LONDON — Boris Johnson was heckled by protestors at Britain’s COVID-19 inquiry as he said he was “deeply sorry” for mistakes made by his government during the pandemic. Moments after the former prime minister was sworn in at the Paddington inquiry center, he started to apologize for the “pain, loss and suffering” that occurred during the coronavirus pandemic. But he was quickly interrupted by the inquiry’s chair Heather Hallett, who had ordered protesters in the public gallery to sit down. After they refused to do so, four protesters — who were quiet, but holding signs aimed at Johnson — were ..read more

The United States’ ambassador to Hungary sharply criticized Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán for disregarding the country’s alliance with NATO, describing him as a leader who “embraces” Russian President Vladimir Putin. Ambassador David Pressman said Hungary “relies upon its NATO allies but feels comfortable disregarding the interests of those same allies and our alliance, including during a time of war in Europe,” while speaking to a gathering of business leaders at an American Chamber of Commerce event Tuesday night in Budapest. “That disregard is evident when the [Hungarian] prime mini ..read more

Oil tankers, golf buddies and explosives: Qatargate suspect’s side hustle Even as he allegedly worked for Qatar and Morocco, Francesco Giorgi was looking for other options. By ELISA BRAUN, GIAN VOLPICELLI and EDDY WAX in Brussels BRUSSELS — As a business deal, it was liable to blow up. Literally. One of the key suspects in the Qatargate corruption scandal tried to source explosive materials for Mauritania’s national mining company in the hope of getting a cut of the transaction.  Details of the venture appear in a cache of leaked documents from the police investigation into the bigge ..read more

French companies keen to be at the forefront of artificial intelligence — and to rein in European Union regulatory ambitions — have a surprising opponent: the European Commission’s self-styled digital enforcer and über-Frenchman Thierry Breton.  Speaking before an audience of startups and tech investors in Marseille in late November, the EU’s internal market chief called out the French AI hopefuls who are lobbying to erode the EU’s landmark Artificial Intelligence Act.  Breton singled out Mistral — a French AI startup backed by prestigious Silicon Valley investors — putting it in the ..read more

Donald Trump said Tuesday he will only be a dictator “on day one” if he returns to office in 2025. In a town hall with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, the former president was pressed on whether he would disavow taking retributive action against all his enemies if he reentered the Oval Office. He initially shied away from responding, but when asked a second time said he would only be a dictator on the first day of his second term. He emphasized that it would be for two specific issues. “I want to close the border and I want to drill, drill, drill,” Trump said. “Other than that, I am not a dictator.” T ..read more

Developing new treatments is a lengthy, complex and high-risk process – it takes 10-15 years and costs, on average, over €1-2 billion1 to bring a new treatment to the market, and roughly 90 percent of compounds fail in clinical trials.2 But scientific and technological progress is yielding innovative treatments for patients at a faster pace than ever before.3 So, to ensure that groundbreaking science, such as cell and gene therapy, stays in Europe where patients can quickly benefit from it, we need strong and predictable intellectual property (IP) and regulatory incentives, which attract R& ..read more

LONDON — As David Cameron heads to Washington this week for his first big speech back on the world stage, his bête noire Boris Johnson will be sat in a dingy room in west London. Johnson is to give two days of televised testimony before Britain’s COVID-19 inquiry, answering a barrage of questions under oath about decisions he took while prime minister in 2020 and 2021 which — many believe — cost thousands of people their lives. As Johnson battles to salvage his battered reputation, Cameron will be strutting through America in a ministerial motorcade, glad-handing Washington’s power player ..read more

Something is rotten in the imperial court of Chairman Xi Jinping.  While the world is distracted by war in the Middle East and Ukraine, a Stalin-like purge is sweeping through China’s ultra-secretive political system, with profound implications for the global economy and even the prospects for peace in the region. The signals emanating from Beijing are unmistakable, even as China’s security services have ramped up repression to totalitarian levels, making it almost impossible to know what is really happening inside the country. The unexplained disappearance and removal of China’s foreign ..read more

BRUSSELS — The EU’s two leaders are expected on Thursday to push China’s President Xi Jinping to take action to curb exports of dual-use goods by Chinese companies to Russia, including a veiled threat of sanctions absent fresh commitments from Beijing, according to five EU officials and diplomats. “We’re very concerned about circumvention of sanctions … And we would like China to take care of some of the entities that are circumventing our sanctions,” a senior EU official said on Tuesday. “The preferred option is that China deals with [the problem] themselves — but we have tools to deal with i ..read more

DUBLIN — In Ireland’s constitution, a woman’s place is in the home — but not for much longer. The Irish government on Tuesday announced long-awaited plans to drop the sexism from Ireland’s constitution, which declares that women shouldn’t be expected “to engage in labour to the neglect of their duties in the home.” It also describes “the common good” as dependent on defending women’s “life within the home.” When Irish leader Eamon de Valera drafted that 1937 constitution in close consultation with the Roman Catholic hierarchy, he sought to shape a nation fit for what he called, in his most fam ..read more