United Kingdom

BELFAST, April 12 (Reuters) - U.S. President Joe Biden urged Northern Irish political leaders to restore their powersharing government with the promise that scores of major U.S. corporations were ready to invest in the region as he marked the 25th anniversary of peace in Belfast.

Biden, who is fiercely proud of his Irish heritage, spent just over half a day in the UK region - where he met British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak - before leaving for the Irish Republic for two-and-a-half days of speeches and meetings with officials and distant relatives.

BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) — President Joe Biden is in Northern Ireland on Wednesday to participate in marking the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement that brought peace to this part of the United Kingdom after the U.S. helped negotiate an end to decades of sectarian violence that killed thousands.

11 Apr 2023; MEMO: Dozens of parliamentarians from six parties as well as independent MPs and Lords in the UK have called on the US Attorney-General to drop extradition proceedings against WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, Anadolu News Agency reports.

On the fourth anniversary of Julian Assange's imprisonment, 23 British MPs and 14 Lords, wrote a letter on Tuesday, demanding Merrick Garland to close Assange's extradition process.

LONDON, April 11 (Reuters) - The Confederation of British Industry, a leading business group, said it had fired Tony Danker as director-general after an investigation into complaints of workplace misconduct, and replaced him with its former chief economist, Rain Newton-Smith.

"The allegations that have been made over recent weeks about the CBI have been devastating," it said in a statement on Tuesday.

LONDON, April 11 (Reuters) - Up to one million smokers will be encouraged to swap cigarettes for "vapes", with pregnant women offered financial incentives to make the change in what will be a world first, the British government said on Tuesday.

Under the scheme, almost one in five smokers will be given a vape - an e-cigarette - starter kit along with support to help quit smoking, the Department of Health (DoH) said.

LONDON (AP) — Tens of thousands of doctors walked off the job across England on Tuesday, kicking off a four-day strike billed as the most disruptive in the history of the U.K.’s public health service.

The walkout by junior doctors, who form the backbone of hospital and clinic care in the National Health Service, is due to last until 7 a.m. on Saturday.

LONDONDERRY, Northern Ireland, April 10 (Reuters) - A number of masked people attacked police with petrol bombs and other objects at a parade opposing the Good Friday peace accord in Londonderry, police said on Monday, a day before U.S. President Joe Biden visits Belfast.

A Reuters photograph showed four young people in the mainly Irish nationalist area of Creggan throwing petrol bombs at an armoured police vehicles, which was covered in flames on one side. Police said nobody was injured and appealed for calm.

LONDON (AP) — Britain is bracing for a four-day walkout by tens of thousands of doctors at the state-funded health care system that one official warned Monday could be “catastrophic” and postpone up to 350,000 appointments.

08 Apr 2023; MEMO: Hundreds of demonstrators staged a protest Friday outside the Israeli Embassy in London against attacks on Al-Aqsa Mosque in the occupied East Jerusalem, reports Anadolu Agency.

Jewish Anti-Zionist Network and Jewish Voice for Labors were among the participants.

Decrying recent Israeli attacks on Palestine, the crowd chanted slogans in solidarity with Palestinians, including, "Free Palestine."

LONDON, April 8 (Xinhua) -- Women being sexually abused is "a common experience" across the Federal Correctional Institution (FCI), east of the U.S. city of San Francisco, British newspaper The Guardian has reported.

The report told the story of Cristal, 31, who came forward about the horrific sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of multiple guards at the federal prison in Dublin, California. But now Cristal is in immigration detention, awaiting deportation to Mexico, a country she left as a baby.