LONDON: Veteran left-wing political maverick George Galloway lost his parliamentary seat in Britain’s election on Friday, defeated by the Labour candidate in the northern English town of Rochdale.
Galloway had served for just four months after winning a by-election triggered by the death of the town’s previous lawmaker.
Back in March, Galloway’s pro-Palestinian campaign helped him win votes from the town’s Muslim community and he secured what was his seventh stint as a lawmaker, representing his left-wing Workers Party of Britain.
That win came after Labour withdrew support from its candidate over a recording espousing conspiracy theories about Israel.
Both the Conservatives and the Labour Party have said they want the fighting in Gaza to stop, but they have also backed Israel’s right to defend itself, angering some among the 3.9 million Muslims who make up 6.5 percent of Britain’s population.
Galloway criticized Labour for supporting Israel in its war against Hamas during his winning by-election campaign in March.
But this time he lost to Labour candidate Paul Waugh, a former political journalist who has previously worked for Britain’s Independent and Evening Standard newspapers, and who grew up in the town.
Galloway, 69, was himself a former Labour parliamentarian before being expelled from the party in 2003 for criticizing then-prime minister Tony Blair over the Iraq war.
By that time, he already had a reputation for controversy.
In 1994, he drew criticism for meeting Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and telling him: “Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability.”
UK left-wing maverick Galloway loses his parliamentary seat
https://arab.news/yehn8
UK left-wing maverick Galloway loses his parliamentary seat
Russian FM slams ‘brazen’ Western plan to deploy force to Ukraine
- “This is not so much about security as it is about yet another attempt, you know, a brazen one,” Lavrov said
- Moscow has repeatedly railed against the idea of Western troops being deployed to Ukraine
CAIRO: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Friday slammed a European proposal to create a multinational force to police any potential peace deal in Ukraine as a “brazen” threat to Russia.
“This is not so much about security as it is about yet another attempt, you know, a brazen one... to carry out the military development of Ukrainian territory as a springboard for creating threats to the Russian Federation,” Lavrov said, during a visit to Egypt.
Leaders of Kyiv’s key European allies — including Britain, France, Germany and Italy — said this week they were ready to deploy a European-led “multinational force Ukraine” to “assist in the regeneration of Ukraine’s forces, in securing Ukraine’s skies, and in supporting safer seas, including through operating inside Ukraine.”
Moscow has repeatedly railed against the idea of Western troops being deployed to Ukraine, warning that it would consider them “legitimate targets” for Russia’s armed forces.
Ukraine is pushing for strong security guarantees if it signs up to a deal to end the four-year war, including Western military commitments that it sees as necessary to prevent Russia from invading once again.
