Pentagon: 2 more years in Somalia
Compiled from news services
WASHINGTON— Amid its escalating campaign of drone strikes in Somalia, the Pentagon has presented the White House with a plan that envisions at least two more years of combat against Islamist militants there, U.S. officials said.
The proposed plan for Somalia would be the first under new rules quietly signed by President Donald Trump in October for counterterrorism operations outside conventional war zones. The U.S. military has carried out about 30 airstrikes in Somalia this year — twice as many as in 2016 — including a Nov. 21 bombing that killed over 100 suspected militants at an al-Shabab training camp.
In a sign that the Defense Department does not envision a quick end to the war in Somalia against alShabab and the Islamic State group, the proposed plan is said to include an exemption to a rule in Mr. Trump’s guidelines requiring annual vetting by staff from other agencies — including diplomats and intelligence officials — of operational plans for certain countries.
Instead, the Pentagon wants to wait 24 months before reviewing how the Somalia plan is working, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Trade deal likely
LONDON — The likelihood of Britain leaving the European Union without a future trade deal has “dropped dramatically” now that the two sides have reached a preliminary agreement on their divorce terms, the country’s Brexit secretary said Sunday.
The deal hammered out by Prime Minister Theresa May last week means the negotiations on Britain’s March 2019 departure from the EU can move onto the next phase, Brexit Secretary David Davis told the BBC. The progress should give Britain enough time to negotiate a free-trade agreement for after it is outside the EU, making it unlikely the country will have to fall back on World Trade Organization rules that would impose tariffs, he said.
Fate of prisoner unclear
TEHRAN — Britain’s foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, left Tehran on Sunday without a clear public resolution on the fate of Nazanin ZaghariRatcliffe, the imprisoned British-Iranian dual citizen whose plight Mr. Johnson had been accused of worsening.
But Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s husband, Richard Ratcliffe, said he was encouraged, saying that her court case scheduled for Sunday — in which she had faced 16 more years in prison — had been postponed and he linked the development to Mr. Johnson’s visit.
Ms. Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 38, worked for the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the independent charitable arm of the Thomson Reuters news agency, when she was arrested while visiting Iran with her 2-year-old daughter in April 2016 and accused of plotting a “soft toppling” of the government, according to the foundation. Her relatives denied the accusation.
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