Sinosphere Blog: National Goals Still Murky After Zhejiang Church Razings

Ahead of the one-year anniversary of King Charles III’s coronation on May 6, the royal family has announced which causes will still receive royal patronages from the King, his wife, Queen Camilla, and other royals, who are taking on some of the late Queen Elizabeth II’s causes. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The tradition of patronages, where a royal supports charities, military associations, professional bodies, or public service organizations, dates back to the reign of George II in the 1700s, according to the royal family’s social media.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Canadian police said they arrested three suspects Friday in the slaying of a Sikh separatist leader last June that became the center of a diplomatic spat with India, and are investigating possible ties between the detainees and the Indian government. Three Indian nationals in their 20s identified as Kamalpreet Singh, Karan Brar and Karampreet Singh were arrested in Edmonton, Alberta on Friday morning in the slaying of 45-year-old Hardeep Singh Nijjar by masked gunmen outside Vancouver, police said. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sparked a diplomatic feud with India in September when he said that there were “credible allegations” of Indian involvement in the slaying of Nijjar. India had accused Nijjar of links to terrorism, but angrily denied involvement in the slaying.

WASHINGTON — A top U. N. official said Friday that hard-hit northern Gaza was now in “full-blown famine” after more than six months of war between Israel and Hamas and severe Israeli restrictions on food deliveries to the Palestinian territory. Cindy McCain, the American director of the U. N. World Food Program, became the most prominent international official so far to declare that trapped civilians in the most cut-off part of Gaza had gone over the brink into famine. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] “It’s horror,” McCain told NBC’s “Meet the Press” in an interview to air Sunday.

Chants of “disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest” are reverberating across the globe as student-led protests in support of Palestine have popped up outside the U. S. and in countries like Australia, Mexico, and the U. K. as the Israel-Hamas war enters into its seventh month.

LONDON — Britain’s governing Conservative Party is suffering heavy losses as an array of election results pour in Friday, piling pressure on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak ahead of a U. K. general election in which the main opposition Labour Party appears increasingly likely to return to power after 14 years. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Labour won control of councils in England it hasn’t held for decades and was successful in a special by-election for Parliament that, if repeated in a general election in coming months, would lead to one of the Conservatives′ biggest-ever defeats. The only negative so far for Labour has been in some areas with large Muslim populations, such as Oldham in northwest England, where the party’s candidates appear to have suffered as a result of leader Keir Starmer ‘s strongly pro-Israel stance in the conflict in Gaza. Perhaps most important in the context of the looming general election, which has to take place by January but could come as soon as next month, Labour easily won back Blackpool South in the northwest of England that went Conservative in the last general election in 2019, when then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson won a big victory.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin met Thursday with his counterparts from Australia, Japan and the Philippines as the U. S. deepens ties with an emerging regional group that Pentagon officials have privately nicknamed, the “Squad.” The quadrilateral grouping is one of a number of regional partnerships that Washington has used to push back against China’s assertiveness in Asia.