Week eight - Referendum

Britain Doesn’t Actually Have to Abide by the Results of the E.U. Referendum

But it will

•  Dan Stewart
 

June 24, 2016

The voters have spoken. Britain will leave the European Union, after some 17.4 million people put their ‘x’ beside Leave in polling stations up and down the country.But none of that necessarily matters. The whole thing could be called off.That’s because the referendum is not legally binding. In the U.K. only parliament gets to sets the laws, and the legislation that created the E.U. referendum did not say parliament had to act in accordance with the result.

So theoretically, this means Prime Minister David Cameron could decide to put the results of the referendum to a parliamentary vote, rather than going straight to the E.U. to ask to leave. The UK Parliament is thought to be about 3/4ths in favour of Remain so this would negate the result.

Or, MPs could use the threat of departure to negotiate the favourable deal with the E.U. that eluded David Cameron back in February. They could then put that deal to a second referendum, if they so wished. A petition calling for a second referendum has already garnered over 100,000 signatures, so they could still say they had popular support. And there’s a long history of other member states simply handing out another ballot paper when voters get the “wrong” result — in Ireland, for example, which reran a referendum on an E.U. treaty in 2001.Or, lastly, they could simply ignore the results of the referendum altogether and say it is too harmful to Britain’s economic and political future to go along with.

Here’s the thing — none of this is likely to happen. Cameron, or whoever replaces him, will almost certainly invoke Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty (the mechanism for leaving the E.U.) or begin other negotiations designed to withdraw.

http://time.com/4381645/eu-referendum-brexit-sovereign-parliament-results/?iid=sr-link4

Structure of the Lead：

WHO- Britain 

WHEN- after the vote

WHAT- leave E.U.

WHY- negative result

WHERE- UK

HOW-  by vote

keywords

1. referendum全民投票
2. parliament議會
3. legislation立法
4. accordance按照
5. favour 贊成
6. petition 請願
7. garnered 獲得
8. ballot選票
9. invoke調用
10. mechanism機制

Week seven - White Helmets

How the White Helmets of Syria Are Being Hunted in a Devastated Aleppo

'It's a catastrophe'

•  Jared Malsin / Istanbul @jmalsin
 

Sept. 25, 2016

It should have been a banner month for the White Helmets. The acclaimed Syrian volunteer rescue group is the subject of a documentary that was released on Netflix on Sept. 16. The organization is up for the Nobel Peace Prize next month, and a raft of celebrities including George Clooney, Ben Affleck and Justin Timberlake petitioned the prize committee in support of the group’s nomination. On Sept. 22, the White Helmets, who are known inside Syria as the Civil Defense, won the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the “alternative Nobel,” honoring the volunteers for their bravery in rushing to the aid of Syrian civilians under relentless bombardment. The group claims to have rescued some 60,000 people since 2013.

But now, the White Helmets have become the targets of that bombing. In the besieged rebel-held section of the city of Aleppo, at least three of the group’s four operations centers were damaged by airstrikes in one night. Many of their vehicles were destroyed. A fire station was heavily damaged. Even the rescue center featured in the Netflix documentary was destroyed.

The attacks are part of new, escalating chapter of the civil war in Syria, in which nearly half a million people have been killed since 2011. The current assault on eastern Aleppo began on the night of Sept. 19, when the Assad regime’s military declared an end to a partial ceasefire that went into effect a week earlier under an agreement negotiated by the U.S. and Russia. That night, regime and Russian aircraft resumed heavy bombardment of rebel-held areas, including an attack on a Red Crescent aid convoy in the rebel-held countryside west of Aleppo that killed at least 20 people and destroyed supplies intended to help more than 70,000 people.

http://time.com/4507009/aleppo-offensive-syria-white-helmets-attack/?iid=sr-link5

Structure of the Lead：

WHO- white helmets

WHEN-  Sept. 16.

WHAT- nomination of Nobel and target of bombing

WHY- rescue civilians from bombing

WHERE- Aleppo

HOW-  by Syrian volunteer rescue group

keywords

1. acclaimed 廣受好評的
2. documentary紀錄
3. petitioned 請願
4. nomination提名
5. alternative 替代
6. aid援助
7. relentless 狠
8. claims聲明
9. vehicles 汽車
10. regime政權