Top story: ‘End slaughter and bloodshed in Syria’ says Trump
Hello – Warren Murray bringing you the Briefing this morning.
The US military has bombarded a Syrian airfield in retaliation for a deadly sarin nerve gas attack on civilians by Bashar al-Assad’s military. We are covering it all live after America intervened directly for the first time against the dictator in Syria’s war.
Donald Trump said he authorised the targeted strike, on the al-Shayrat air base near Homs, to answer the use of banned chemical weapons by the Syrian dictator. Assad had “choked out the lives of helpless men, women and children”, said Trump. There could be “no dispute” Assad used illegal weapons, defying the UN security council in the process.
Trump called for an international effort to end the bloodshed in Syria “and terrorism of all kinds” as he paused from his meeting with the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
The strike came in the form of a hail of Tomahawks – a weapon of deadly precision that can be launched from a thousand miles away at sea to hit a target with pinpoint accuracy. US navy ships fired 59 of the million-dollar cruise missiles into Syria.
Hillary Clinton had just beforehand given her first interview since the 2016 election and suggested she might have bombed Assad’s airfields sooner if she had won.
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Clinton opens up – In other notable remarks from that interview at the Women in the World summit, Hillary Clinton didn’t hold back on Russia, hitting out at Congress for failing to “act like patriotic Americans” and properly investigate election interference. Clinton said Russia’s meddling was “the weaponisation of information” in the form of “a thousand agents, bots and trolls. What was done to us was an act of aggression and it was carried out by a foreign power … to send us into a tailspin.” The 2016 Democratic candidate also said being an ambitious woman made her a “Typhoid Mary” and counted against her in the election: “Certainly misogyny played a role.”
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‘What’s mine is yours’ – A former Miss Malaysia will receive £64m in a divorce settlement from the boss of Laura Ashley. Pauline Chai had sought £100m from Khoo Kay Peng, who likened her to Imelda Marcos during their long-running dispute. They were married for 42 years and broke up in 2012 after having five children. Chai won the right to have the case heard in the UK rather than Malaysia because they had been living in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire.
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Brexitland – Owen Jones is back at work unpicking why Britain really voted to leave the EU. This time he visits Fareham, a town that challenges the idea that remainers are a privileged bunch and Brexit constituted a working-class revolt. In affluent Fareham, with low migrant numbers, no housing crisis and 86% owner-occupied homes, there was a 55% leave vote – higher than the national average. Owen finds out why.
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Buying time – Rich people are living up to 15 years longer than the poor in America, where the health system is the most expensive in the world. Britain’s Lancet medical journal found the starkest disparities between the richest 1% and the poorest 1%. Tellingly, more than one-third of low-income Americans avoid medical care because of costs, compared with only 1% in the UK. Introducing the findings, Bernie Sanders condemned the profit-geared American system, writing that it had given the US “the most expensive, bureaucratic, wasteful, and ineffective healthcare system in the world”.
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Making the Easter bunny – Some great shots and delicious fun in this photo essay by Graeme Robertson and Matt Fidler who travelled to Fakenham, Norfolk, where the Kinnerton confectionery factory is busy at this time of year churning out Alfie Bunnies by the thousands for M&S.
Secret chocolate arrives six times a day in a 24-tonne tanker and gets quality-tested, churned, tempered, moulded, vibrated, spun and hand-finished by dedicated workers until more than 15,000 Alfies a day pop out the other end, along with other sweet products of the season.
Lunchtime read: Can the mega-movie survive?
Cinematic blockbusters under threat? With the rampaging success of Marvel Universe offerings like Iron Man and the Avengers, it seems like these franchises could roar along forever. But there’s a problem.
Streaming services like Netflix are disrupting the traditional model of a theatre release followed some time later by disc and streaming. And more cheaply made films like the recent Arrival are also under threat due to low profit margins. For now the strategy is make or break, “blockbuster or bust” – but as Gwilym Mumford asks, how long can it last?
Sport
The 2017 Masters have begun with the dramatic withdrawal of world No1 Dustin Johnson and a first-round lead for Charley Hoffman. Andy Bull casts his eye over Jordan Spieth.
In football, Antonio Conte has committed to Chelsea and slapped down the talk of agent Federico Pastorello, which suggested otherwise. Guardian writers have 10 things to look out for in this weekend’s Premier League action, while David Conn reports that USA, Canada and Mexico are set to submit a joint bid for the 2026 World Cup.
In Australia, Test spinner Steve O’Keefe has been fined $20,000 and suspended by Cricket Australia for inappropriate comments made when he was drunk at a function.
Business
The US air strikes on Syria have sent stock markets falling in the Asia-Pacific. The biggest loser was Hong Kong where the Hang Seng index was down more than 0.5%, a fall also driven by investor anxiety about the outcome of the Trump-Xi talks.
Shares in Japan, Australia and South Korea were also down and the FTSE100 is expected to drop around 0.25% later today.
The pound was flat at $1.25 and €1.17.
The papers
The print editions missed the story of the US strike on Syria – understandably so, as it happened around 2am.
The Telegraph unfortunately has a hostage to fortune splash headline: “Britain tries to calm war talk” it says. That horse has probably bolted.
The Times splashes with “Foreigners dominate market for new homes” saying that first-time buyers are being priced out the market by investors. The FT has a very FT splash, saying investors have welcomed the revamp at Unilever which could boost returns after it rejected a takeover bid by Kraft Heinz.
The Sun meanwhile has the most bizarre splash of the day which, frankly, could be read in an unintended way. “We only want to blow the bloody senors off” it says. It’s a mash-up of two stories: that Michael Caine says he is behind Brexit, and the current spat with Spain over Gibraltar, while harking back to one of Caine’s most famous films.
The Mail headline is “Now end school holiday rip-offs”. The story says now the supreme court has ruled that parents must not take children out of school during term time, holiday companies should stop hiking their prices.
Lastly the Mirror has the headline “Ripper killed 8 more” with the story saying a former detective fears Peter Sutcliffe had more than 13 victims.
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