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Italy's anti-establishment 5-Star Movement said on Sunday that Matteo Salvini, leader of the far-right League, was no longer a credible partner, apparently closing the door on any possibility of resurrecting the ruling coalition. Top brass of 5-Star met on Sunday at the villa of the movement's founder, comedian Beppe Grillo, to discuss their stance after Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte addresses the Senate on Tuesday on the government crisis. "All those present were agreed in defining Salvini as no longer a credible interlocutor," 5-Star said in a statement.

Sun, 18 Aug 2019 12:51:33 -0400

A manhunt was under way on Sunday after a waiter was shot dead by a customer at a café on the outskirts of Paris, apparently for being too slow to serve him.  Enraged at being made to wait for a sandwich, the customer pulled out a handgun and shot the 28-year-old waiter in the shoulder, witnesses said. The waiter was still conscious when police and an ambulance arrived minutes after the Friday night shooting, but frantic efforts to save him failed and he died at the Mistral pizza and sandwich outlet in the east Paris suburb of Noisy-le-Grand. Witnesses helped police identify a suspect, described as a 34-year-old man with a criminal record. Detectives searched his home but have not tracked down the suspect, who is now wanted for murder. A police source said he was “determined and very dangerous” and warned the public not to approach him.  After the shooting, stunned and horrified local residents gathered outside. A witness said: “He got very agitated and flew into a terrible rage that his sandwich wasn’t being made fast enough.” A resident asked in disbelief: “He was killed over a sandwich? How can that happen?” “It’s sad," a 29-year-old woman said. “This is a quiet restaurant, without any problems. It only opened a few months ago.” Some residents, however, said the neighbourhood had become dangerous because of a recent surge in crime, with drug-dealing and gang-members getting drunk on the streets. “People can be killed over nothing these days,” a 52-year-old woman said. “People in this area are living in fear now. You can be beaten up for refusing to give someone a cigarette, looking at them the wrong way or parking in a space they wanted.”

Sun, 18 Aug 2019 12:50:52 -0400

White House officials pushed back on Sunday against concerns that economic growth may be faltering, saying they saw little risk of recession despite a volatile week on global bond markets, and insisting their trade war with China was doing no damage to the United States. Trump administration economic adviser Larry Kudlow said trade deputies from the two countries would speak within 10 days and "if those deputies meetings pan out...we are planning to have China come to the USA" to advance negotiations over ending a trade battle that has emerged as a potential risk to global economic growth.

Sun, 18 Aug 2019 12:45:46 -0400

Peering out from behind the 15ft-high solid oak door Prince Andrew is seen to catch himself and check if anyone is watching as he waves goodbye to an attractive brunette. And it may be little surprise that he was concerned that someone might spot him in the doorway of the £63million Manhattan mansion, as it belonged to convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. A video of the encounter emerged as the Duke of York faced a growing list of questions over this association with the financier who died in prison in an apparent suicide earlier this month. The Duke is seen in the video emerging in the imposing doorway of the New York building which Epstein’s victims have dubbed the “House of Horrors” to chat for a few seconds and then wave goodbye to an unnamed woman. Before he closes the door he peers around it apparently to see if anyone is watching. Less than an hour earlier Epstein had left the house in a thick fur-lined coat in the company of a young blonde woman who was wearing a thin jumper and appeared to be shivering. Jeffrey Epstein was in prison awaiting trial when he apparently took his own life  Witnesses told the Mail on Sunday that the woman entering and leaving the house whilst the Duke was inside “looked very young indeed”. The footage is from December 2010 when the Duke, then the UKs Special Representative for Trade, stayed with Epstein in his New York home. Previously pictures have emerged from the same trip of the pair walking together in Central Park. The corridor in which the Duke stood to wave goodbye to the woman is said to contain a number of bizarre items, including a painting of Bill Clinton wearing the dress Monika Lewinsky was infamously wearing when she performed a sex act on him and a chandelier with a life sized female doll hanging from it. Two years before the video was shot Epstein had been convicted of sex with a child and placed on the sex offenders register.   The emergence of the video came after prosecutors in the US said they were continuing their investigations into Epstein's crimes and their attention had turned to his associates. The source said that they had gone public with the footage to try and encourage other victims to come forward. Ghislaine Maxwell denies being a "madam" for her former lover Jeffrey Epstein   The Duke is braced for the release of further court documents in coming weeks after being named in documents relating to British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, who is alleged to have “acted as a madam" for her lover Epstein. She has repeatedly denied the claims. Buckingham Palace have refused to comment on the video but have recently repeated their “emphatic denial” of allegations against the Duke made by Virginia Roberts, one of Epstein’s victims. A spokesman for the Palace said: “Any suggestion of impropriety with underage minors is categorically untrue.” The Duke is currently on holiday in Spain with his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson. The Metropolitan Police have refused to say whether they will look at requests by Ms Roberts to resume their inquiries into the allegations she made surrounding her time in London. In 2015 Detectives looked at allegations that Ms Roberts, who now uses her married name Guiffre, was trafficked to London for sexual exploitation but they did not to pursue a full investigation.

Sun, 18 Aug 2019 12:42:57 -0400

The Argentine opposition candidate, Alberto Fernandez, said that the country would struggle under present conditions to repay a loan to the International Monetary Fund and he would seek to renegotiate the repayment terms, according to an interview published on Sunday by the newspaper Clarin. "I would say that there is only one incontrovertible reality and that is that Argentina in these conditions is not able to repay the debts it took on," said Fernandez, the favorite to win the October elections. "I have no problem helping the president (Mauricio Macri) to renegotiate in the way that I propose but do have a lot of trouble with is having to explain to the Fund the failings of the president.

Sun, 18 Aug 2019 12:42:53 -0400