Tory aide in Boris’s marital breakdown
JAPANESE authorities say 37 people have been confirmed dead from a powerful earthquake that struck the northern island of Hokkaido last week.
The Hokkaido government said yesterday that two people remain missing and one other person has no vital signs.
Rescue workers are using backhoes and shovels to search for the missing in a tangle of dirt and the rubble of homes left by landslides in the town of Atsuma. All but four of the victims are from the community of 4600 people.
The magnitude 6.7 earthquake struck on Thursday. AN EGYPTIAN court has sentenced 75 people to death, including leaders of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, for their involvement in a 2013 sit- in protest by Islamists that was broken up by security forces in an operation that left hundreds dead.
In a case involving 739 defendants, the court also sentenced to life in prison the head of the Brotherhood, Mohammed Badie, and 46 others.
The trials and death sentences have drawn outrage from rights groups at home and abroad, which have branded the process as a mockery. A PARTY- loving Tory aide is at the centre of Westminster speculation about Boris Johnson’s marriage split.
The Daily Mail reports Carrie Symonds, the party’s former director of communications, was linked to the former foreign secretary after it was claimed he had developed a “strong friendship” with the blonde in the months leading up to his separation from wife Marina Wheeler.
Ms Symonds, 30, has been a high- profile figure in West- minster for nearly a decade.
She has held senior positions at Tory headquarters and as an adviser to Cabinet ministers.
Ms Symonds regularly posts glamorous pictures of herself on social media. They include a photo of herself striking a pose while standing on the bonnet of a car in the grounds of Parliament.
Neither Mr Johnson nor Ms Symonds have commented on their friendship.
Mr Johnson, who has had at least four extramarital affairs and made at least two of his mistresses pregnant, refused to comment when he left his country home in Oxfordshire.
Minutes later he and Ms Wheeler announced their marriage was over.
In a joint statement they said: “Several months ago, after 25 years of marriage, we decided it was in our best interests to separate.”
Ms Wheeler, 54, who is the mother to their four older children – Lara, Milo Arthur, 23, Cassia Peaches, 21, and Theodore Apollo, 19 – has been getting their assets professionally valued in recent weeks, a source said.
She has put up with her husband’s infidelity for many years.
Fashion journalist Lara was reportedly overheard exploding with rage at her father, telling friends at a party he “is a selfish b******”.
The Sun newspaper quoted her as saying: “Mum is fin- ished with him. She will never take him back now.”
The announcement of the break- up came amid signs that Mr Johnson was poised to make a pitch for No. 10.
Mr Johnson was booed by cricket fans when he was shown on a big screen at the England- India Test match on Saturday.
His appearance there came just 24 hours after publicly confirming that he and Ms Wheeler were seeking a divorce.