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Every weekend, Asia Pacific Daily will provide you with a run-down of the latest hot news.
This week, the following hot news you should know:
Top 1 | Democrats win meager GOP support for post-Trump effort to shield inspectors general
The House passed a comprehensive package of reforms Tuesday to protect inspectors general from being fired or otherwise prevented from doing their jobs, a measure inspired by former president Donald Trump’s pattern of ousting the agency watchdogs who challenged him.
The 221-to-182 vote fell almost completely along party lines, heralding a long and difficult road ahead for congressional Democrats as they attempt a variety of initiatives to prevent future presidents from silencing their critics and punishing their enemies with as much impunity as Trump did.
Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.), chairwoman of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, summarized the package Tuesday as an effort to “protect IGs from being fired simply for doing their jobs” and a needed antidote to how “the previous administration bullied, sidelined and retaliated against multiple IGs.”
Top 2 | Britain working with EU countries as momentum grows for wider travel reopening
Britain is working with countries across the European Union to encourage them to accept its fully vaccinated travellers, its business minister said on Thursday, as momentum builds for a fuller reopening of travel from the United Kingdom.
Throughout May and June Britain has only permitted very limited quarantine-free travel, but the government has said that it will set out details this month of plans to allow fully vaccinated people avoid self-isolation on return from top destinations like Spain and France.
That rule change will come in by July 26, the first full week of the school holidays, The Times newspaper reported.
However, travel for those from Britain will also depend on countries allowing them in, and concern about a rise in the UK's COVID cases sparked by the Delta variant has prompted Italy, Portugal and Spain to tighten their entry requirements.
Top 3 | NYC mayoral race: Board of Elections throws mayoral primary into chaos by counting test ballots
The campaign to become New York City's next mayor has come in for another twist.
On Tuesday, the City Board of Elections released new numbers that suggested Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams' lead in the Democratic primary had narrowed in the first set of tabulated ranked-choice voting results. Former Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia, in this preliminary count, had nearly closed the gap, giving Adams a two-point lead.
But within hours of the new figures coming online, the board backtracked -- following questions from the Adams campaign and others -- and acknowledged a "discrepancy" in its counting process. It subsequently removed the data from its website. Late Tuesday night, the body put out another statement, this time revealing it had mistakenly included 135,000 test vote records in the initial tally. The count will be re-run once the slate is cleared.
Top 4 | Australia deputy leader fined for not wearing mask in breach of COVID-19 rules
Australia's deputy prime minister was fined for failing to wear a mask in a service station in violation of COVID-19 prevention orders, the authorities said on Tuesday, the country's most powerful person to face repercussions for non-compliance.
Barnaby Joyce, who returned as leader of the Nationals coalition partner a week earlier, was spotted by a member of the public paying for fuel without a mask in his electorate about 500 km (310 miles) north of Sydney on Monday, the police said.
The person called Crime Stoppers, an emergency hotline, and officers went to the service station where "inquiries revealed a 54-year-old man was not wearing a face mask while in the store", New South Wales state police said in a statement.
Top 5 | Hopes fade for scores missing under Florida condo rubble as search enters 6th day
Search-and-rescue operations stretched into a sixth day on Tuesday at the site of a partly collapsed Florida condominium complex where at least 11 people were killed and another 150 were missing and feared dead.
With hopes fading by the hour of pulling anyone else alive from the rubble left when nearly half the 12-floor, 156-unit tower abruptly caved in on itself, authorities held out the possibility that survivors might yet be found.
Families of the 150 still missing were "coping with the news that they might not have loved ones come out alive and still hoping that they will," Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine told reporters on Monday evening.
Top 6 | Mexico decriminalizes recreational use of cannabis
Mexico's Supreme Court struck down laws which criminalized the recreational use of cannabis on Monday evening.
The decisive 8-3 ruling comes after advocates pushed for decriminalization as a means to reduce drug-fueled cartel violence in the country.
The court declared the prohibition of cannabis unconstitutional in 2018, leading lawmakers to move forward on passing a bill.
However, after a bill signed by Mexico's president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador struggled to make it through Congress deliberations weeks after the set deadline, the court moved to vote.
Top 7 | Trump Organisation's Lawyers Face Deadline to Dissuade NY Prosecutors From Criminal Charges: Report
In May, the New York Attorney General's office informed the Trump Organisation that its investigation into the latter's affairs is no longer "purely civil", but criminal.
Former US President Donald Trump's lawyers have 24 hours to respond to New York prosecutors' demands and say why criminal charges should not be filed against the Trump Organisation, The Washington Post cited two unnamed sources as saying on Sunday.
The sources described the deadline as "another strong signal that Manhattan District Attorney (DA) Cyrus Vance and New York Attorney General (AG) Letitia James are considering criminal charges against the company as an entity".
This followed The New York Times reporting on Friday that Vance may announce charges against the Trump Organisation and its CFO Allen Weisselberg in the next seven days.
Top 8 | Iran says nuclear site images won't be given to IAEA as deal has expired
The speaker of Iran's parliament said on Sunday Tehran will never hand over images from inside of some Iranian nuclear sites to the U.N. nuclear watchdog as a monitoring agreement with the agency had expired, Iranian state media reported.
"The agreement has expired ... any of the information recorded will never be given to the International Atomic Energy Agency and the data and images will remain in the possession of Iran," said Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf.
The announcement could further complicate talks between Iran and six major powers on reviving a 2015 nuclear deal. Three years ago then U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from the pact and reimposed crippling sanctions on Tehran; Iran reacted by violating many of the deal's restrictions on its nuclear programme.
The IAEA and Tehran struck the three-month monitoring agreement in February to cushion the blow of Iran reducing its cooperation with the agency, and it allowed monitoring of some activities that would otherwise have been axed to continue.
Top 9 | UK government to probe leak of Hancock footage
Britain's government will investigate how footage of former minister Matt Hancock kissing his aide found its way into the media and forced his resignation, in the latest scandal to hit Prime Minister Boris Johnson's government.
After first rejecting calls for Hancock to be sacked or resign as health minister after pictures were published of him embracing a woman he had appointed to a taxpayer-funded role, Johnson accepted his decision to step down on Saturday.
The departure puts pressure on Johnson's government, which has overseen one of the highest official death tolls from the COVID-19 pandemic and was criticised for its early handling - led by Hancock - of the crisis.
A report by the BBC that sensitive documents from the defence ministry were found by a member of the public at a bus stop did little to dispel a feeling of chaos at the heart of government. The ministry said it was investigating the incident.
Top 10 | Brexit: EU women fear losing jobs and housing over UK computer glitch
Women who applied for EU settled status in the UK under their married names may struggle to access jobs and housing because of a government computer anomaly, it has emerged.
Many have been left unable to prove their status to councils and employers because they have been wrongly registered to the EU settlement scheme (EUSS) in their birth names.
There are fears that this could leave them in legal limbo from 1 July, when EU nationals have to prove they have been granted settled status in order to rent property, access banking services or claim benefits.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
