Great Britain

Subterms

    More stories

    • 113 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      China Claims Britain’s MI6 Recruited Chinese Couple as Spies

      by

      The accusation from China came a few weeks after Britain charged three men with assisting Hong Kong’s intelligence service.China’s top security ministry accused Britain’s MI6 intelligence agency on Monday of persuading a married couple working for unnamed central Chinese government bodies to become spies for the British government, the latest in a volley of continuing espionage accusations between the two countries.In a post on its official WeChat account, China’s Ministry of State Security said MI6 British intelligence officials had lured a man with the surname Wang, who worked for a Chinese government agency with part-time consulting work that paid him a high salary during his visit to Britain as part of an exchange program.The Chinese ministry said MI6 trained Mr. Wang to become a spy and ordered him to return to China to gather intelligence. It said that his wife, who has the surname Zhou, also agreed to spy for Britain. China said the matter was under further investigation, but it is not clear whether the couple are being detained by the Chinese authorities.This is the latest in a series of back-and-forth espionage accusations between Beijing and London, a source of escalating tension between the two countries.Last month, three men in Britain were charged with gathering intelligence for Hong Kong, a former British colony now under Chinese rule, to pursue pro-democracy activists living in Britain.China has condemned these latest accusations. It said that Britain had leveled a series of “groundless and slanderous” accusations of spying and cyberattacks against Beijing.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      What to Know About the UK Election on July 4

      by

      Why does this election matter?How does Britain vote?What are the main issues?Who is running, and who is likely to win?When will we find out the results?Where can I find more information?Why does this election matter?The general election on July 4 is a pivotal moment for Britain after 14 years of government by the Conservative Party. The last full parliamentary election was in December 2019, when Boris Johnson won a landslide victory for the Conservatives, propelled by his charisma and a promise to “Get Brexit done” after the country’s decision to leave the European Union in a 2016 referendum.A lot has changed since then. In July, voters will give their verdict on five tumultuous years of government that have spanned the coronavirus pandemic, the troubled implementation of Brexit, the “Partygate” scandal around Mr. Johnson’s rule-breaking during pandemic lockdowns and the disastrous six-week tenure of Prime Minister Liz Truss.The Parliament in London. Voters in each of the country’s 650 constituencies will select a candidate to represent them as a member of Parliament.Hollie Adams/ReutersPolls suggest that the center-left Labour Party is set to return to power after more than a decade in opposition, which would bring a fundamental realignment to British politics.How does Britain vote?The United Kingdom — which consists of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales — is divided into 650 constituencies.Voters in each constituency select a candidate to represent them as a member of Parliament, and the political party that wins the most seats usually forms the next government. That party’s leader also becomes prime minister.

      #story h1, .nytapp-hybrid-article h1 {
      font-style: normal;
      font-weight: 700;
      font-size: 2.5rem;
      line-height: 1;
      }

      #story li p a,
      .nytapp-hybrid-article li p a {
      text-decoration-color: var(–color-content-secondary) !important;
      color: var(–color-content-primary);
      text-underline-offset: 3px;
      }

      #story li p a:visited,
      .nytapp-hybrid-article li p a:visited {
      text-decoration-color: var(–color-content-secondary) !important;
      color: var(–color-content-primary);
      text-underline-offset: 3px;
      }

      #story li > p,
      .nytapp-hybrid-article li p {
      font-family: nyt-cheltenham, nyt-imperial,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;
      font-size: 20px;
      font-weight: 300;
      }

      @media screen and (min-width: 600px) {

      #story li > p {
      font-size: 22px;
      }

      }

      @media screen and (min-width: 1024px) {

      h2:not(#styln-toplinks-title) {
      padding-top: 40px;
      }

      #story h1, .nytapp-hybrid-article h1 {
      font-size: 2.938rem;
      line-height: 1;
      }

      }

      We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares129 Views

      in Elections

      Report Finds ‘Catalog of Failures’ in U.K. Contaminated Blood Scandal

      by

      A six-year inquiry found that the deaths of about 3,000 people and the infection of tens of thousands of others could have mostly been avoided.A “catalog of failures” by government and medical officials in Britain, most of them avoidable errors, led to blood contaminations that killed about 3,000 people and infected more than 30,000 others over two decades, according to a long-awaited report published on Monday.The report is the product of a six-year inquiry that the British government ordered in 2017 after decades of pressure from victims and their families, and it could pave the way for sizable compensation payments.The independent report puts a harsh spotlight on Britain’s state-run National Health Service, identifying “systemic, collective and individual failures” by British authorities as they dealt with the infections of tens of thousands of people by tainted blood transfusions or contaminated blood products between the 1970s and the 1990s.The authorities at the time refused to acknowledge those failings — including the lack of proper screening and testing of blood — by “hiding the truth,” the report said.“This disaster was no accident,” Brian Langstaff, a former High Court judge who led the inquiry, said at a news conference on Monday. “People put their trust in doctors and the government to keep them safe, and that trust was betrayed.”He added, “The N.H.S. and successive governments compounded the agony by refusing to accept that wrong had been done.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Why a Tactic Used by Czars Is Back With a Vengeance

      by

      Authoritarian governments have long sought to target dissidents abroad. But the digital age may have given them stronger motives, and better tools, for transnational repression.Diplomatic tensions are rising here in London. On Tuesday, the British foreign ministry summoned the Chinese ambassador for an official reprimand. The day before, the police charged three men with aiding the Hong Kong intelligence service and forcing entry into a residential address.In a statement, the Foreign Office criticized “the recent pattern of behavior directed by China against the U.K,” and cited, among other things, Hong Kong’s issuing of bounties for information on dissidents who have resettled in Britain and elsewhere.I’m not going to speculate on whether the three men are guilty or innocent, as their court case is ongoing. But the arrests have drawn attention to the phenomenon of “transnational repression,” in which autocratic governments surveil, harass or even attack their own citizens abroad. Last month, following a string of attacks on Iranian journalists, Reporters Without Borders proclaimed London a “hot spot” for the phenomenon.Although transnational repression is an old practice, it appears to be gaining prevalence. Globalization and the internet have made it easier for exiles to engage in activism, and have also increased autocracies’ desire — and ability — to crack down on political activity in their diasporas.“Everyone is online,” said Dana Moss, a professor at Notre Dame who coedited a recent book about transnational repression. “And we all have tracking devices called smartphones in our pockets.”Is transnational repression on the rise, or does it just feel like that?“This is a very old phenomenon,” said Marlies Glasius, a professor of international relations at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. “We know that the czarist regimes, for instance, kept tabs on Russian dissidents in Paris.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 163 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Bernard Hill, Actor in ‘Titanic’ and ‘Lord of the Rings,’ Dies at 79

      by

      With a stout frame, bushy whiskers and a weathered visage, he embodied men of authority facing down danger with weary stoicism.Bernard Hill, a British actor who incarnated a humble style of masculine leadership in three hugely successful Hollywood movies, “Titanic” and two films in the “Lord of the Rings” franchise, died on Sunday. He was 79.His death was announced in a family statement sent by a representative of Lou Coulson Associates, a British talent agency. It did not say where he died or provide a cause.Mr. Hill drew praise from critics for his work in serious TV dramas, small-budget films and theater. But he was best known for playing the ship’s captain in “Titanic” (1997) and the ruler of a horsemen’s kingdom in the second and third installments of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, “The Two Towers” (2002) and “The Return of the King” (2003).By appearing in “Titanic” and “The Return of the King,” Mr. Hill became the first actor to star in more than one film to gross over $1 billion and the only actor to appear in two of the three films to win a record 11 Oscars (the third is “Ben-Hur”), The Manchester Evening News reported in 2022.In each film, his stout frame, bushy whiskers and weathered visage helped him embody men of authority who faced danger with reluctance, then acceptance and, finally, self-sacrificial stoicism.In “Titanic,” he was Capt. Edward J. Smith. Early in the movie, he grasps the ship’s railing, looks out to sea and instructs one of his crew to increase the ship’s speed: “Let’s stretch her legs,” he declares. The movie ultimately suggests that the undue speed of the ship is a factor in its fatal collision with an iceberg.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Sadiq Khan Heads for 3rd Term as London Mayor

      by

      Initial results showed the mayor, representing the center-left opposition Labour Party, gaining ground against a right-wing rival who focused on crime and cars.Sadiq Khan, the two-term center-left mayor of London, was poised on Saturday to become the first three-time winner of the job by a clearer margin than some of his supporters had predicted.Mr. Khan, from the main opposition Labour Party, was initially elected to the post in 2016, becoming London’s first Muslim mayor, and would now become the first politician to win three consecutive terms since the role was created in 2000.With the Labour Party well ahead in the opinion polls ahead of a looming general election, many analysts had expected Mr. Khan to cruise to a comfortable victory in a city that tends to lean to the left, but some saw the potential for an unexpectedly tight race against Susan Hall, representing Britain’s governing Conservative Party.That prospect quickly faded on Saturday, with Mr. Khan’s party declaring victory and the BBC forecasting him as the winner after results from half of London’s regions showed the mayor exceeding his performance in his last election, in 2021.“Sadiq Khan was absolutely the right candidate,” said Keir Starmer, leader of the Labour Party. “He has got two terms of delivery behind him and I am confident he has got another term of delivery in front of him.”The vote itself took place on Thursday along with other local and mayoral elections in which the Conservatives, led by Britain’s embattled prime minister, Rishi Sunak, suffered a series of setbacks.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      Rishi Sunak’s Dismal Task: Leading U.K. Conservatives to Likely Defeat

      by

      After 14 years of Conservative government, Britain’s voters appear hungry for change. And Prime Minister Rishi Sunak seems unable to persuade them otherwise.A few days before Britain’s Conservative Party suffered a stinging setback in local elections on Thursday, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak recorded a short video to promote some good news from his government. In the eight-second clip, Mr. Sunak poured milk from a pint bottle into a tall glass, filled with a steaming dark beverage and bearing the scribbled figure of 900 pounds on the side.“Pay day is coming,” Mr. Sunak posted, referring to the savings that an average wage earner would supposedly reap from a cut in mandatory contributions to Britain’s national insurance system.The mockery soon started. He’d added too much milk, some said. His numbers didn’t add up, said others. And why, asked one critic, would Mr. Sunak choose a pint bottle as a prop days after the opposition Labour Party’s deputy leader, Angela Rayner, had skewered him in Parliament as a “pint-size loser?”However partisan her jab, loser is a label that Mr. Sunak is finding increasingly hard to shake, even among his members of his own party. In the 18 months since he replaced his failed predecessor, Liz Truss, Mr. Sunak, 43, has lost seven special parliamentary elections and back-to-back local elections.This past week’s local elections, in which the Conservatives lost about 40 percent of the 985 seats they were defending, were merely the latest signpost on what analysts say is a road to thumping defeat in a general election. National polls show the Labour Party leading the Conservatives by more than 20 percentage points, a stubborn gap that the prime minister has been unable to close.The drumbeat of bad news is casting fresh scrutiny on Mr. Sunak’s leadership and the future of his party, which has been in power for 14 years but faces what could be a long stretch in the political wilderness.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      C.J. Sansom, Mystery Novelist Drawn to Tudor England, Dies at 71

      by

      He wrote a popular series of books revolving around a hunchbacked detective, Shardlake, whose troubles echo the author’s experiences of childhood bullying.“Oh, goody! An 800-page novel about the peasant uprisings of 1549!” Marilyn Stasio, the longtime mystery and crime reviewer for The New York Times Book Review, began a column in 2019.It was an assessment of “Tombland,” the seventh work of historical fiction by C.J. Sansom to feature Matthew Shardlake, a hunchbacked lawyer-turned-detective whose exploits solving chilling murders in Tudor England come steeped in suspense and granular historical detail. Readers are made privy to the court intrigues of Thomas Cromwell and King Henry VIII, eavesdrop on women arguing in a market stall, and inhale the stench of London streets.Ms. Stasio’s enthusiasm was real, not snarky. “Sansom describes 16th-century events in the crisply realistic style of someone watching them transpire right outside his window,” she wrote.Mr. Sansom, who earned a Ph.D. in history and a law degree before turning to writing in his late 40s, quickly becoming one of Britain’s most popular historical novelists, died of cancer in hospice care on April 27. He was 71.His death was announced by his publisher, Pan Macmillan, which did not say where he died. In 2012, Mr. Sansom disclosed that he had multiple myeloma, a blood cancer, but said it was in remission after treatment. The disease returned during his work on “Tombland,” forcing him to quit writing for six months. He eventually resumed working two hours a day and finished the book, his last to be published.“Sansom describes 16th-century events in the crisply realistic style of someone watching them transpire right outside his window,” a Times critic wrote in 2019 in reviewing Mr. Sansom’s seventh Shardlake novel. Mulholland BooksWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More