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Overnight News Digest: King warmly welcomes PM Carney to Buckingham Palace [1]
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Date: 2025-03-17
BBC
King Charles gave a warm welcome to the new Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney when he visited Buckingham Palace. It was another symbolic gesture of support for Canada from a King, wearing a red tie, who has to send coded signals rather than spell things out in words, as Canada faces threats from US President Donald Trump. But the King has sought to make clear his commitment to Canada - and if it had not been for his cancer diagnosis, the BBC understands he would have travelled there for an intended visit in 2024. There are also suggestions that once Canada's election is out the way, a visit to Canada will be a priority, where he can further demonstrate his support. The new Canadian prime minister told the King that his Order of Canada pin had broken this morning. The King joked: "Do you want another one?" "There's much to catch up on," said the King, ushering Carney to a seat, and perhaps hoping that the broken pin was not a symbol of a Commonwealth relationship under strain.
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Deutsche Welle
The North Macedonian Interior Ministry on Monday said more than 20 people faced investigation after a fire that swept through a nightclub, killing dozens. At least 59 people died as a result of the blaze that started when stage pyrotechnics set fire to a patch of ceiling at a club that prosecutors say was in breach of several fire regulations. What is being investigated? State prosecutor Ljupco Kocevski said a preliminary inspection of the nightclub in the northern town of Kocani had revealed a succession of safety code violations. "It did not have two exit doors, but only one single improvised metal door at the back of the building, which was locked and without a handle on the inside," Kocevski said. There was said to be an insufficient number of fire extinguishers and insufficient emergency vehicle access. The blaze caused the roof of the single-story building, a former carpet warehouse, to partially collapse. "The omissions are significant. I can confidently say that this is a failure of the system," the prosecutor told reporters. He also highlighted the lack of an overhead extinguisher system and fire alarms as well as the use of flammable materials to line the inside walls.
Al Jazeera
Thatta, Pakistan – On a sunny afternoon at Dando Jetty, a small fishing village in Pakistan’s sprawling Indus Delta, a boat is being unloaded and another is about to leave for the Arabian Sea. The melodious voice of Sindhi folk singer Fouzia Soomro rises from a loudspeaker playing on a nearby parked boat. About 130km (81 miles) from Pakistan’s largest city of Karachi, Dando Jetty sits on the bank of Khobar Creek, one of the two surviving creeks of the Indus River in Thatta, a coastal district in the eastern Sindh province. “There should be freshwater in this creek, flowing into the sea,” Zahid Sakani tells Al Jazeera as he embarks on a boat to visit his ancestral village, Haji Qadir Bux Sakani, in Kharo Chan, a sub-district of Thatta, three hours away. “Instead, it’s seawater.”
The Guardian, Europe
Lithuanian prosecutors have blamed the Russian military intelligence service for being behind an arson attack on an Ikea store in Vilnius last year, calling it “an act of terrorism”. Lithuania, a Nato member, has been a staunch ally of Ukraine since Moscow invaded in February 2022, and has frequently warned of Russian sabotage attempts. On Monday, the Lithuanian prosecutor general’s office attributed the arson attack in Vilnius in May 2024 to Russia’s military intelligence agency, the GRU. There were no casualties, but the prosecutor Arturas Urbelis told reporters: “We regard this act as an act of terrorism with serious consequences.” Two Ukrainian citizens were suspects in the Ikea arson case, with one being detained in Lithuania and the other in Poland, he added.
The Guardian, UK
The former Bank of England deputy governor Charlie Bean has warned the chancellor against making kneejerk cuts in next week’s spring statement to try to hit fiscal targets that are five years away. Rachel Reeves is preparing to slash spending, including on disability benefits, in response to weaker forecasts from the independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) – prompting a backlash from within her own party. But Bean – who is also a former member of the OBR’s budget responsibility committee, which agrees the forecasts – warned the chancellor against “fine-tuning”. “We’ve got ourselves into a frankly pretty ridiculous position where we’re doing fiscal fine-tuning to control the OBR forecast five years ahead,” Bean told an event hosted by the Resolution Foundation thinktank on Monday. “The OBR forecast embodies all sorts of adjustments, judgments – it’s pretty flaky,” he said. “People who do the forecasts understand the uncertainty.”
The Guardian, International
Japan is planning to deploy long-range missiles on its southern island of Kyushu amid concerns around the Trump administration’s stance towards its security pacts and continuing regional tensions. The missiles, with a range of about 1,000km, would be capable of hitting targets in North Korea and China’s coastal regions, and are due to be deployed next year in two bases with existing missile garrisons. They would bolster the defences of the strategically important Okinawa island chain and are part of Japan’s development of “counterstrike capabilities” in the event it is attacked, according to reports from Kyodo News agency, citing government sources. Deployment of long-range missiles on the Okinawa islands, which stretch to within 110km of Taiwan, is unlikely to happen, to avoid provoking China . The islands already house a number of missiles batteries with shorter ranges.
Reuters
Elon Musk’s EV company is struggling as he plunges into politics. Robyn Denholm, the Australian chair of Tesla, is thriving after cashing in half a billion dollars of the stock. Investors are clamoring for her to rein in the world’s richest man – but some question whether she has the independence to do so. SYDNEY - Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk is drawing political flak as he champions right-wing causes in Europe and leads President Donald Trump’s slashing of the U.S. federal workforce. The controversy is pummeling sales at Tesla, the electric-vehicle giant Musk runs. Its stock has plunged – down 15% on March 10 alone – and investors are yelping in pain. Sixteen time zones away, the woman who ostensibly supervises CEO Musk is faring well: Robyn Denholm, hand-picked by Musk to run Tesla’s board, is the best-paid chair at any public company in the U.S. The Australian businesswoman has been so richly compensated as Tesla chair that a shareholder lawsuit recently forced her to return part of her fortune. In a separate and ongoing case, a Delaware judge criticized Denholm for okaying a payout for Musk that, if approved by a higher court, would set a record for CEO compensation: $56 billion.
BBC
Rwanda has cut diplomatic ties with Belgium, saying it has been "consistently undermined" by the European nation during the ongoing conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Brussels has been leading calls for European nations to sanction Rwanda over its support for the M23, a rebel group at the centre of DR Congo's crisis. The authorities in Kigali, Rwanda's capital, have given Belgian diplomats 48 hours to leave the country. Belgium, which is the former colonial power, has said it will respond to these measures and labelled Rwanda's decision "disproportionate".
NPR
A federal judge Monday ordered the U.S. Justice Department to provide a sworn declaration by noon Tuesday with details on how plane-loads of alleged members of Tren de Aragua were deported despite his order to turn the planes around. The hearing on Monday centered on whether the government complied with Judge James Boasberg's temporary restraining order including a debate about when exactly the order was issued and where U.S. custody over deportees ends. Also discussed: whether an oral order versus a written order holds the same weight when it comes to restraining government action.
Reuters
TORONTO, March 17 (Reuters) - Toronto is no longer providing financial incentives for Tesla (TSLA.O) , opens new tab vehicles purchased as taxis or ride shares due to trade tensions with the United States, the city's mayor, Olivia Chow, said on Monday. But as of March 1, Tesla vehicles are no longer eligible for the incentives, Chow said at a news conference. "The vehicles for hire, like taxis, will have to find a different kind of car," she told Reuters after the news conference. "There are other electric cars they could purchase." The exclusion will continue until trade issues with the U.S. are resolved, she said. Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The city is promoting the adoption of electric vehicles purchased as vehicles for hire by giving drivers and owners a reduction in licensing fees and renewal fees until the end of 2029, to help it lower emissions.
Deutsche Welle
On March 13, leaders of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) regional bloc signaled the end of its peacekeeping mandate in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) following the killing of more than a dozen peacekeepers by M23 rebels in January. The country had been relying on the SADC Mission in the DRC, known as SAMIDRC, to neutralize the M23 rebel group in the country's conflict-hit east. The bloc's decision to pull its mission came one day after mediators in Angola set a new round of peace talks between Congo and the Rwanda-backed rebel group. What happens to peacekeeping in Congo now? SAMIDRC had taken over from an East African Community (EAC) deployment and the United Nations Force Intervention Brigade, which had been in Congo for over two decades.
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