Plans for a new Chinese “super-embassy” in London must be blocked after a warning from the White House, the Tories have said.
Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said the proposals for a huge new complex near the city’s financial hub pose a “security risk” and should be thrown out.
The proposed “mega embassy” at the former Royal Mint site near the Tower of London has been locked in a planning battle for years, with the decision called in for review last year.
Carney to announce Canada will meet 2% NATO spending target by March
Prime Minister Mark Carney is set to announce that his government plans to meet the NATO benchmark target of two per cent of the country’s gross domestic product by the end of the current fiscal year in March, Radio-Canada has confirmed.
The prime minister will outline a pathway to the often-hyped two per cent goal in a speech in Toronto this morning, said the confidential source who was not authorized to speak publicly.
NATO to propose upping members’ defence spending to 5% in line with Trump demand
NATO’s Secretary-General Mark Rutte on Thursday said he will propose that members increase their overall military spending target to 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) at the pact’s next summit. “There’s broad support,” Rutte said.
More … Canada faces ‘massive challenge’ as NATO eyes new 5% spending target: expert
With up to 6,000 fighters, JNIM is now the most well-armed militant force in the Sahel — and among the most powerful in the world, officials and experts say.
TUMU, Ghana — In the space of just a few months, the al-Qaeda affiliate has overrun major cities in Burkina Faso and Mali, carried out the deadliest-ever attack on soldiers in Benin and expanded its hard-line Islamist rule across the region. No one knows when its fighters will strike next — or where they plan to stop.
After years spent quietly gaining strength, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) is now the most well-armed militant force in West Africa and among the most powerful in the world, according to regional and Western officials, with as many as 6,000 fighters under its command. Local strategies employed to combat JNIM are accelerating its rise, officials and experts say, as atrocities by West African forces have allowed the group to claim the moral high ground and legitimize its growing authority.
Roger Foley is a leading activist for the rights of the disabled, including his own. A hero to associations for the disabled, he is often considered a thorn in the side of health bureaucrats. Recently, an account of his case — emanating more sympathy for the bureaucrats than for Foley, alas — was prominently featured in these pages.
Foley suffers from a grave neurodegenerative affliction, spinocerebellar ataxia, which renders him almost completely physically dependent on caregivers. Cognitively normal and technologically skilled, he enjoys a rich life of the mind. In spite of what most Canadians would consider the grimmest of circumstances — which shamefully includes persistent reminders from carers that he has a right to euthanasia, which he just as persistently rebuffs — Foley remains life-affirming and bullish in pursuit of more humane and empowering care conditions.
Israeli forces take control of Gaza aid boat carrying Greta Thunberg
Israel’s military took control of a boat trying to deliver food to Palestinians in Gaza in the early hours of Monday morning, and brought its crew of activists including Greta Thunberg to an Israeli port.
The Madleen was making a symbolic attempt to break to the blockade of Gaza and raise awareness of a looming “starvation crisis”.
It was never likely to get through Israel’s naval blockade of the territory, where UN-backed experts have warned of looming famine, and dozens of people have been killed by Israeli forces trying to reach food distribution centres.
‘Violation of int’l law’: Hamas, foreign government attack Israel over Gaza flotilla’s interception
Varying reactions were issued on Monday after the IDF intercepted the Gaza Freedom Flotilla, Madleen, early in the morning. Foreign ministries with citizens on board the ship confirmed that they have requested consular access.
“My name is Greta Thunberg and I am from Sweden. If you see this video, we have been intercepted and kidnapped in international waters by the Israeli occupational forces, or forces that support Israel.” pic.twitter.com/Ku7QILHpfd
— Prem Thakker (@prem_thakker) June 9, 2025
h/t Mauser
Prime Minster Mark Carney’s solution to the ‘housing crisis’ is the same as was that of former Prime Minster Justin Trudeau’s: throw money at it. Most of Carney’s government people are former Trudeau government people, so it shouldn’t be a surprise their answer is to spend other peoples’ money.
The Carney Liberals’ plan is to build a new bureaucracy to build new homes, called Build Canada Homes, at a cost of $25 billion taxpayer bucks. While in office, Trudeau’s government spent $116 billion on the housing crisis, so Carney has a long way to go to match Trudeau’s pilfering of Canadians’ tax money but of course, he’s just getting started.
Skip the National Guard.
Bring in the rooftop South Koreans.pic.twitter.com/K8gaVFnLe2
— Breanna Morello (@BreannaMorello) June 8, 2025
The national guard is the problem not the thugs rioting, did I get that right https://t.co/LwCJYWZChn
— Daniel✌️ (@Countryboyzcan) June 9, 2025
COMPLETE ANARCHY IN LA – NO COPS PRESENT – NO NATIONAL GUARD
I AM ON THE GROUND FOLLOW NOW FOR UPDATES | LA RIOTS pic.twitter.com/UDFDOgzwIx
— Cam Higby | America First (@camhigby) June 9, 2025
When Essi Farida Geraldo, a Lomé-based architect, heard about partial restrictions on travel to the US from Togo as part of the travel bans announced by Donald Trump on Thursday, she lamented losing access to what many young Togolese consider to be a land of better opportunities.
“The United States was the Togolese’s El Dorado,” Geraldo said. “Many people go to work in the US to save money and support their families or projects in Africa … This will force the country to really develop stronger partnerships that exclude the US.”
Trump’s order, which is to come into effect on Monday, prohibits people from seven African countries – Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Libya, Somalia and Sudan – from entering the US, making Africa the worst-affected continent. People from another three African countries – Burundi, Sierra Leone and Togo – will be subject to partial restrictions, meaning they will not be able to travel to the US on certain visas.
If Canada decides to buy submarines from Germany, it would mean tightening ties with a “club of countries” in Europe as it looks to meet NATO defence spending goals and face an uncertain world, Germany’s ambassador says.
Matthias Lüttenberg, Germany’s ambassador to Canada, sat down with The West Block‘s Mercedes Stephenson in an interview airing on Sunday and emphasized the value of working more closely together.
“It’s up to the Canadian government to decide which direction they want to go,” said Lüttenberg.
Susan Delacourt: Thanks to Doug Ford, I have had a song stuck in my head for days this week. “Love is in the Air,” a one-hit wonder from the 1970s, turned into the soundtrack of the first ministers’ meeting after the Ontario premier walked in singing it.
No question, there seems to be a lot of love in the air around Mark Carney right now. The premiers gushed about him after their meeting. He got his throne speech through the minority Commons. He’s having cosy phone chats with Donald Trump. This is a honeymoon. How long can it last?
So long as he keeps refilling the trough he’ll be fine.
Ukraine’s Operation Spider’s Web attack on Russian airbases caused shockwaves among strategists and military planners around the world. Analysts said more than 20 of Moscow’s hugely expensive long-range bombers, which it will struggle to replace quickly, were destroyed by drones developed from hobbyists’ craft supplies at a cost of just a few thousand pounds each.
The audacious strike has been described as Russia’s Pearl Harbor: an unforeseen sucker punch that has revealed deep vulnerabilities.
New technology, innovatively and daringly used, appears to be denying Russia its strategic advantages — from the size of the country, where bases deep in Siberia were assumed to be safe, to a population more than three times the size of Ukraine’s.
For two months, Democrats have agitated on behalf of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an illegal immigrant, alleged gang member, and suspected human trafficker whom the Trump administration deported to El Salvador. Picked up by police in Maryland in 2019, Abrego Garcia was given a deportation order on the basis of his unlawful presence in the United States and gang activity. But the immigration judge specifically ordered that Abrego Garcia not be deported to his home country of El Salvador, where Abrego Garcia claimed he would be in danger.
On Sunday the New York Times Magazine published a feature about Canada’s legal regime for assisted suicide, wrapping large volumes of reporting on law, ethics and medicine around the individual story of Paula Ritchie, an Ontario woman who sought and received “MAiD” after an unhappy life full of pain and misery.
Katie Engelhart’s story plays pretty fair with an explosive social issue that is of increasing global concern. She knows the NYT’s world audience is aware of Canada’s avant-garde experiment with the facilitation of medical suicide for patients who don’t have terminal illnesses, and she doesn’t stack the deck either way.
Many had warned that Britain would soon have ‘blasphemy laws by the back door’. And so it came to pass on Monday, when Hamit Coskun was found guilty of a religiously aggravated public-order offence for setting fire to the Koran. Yet while there has been justified outrage at the decision, there remains a failure to grasp the true meaning of this landmark verdict. It represents not merely the return of blasphemy law by the back door, but also the advancement of ‘hard multiculturalism’ through the front door.
“Cockroach milk has captured the attention of scientists and nutritionists alike. In 2016, researchers studied a milk-like substance produced by female Pacific beetle cockroaches to nourish their young…”
