Section: Independent Online (South Africa)
Donald Trump hires OJ Simpson’s lawyer to fight impeachment
London – The lawyer who got OJ Simpson off murder charges will defend Donald Trump at his impeachment trial, it was announced on Friday night. Alan Dershowitz will be joined in a new legal “Dream Team” by Ken Starr, the lawyer whose investigation of Bill Clinton over his affair with Monica Lewinsky led to the last presidential...
Pompeo says he has a duty to investigate alleged threats to envoy in Ukraine
Washington — Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday broke nearly 72 hours of silence over alleged surveillance and threats to the former US ambassador to Ukraine, saying he believed the allegations would prove to be wrong but that he had an obligation to evaluate and investigate the matter. In interviews with conservative radio hosts, Pompeo...
Khamenei says Iran delivered a ‘slap’ to America’s superpower image, calls Trump a ‘clown’
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Iran had delivered a “slap to the U.S.’s image as a superpower” in this month’s military confrontation, seeking to rally Iranians around an embattled establishment as he led Friday prayers in Tehran for the first time in eight years. His speech came amid unprecedented...
Iran can take fight beyond its borders, Khamenei says after US strike
Dubai – The Revolutionary Guards can take their fight beyond Iran’s borders, the supreme leader said on Friday, responding to the U.S. killing of a top general and to unrest at home over the accidental downing of an airliner. In his first Friday prayers sermon in eight years, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also told thousands of Iranians who...
How Putin is laying the groundwork to keep his grip on Russia’s autocracy
In 1999, Russia’s president Boris Yeltsin appointed a competent, little-known security official named Vladimir Putin as acting prime minister, before steering him into the presidency. Here, Yeltsin thought, was a loyalist who would protect him and his family from prosecution but also safeguard Yeltsin’s legacy – a Russia that...
Oleksiy Honcharuk offers to resign after tape suggests he criticised President Volodymyr Zelenskiy
Kiev – Ukraine’s prime minister Oleksiy Honcharuk submitted his resignation on Friday after an audio recording suggested he had criticised the president, but then appeared to suggest in comments to Reuters that he might stay in his job. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy will consider the resignation letter later on Friday, the...
Trump impeachment trial opens as watchdog faults White House on Ukraine
Washington – The Senate impeachment trial on whether to remove US President Donald Trump from office formally began on Thursday even as a congressional watchdog found that the White House broke the law by withholding security aid for Ukraine approved by Congress. The assessment from the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office (GAO) was...
Trump impeachment trial: White House faulted on Ukraine aid freeze
Washington – As the Senate formally opened the impeachment trial on whether to remove Donald Trump from office, a nonpartisan congressional watchdog on Thursday dealt the Republican president a blow by concluding that the White House violated the law by withholding security aid approved for Ukraine by U.S. lawmakers. Democrat Adam Schiff,...
The link between Trump’s impeachment trial and US democracy
It’s a busy time for US legal academics visiting South African universities. Faculty colleagues and students ask what will happen in the US Senate when the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump starts later this week or next. Presidential impeachment law is a pretty specialised area of research. It’s only happened twice before...
WATCH: With pomp and circumstance, House Democrats deliver impeachment articles to the Senate
Washington – After weeks of rhetorical fire and fury, a handful of US House members walked quietly across a hushed Capitol on Wednesday to deliver articles of impeachment to the Senate, paving the way for the trial of President Donald Trump. Led by the House of Representatives’ sergeant at arms and the House clerk carrying the...
