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McConnell to put Green New Deal to vote, forcing Democrats to go on record

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will put the Green New Deal to a vote on Tuesday in a move that will force Democrats to take an official stand on the measure and thus pit the party’s moderates from its progressive wing.

“I could not be more glad that the American people will have the opportunity to learn precisely where each one of their senators stand on the “Green New Deal,” McConnell tweeted. “A radical, top-down, socialist makeover of the entire U.S. economy.”

The resolution, which amounts to an ambitious overhaul of the U.S. to combat climate change, undoubtedly will not pass in the GOP-controlled Senate. But Republicans say that the vote will allow them to better gauge Democrats’ commitment to its radical proposals.

U.S.  Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., has called the derided the planned vote a political stunt and accused Republicans on Saturday of “wasting votes in Congress.”

“Stop wasting the American peoples’ time + learn to govern,” the freshman lawmaker tweeted. “Our jobs aren’t for campaigning, & that’s exactly what these bluff-votes are for.”

Republicans have resoundingly lambasted the Green New Deal for its socialist implications and hefty price tag. Sen. Charles E Grassley, R-Iowa, has liked the proposal to a “utopian manifesto,” while Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., called it a “socialist fantasy.”

J. Scott Jennings, McConnell’s former campaign adviser, said the Green New Deal is dividing Democrats, but that moderates are afraid to speak out because the party’s base “is demanding this sort of extremely out-of-the-mainstream stuff.”

AOC DEFENDS GREEN NEW DEAL, SAYS NARRATIVE BEING 'MANIPULATED' BY TRUMP, OTHER CRITICS

By contrast, said Republican political consultant Joseph Pinion, the Green New Deal has united Republicans – both Trumpers and never-Trumpers alike – “in the idea that the policies of a Green New Deal would be disastrous for America.”

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The New York Times reports that most Democrats will vote present on Tuesday because the terms of the resolution have not been fully flushed out or discussed among the party.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Brown University president rejects student-approved BDS referendum

A student-approved referendum calling on Brown University to divest from companies “complicit in human rights abuses in Palestine” has been rejected by the president of the Ivy League institution.

“Brown’s endowment is not a political instrument to be used to express views on complex social and political issues, especially those over which thoughtful and intelligent people vehemently disagree,” Brown president Christina Paxson said in response to the March 21 vote, according to reports.

The vote made Brown the first Ivy League school to approve a boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) referendum, the Forward reported last week. The student government at Barnard College, affiliated with Columbia University, passed a similar measure last year.

REP. RASHIDA TLAIB SAYS ISLAMOPHOBIA STILL 'VERY PRESENT ON BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE' IN CONGRESS

The publication reported that student or faculty BDS resolutions have passed at 31 universities across the U.S. since 2015, according to Amcha Initiative, a nonprofit that tracks campus anti-Semitism.

The BDS movement supports Palestinian rights and opposes Israel's occupation of the West Bank. Israeli officials have called the movement anti-Semitic.

Students approved the non-binding referendum in a landslide, 61-39 percent, according to reports.

The referendum urged Brown to divest from nine companies that the student coalition Brown Divest identified as facilitating human rights abuses in Palestine, the student newspaper the Brown Daily Herald, reported Tuesday.

US AMBASSADOR CONDEMNS CONVICTED PALESTINIAN TERRORIST'S SPEECH IN GERMANY

Brown Divest said the referendum’s approval was a “historic day for Brown as we take an emboldened and clear stand against the university’s complicity in human rights abuses in Palestine and in similar systems of oppression around the world,” according to the Forward.

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Another student group,, Brown Students for Israel, said the referendum was “a defeat for all students who believe there is a better way to pursue peace between Israelis and Palestinians, who seek intellectually honest discourse about Israel and the conflict, and who prioritize a safe and inclusive community at Brown.”

Source: Fox News National

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Factbox: New revelations from the Mueller report

The Muller Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election is pictured in New York
The Mueller Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election is pictured in New York, New York, U.S., April 18, 2019. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri

April 18, 2019

(Reuters) – There are several aspects of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 U.S. election campaign that were not previously known until the release of his report on Thursday.

TRUMP’S REACTION TO APPOINTMENT OF SPECIAL COUNSEL

U.S. President Donald Trump believed the appointment of a special counsel to take over an active federal investigation would spell the end of his presidency, according to Mueller’s report.

When then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions told Trump of Mueller’s appointment on May 17, 2017, the report said, Trump slumped back in his chair and said: “Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my presidency. I’m fucked.”

Trump asked Sessions, whom he had berated for months for recusing himself from the investigation of Russian interference in the election: “How could you let this happen, Jeff?” and told Sessions he had let him down.

Trump told Sessions he should resign, and Sessions agreed to do so. When Sessions delivered his resignation letter to Trump the following day, Trump put the letter in his pocket but said he wanted Sessions to stay on the job.

That alarmed chief of staff Reince Priebus and senior advisor Steve Bannon, who worried Trump would use the letter to control the Department of Justice, and they tried to return it to Sessions.

Trump took the letter with him on a trip to the Middle East, where he showed it to several senior advisers and asked them what he should do about it. On May 30, he finally returned the letter to Sessions with a note saying: “Not accepted.”

THE PRESIDENTIAL INTERVIEW THAT WASN’T

Mueller tried for more than a year to interview Trump, but in the end Trump refused. Trump provided written answers on some Russia-related topics, but did not agree to answer questions about possible obstruction of justice or events that took place during the presidential transition.

Mueller said he thought he had the legal authority to order Trump to testify before a grand jury, but he decided not to take that course because of the “substantial delay that such an investigative step would likely produce at a late stage in our investigation.”

TRUMP’S EFFORTS TO FIRE MUELLER

Trump tried to get Mueller fired in June 2017, shortly after he was appointed, according to the 448-page report. Trump called then-White House counsel Don McGahn twice and directed him to order Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to fire Mueller on the grounds that he had conflicts of interest.

McGahn felt “trapped,” but did not carry out the order, deciding that he would rather resign, Mueller said.

Other White House advisers later talked McGahn out of resigning, and Trump did not follow up to ask whether McGahn had fulfilled his directive.

Trump pressured McGahn to deny that these events took place when they surfaced in news accounts in January 2018, but McGahn refused, according to Mueller’s report, some of which was blacked out to protect some sensitive information.

TRUMP’S EFFORTS TO LIMIT THE INVESTIGATION

Trump also enlisted his former campaign manager, Corey Lewandowksi, to try to narrow the investigation’s scope. The report said Trump asked Lewandowski in June 2017 to tell Sessions that he should publicly announce that the Russia probe was “very unfair” to the president, say Trump had done nothing wrong, and limit Mueller’s probe into interference in future elections, not the one that had put him in the White House.

A month later, Trump asked Lewandowski about the status of his request and Lewandowski assured Trump he would deliver the message soon. Trump then publicly criticized Sessions in a New York Times interview and a series of Twitter messages.

Mueller says Lewandowski did not want to deliver the message to Sessions, so he asked senior White House official Rick Dearborn to speak to him. Dearborn also did not want to carry out the task. Ultimately, the message never reached Sessions.

MANAFORT’S EFFORTS TO MONETIZE THE CAMPAIGN

Mueller found that campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s efforts to work with his former business partners in Ukraine were greater than previously known, as he tried to use his insider status on the campaign to collect on debts owed for his past work by Oleg Deripaska, an oligarch who is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Shortly after he joined the campaign in the spring of 2016, Manafort directed his deputy Rick Gates to share internal polling data and other campaign materials with Konstantin Kilimnik, a former Ukrainian business partner, with the understanding that it would get passed on to Deripaska, the report said.

During an August 2016 meeting in New York, Manafort told Kilimnik about the campaign’s efforts to win the battleground states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Minnesota, the report said. Trump ended up winning three of those states in the November election.

Manafort worked with his Ukrainian allies until the spring of 2018, after he had been indicted by Mueller, to promote a peace plan that would have split the country in two. These efforts did not constitute coordination between the campaign and Russian efforts to disrupt the election, Mueller found.

Manafort urged Gates not to plead guilty after they were both indicted by Mueller, apparently believing that they would be pardoned by the president if they did not cooperate with investigators. Trump’s numerous sympathetic statements before and during Manafort’s criminal trial could be interpreted as an effort to sway the outcome, but they also could be interpreted as a sign that he genuinely felt sorry for Manafort, Mueller said.

PLAN FOR U.S.-RUSSIA RECONCILIATION

Relations between Washington and Moscow had deteriorated under two previous administrations and the United States had imposed sanctions on Russia. Following Trump’s election victory, Russian financier Kirill Dmitriev worked on a proposal to improve ties with Rick Gerson, a hedge fund manager who is friends with Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner. Dmitriev runs Russia’s sovereign wealth fund and reports directly to Putin.

Gerson gave the plan to Kushner before Trump was sworn in, Mueller’s report said, and Kushner gave copies to Bannon and then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

After Trump took office in January 2017, Dmitriev told Gerson that his “boss” – an apparent reference to Putin – wanted to know if there was a reaction to the proposal, which called for cooperation on terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and economic matters. When Putin and Trump spoke by phone, Dmitriev told Gerson that their plan had “played an important role.”

Gerson told Mueller’s team that he acted as an intermediary between Trump and Russia on his own initiative, not at the request of Trump’s aides.

(Compiled by Andy Sullivan; editing by Grant McCool)

Source: OANN

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Ukraine's president wants UN options for peace force in east

Ukraine's president says a U.N.-mandated peacekeeping operation could be decisive in ending the conflict in the east with Russian-backed separatists — and says Secretary-General Antonio Guterres should send a mission to come up with options.

Petro Poroshenko told the General Assembly Wednesday that Ukraine is ready to discuss a multinational peacekeeping operation with "a clear objective to end the Russian aggression and restore Ukraine's sovereignty."

He accused Russia of conducting an "undeclared war" and said it may be time for the international community "to put Russia in its place," starting by depriving Moscow of its Security Council veto on issues "related to the Russian aggression against Ukraine."

Russia's annexation of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014 and support for separatist rebels in the east triggered a conflict with Ukrainian government forces.

Source: Fox News World

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Presidents can talk, but Fed won’t listen: Kashkari

FILE PHOTO: President of the Federal Reserve Bank on Minneapolis Neel Kashkari speaks during an interview in New York
FILE PHOTO: President of the Federal Reserve Bank on Minneapolis Neel Kashkari speaks during an interview in New York, U.S., March 29, 2019. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

April 3, 2019

By Ann Saphir

(Reuters) – Federal Reserve policymakers pay attention to economic data, not politics or the desires of politicians, when they make decisions on interest rates, Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank President Neel Kashkari said on Wednesday.

“Presidents are free to say what they want” Kashkari said in a town hall held in Fargo, North Dakota. “I can tell you with great confidence that my colleagues and I don’t pay any attention.”

The Trump administration repeatedly has criticized the Fed for raising interest rates last year, and on Friday President Donald Trump blamed the Fed for hurting economic growth and the stock market.

(Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Diane Craft)

Source: OANN

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French consumer confidence jumps to pre-‘yellow vest’ level

FILE PHOTO: A protester wearing a yellow vest attends a demonstration of the
FILE PHOTO: A protester wearing a yellow vest attends a demonstration of the "yellow vests" movement in Nantes, France, December 22, 2018. REUTERS/Stephane Mahe

February 26, 2019

PARIS (Reuters) – French consumer confidence jumped in February to its highest level since “yellow vest” protesters started their weekly demonstrations, as households took heart in an improvement in their finances and unemployment fears receded.

The reading of 95 points marked the highest level for the consumer confidence index since October, which was the month before “yellow vests” protesters started weekend marches against high living costs and President Emmanuel Macron’s policies.

The increase in the index by the national INSEE statistics office, which beat the average forecasts of economists, came as Macron’s costly measures to boost workers’ income and quell the protests kicked in this month.

In December, the French leader decided to speed up an increase in benefits received by the poorest workers, halt a planned rise in fuel taxes, and reduce taxes on overtime, for a total cost of 10 billion euros ($11.35 billion).

“The French consumer is recovering quickly,” Pictet economist Frederik Ducrozet said. “Confidence is rising post-‘gilets jaunes’ as Macron’s stimulus measures kick in and unemployment fears recede.”

The national statistics office, INSEE, said the number of consumers who had observed an improvement in their finances in the past year had increased, while more of them also expected the increase to continue in the future.

Households fears of unemployment also dropped markedly this month, INSEE said.

France’s unemployment rate fell unexpectedly at the end of last year to its lowest level since the start of 2009, official data showed earlier this month.

The brighter outlook is good news for Macron, whose popularity has started to recover from its worst level at the peak of the “yellow vest” crisis in December.

The 41-year-old leader has launched a series of debates across the country aimed at reconnecting with voters, particularly in rural areas.

Weekly “yellow vest” marches continue every Saturday, but turnout has fallen and support for the movement among the broader public as waned, polls show.

Named after the fluorescent jackets motorists must keep in their cars, the grassroot “yellow vest” protests started in mid-November as a revolt against high prices at the pump, before morphing into a broader challenge to Macron’s pro-business policies.

(Reporting by Michel Rose; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Alison Williams)

Source: OANN

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EU needs financial police, money-laundering watchdog: lawmakers

FILE PHOTO: A EU flag is seen outside the EU Commission headquarters in Brussels
FILE PHOTO: A European Union flag is seen outside the EU Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium November 14, 2018. REUTERS/Francois Lenoir/File Photo

February 27, 2019

By Francesco Guarascio

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European Union should set up a police force to investigate tax evasion and financial crime and create a watchdog to counter money-laundering, EU lawmakers said in a report on Wednesday, which accuses seven member states of acting as tax havens.

The report is the result of a year’s work by a committee of the EU Parliament, set up after a series of revelations of alleged financial crime in some EU states and in tax havens across the world, such as the Luxleaks and Panama Papers.

The committee concluded that not enough has been done by EU states to close loopholes on tax rules, as many governments showed a “lack of political will to tackle tax avoidance and financial crime.”

Under pressure from media revelations, EU states did approve some reforms in past years to reduce tax avoidance, but blocked the most relevant overhauls over a common tax base and a digital levy.

New loopholes have also emerged, such as the “cum/ex” tax trade trick revealed last year by Reuters and other media organizations.

The European Commission, led by former Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, shunned proposing a reform that could end governments’ veto power on tax matters.

The lack of appetite for reform is partly due to the fact that some of the 28 EU states “display traits of a tax haven and facilitate aggressive tax planning,” the report said, citing Luxembourg, Belgium, Cyprus, Hungary, Ireland, Malta and The Netherlands.

“Europe has a serious money-laundering and tax fraud problem,” said socialist lawmaker Jeppe Kofod, who took part in drafting the report.

The report was backed by the main parties in the European Parliament, including the conservatives and the socialists, and will be put to a vote of the whole assembly in coming weeks.

To counter cross-border tax evasion and financial crime, the committee recommended the European Commission immediately starts working on a proposal for a European financial police force with investigative powers.

The EU’s police agency Europol has limited powers and largely coordinates the work of national forces – when they are willing to cooperate.

The report, which is not binding but bears political weight, also called on EU states to set up a watchdog in charge of countering money-laundering in the bloc, after scandals at several EU banks in recent months.

States have so far ignored European Central Bank calls to create such a body, fearing the loss of national competences.

They have only agreed on a minor reform that would allow the European Banking Authority (EBA) to increase to a dozen the officials working on money-laundering, an overhaul the EBA’s incoming head deems insufficient.

(Reporting by Francesco Guarascio; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Source: OANN

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Afghan President Ashraf Ghani speaks during the inauguration of the newly-elected parliament in Kabul
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani speaks during the inauguration of the newly-elected parliament in Kabul, Afghanistan April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Omar Sobhani

April 26, 2019

By Rupam Jain and Hameed Farzad

KABUL (Reuters) – Afghan President Ashraf Ghani encouraged newly-elected lawmakers to participate in the peace process with the Taliban as he opened on Friday the first session of parliament since a controversial election.

Ghani has invited thousands of politicians, religious scholars and rights activists to an assembly known as a loya jirga next week to discuss ways to end the 17-year war.

Several opposition leaders have said they will boycott the four-day assembly in Kabul, saying it was pulled together without their input and is being used by Ghani as he seeks a second term in a September presidential election.

“We have presented the peace plan on a regular basis and we are committed to it,” Ghani said in the first session since parliamentary elections marred by technical problems, militant attacks and accusations of voting fraud last year.

“Based on this plan, there will be no peace deal and negotiation that does not have the green card of the parliament,” he added.

Officials from the United States and the Taliban have held several rounds of talks to end the Afghan war.

U.S. negotiator, Zalmay Khalilzad, has reported some progress toward an accord on a U.S. troop withdrawal and on how the Taliban would prevent extremists from using Afghanistan to launch attacks as al Qaeda did on Sept. 11, 2001.

The insurgents have so far rejected U.S. demands for a ceasefire and talks on the country’s political future that would include Afghan government officials.

The loya jirga, a centuries-old institution used to build consensus among competing tribes, factions and ethnic groups, is an attempt by Ghani to influence the peace talks and cement his position for a second term, Afghan politicians and Western diplomats say.

Amid growing political divisions in Kabul, opposition politicians have demanded that Ghani step down when his mandate ends next month, and give way to an interim government to oversee peace talks with the Taliban. Ghani has ruled that out.

The country’s top court said last week Ghani can stay in office until the presidential election in September.

(Reporting by Hameed Farzad, Rupam Jain, Editing by Darren Schuettler)

Source: OANN

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Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein Thursday defended special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation while slamming former President Barack Obama’s administration for being slow to take action on Russian interference in U.S. elections and ex-FBI Director James Comey for telling Congress the agency was investigating collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

“Our nation is safer, elections are more secure, and citizens are better informed about covert foreign influence schemes,” Rosenstein said in a speech to the Armenian Bar Association, marking his first public remarks after the Mueller report was released, reports CBS News.

He also pointed out that the investigation revealed a pattern of computer hacking and the use of social media to undermine elections as “only the tip of the iceberg of a comprehensive Russian strategy to influence elections, promote social discord, and undermine America, just like they do in many other countries,” reports The Wall Street Journal.

The Obama administration also made “critical decisions,” including choosing not to publicize the full story about Russian hackers and social media trolling, “and how they relate to a broader strategy to undermine America,” said Rosenstein.

He noted that the Mueller probe began after Comey disclosed during a hearing before Congress that President Donald Trump “pressured him to close the investigation and the president denied that the conversation occurred.”

Rosenstein said two years ago, when he was confirmed, he was told by a Republican senator that he would be in charge of the probe and that he’d report the results to the American people.

However, he said he didn’t promise to do that, because it is “not our job to render conclusive factual findings. We just decide whether it is appropriate to file criminal charges.”

Source: NewsMax Politics

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FILE PHOTO: The Huawei logo is pictured outside its Huawei's factory campus in Dongguan, Guangdong province
FILE PHOTO: The Huawei logo is pictured outside its Huawei’s factory campus in Dongguan, Guangdong province, China, March 25, 2019. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Ben Blanchard

BEIJING (Reuters) – Britain must get to the bottom of the leak of confidential discussions during a top-level security meeting about the role of China’s Huawei Technologies in 5G network supply chains, British finance minister Philip Hammond said on Friday.

News that Britain’s National Security Council, attended by senior ministers and spy chiefs, had agreed on Tuesday to bar Huawei from all core parts of the country’s 5G network and restrict its access to non-core elements was leaked to a national newspaper.

The leak of secret discussions has sparked anger in parliament and amongst Britain’s intelligence community. Britain’s most senior civil servant Mark Sedwill has launched an inquiry and written to ministers who were at the meeting.

“My understanding from London (is) that an investigation has been announced into apparent leaks from the NSC meeting earlier this week,” said Hammond, speaking on the sidelines of a summit on China’s Belt and Road initiative in Beijing.

“To my knowledge there has never been a leak from a National Security Council meeting before and therefore I think it is very important that we get to the bottom of what happened here,” he told Reuters in a pooled interview.

British culture minister Jeremy Wright said on Thursday he could not rule out a criminal investigation. The majority of the ministers at the NSC meeting have said they were not involved, according to media reports.

Hammond said he was unaware of any previous leak from a meeting of the NSC.

“It’s not about the substance of what was apparently leaked. It’s not earth-shattering information. But it is important that we protect the principle that nothing that goes on in national security council meetings must ever be repeated outside the room.”

Allowing Huawei a reduced role in building its 5G network puts Britain at odds with the United States which has told allies not to use its technology at all because of fears it could be a vehicle for Chinese spying. Huawei has categorically denied this.

There have been concerns that the NSC’s conclusion, which sources confirmed to Reuters, could upset other allies in the world’s leading intelligence-sharing network – the Five Eyes alliance of the United States, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

However, British ministers and intelligence officials have said any final decision on 5G would not put critical national infrastructure at risk. Ciaran Martin, head of the cyber center of Britain’s main eavesdropping agency, GCHQ, played down any threat of a rift in the Five Eyes alliance.

(Writing by Michael Holden; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Source: OANN

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President Trump on Friday said “no money” was paid to North Korea for Otto Warmbier, after reports that the U.S. received a $2 million hospital bill from Pyongyang for the late American prisoner’s care.

“No money was paid to North Korea for Otto Warmbier, not two Million Dollars, not anything else. This is not the Obama Administration that paid 1.8 Billion Dollars for four hostages, or gave five terroist[sic] hostages plus, who soon went back to battle, for traitor Sgt. Bergdahl!” Trump tweeted Friday.

NORTH KOREA GAVE US $2M HOSPITAL BILL OVER CARE OF AMERICAN OTTO WARMBIER, SOURCES SAY

The Washington Post first reported that North Korean authorities insisted the U.S. envoy sent to retrieve Warmbier, 21, who was a student of the University of Virginia, sign a pledge to pay the bill before allowing Warmbier’s comatose body to return to the United States. Sources confirmed the bill and the amount to Fox News on Thursday.

Sources told the post that the envoy signed an agreement to pay the medical bill on instructions from the president, but a source told Fox News that the U.S. did not ever pay money to North Korea.

The White House declined to comment when asked on the bill, with Press Secretary Sarah Sanders saying in a statement that: “We do not comment on hostage negotiations, which is why they have been so successful during this administration.”

Meanwhile, the president added: “’President[sic] Donald J. Trump is the greatest hostage negotiator that I know of in the history of the United States. 20 hostages, many in impossible circumstances, have been released in last two years. No money was paid.’ Cheif[sic] Hostage Negotiator, USA!”

Warmbier was on tour in North Korea when he allegedly stole a propaganda sign from a hotel. He was arrested in January 2016 and sentenced to 15 years in prison with hard labor in March 2016. Warmbier, for unknown reasons, fell into a coma while in custody and was held in that condition for an additional 17 months.

North Korean officials did not tell American officials until June 2017 that Warmbier had been unconscious the entire time. He died less than a week after he returned to the U.S. North Korean officials, though, have repeatedly denied accusations that Warmbier was tortured, instead claiming that he had suffered from botulism and then slipped into a coma after taking a sleeping pill.

AMERICAN PRISONERS HELD IN NORTH KOREA ON THEIR WAY HOME AFTER POMPEO VISIT, TRUMP SAYS

Fred and Cindy Warmbier sued North Korea over their son’s death and in December were awarded $501 million in damages – money that the Hermit Kingdom will probably never pay.

While the Warmbiers blamed North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Trump has said he believes Kim’s claims that he did not know about the student’s treatment.

Trump and Kim have met in two separate summits. The most recent, held in February, ended without an agreement on denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.

Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, told Fox News: “Otto Warmbier was mistreated by North Korea in so many ways, including his wrongful conviction and harsh sentence, and the fact that for 16 months they refused to tell his family or our country about his dire condition they caused.  No, the United States owes them nothing. They owe the Warmbier family everything.”

Last year, the Trump administration was also able to save three American prisoners held by North Korea. Kim Dong Chul, Tony Kim, and Kim Hak Song were all detained in North Korea. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo brought the three Americans home last May, and said they were all in “good health.”

Fox News’ John Roberts, Rich Edson, Nicholas Kalman, and Mike Emanuel contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

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Park Yoo-chun, a K-pop idol singer, arrives at the Suwon district court in Suwon
Park Yoo-chun, a K-pop idol singer, arrives at the Suwon district court in Suwon, South Korea, April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

April 26, 2019

SEOUL (Reuters) – K-pop and drama star Park Yu-chun was arrested on Friday on charges of buying and using illegal drugs, a court said, the latest in a series of scandals to hit the South Korean entertainment business.

Suwon District Court approved the arrest warrant for Park, 32, due to concerns over possible destruction of evidence and flight risk, a court spokesman told Reuters.

Park is suspected of having bought about 1.5 grams of methamphetamine with his former girlfriend earlier this year and using the drug around five times, an official at the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency said.

Park has denied wrongdoing, saying he had never taken drugs, and he again denied the charges in court, Yonhap news agency said.

Park’s contract with his management agency had been canceled and he would leave the entertainment industry, Park’s management agency, C-JeS Entertainment, said on Wednesday.

Park was a member of boyband TVXQ between 2003 and 2009 before leaving the group with two other members, forming the group JYJ.

A scandal involving sex tapes, prostitutes and secret chat about rape led at least four other K-pop stars to quit the industry earlier this year.

The cases sparked a nationwide drugs bust and investigations into tax evasion and police collusion at night clubs and other nightlife spots.

(Reporting by Joyce Lee; Additional reporting by Heekyong Yang; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Source: OANN

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