geneva_convenience

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s budget office on Wednesday rescinded a memo freezing spending on federal loans and grants, less than two days after it sparked widespread confusion and legal challenges across the country.

The memo, which was issued Monday by the Office of Management and Budget, had frightened states, schools and organizations that rely on trillions of dollars from Washington.

Administration officials said the pause was necessary to review whether spending aligned with Trump’s executive orders on issues like climate change and diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

But on Wednesday, they sent out a two-sentence notice rescinding the original memo. The reversal was the latest sign that even with unified control of Washington, Trump’s plans to dramatically and rapidly reshape the government have limits.

LONDON (AP) — The BBC has apologized to staff members who felt unable to complain about the conduct of actor and comedian Russell Brand because of his status after an internal review found that concerns about his behavior weren’t handled appropriately.

The investigation by Peter Johnston, the BBC’s director of editorial complaints, identified eight complaints about Brand, including allegations that he had sex on BBC premises and exposed himself in the studio. Only one of those complaints was formally made to management at the time, Johnston found.

“I am grateful to those who have come forward to talk to me and my team and I have apologized on behalf of the BBC to those most directly affected by what I have documented here,’’ Johnston said in a report released Thursday. “The culture of the time undoubtedly influenced what was acceptable/tolerated, but I have found that a number of individuals had concerns about Russell Brand’s behavior which they felt unable to raise then.’’

The BBC launched its investigation after British media published claims by four women that they were sexually assaulted by Brand between 2006 and 2013, at the height of his fame. Brand had two weekly radio shows on the BBC from 2006 to 2008 and worked periodically on a number of short-term projects.

Rwanda has put $1bn of global aid under threat by taking part in the invasion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the UK foreign secretary, David Lammy, has said.

He made the direct warning in a phone call to the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, on Sunday after also speaking to the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, about the crisis.

Lammy said Rwanda received more than $1bn of global aid every year, including about £32m of bilateral UK assistance.

“All of that is under threat when you attack your neighbours, and we are clear that we cannot have countries challenging the territorial integrity of other countries. Just as we will not tolerate it in the continent of Europe, we cannot tolerate it wherever in the world it happens. We have to be clear about that,” Lammy said.

WASHINGTON, Jan 29 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday to combat antisemitism and pledged to deport non-citizen college students and others who took part in pro-Palestinian protests.

A fact sheet on the order promises "immediate action" by the Justice Department to prosecute "terroristic threats, arson, vandalism and violence against American Jews" and marshal all federal resources to combat what it called "the explosion of antisemitism on our campuses and streets" since the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Palestinian Islamist group Hamas.

"To all the resident aliens who joined in the pro-jihadist protests, we put you on notice: come 2025, we will find you, and we will deport you," Trump said in the fact sheet. "I will also quickly cancel the student visas of all Hamas sympathizers on college campuses, which have been infested with radicalism like never before," the president said, echoing a 2024 campaign promise.

Rights groups and legal scholars said the new measure would violate constitutional free speech rights and would likely draw legal challenges.

Britain’s Royal Air Force (RAF) has dispatched two surveillance planes towards Gaza since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas began, Declassified can reveal.

Zaki Sarraf, a legal officer at the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP) told Declassified: “For months, the government has said that RAF planes flying around Gaza are used solely for locating hostages, so why are these flights still happening now that hostilities have paused?”

The first spy flight departed from RAF Akrotiri, Britain’s airbase in Cyprus, at 15:32 and returned at 20:59 local time on 19 January – the day the ceasefire went into effect.

The aircraft turned off its transponders over the eastern Mediterranean, raising questions about precisely what it was doing in the air while the last remaining British hostage, Emily Damari, was being released by Hamas.

The second flight departed from RAF Akrotiri on 25 January at 11:26 local time and returned to base at 17:44, once again turning off its transponders over the eastern Mediterranean as the second hostage exchange was taking place.

Israel instructed buses carrying Palestinian prisoners slated for release under the Gaza ceasefire deal with Hamas to return to prisons, an official involved in the operation told Reuters on Thursday.

Israel's Channel 12 reported that the decision to halt the release of Palestinian prisoners was made 'in protest' of the scenes outside Yahya Sinwar's home, where Israeli and Thai captives were exchanged for the prisoners.

A total of 110 Palestinian prisoners, including 30 children, are set to be released, in exchange for three Israeli and five Thai captives.

WASHINGTON, Jan 29 (Reuters) - Scores of people were feared dead after an American Airlines regional passenger jet with 64 people on board and a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter collided and crashed into the frigid Potomac River near Reagan Washington National Airport.

Officials provided no death toll from Wednesday night's collision but U.S. Senator Roger Marshall of Kansas, from where the flight was traveling, suggested most if not all those on board had been killed.

"It's really hard when you lose probably over 60 Kansans simultaneously," he told a press conference at Reagan airport in the U.S. capital early on Thursday.

"When one person dies, it's a tragedy, but when many, many, many people die, it's an unbearable sorrow. It's a heartbreak beyond measure."

American Airlines confirmed 60 passengers and four crew members were aboard the jet. The helicopter, on a training flight, was carrying three soldiers, a U.S. official said.

An Israeli contractor working for the Defense Ministry who was conducting engineering work for the Israel Defense Forces in Gaza was mistakenly killed by IDF soldiers on Tuesday.

The IDF said that it has opened an investigation into the circumstances of the death of the contractor, who was named as Yaakov (Kobi) Avitan, 38 years old.

According to the IDF, Avitan, who approached Israeli troops and did not respond to calls to stop, was unarmed and dressed in civilian clothing, making it unclear why he was shot.

In 2008, the then German chancellor, Angela Merkel, claimed before the Knesset that ensuring Israel’s security was part of Germany’s Staatsräson, or raison d’état. The phrase was repeatedly invoked, with more vehemence than clarity, by German leaders after 7 October 2023. Less than two months before the Hamas offensive, Israel had secured, with American blessing, its largest ever arms deal with Germany. German arms sales to Israel surged tenfold in 2023; the vast majority of sales were approved after 7 October, and fast-tracked by German officials who insisted that permits for arms exports to Israel would receive special consideration.

As Israel began to bomb homes, refugee camps, schools, hospitals, mosques and churches in Gaza, and Israeli cabinet ministers promoted their schemes for ethnic cleansing, the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, reiterated the national orthodoxy: “Israel is a country that is committed to human rights and international law and acts accordingly.” As Benjamin Netanyahu’s campaign of indiscriminate murder and destruction intensified, Ingo Gerhartz, the head of the German air force, or Luftwaffe, arrived in Tel Aviv hailing the “accuracy” of Israeli pilots; he also had himself photographed, in uniform, donating blood for Israeli soldiers.

The German health minister, Karl Lauterbach, approvingly retweeted a video in which an English far-right agitator claims that the Nazis were more decent than Hamas. Die Welt claimed that “Free Palestine is the new Heil Hitler” and Die Zeit alerted German readers to the apparently outrageous fact that “Greta Thunberg openly sympathises with the Palestinians”. When the minister of culture, Claudia Roth, was caught on camera applauding the Israeli film-maker Yuval Abraham and his Palestinian colleague Basel Adra at the Berlinale film festival – for their now Oscar-nominated documentary – she clarified that her applause was intended only for “the Jewish-Israeli” Abraham.

For months, German leaders put up the strongest resistance to joint European calls for a ceasefire. The German president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, unstintingly backed Israel’s vengeful violence, much to the chagrin of many of her own colleagues; she also ignored repeated calls to sanction Israel from EU member countries such as Spain and Ireland. In October 2024, as Israel bombed hospitals and tent encampments in Gaza, and blew up entire villages in Lebanon, the German foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, justified these violations of international law, asserting that civilians could lose their protected status in war.

Sebutinde, who currently holds what is arguably the world's most prestigious judicial position, has recently been accused of directly lifting several sentences almost word for word in her dissenting opinion written on 19 July.

At the time, a 15-judge panel found that Israel's decades-long occupation of the Palestinian territories was "unlawful" and that its "near-complete separation" of people in the occupied West Bank breached international laws concerning "racial segregation" and "apartheid".

Sebutinde's dissenting opinion contained at least three sentences very closely resembling statements from a December 2021 article by Douglas Feith, a former US official.

An additional four sentences were taken from the pro-Israeli advocacy website Jewish Virtual Library. The allegations were first uncovered by researcher Zachary Foster.

Colonel Hassan Abdel Ghani, the spokesperson for the Military Operations Administration, announced the victory of the Syrian revolution during a press conference reported by the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA).

Colonel Abdul Ghani declared December 8 as a national day to commemorate this historic victory. He also confirmed the cancellation of the 2012 Constitution and the suspension of all exceptional laws previously in place.

Additionally, he announced the dissolution of the People's Assembly of Syria established during the previous regime and the committees derived from it. In a move to restructure the military, he revealed plans to dissolve the former regime's army and rebuild the Syrian army on national foundations.

The colonel outlined the dissolution of all security agencies linked to the former regime, including their various branches and names, as well as the militias created by it. He emphasized the establishment of a new security institution to ensure the safety of citizens.