Grand jury used in Trump-Russia investigation
The special counsel investigating claims of Russian meddling in the US election has begun using a grand jury in Washington, reports say.
The move suggests Robert Mueller may be taking a more aggressive approach to gathering data on possible collusion with Donald Trump's campaign team.
Grand juries are used to issue subpoenas to compel people to testify.
The president has again poured scorn on the inquiry, telling a rally in West Virginia it was a "total fabrication".
What is a grand jury?
In the US, grand juries are composed of members of the public who hear evidence in secret.
Prosecutors use them to gather evidence, as they can compel people to testify or hand over documentation.
South Korea spy agency admits trying to rig 2012 presidential election
National Intelligence Service says it mobilised cyberwarfare experts to ensure Park Geun-hye beat rival and now president Moon Jae-in
South Korea’s spy agency has admitted it conducted an illicit campaign to influence the country’s 2012 presidential election, mobilising teams of experts in psychological warfare to ensure that the conservative candidate, Park Geun-hye, beat her liberal rival.
An internal investigation by the powerful National Intelligence Service also revealed attempts by its former director and other senior officials to influence voters during parliamentary elections under Park’s predecessor, the hardline rightwinger Lee Myung-bak.
Claims, now confirmed by the service, that it was behind an aggressive online campaign to sway voters is certain to add to public anger towards South Korea’s political system.
When you watch Dunkirk, remember that it’s a whitewashed version which ignores the bravery of black and Muslim soldiers
Even in this early stage of the Second World War, ethnic minority British citizens did show enormous courage – one of the bravest ARP men during the Blitz was black, although we have yet to see a film about him
In my mother’s family scrapbook, there is a tiny box camera snapshot of a very young Robert staring at the Luftwaffe-smashed “mole” leading out to sea from the port of Boulogne – sixteen years after British troops evacuated under fire in May 1940 as their comrades stood on the beaches of neighbouring Dunkirk. In the photograph, the right-hand side of the Boulogne jetty remains, in dilapidated, post-war France, just as it was when British soldiers scrambled aboard the last ships to Britain, the concrete, right-hand side of the mole collapsed into the sea, just a few old hawsers showing where it stood.
I remember that when our car ferry docked from Dover, passengers still had to “walk the plank” across a bridge of duckboards suspended above the water with ropes on each side to cling onto above another bombed-out part of the jetty. A day later, my father drove our Austin up to Dunkirk to see the famous beaches. It was a grey, cold day and the sand was grey and there was some unrecognisable, rusting junk along the promenade and several of the old beach hotels were still under repair. That was it. History had passed this way and the Brits had returned to other beaches 250 miles further west four years later and Hitler killed himself and we dropped atoms bombs on Japan and, by the time I reached Dunkirk, we’d lost soldiers in Korea and the poor old French were just starting their doomed war to hold onto Algeria.
A spectacular research project has commenced in Greenland: Scientists are drilling core samples from a huge ice stream. They want to examine its stability -- and how it could affect global sea levels.
A Report from the Greenland Ice Sheet By Christoph Seidler
A River of Ice
Chapter 1: A Strange River
It seems like an absurd idea that we are standing on a river right now. There is white in every single direction, only the sky above us is steel blue. At least today. There are days, though, when everything is white. These are the days when one cannot distinguish where the ground ends and the sky begins. That's what they call a whiteout around here. When it happens, there's nothing to stop the wind from whipping the snow over Greenland's ice shield and you can't even see your hands in front of your face.
Fortunately, there's no whiteout today. But you still can't recognize that this is a river. There are three reasons for this. First, it's so gigantic that you can't even grasp its dimensions - features like river banks are nowhere to be seen. Second, the river doesn't appear to flow at all. Third, the river water is frozen.
Rwandans set to choose prosperity over human rights in 'formality' presidential poll
More than 6 million voters are registered to cast their ballots in Rwanda Friday in a presidential election that incumbent longtime leader Paul Kagame is widely expected to win.
Ever since the 1994 Rwandan genocide saw him sweep into the capital, Kigali, at the head of a disciplined fighting force, Kagame has dominated his country’s political scene and never lost an election – or, for that matter, received less than 90 percent of the vote.
In the 2010 election, he won 93 percent of the vote -- down from the 2003 poll tally of 98 percent.
Kagame himself believes the outcome of Friday’s vote is a foregone conclusion. At a campaign rally in July, Kagame told tens of thousands of his supporters that: “The day of the presidential election, August the 4th, this is just a formality.”
EPA STAFFERS ARE spending their days addressing an industry wish list of changes to environmental law, according to Elizabeth Southerland, a former senior agency official who issued a scathing public farewell message when she ended her 30-year career there on Monday.
Southerland, who most recently served as director of science and technology in the EPA’s Office of Water, said that agency staffers were now devoted to regulatory rollback based on the requests from industry. Companies and trade groups have directly asked EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt for some changes. Other requests have come in through public comments in response to executive order 13777, which the White House issued in February. That executive order directed federal agencies including the EPA to suggest regulations to be changed, repealed, or replaced.
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