FAIRFIELD-SUISUN, CALIFORNIA
Protesters storm the Capitol and halt a joint session of the 117th Congress, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington, D.C. (Kent Nishimura/Los Angeles Times/TNS)
‘This is not America’: World gapes in horror at pro-Trump attack on Capitol
By Shashank Bengali, Kate Linthicum and Erik Kirschbaum, Los Angeles Times, (TNS)
SINGAPORE For four years, the world has watched with surprise, horror and in some places glee as President Donald Trump battered one democratic norm after another, exposing the so-called leader of the free world as just another troubled and deeply divided nation.
Still, the planet was little prepared for the stunning scenes Wednesday, when a pro-Trump mob, some flying Confederate flags, stormed the U.S. Capitol to disrupt a congressional vote certifying President-elect Joe Biden’s electoral victory.
BBC News
By Preeti Jha
image copyrightEPA, Reuters, Instagram
image captionA social worker, an ex-journalist, an academic and an American lawyer (clockwise from top left) were among the arrested
When news of the first arrests began trickling through, Joey Siu got straight onto the phone to her friends in Hong Kong. As they stopped responding, one by one, she realised the crackdown was growing - and fast.
The 21-year-old student activist, who fled to the US two months ago, watched the detentions mount on her screen: a social worker, an academic, a former journalist, an American lawyer. I panicked, said Ms Siu, as the scale of the operation became apparent, partly because of the fact that I can t go back and help.
The Man You Love to Hate But Can t! Published December 10th, 2020 - 10:01 GMT
(AFP File Photo)
Trump’s election defeat is a setback for the global populist right.
Apart from 74 million voters in the United States, who still approves of President Donald Trump? Most Europeans are overjoyed to see the back of him. But he has been popular with a number of right-wing strongmen and demagogues, and many of their followers.
His admiration for autocrats, his disdain for immigrants, racial minorities and Muslims, and his contempt for liberal democratic norms boosted authoritarian governments in Hungary, Poland, Brazil, India and the Philippines. His esteem for Russian President Vladimir Putin was never in doubt.