Sunday Times backed a Conservative-Liberal pact, saying Brown “should no longer be prime minister.”
“The Lib Dems should remember that it is better to be inside the tent than outside,” it said.
Also See: Markets wait on UK poll talks
A deluge of disinformation about a virus called hMPV is stoking anti-China sentiment across Asia and spurring unfounded concerns of renewed lockdowns, despite experts dismissing comparisons with the COVID-19 pandemic five years ago. Agence France-Presse’s fact-checkers have debunked a slew of social media posts about the usually non-fatal respiratory disease human metapneumovirus after cases rose in China. Many of these posts claimed that people were dying and that a national emergency had been declared. Garnering tens of thousands of views, some posts recycled old footage from China’s draconian lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic, which originated in the country in late
French police on Monday arrested a man in his 20s on suspicion of murder after an 11-year-old girl was found dead in a wood south of Paris over the weekend in a killing that sparked shock and a massive search for clues. The girl, named as Louise, was found stabbed to death in the Essonne region south of Paris in the night of Friday to Saturday, police said. She had been missing since leaving school on Friday afternoon and was found just a few hundred meters from her school. A police source, who asked not to be named, said that she had been
VIOLENCE: The teacher had depression and took a leave of absence, but returned to the school last year, South Korean media reported A teacher stabbed an eight-year-old student to death at an elementary school in South Korea on Monday, local media reported, citing authorities. The teacher, a woman in her 40s, confessed to the crime after police officers found her and the young girl with stab wounds at the elementary school in the central city of Daejeon on Monday evening, the Yonhap news agency reported. The girl was brought to hospital “in an unconscious state, but she later died,” the report read. The teacher had stab wounds on her neck and arm, which officials determined might have been self-inflicted, the news agency
ISSUE: Some foreigners seek women to give birth to their children in Cambodia, and the 13 women were charged with contravening a law banning commercial surrogacy Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday thanked Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni for granting a royal pardon last year to 13 Filipino women who were convicted of illegally serving as surrogate mothers in the Southeast Asian kingdom. Marcos expressed his gratitude in a meeting with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet, who was visiting Manila for talks on expanding trade, agricultural, tourism, cultural and security relations. The Philippines and Cambodia belong to the 10-nation ASEAN, a regional bloc that promotes economic integration but is divided on other issues, including countries whose security alignments is with the US or China. Marcos has strengthened