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Former Former Office chief Sir Olly Robbins is expected to be grilled by the Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday.
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The decision to send Peter Mandelson to Washington has become a scandal that just won't go away for Labour.
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It's emerged that Lord Mandelson did not pass inital security vetting checks ahead of taking up the role of ambassador to the United States.
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Political correspondent Harry Farley reports as new information emerges about the former US ambassador's appointment to the role.
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After the first round of ceasefire negotiations in Pakistan collapsed over the weekend, we speak to two former nuclear negotiators about prospects for ending the ongoing U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, including what another nuclear deal might look like. Robert Malley, a U.S. negotiator for the 2015 nuclear deal (which President Trump withdrew from in his first term), says Trump's "mercurial" behavior makes it difficult to predict his objectives and the course of any future talks. "Iran was in full compliance with the JCPOA" and was blindsided by the U.S.'s decision to pull out of the deal, says Seyed Hossein Mousavian, who served as spokesperson for Iran's nuclear negotiation team from 2003 to 2005. Now its leaders "don't know whether the U.S. is really for diplomacy or not."
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The U.S.-Israeli war on Iran has now entered its fourth week. The de facto closure of the Strait of Hormuz by Iranian forces is being felt worldwide, as shipments of oil, natural gas and fertilizer have been drastically curtailed. A fifth of the world's oil supply transits through the strait, and the price of oil is up by about 50% since the war began in late February.
On Saturday evening, President Trump threatened Iran on social media, saying he would "obliterate their various power plants, starting with the biggest one first," if the Strait of Hormuz was not fully reopened within 48 hours. He later extended his deadline by five days following Iranian threats to destroy essential infrastructure, including energy and water systems, across the Gulf. Iran has denied reports of direct or indirect talks with the U.S.
If Iran can keep the Strait of Hormuz closed and "hold Washington to ransom," it will have significant leverage, says Alfred McCoy, professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "In a strategic analysis, Iran right now is in the dominant position."
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 CNNCNN anchor Anderson Cooper was flabbergasted Wednesday by a surrogate's defense of Donald Trump, calling his explanation for the former president's bombastic statements literal "bulls---."
On AC360, former California Lieutenant Gov. Abel Maldonado, a Republican, said that Trump's recent comments calling for the military to "handle" Democrats were simply his way of expressing his inner New Yorker. "He's a fighter," Maldonado added.
The conversation began when Cooper brought up Trump's former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley, who, alongside other military leaders, have begun to warn of the dangers of re-electing the former president. Milley has called Trump a "fascist to his core."
Read more at The Daily Beast.
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