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France 24
a day ago
- Politics
- France 24
Hundreds march in London against UK recognising a Palestinian state
Joined by several relatives of the hostages, the march ended at the 10 Downing Street office of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who has said the UK will recognise a Palestinian state if Israel does not agree to a truce in its war with Hamas. Many of the protesters waved Israeli flags or wore yellow ribbons, a symbol of solidarity with the hostages, whose liberation the organisers of the march argue should be the Labour leader's priority. Of the 251 hostages Hamas seized in its October 7, 2023 attack which began the war in Gaza, 49 are still held captive, including 27 who the Israeli army says are dead. Among the demonstrators were Ayelet Stavitsky, sister of dead hostage Nadav Popplewell, and Adam Ma'anit, cousin of Tsachi Idan, who died while held by Hamas. "I think that the government got it wrong with its foreign policy, that it's time for it to correct and refocus on the hostages," said Ma'anit, criticising Starmer's planned recognition of a Palestinian state in September. Israel has faced mounting outcry over the 22-month-long war with Hamas, with United Nations-backed experts warning of widespread famine in besieged Gaza. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is under mounting pressure to secure the release of the remaining hostages, as well as over his plans to expand the Gaza war, which he has vowed to do without the backing of Israel's allies abroad. Starmer's move towards recognising a State of Palestine follows on from similar pledges made by leaders including France's President Emmanuel Macron, as international disquiet over the dire humanitarian in the Palestinian territory grows. Hamas's 2023 attack on Israel, which triggered the war, resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.
NDTV
24-07-2025
- Business
- NDTV
PM Modi Concludes UK Visit After Meeting With King Charles
London: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday concluded his two-day visit to the UK during which the two countries inked a landmark free trade pact. PM Modi was hosted by his UK counterpart, Keir Starmer, at Chequers – the official country residence of the British Prime Minister – for an intense session of talks that also covered regional and global issues of mutual interest. "Concluding a very important UK visit. The outcomes of this visit will benefit our future generations and contribute to shared growth and prosperity. Gratitude to the PM Keir Starmer, the UK government and people for their warmth," PM Modi said in social media post. He leaves for the Maldives for the second leg of his two-nation tour, soon after an audience with King Charles III at his Sandringham Estate in Norfolk, eastern England. He presented the British monarch with a Sonoma dove tree, or handkerchief tree to be planted at the royal estate in the Autumn as part of his environmental initiative "Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam". "The leaders celebrated the landmark UK-India Free Trade Agreement, which was signed today and will see growth in every part of the country – delivering on the government's Plan for Change," 10 Downing Street said in a readout of the prime ministerial engagement at Chequers. "The leaders also discussed the importance of the UK-India Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, which will see closer collaboration on trade, defence, security, technology and education – underscored by the close and historic relationship between the two countries," it said. "The leaders also discussed the Air India plane crash last month, and said their sympathies are with all the families and loved ones of the victims. The Prime Minister said the UK will continue to support all those affected by the tragedy," it added. PM Modi has extended an invitation to Starmer to visit India, which the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said has been accepted and officials will now be working out the details. Downing Street noted that both leaders "looked forward to seeing one another soon".
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First Post
24-07-2025
- Business
- First Post
PM Modi concludes UK visit with historic FTA, departs for Maldives for second leg of foreign trip
Prime Minister Narendra Modi departed for Maldives after concluding his two-day official visit to the UK on Thursday after signing off a historic bilateral Free Trade Agreement. read more Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday departed for Malé (Maldives) for a two-day state visit, the second leg of his ongoing foreign tour after concluding his two-day official visit to the UK on Thursday after signing off a historic bilateral Free Trade Agreement. This will be Modi's third visit to the island nation and the first by any head of state or government since President Mohamed Muizzu took office. The visit comes at the invitation of President Muizzu and is expected to reaffirm bilateral ties. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD #WATCH | London, UK: PM Narendra Modi emplanes for Malé, Maldives for the second leg of his visit. He will undertake a State Visit to Maldives from July 25–26 at the invitation of Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu. This will be his third visit to the island nation and the… — ANI (@ANI) July 24, 2025 Modi was hosted by his UK counterpart, Keir Starmer, at Chequers – the official country residence of the British Prime Minister – for an intense session of talks that also covered regional and global issues of mutual interest. 'Concluding a very important UK visit. The outcomes of this visit will benefit our future generations and contribute to shared growth and prosperity. Gratitude to the PM Keir Starmer, the UK government and people for their warmth,' Modi said in a statement on social media. He leaves for the Maldives for the second leg of his two-nation tour, soon after an audience with King Charles III at his Sandringham Estate in Norfolk, eastern England. He presented the British monarch with a Sonoma dove tree, or handkerchief tree to be planted at the royal estate in the Autumn as part of his environmental initiative 'Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam'. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'The leaders celebrated the landmark UK-India Free Trade Agreement, which was signed today and will see growth in every part of the country – delivering on the government's Plan for Change,' 10 Downing Street said in a readout of the prime ministerial engagement at Chequers. 'The leaders also discussed the importance of the UK-India Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, which will see closer collaboration on trade, defence, security, technology and education – underscored by the close and historic relationship between the two countries,' the statement said. 'The leaders also discussed the Air India plane crash last month, and said their sympathies are with all the families and loved ones of the victims. The Prime Minister said the UK will continue to support all those affected by the tragedy,' it added. Modi has extended an invitation to Starmer to visit India, which the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said has been accepted and officials will now be working out the details. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Downing Street noted that both leaders 'looked forward to seeing one another soon'. With inputs from agencies
BBC News
08-07-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Monzo fined for giving account to fake 10 Downing St address
Digital bank Monzo accepted customers claiming to live at 10 Downing Street, Buckingham Palace and even its own premises, an investigation has found.A lack of address verification meant it failed to spot the "implausible" use of London landmarks on applications to open was fined £21m by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for its failures regarding anti-financial crime bank said the regulator's findings related to problems of more than three years ago and vast improvements had since been made to its systems. The FCA's investigation, which has taken a number of years, found Monzo took on customers using using PO boxes, foreign addresses with UK postcodes or "obviously implausible UK addresses, such as well-known London landmarks".They included home of the UK Prime Minister 10 Downing Street, the Royal residence Buckingham Palace and its own business premises. The lack of verification meant it took on risky customers who were based outside of the UK, and illustrated "how lacking Monzo's financial crime controls were", the regulator was one of a number of areas in which it failed to mitigate the risk of financial had grown rapidly, with the number of customers increasing almost tenfold from around 600,000 in 2018 to over 5.8 million in 2022. Many were attracted by its claims to be a digital pioneer. It has no physical the FCA said that Monzo's financial crime controls failed to keep pace with its customer and product Chambers, FCA joint executive director of enforcement and market oversight, said that banks were a vital line of defence in the fight against financial crime."They must have the systems in place to prevent the flow of ill-gotten gains into the financial system," she said. "Monzo fell far short of what we, and society, expect." 'In the past' TS Anil, chief executive of Monzo, said the FCA's findings "draw a line under issues that have been resolved and are firmly in the past" as improvements had now been bank was fined for its inadequate anti-financial crime systems and controls between October 2018 and August FCA said it also repeatedly breached a requirement preventing it from opening accounts for high-risk customers between August 2020 and June Anil said that financial crime was an issue that affected the whole banking sector, but Monzo was "doing all that we can to stop it in its tracks".
BBC News
04-07-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Keir Starmer told me he'd met every challenge. But things look bad right now
Will Keir Starmer allow himself to celebrate his first anniversary as prime minister this weekend? Or will he be taking a long, hard look in the mirror and asking himself what went wrong?That is what is in my mind as he greets me in the Terracotta Room on the first floor of 10 Downing Street for a long-planned conversation about his first 12 months in office, this looks surprisingly relaxed, given that his chancellor, Rachel Reeves, had been in tears sitting behind him in the Commons just hours earlier. That triggered fevered speculation about how long she would last in the job, moving markets to sell the pound and increase the cost of that is the impression he wants to convey to me as he shares a story about his photo opportunity with Formula One cars parked outside his front door - the most famous door in the is determined that the problems of recent weeks - and boy there's been a long list of those - will not overshadow the achievements he believes deserve just as much attention."We have done some fantastic things," he tells me, "really driven down the waiting lists in the NHS, really done loads of improvements in schools and stuff that we can do for children - whether that's rolling out school uniform projects, whether it's school meals, breakfast clubs, you name it - and also [brought in] a huge amount of investment into the country. And of course we've been busy getting three trade deals."It's clear that, given the chance, his list would go on. And yet, I point out, there is another long list - of things he's recently admitted to getting the last year, he's said hiring Sue Gray - Starmer's former chief of staff who left Downing Street in October - was wrong. He's also held his hands up about plans to end winter fuel payments, about rejecting a national grooming gang inquiry, and cutting benefits for disabled people. That's not even the full list, yet it's quite a number of things that he's admitting to being a prime minister thinks I've rather crudely summarised his personal reflections on what he might have done better. He challenges the idea, which is prevalent in Westminster, that changing your mind represents weakness, or a "humiliating U-turn".Listen: The inside story of Starmer's stormy first yearInDepth: Why Sir Keir's political honeymoon was so short-livedThis is the fourth time we've sat down for an extended and personal conversation for my Political Thinking podcast."You know this from getting to know me," he says. "I'm not one of these ideological thinkers, where ideology dictates what I do. I'm a pragmatist. You can badge these things as U-turns - it's common sense to me."If someone says to me, 'here's some more information and I really think it's the right thing to do', I'm the kind of person that says, 'well in which case, let's do it'."There is, though, no doubt that scrapping so much of his welfare reforms was a U-turn - a costly and humiliating one. Starmer and his chancellor have not only lost authority and face, they've lost £5bn in planned savings, something that will have to be paid for somehow, through extra borrowing, lower spending or, most likely, higher taxes."I take responsibility," he says, "we didn't get the process right". But somehow he implies that it might have been someone other than the leader of the Labour Party's responsibility to persuade Labour MPs to back his plans. He doesn't spell out what he means by getting the process right and, perhaps more importantly, he dodges my attempts to get him to spell out clearly what story he's trying to tell the country about Labour be on the side of disabled people and people like his own mother, who had a crippling disease that meant she eventually had to have a leg amputated? Or should they adopt her unwillingness to be written off, which he described to me the last time we spoke? When told by her doctors that she wouldn't walk again she refused to listen. Wounded by the events of the past week, Starmer refuses to even address that choice. But surely, I suggest to him, the nation doesn't just want a problem-solver, or a chief executive of UK plc? Voters surely want a leader who has a story to tell?Starmer clearly knew this question - or a variation of it - was coming. I've pushed him on it every time we've spoken at length. "It's about a passion, if that's the right word," he says. "But certainly a determination to change the lives of millions of working people and, in particular, to tackle this question of fairness.""It's almost like a social contract," he adds, "that people are getting back what they're putting in, that there is a fairer environment for them that supports them and respects them."That's a bit long to sew on to an election banner, to chant in the streets, or write in a post on X, but it is a theme. He is a self-proclaimed pragmatist who doesn't want there to be something that can be labelled as "Starmerism", but at least we can now say that his guiding principle is fairness. In truth, what matters more than anything else to him is not losing, something he tells me he hates, whether in politics or on the five-a-side pitch playing football regularly with his mates - as he still does and has done for decades.I tell him people think he is losing now - some say he is the most unpopular prime minister since records began. He reacts with the defiance of a man whose football-playing friend recently described him as a "hard bastard". A man who served in Jeremy Corbyn's shadow cabinet and then had him thrown out of the party; who stood to be leader on promises to keep much of Corbyn's agenda before tearing up those promises to win power; and someone who hired then fired Sue Gray as his first Downing Street chief of staff. "Every challenge that's been put in front of me I've risen to, met it, and we're going to continue in the same vein," he says.I end our conversation by reminding him what they say about failing football managers who have "lost the dressing room". Has he lost the Labour Party dressing room? His reply is emphatic."Absolutely not," he says. "The Labour dressing room, the PLP, is proud as hell of what we've done, and their frustration - my frustration - is that sometimes the other stuff, welfare would be an example, can obscure us being able to get that out there."Almost as an afterthought he adds: "I'm a hard-enough bastard to find out who it was who said that, so that I can have a discussion with him." Knowing Starmer I suspect he's much more likely to deliver a crunching tackle on the pitch than a quiet word off the prime minister's message is clear to me: Don't count me out, however bad it looks now. To pretty much everyone other than him it currently does look bad. Very bad.
