Monday Morning Briefing: Volcano eruption in New Zealand kills five

Top Stories

At least five people were killed, up to 20 injured and several reported missing after a volcano that is a tourist attraction suddenly erupted off the coast of New Zealand’s North Island on Monday. A webcam set up on the volcano shows at least one group of tourists were inside the crater moments before it erupted and blanketed the area in a massive ash cloud.

A U.S. congressional panel leading the impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump will debate the evidence against him on Monday, with Democratic lawmakers poised to move forward with formal charges of wrongdoing within days. The Democratic-led House Judiciary Committee will formally review evidence from impeachment investigators at an all-day hearing scheduled to begin at 9 a.m.

U.S. investigators face mounting pressure on Monday to deliver answers on the motive that led a Saudi Air Force lieutenant to shoot and kill three people and wound eight others at a U.S. Navy base in Pensacola. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, speaking at a Sunday evening press conference, said he was sure the gunman carried out an act of terrorism.

Satellite imagery indicated on Monday that North Korea had tested a rocket engine, and a senior Pyongyang official called Donald Trump a “heedless and erratic old man”, resuming insults of the U.S. president that had been set aside during a thaw. Tensions have been rising in recent weeks as a year-end deadline approaches set by North Korea for Washington to soften its stance in negotiations

World

Russia was banned from the Olympics and world championships in a range of sports for four years on Monday after the World Anti-Doping Agency ruled to punish it for manipulating laboratory data. WADA’s executive committee took the decision after it concluded that Moscow had tampered with laboratory data by planting fake evidence and deleting files linked to positive doping tests that could have helped identify drug cheats.

Hong Kong protesters set a fire outside court buildings threw petrol bombs and spray-painted graffiti on government buildings, marring what was otherwise a “generally peaceful” march over the weekend, police said. The comments came as protesters called for strikes across the city on Monday.

Human rights campaigners supporting Myanmar’s Rohingya Muslim minority on Monday called for a global boycott of the country, a day before genocide hearings begin at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. Myanmar leader and Nobel Peace prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi will defend her country’s record during three days of hearings.

Finland’s new prime minister - the world’s youngest premier - will have a finance minister two years her junior in a new women-led coalition cabinet after a political shake-up, party officials said on Monday. Sanna Marin, 34, has had a swift rise in Finnish politics since becoming head of the city council of her industrial hometown of Tampere at the age of 27.

Business

Jobs of the future are clustering in a handful of U.S. cities, study finds

A new analysis of where “innovation” jobs are being created in the United States paints a stark portrait of a divided economy where the industries seen as key to future growth cluster in a narrowing set of places.

4 min read

South Korea jails three Samsung Electronics executives over evidence destroyed in probe of alleged fraud

A South Korean court on Monday jailed three executives of Samsung Electronics for their role in a plot that included burying computers under factory floors at its biotech affiliate, in an investigation of alleged accounting fraud.

3 min read

Trial begins in U.S. states' effort to block T-Mobile/Sprint deal

U.S. state attorneys general, led by New York and California, deliver opening arguments Monday in a bid to stop T-Mobile U.S. from buying Sprint in a trial that highlights disagreements between federal antitrust enforcers, who are Republican, and Democrats in powerful states.

3 min read

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