News in Brief --(27-01-2018)
Saturday, 27 January 2018
Ousted Thai party protests election delay
BANGKOK, Jan 26: Thailand's former ruling party on Friday slammed the junta's latest postponement of elections until 2019, accusing the generals of buying time to consolidate support ahead of a return to voting. The junta has delayed several poll dates since toppling the elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra in 2014 and instituting a ban on all political activity. Late Thursday, the military government's rubber-stamp parliament voted to change an election law and pave the way for polls to be pushed back from the junta's previously-stated timetable of November 2018. — AFP
E Timor dissolves parliament
DILI, East Timor, Jan 26: East Timor is set to hold fresh elections after president Francisco Guterres dissolved parliament Friday, ending a months-long political impasse that plunged Asia's youngest democracy into a post-election stalemate. Fighting among lawmakers paralysed the former Portuguese colony and has left it on the brink of its worst period of political instability in more than a decade. Speaking at the presidential palace, Guterres called for new parliamentary elections to put an end to "a serious institutional crisis" and blasted leaders for turning "their backs to each other". — AFP
EU slams Venezuela
BRUSSELS, Jan 26: The EU on Friday condemned Venezuela's expulsion of the Spanish ambassador, expressing "solidarity" with Madrid and urging the socialist government of Nicolas Maduro to reverse the decision. Venezuela on Thursday declared Spain's ambassador to Caracas, Jesus Silva, "persona non grata" and accused Madrid of masterminding recent European Union sanctions on seven of Maduro's key allies. —AFP