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California WeChat users claim China surveillance in lawsuit
San Francisco (AFP) - California WeChat users sued its parent company Tencent on Wednesday, saying the mobile app is used for spying on and censoring users for the Chinese government. US-based nonprofit Citizen Power Initiatives for China (CPIFC) filed the suit in Silicon Valley, joined by a half-dozen California residents in urging a state court to order Tencent to change its ways and pay damages. "As the global erosion of democratic values shows little sign of relenting, this lawsuit is part of our attempt to slow that erosion, and to perhaps help turn the tide, by relying on the rule of law...
AFP
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Trump pardons engineer who stole Google trade secrets
San Francisco (AFP) - A former Google engineer who pleaded guilty to stealing secrets from its self-driving car program was among those pardoned by Donald Trump on his last day in the White House. Trump on Wednesday granted a full pardon to Anthony Levandowski in a move backed by billionaire venture capitalist Peter Thiel and Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, who were among the former president's scant supporters in Silicon Valley. Levandowski was a founding member of an autonomous vehicle project in 2009 called "Chauffeur," one of Google's more ambitious undertakings. Several years later Levandow...
AFP
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UK newspaper group calls for full trial in Meghan Markle case
London (AFP) - Lawyers for a British newspaper group that Meghan Markle is suing for publishing a private letter to her estranged father called on Wednesday for a full trial to "shed light" on the case. The Duchess of Sussex launched legal action against Associated Newspapers, which publishes the Mail on Sunday and MailOnline website, for printing extracts of the letter to Thomas Markle. The letter was written in August 2018, a few months after Meghan Markle married Prince Harry, and asked her father to stop talking to tabloids and making false claims about her in interviews. Her legal team ar...
AFP
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Scottish court upholds Lockerbie bomber's conviction
Edinburgh (AFP) - Five judges at Scotland's highest court of criminal appeal on Friday upheld the conviction of the only man found guilty of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing after a posthumous legal challenge. The family of former Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi, which brought the case, said they were "heartbroken" at the decision, their lawyer Aamer Anwar said. They will apply to appeal to the UK Supreme Court within 14 days, he added. The ruling at the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh comes just over 32 years after what remains Britain's worst terrorist attack, wi...
AFP
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Ex-state governor charged in Flint water crisis
Washington (AFP) - Ex-Michigan governor Rick Snyder is among a number of former state officials charged over the Flint water crisis, authorities said Thursday, the latest development in a years-long health scandal that has come to symbolize social injustice in the US. Prosecutors allege that Snyder willfully neglected his duty to protect residents of the decaying former industrial city that switched its drinking water source to the polluted Flint River to cut costs in 2014. Officials failed to add corrosion controls to the new tap water source, allowing lead and other contaminants to leach fro...
AFP
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‘SoHo Karen’ Miya Ponsetto Claims She Can’t Be Racist Because She’s A ‘Woman of Color’
Californian woman Miya Ponsetto falsely accused a black teenager of stealing her iPhone before allegedly attacking him at a New York City hotel, to which led many to then dubbed her as “SoHo Karen.” A “Karen” is an internet term for entitled women who use their privilege to get their way. The 22-year-old is now facing a series of legal charges, such as attempted robbery, grand larceny, acting in a manner injurious to a child and two counts of attempted assault after the December 26 attack was caught on camera. The victim was 14-year-old Kenyon Harold, Jr., son of jazz trumpet player Kenyon Har...
uInterview.com
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WikiLeaks founder Assange denied bail despite US extradition block
London (AFP) - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange must remain in custody in Britain, while the US appeals a court decision to block his extradition to face charges there for leaking secret documents, a judge in London ruled Wednesday. Judge Vanessa Baraitser, who on Monday refused to grant his extradition, told Westminster Magistrates Court that if released there were "substantial grounds" to suspect Assange would "fail to surrender" for future appeal hearings. "Mr Assange still has an incentive to abscond from these as yet unresolved proceedings," she said. "As a matter of fairness the United...
AFP
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UK court hears WikiLeaks' Assange is flight risk if bailed
London (AFP) - The United States on Wednesday urged a judge in London not to release WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on bail, as it seeks to appeal a decision to block his extradition to face charges for publishing secret documents. Lawyer Clair Dobbin, representing the government in Washington, told Westminster Magistrates Court there were "no conditions that could guarantee his surrender" if he were freed from custody. Assange, 49, who was in court to hear the application, is seeking to be released on bail, after an unexpected decision on Monday to block his removal to the United States on ...
AFP
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Assange case remains threat to investigative journalism: analysts
Washington (AFP) - WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange dodged a bullet Monday when a British judge refused to extradite him to the United States to face charges under an espionage law, but experts say his case remains an ominous threat to press freedom. Judge Vanessa Baraitser said the US charges were justified against the 49-year-old transparency advocate, who stunned the world in 2010 with the publication of hundreds of thousands of classified military and diplomatic documents. But Baraitser ruled that his mental health problems raise the risk of suicide in a US jail. Her decision, and the US J...
AFP
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UK court rejects Assange's US extradition over suicide fears
London (AFP) - A British judge on Monday blocked Julian Assange's extradition to the United States to face espionage charges after deciding the WikiLeaks founder was at serious risk of suicide, sparking disappointment in Washington. District Judge Vanessa Baraitser said the 49-year-old Australian publisher would have been "well aware" of the effects of his leaking of secret documents, actions that went "well beyond" the role of a journalist. But she said his mental health would probably deteriorate in the US penal system "causing him to commit suicide". Assange wiped his forehead as the decisi...
AFP
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