British Prime Minister Boris Johnson headed to Scotland in campaign mode yesterday, despite failing to call an early election after lawmakers this week thwarted his hardline Brexit strategy.
Johnson, who plans to make a fresh attempt next week to force a snap election next month, is set to visit a fish market and announce a post-Brexit funding boost for Scottish farmers during a visit to Aberdeenshire, his office said.
He is then to stay at Queen Elizabeth II’s Balmoral estate and dine with her, an annual weekend-long tradition for prime ministers, but one that Johnson has been forced to cut short to a single night due to the political turmoil in Westminster.
Opposition lawmakers and rebels in his ruling Conservative Party on Wednesday left Johnson’s plans for a no-deal Brexit next month in tatters and then blocked a request for a snap election on Oct. 15.
Under British law, the government requires two-thirds of lawmakers to support holding such a poll.
The main opposition Labour Party abstained on the proposal, saying that parliament must first approve its legislation to prevent Britain leaving the EU without an agreement on Oct. 31.
The government has said it would make a second attempt to force it through next week.
“What I want to do now is to give the country a choice,” Johnson said on Thursday during a campaign-style visit to northern England, where he greeted voters and delivered a speech.
His trip to Scotland, where voters backed remaining in the EU in the 2016 referendum and the Tories face a struggle to hold 13 parliamentary seats there in any upcoming election, appears part of a strategy to pressure Labour to cave into his demand.
The House of Lords was yesterday set to approve the legislation, which compels Johnson to seek a three-month extension from Brussels if he cannot agree to a divorce deal at an EU summit on Oct. 17 and Oct. 18.
It is then expected to become law on Monday.
Johnson on Thursday said that he would “rather be dead in a ditch” than delay Brexit and is pushing for the election in the hope of winning a fresh mandate for his approach.
Lawmakers rushed the bill through parliament ahead of a five-week shutdown the prime minister controversially ordered last month, which was widely seen as a pre-emptive attempt to prevent such legislation.
The decision to suspend parliament provoked uproar from Johnson’s critics, who called it a “constitutional outrage,” and several legal challenges.
Three High Court judges were yesterday expected to rule on its legality after Gina Miller, a businesswoman and leading anti-Brexit campaigner, applied for a judicial review.
A judge in Scotland ruled in favor of Johnson on Wednesday in a separate challenge.
Johnson argues that his threat to leave with or without a deal will force EU leaders to agree to better terms.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
Polish presidential candidates offered different visions of Poland and its relations with Ukraine in a televised debate ahead of next week’s run-off, which remains on a knife-edge. During a head-to-head debate lasting two hours, centrist Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, from Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s governing pro-European coalition, faced the Eurosceptic historian Karol Nawrocki, backed by the right-wing populist Law and Justice party (PiS). The two candidates, who qualified for the second round after coming in the top two places in the first vote on Sunday last week, clashed over Poland’s relations with Ukraine, EU policy and the track records of their
‘A THREAT’: Guyanese President Irfan Ali called on Venezuela to follow international court rulings over the region, whose border Guyana says was ratified back in 1899 Misael Zapara said he would vote in Venezuela’s first elections yesterday for the territory of Essequibo, despite living more than 100km away from the oil-rich Guyana-administered region. Both countries lay claim to Essequibo, which makes up two-thirds of Guyana’s territory and is home to 125,000 of its 800,000 citizens. Guyana has administered the region for decades. The centuries-old dispute has intensified since ExxonMobil discovered massive offshore oil deposits a decade ago, giving Guyana the largest crude oil reserves per capita in the world. Venezuela would elect a governor, eight National Assembly deputies and regional councilors in a newly created constituency for the 160,000
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
RSS