TV News LIES

The US embassy in London is offering grants of up to half a million dollars for new “public education” programmes in what has been criticised as interference in British domestic politics.

Using language that the pro-Trump Maga movement has sought to appropriate, a funding notice identifies a goal of fostering a “national conversation” about “shared civilizational values” underpinning US-UK ties. Priority will go to applicants aiming to celebrate “freedom of speech” and “limited government”.

It comes after senior Trump officials voiced sharp criticism of British authorities and repeated misinformation on a range of fronts including abortion and digital regulation, and allied with European far-right movements in attacks on hate speech and immigration policies.

The grants appear to be separate from other grants of $12m which the US state department is planning to allocate to organisations in the UK founded by the prominent Conservatives Jacob Rees-Mogg and Toby Young.

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Scammers in New York have been using gold bars to steal money from victims, primarily older adults, and made off with more than $100m over the past two years, the state’s attorney general announced on Friday.

The scheme starts with victims receiving a fake pop-up message that states their computer or financial account has been compromised, the press release stated. The message includes a phone number to call, and when people do, the scammers convince the victims to provide remote access to their computers, which allows them to access their financial information or online bank accounts.

The victims are then directed to someone posing as law enforcement who tells them that their accounts have been compromised. To protect their money, the person says, they must withdraw it and purchase gold bars or coins and then turn them over to the authorities.

The scammers tell the victims not to discuss the breach with anyone and then send couriers to collect the gold.

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Oleksiy Yukov, a Ukrainian known as the "collector of souls" for his decades-long work recovering the remains of soldiers and civilians on the frontlines of war, was honored in Kyiv on Saturday after being killed by a landmine during a recovery mission in the eastern Donetsk region.

Yukov, 40, was killed on Aug. 5 when he stepped on the mine during an effort to exhume a body, according to a social media post by his friend, Serhiy Hnezdilov. "This is a great loss for me personally and for the people close to me," he wrote in a translation published by Kyiv Post. "[H]e gave names back to the dead."

Thousands of Ukrainians paid their respects to Yukov in an Orthodox Christian service in the capital. Before the service in Kyiv, Yukov was mourned and honored in his hometown of Sloviansk in Donetsk province.

Yukov was known for his tireless efforts to bring closure to the families of those killed in the war. In carrying out that task in 2022, he lost an eye and sustained a leg injury in a mine blast, The Associated Press says, but returned to his work even as he was still recovering.

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America's two largest private prison companies, CoreCivic and GEO Group, are reporting a combined $1.4 billion in quarterly revenue over the spring as immigration detention closes in on record levels.

Those revenues announced Thursday do not include net proceeds of $1.6 billion made by CoreCivic after the recent sale of four of their facilities to the Department of Homeland Security. Patrick Swindle, CoreCivic's President and CEO, told investors on an earnings call that that works out to an average rate of $307,000 per bed.

The earnings — from April through June of this year — come as the U.S. is holding almost 66,000 people in immigration detention, nearing record levels not seen since January, according to Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a nonpartisan research center. Both companies say they're also finding other revenue opportunities, like ankle monitors for Haitian immigrants who recently lost their protected immigration status.

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Hawaiian voters go to the polls today to select the Democratic and Republican candidates in the Aloha State’s congressional races this November.

Both Democratic incumbents are seeking reelection, but one faces a progressive challenger who’s hoping left-wing candidates’ success across the country this year comes to the Aloha State. Meanwhile, Republicans already have presumptive nominees in both races, with only one candidate running in each race.

In the First Congressional District, four-term Rep. Ed Case, a Blue Dog Democrat backed by AIPAC, is hoping to fend off a primary challenge from state Sen. Jarrett Keohokalole, who has the backing of progressive groups such as Our Revolution and internet personality Ms. Rachel.

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The Senate confirmed Todd Blanche as attorney general in a vote early Saturday morning, cementing President Donald Trump's former personal attorney's command of a Justice Department the Republican president has sought to bend to his will.

The Republican-led Senate voted 50-49 to make Blanche the second confirmed attorney general since Trump returned to the White House last year with a stated desire to use the law enforcement agency to investigate his political enemies. While Blanche has already been leading the department in an acting capacity, his confirmation could free him to pursue the Trump administration's agenda even more aggressively.

Blanche said on social media that he was "deeply honored by the trust and confidence President Trump has placed in me," adding that he was "grateful" to senators for working late to confirm him.

The vote followed a tumultuous confirmation fight that exposed deep concerns — from some Republicans as well as Democrats — about installing Trump's close ally atop a Justice Department that historically prided itself on its independence from the White House.

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On February 20, 2015, an official of the United Nations Population Fund sent two Israeli diplomats an email containing a confidential report about a trip two weeks earlier to Washington, D.C. by Zeid Ra’ad Al-Hussein, then the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

“For your eyes only. Do not forward,” Yahav Lichner wrote to then-Israeli Ambassador to the UN Ron Prosor and diplomat Ronny Leshno-Yaar in a meshttps://www.dropsitenews.com/p/for-your-eyes-only-israels-mole-insidesage sent from Lichner’s personal email account, describing the report as a “classified internal summary of Zeid’s meetings in Washington.”

The meetings came at a time when Israel was facing an independent commission inquiry by the UN Human Rights Council over its conduct during the 2014 military offensive against the Gaza Strip.

The document recorded private meetings that Al-Hussein held with White House officials, senators, congressional appropriations staff, AIPAC, J Street, and human rights organizations.

It also revealed a concern inside Al-Hussein’s office: that congressional anger over the UN inquiry could threaten American funding for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). Lichner added that Al-Hussein had met with members of Congress including “our friend,” the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, adding that Al-Hussein was “trying to do damage control and distance himself from the report.”

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International law professor William Schabas has expressed his concern over the independence of the next prosecutor of the International Criminal Court following the controversial removal of Karim Khan by member states after an 18-month long misconduct probe. 

The Assembly of States Parties (ASP), the ICC’s governing body, voted on 24 July to dismiss Khan after deciding that "the elected official... committed serious misconduct and a serious breach of duty" by engaging in "prohibited conduct against a subordinate staff member".

The opinion was contrary to the conclusion reached by the judicial process established by the bureau - the executive body of the ASP - to make a legal determination on a United Nations fact-finding investigation that outlined the evidence from the complainant, Khan and more than 30 witnesses.

In March, the panel of three judges appointed by the bureau concluded unanimously that the facts presented in the UN probe did not establish any wrongdoing under the relevant legal framework.

The July removal vote was based on the recommendation of the 21-member ASP bureau a month earlier that effectively disregarded the judges' panel opinion, finding instead that Khan committed “serious misconduct” by engaging in a sexual relationship with a subordinate. Khan has denied any wrongdoing.

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