BBC Several of today's papers lead on an essay by former Prime Minister Sir Tony Blair criticising the Labour government. The Telegraph summarises his words with "Starmer has no plan for Britain", calling Sir Tony's comments a "stinging attack". In a follow up to the news that former SNP chief Peter Murrell admitted to embezzling £400,000 from the Scottish party, the Telegraph says a witness "cast...
BBC Several of today's papers lead on an essay by former Prime Minister Sir Tony Blair criticising the Labour government. The Telegraph summarises his words with "Starmer has no plan for Britain", calling Sir Tony's comments a "stinging attack". In a follow up to the news that former SNP chief Peter Murrell admitted to embezzling £400,000 from the Scottish party, the Telegraph says a witness "casts doubt" on Murrell's wife, former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, not knowing of his crime. It reports Sturgeon had said she was unaware of a motorhome Murrell had bought, but one man says he saw her buying "frozen pizza and garlic bread" near where it was parked.
Central bank and commercial institutions would arm themselves under new law; anger at UN over Russian threats to embassies. What we know on day 1,554 The Russian government has told top banks including its federal reserve that they should shoot down Ukrainian drones themselves, as well as handling the costs. It comes as Moscow struggles to defend key sites on its vast territory against Ukrainian a...
Central bank and commercial institutions would arm themselves under new law; anger at UN over Russian threats to embassies. What we know on day 1,554 The Russian government has told top banks including its federal reserve that they should shoot down Ukrainian drones themselves, as well as handling the costs. It comes as Moscow struggles to defend key sites on its vast territory against Ukrainian attacks that have forced Russia to cluster its air defence in some areas, including Moscow, leaving it spread extremely thin or nonexistent elsewhere. Kyiv’s forces have targeted infrastructure and equipment within Russia used to either carry out or fund the war – from ships, planes and airfields to oil refineries, depots and pipelines, natural gas networks and factories that make military electronics and explosives. Reuters reports that the Russian parliament has passed a law allowing the banks including Russia’s biggest, Sberbank , and other financial institutions to operate defence systems and arm staff against drones without special forces involvement. They would handle the cost themselves, Anatoly Aksakov, the head of the State Duma’s financial committee, was quoted as saying by the RBC news outlet. Alexander Shokhin, head of Russia’s most powerful business lobby, on Monday told Vladimir Putin that companies were prepared to buy heavier weapons and electronic systems to defend themselves against drone attacks. Almost 50 countries at the United Nations have condemned what they said were “threats by Russia to diplomatic institutions and embassies in Kyiv” . “This is something which we cannot accept,” said a joint statement signed by European countries, Japan, South Korea and others. The EU also lashed out, saying it had no plans to move its staff. Germany and Norway summoned Russia’s ambassadors to deliver reprimands. Russia announced on Monday that it had started a campaign of “systematic” strikes on Kyiv that would target the Ukrainian capital’s “decision-making centres...