LONDON: Scotland will vote to become independent within two years due to the hard-line position being taken by British Prime Minister Theresa May over Brexit, former Scottish first minister Alex Salmond said on Friday.
Scotland rejected independence in 2014 by 55 to 45 percent, but current Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon has said Scots are now more likely to want independence after they voted emphatically last June to remain in the EU while the United Kingdom as a whole voted to leave.
Sturgeon has submitted a series of proposals on Scotland’s position to the UK government, including the option of Scotland maintaining its EU single market links from within the UK.
“If the UK government rejects Nicola Sturgeon’s compromise plan ... then I think an independence referendum will be very likely,” Salmond, who led the pro-independence devolved government during the 2014 referendum, told BBC Radio.
“And I think in that context, within that two year period, then I think the Yes side this time would win it.”
May said earlier this week that Britain would quit the single market and impose immigration limits when it leaves the EU. Opinion polls show support for independence is unchanged since before the EU referendum, suggesting Scots would reject secession in another vote.
Scotland will vote for independence in two years-Salmond
Scotland will vote for independence in two years-Salmond
‘Stay out of our politics,’ Australia’s former PM tells Netenyahu
- Turnbull slams Israeli prime minister in Channel 4 interview
- Netanyahu’s attempts to link Bondi massacre to Palestine policy ‘unhelpful’
LONDON: Australia’s former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull has told Benjamin Netanyahu to “stay out of our politics” after the Israeli leader linked the recognition of Palestine to the Bondi Beach mass shooting.
Fifteen people were killed when a father and son opened fire on people celebrating the Jewish festival of Hanukkah on Sunday evening.
Netanyahu said Australia's decision to recognize Palestinian statehood earlier this year had poured “oil on the fire of antisemitism” in the weeks leading up to the attack.
When asked about the comments on Channel 4 News in the UK, Turnbull said: “I would respectfully say to Bibi Netanyahu, please stay out of our politics.
“If you've got that kind of commentary to make, you are not helping … and it’s not right.”
Turnbull backed the current Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s government for recogizing Palestinian statehood in August along with many other Western nations as international pressure grew over the war in Gaza.
In a speech after the Bondi attack, Netanyahu said: “A few months ago I wrote to the Australian prime minister that your policy is pouring oil on the fire of antisemitism.”
He added: “Antisemitism is a cancer that spreads when leaders are silent.”
Turnbull said the vast majority of countries in the world recognize Palestine as a state and support a two-state solution to the conflict.
He said Australia is a very successful multicultural society that can not allow foreign conflicts to be imported.
“We need to ensure that that wars in the Middle East or wars in any other part of the world are not fought out here,” he said. “Trying to link them, which is what Netanyahu has done, is not helpful and that's exactly the reverse of what we want to achieve.”
Albanese also rejected Netanyahu’s comments when asked about whether there was a link between his approach to Palestine and the Bondi attack.
“Overwhelmingly, most of the world recognizes a two-state solution as being the way forward in the Middle East,” he told broadcasters. “This is a moment of national unity where we need to come together … We need to wrap our arms around members of the Jewish community who are going through an extraordinarily difficult period.”
Albanese visited in hospital the man hailed a s hero for disarming one of the attackers.
Ahmed Al-Ahmed, a shopkeeper who moved to Australia from Syria in 2007, is recovering after tackling the gunman.
