BitGou: Friday Morning Briefing: U.S. lawmakers gift-wrap an impeachment impasse ahead of holiday break

2019年12月20日星期五

Friday Morning Briefing: U.S. lawmakers gift-wrap an impeachment impasse ahead of holiday break

Top Stories

U.S. lawmakers who control the fate of President Donald Trump left Washington for a holiday break with no agreement over how they will handle the Senate trial to consider his impeachment charges in January. Democrats want to call top Trump aides as witnesses, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has not yet sent the impeachment package over to the Senate in a bid to ramp up the pressure.

Wine caves and billionaires - Buttigieg under fire over fundraising at Democratic debate. Rising Democratic candidate Pete Buttigieg came under attack during a debate among U.S. presidential hopefuls, as his rivals questioned the 37-year-old mayor’s thin political resume and criticized his fundraising from wealthy donors.

The United States said new evidence and analysis of weapons debris recovered from an attack on Saudi oil facilities on Sept. 14 indicates the strike likely came from the north, reinforcing its earlier assessment that Iran was behind the offensive. In an interim report of its investigation - seen by Reuters - Washington assessed that before hitting its targets, one of the drones traversed a location approximately 124 miles to the northwest of the attack site.

A last minute flurry of diplomacy aimed at engaging with North Korea ahead of its declared year-end deadline for talks has been met with stony silence from Pyongyang so far, with the looming crisis expected to top the agenda at summits in China next week.

World

How murder, kidnappings and miscalculation set off Hong Kong’s revolt. Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam says the plan that ignited the revolt in her city was born of a straightforward quest for justice. A Reuters examination has found a far more complicated story.

From housewives to hijab-clad students, women take center stage in Indian protests. As protests in India against a new citizenship law that critics say targets Muslims grow by the day, they have drawn many women and girls - some housewives, some students with hijabs covering their hair, and others in full-length burqa robes - in a rare sign of public anger against the government.

The British parliament will vote on Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal on Friday, a move the prime minister described as delivering on his promise to “get the Brexit vote wrapped up for Christmas” after his landslide election victory. After suffering several defeats in the previous parliament, Johnson now enjoys a large majority and should face little opposition in passing the bill.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison issued a rare public apology and cut short a Hawaiian vacation in response to mounting public anger after two volunteer firefighters were killed battling bushfires sweeping the country’s east coast. Some areas of Sydney are set for “catastrophic” conditions on Saturday, and the deadly fires are now engulfing other parts of the country.

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Business

Exclusive: Pentagon to stockpile rare earth magnets for missiles, fighter jets

The U.S. military plans to stockpile rare earth magnets used in Javelin missiles and F-35 fighter jets, according to a government document seen by Reuters, a step that critics say does little to help create a domestic industry to build specialized magnets now made almost exclusively in Asia.

5 min read

Chipotle accused of violating U.S. labor law on union organizing

The general counsel of a U.S. labor agency has accused Chipotle Mexican Grill of violating U.S. labor law by allegedly firing an employee in New York in retaliation for complaining about workplace problems and trying to organize with a union.

3 min read

French telco Orange and ex-CEO found guilty over workers' suicides

French telecoms group Orange and its former CEO Didier Lombard were guilty of “moral harassment” that prompted a spate of suicides during a restructuring at the company in the late 2000s, a court ruled. The traumatic episode of workers’ deaths at the company, then known as France Telecom, in the late 2000s, led to deep soul-searching over corporate culture in France.

3 min read