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Theresa May is in China, and all she got asked on the way there was how long she'll keep her job.
“I'm not a quitter,” the British prime minister insisted — a stance she's held ever since she lost her majority in a miscalculated call for elections last June. But what if she were forced out?
Back in Westminster, Conservative lawmakers will meet to vent their frustrations. The so-called 1922 Committee holds the key to her fate. Kitty Donaldson lays out what they can do.
But the biggest problem facing plotters isn't so much shifting May as replacing her. Not only can they not agree on a candidate, they can't agree on what that person should do.
The bad news doesn't stop. An embarrassing leak of government forecasts shows just how badly off the country will be under pretty much all Brexit scenarios. This afternoon in Parliament the opposition Labour Party will try and force the government to go public with an assessment it has tried to keep secret.
Before they decide who they want to lead them, the Tories need to agree what type of Brexit they want. Until then, May limps on.
Global Headlines
State of the Union pivot play | U.S. President Donald Trump promised — as expected — to unify the country, calling for bipartisan cooperation, and took full credit for the surging economy. He peppered his speech yesterday with his nationalist agenda, though, as he threw jabs at “dreamer” immigrants and countries that condemned his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Democrats portrayed the address as stoking division and U.S. stocks and the dollar tumbled.
Memo pledge | Trump was heard telling a Republican lawmaker he's “100 percent” planning to release a classified document written by GOP members alleging bias as the reason the FBI and Justice Department started the Russia probe. Democrats argue the memo gives an inaccurate portrayal of law enforcement actions and say Republicans have blocked a request to release a competing version. The White House has five days to review it.
Sanctions and Syria | Amid criticism for not imposing more sanctions on Russia and cribbing the much-awaited roster of Russian oligarchs from the Forbes' rich list, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said there will be more penalties to come for Moscow's alleged meddling in the 2016 election. Meanwhile in Sochi, the Kremlin's efforts to engineer a peace deal in Syria stumbled, with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov heckled as he spoke at the opening session.
Islamists target West Africa | Mali is scrambling to subdue Islamist militant attacks in time for presidential elections in July, Security Minister Salif Traore told Olivier Monnier and Kaourou Magassa. Islamic State and al-Qaeda-backed fighters, including the group that claimed responsibility for killing four U.S. soldiers in neighboring Niger in October, are engaged in a widening conflict across the region against combined U.S., French, African and United Nations forces.
Kim steals the spotlight | While it isn't clear if Kim Jong Un enjoyed the aprés-ski during his stay in Switzerland, the North Korean strongman is well known for his love of the piste — so much so that he ordered soldiers to build him a luxury resort shortly after coming to power. Now, as Sam Kim reports, South Korean skiers are set to begin training on the Masikryong slopes for the upcoming Winter Olympics, in what some say is a propaganda coup for Kim's regime.
And finally… A high-level investigation is underway in Australia after hundreds of classified documents were discovered in a second-hand furniture store in the nation's capital. The papers — which would usually remain under wraps for 20 years — were found inside a locked filing cabinet. Among the revelations: the Australian Federal police lost almost 400 national security files in five years.
--With assistance from Karl Maier Gregory White and Andy Sharp
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Michael Winfrey at mwinfrey@bloomberg.net, Ruth Pollard Caroline Alexander
©2018 Bloomberg L.P.
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