Thursday, June 7, 2018

Six In The Morning Thursday June 7

Trump-Kim summit: Abe heads to US amid surge of diplomacy


Japan's PM Shinzo Abe is set to hold a last-minute meeting with Donald Trump, days before the US president meets North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
Mr Abe's visit is part of a surge of diplomacy ahead of the unprecedented summit on 12 June in Singapore.
Few details of the agenda for the Trump-Kim meeting have been confirmed.
When he meets Mr Trump in Washington on Thursday, Mr Abe is expected to push for Japan's security concerns to be reflected.
Also on Thursday, Singapore's Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan headed to Pyongyang to meet his counterpart Ri Yong-ho.




Nicaragua: how a Sandinista stronghold turned against the president


Graffiti coating signs and billboards on the road to the cradle of Sandinismooffer once unimaginable snubs to the movement’s most celebrated comandante: ‘Despot!’ ‘Murderer!’ ‘Get out Daniel!’ ‘Ortega you are dead!’
Masked rebels toting homemade mortars guard more than a dozen roadblocks that now separate Nicaragua’s capital from Masaya, a storied revolutionary stronghold just 26km south, from which guerrillas launched their final assault on the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza in 1979.
Almost four decades on from that momentous triumph, and with Nicaragua seemingly in the midst of another epochal upheaval, Masaya now has Daniel Ortega in its crosshairs.

Can NATO deter both Russia and radicalization?

Donald Trump wants more counterterrorism action from the alliance. Can NATO deliver? Should it even try? Teri Schultz examines the issues ahead of the July summit.
Donald Trump's constant refrain to European allies to "spend more" on defense is usually accompanied by a demand to "do more" on counterterrorism. And the US president has made clear he's expecting to be served a platter of plumped-up policies at the NATO summit in July. US Ambassador to NATO Kay Bailey Hutchison confirmed Wednesday that's "definitely" something Trump is seeking as a summit "deliverable."
Although it was the terrorist attack on the US on September 11, 2001 that remains the sole time NATO's sacred Article V — collective defense — has ever been invoked, it was only Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea and its brash buildup in eastern Ukraine that galvanized the alliance to dramatically reform and reconfigure itself.

State Department sends personnel for screenings in US after China acoustic incident

Updated 0809 GMT (1609 HKT) June 7, 2018

A number of US personnel in China have been sent back to the United States for further health screenings after concerns over reports of mysterious acoustic incidents similar to the Cuba "sonic attacks."
The US State Department said Wednesday a medical team had been sent to Guangzhou, in southern China, to conduct screenings of all US government employees and family members who asked for them.
"As a result of the screening process so far, the Department has sent a number of individuals for further evaluation and a comprehensive assessment of their symptoms and findings in the United States," State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.

Myanmar, UN sign pact to encourage the return of Rohingya refugees



More than 700,000 Rohingyas, an ethnic minority in Myanmar, have fled the country to escape government persecution since August 2017. On Wednesday, the United Nations and Myanmar signed an agreement that could be the first step toward solving the crisis. 

Myanmar and United Nations agencies signed an agreement Wednesday that could eventually lead to the return of some of the 700,000 Rohingya Muslims who fled brutal persecution by the country's security forces and are now crowded into makeshift camps in Bangladesh.
The memorandum of understanding promises to establish a "framework of cooperation" that aims to create conditions for "voluntary, safe, dignified and sustainable" repatriation of Rohingya refugees but does not address Myanmar's denial of citizenship for the minority.
Myanmar's government said it hoped the pact would hasten repatriation, but rights groups still doubt it will let many Rohingya return or can guarantee the safety of those who do. Myanmar's statement didn't mention Rohingya, reflecting the government and the Burmese majority's insistence there is no such ethnic group in Myanmar. Instead it referred to them as "displaced persons."

Trump, Fox News, and Twitter have created a dangerous conspiracy theory loop

The president tweeted literal “fake news” about the so-called “Spygate” controversy. The story behind the tweet is revealing — and scary.

Late on Tuesday, President Trump tweeted something that’s embarrassing even by his standards: an unfounded conspiracy theory that originated in some of the internet’s worst “fake news” corners.
“Strzok-Page, the incompetent & corrupt FBI lovers, have texts referring to a counter-intelligence operation into the Trump Campaign dating way back to December, 2015,” the president wrote. “SPYGATE is in full force!”
The supposed source for this claim is text messages between two FBI employees, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, who were having an affair during the 2016 campaign. Their text messages reveal that they were openly hostile to Trump and supportive of Hillary Clinton.

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