Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Interceptor7, Magnifico, annetteboardman, jck, and Besame. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Man Oh Man, wader, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
Pictures of the week come from the Atlantic, Roll Call, CNN, NBC Boston, 9 News (Australia), and the BBC (Africa). And a short video from Romania Insider: Watch: Three brown bears walking in line in Romanian forest.
Let’s get the Brexit news out of the way… It is on, apparently. From The Local (Germany):
Britons across Germany on Friday spoke of their disappointment, sadness and worry over the UK general election result and impending Brexit which saw a huge victory for Boris Johnson.
Johnson is to return to Downing Street with a large majority after forecasts showed the Conservatives were set to win 364 seats after Thursday’s vote.
The Prime Minister said it would give him a mandate to "get Brexit done" and take the UK out of the EU next month.
From The Local (Italy):
Brits across Italy on Friday spoke of their shock, sadness and concern over the UK general election result, which saw a huge victory for Boris Johnson and the pro-Brexit Conservatives.
Johnson is to return to Downing Street with a large majority after Thursday’s vote, which was dominated by the question of how, when and if the UK's exit from the European Union should proceed.
The victorious prime minister insisted on Friday he would do everything to "get Brexit done" by January 31st. Brexit, he said, was now the "irrefutable, irresistible, unarguable will of the British people".
And from The Local (France):
Britons in France expressed anger and dismay on Friday after the UK election result dashed their remaining hopes that Brexit could somehow be avoided. But they were urged to look at the positive aspect of Boris Johnson's resounding win.
The victorious prime minister insisted on Friday he would do everything to get Brexit done by January 31st 2020.
Brexit he said was now the "irrefutable, irresistible, unarguable will of the British people".
But there are other things going on in Europe. Let’s begin with the Washington Examiner:
Paris — Nicolas Martin, poring over the map of France, interrupted his description of the wine from each region when he came to Bourgogne to make an economic comment: The best Burgundian wine is owned by China.
“If you are trying to buy good bottles, it costs the same price for us [as] for you guys in the U.S. or in Australia, you know?” Martin, one of two employees at a small wine shop and restaurant in central Paris, told the Washington Examiner. “Because the bottles are not in France anymore.”
From Spacewatch Global:
Made In Space Europe and Luxembourg Space Agency (LSA) announce a joint contract with the European Space Agency (ESA) to develop a robotic arm for space applications. The contract falls under the LuxIMPULSE programme, Luxembourg’s National Space Programme.
From Deutsche Welle:
The new regulations include greater powers for authorities to check in on gun owners. However, some opposition politicians called for more action on homemade firearms after the anti-Semitic attack in Halle in October.
Germany's Bundestag agreed to new gun control regulations on Friday, including a controversial measure that would have everyone who owns a firearm regularly checked by the country's domestic intelligence agency (BfV).
Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said that the government's goal is "no weapons in the hands of extremists." This includes implementing an amended European Firearms Directive into German law in order to make it more difficult for criminals and terrorists to get their hands on weapons.
From The Guardian:
Workers from tilers to toymakers need to attain rank of master craftsperson to start a business
Philip Oltermann
German workers including tilers, organ builders and makers of wooden toys now need to attain the rank of “master craftsperson” before they can start their own business, as the country rolls back some of the deregulatory labour market changes of the past decade.
Germany’s parliament voted on Thursday to reintroduce rules requiring those founding businesses in 12 trade sectors to have gained the qualification of “Meister”.
From Deutsche Welle:
Across Eastern Europe, NGOs are accused of undermining national unity for international interests. It seems that some politicians don't want citizens to get organized, the cultural anthropologist Ivaylo Ditchev writes.
"Norwegians, go away! Our children are not for sale!" Placards with these words have been carried around the streets of Bulgaria's capital, Sofia, over the past couple of months. The angry protesters are an amalgam of nationalists, religious fundamentalists and haters of the government. They bitterly disagree with a new draft law on social services in Bulgaria, just as they disagreed at the beginning of this year with the proposed "Strategy for the Child" with measures for improving child protection and, before that, with the Istanbul Convention on combating violence against women. They also suspect that the state is planning to destroy the traditional Bulgarian family.
From the Netherland Times:
By Janene Pieters
The percentage of female educators in higher education is on the rise, but slowly, according to figures from the Dutch network of female professors LNHV. If this pace continues, the Netherlands will only reach a balance of 50 percent female and 50 percent male professors in 2042, the network said.
Currently 23.1 percent of professors in the Netherlands are women, up from 20.9 percent last year - the biggest increase in Dutch history. On the downside, the percentage of women among associate professors decreased from 28.6 to 28.4 percent.
From the New York Times:
By Reuters
MADRID — The Spanish government on Friday authorized nearly 150 million euros ($165 million) in subsidies to ease the strain on its migrant-processing system after a recent spike in arrivals from Latin America overwhelmed its social services.
From Euroweekly news:
A RESIDENT in Miengo in Cantabria, Spain, made a horrifying discovery this morning (December 13) as they stumbled upon the body of a dead man lying on the street.
The Guardia Civil were immediately notified where once on the scene they found that the man, who is believed to be in his 20s, had not only been shot multiple times, but some of his fingers had even been amputated.
From Al Jazeera:
Large anti-Salvini protest planned for Rome after several successful demonstrations by movement founded by flatmates.
Rome, Italy - On the evening of November 14, Matteo Salvini, leader of the far-right League party, was in Bologna to kick off his campaign for January's regional elections.
The area has been a left-wing bastion since World War ll, but polls put the League neck-and-neck with the incumbent centre-left Democratic Party.
From The Independent:
Social media company restores account in Italy but it remains blocked outside of country
An Italian judge has ordered Facebook to reopen an account run by the neo-fascist party CasaPound and pay the group €15,000 (£12,500) in legal fees.
The social media behemoth blocked the group’s account, which had around 250,000 followers, in September for violating the platform’s policy against spreading hate.
From ekathimerini.com:
Greece plans to acquire three unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) from the United States with surveillance capabilities ranging from the Black Sea to Libya, Greece's Defense Minister Nikos Papagiotopoulos said on Friday, as reported by state-run news agency ANA-MPA.
From Romania Insider:
The acting president of the biggest political party in Romania, the Social Democratic Party (PSD), Marcel Ciolacu, announced on Thursday, December 12, that his party (now in opposition) will submit an amendment to the state budget law for 2020, by which child allowances will be doubled. The move would cost the budget some 0.4% of GDP.
“We want to double [the allowance] because last year the National Liberal Party - the current ruling party - did the same,” Ciolacu explained, according to Digi24.ro.
Now for news of the arts…
From Runner’s World:
In 1896, Olympic marathon champion Spyros Louis was awarded a 6th century B.C. relic, but it disappeared a few decades later.
At the inaugural
Olympic Games in 1896, the
marathon winner received something much different than the gold medal we think of today: a piece of pottery known as a ‘Skyphos,’ a two-handled wine cup that dated all the way back to the 6th century B.C. The prize Greek relic was presented to 1896 Olympic marathon champion Spyros Louis of Greece.
From artnet:
New Zealand and the Congo are just the latest nations to push for the return of their cultural artifacts.
Karen Chernick
New Zealand and Congo have asked the Belgian government to restitute specific cultural artifacts currently held at the Art & History Museum in Brussels. New Zealand has requested that the remains of indigenous Maori people be returned, and Congo is appealing for the return of archives recording mixed-race populations in their country, kept during early 20th century Belgian colonial rule.
From livescience:
By Owen Jarus
Some 1,600 years ago, ancient Romans would have worshipped the god Mithras, possibly in an altered state of consciousness, within the "Mithraeum of Colored Marbles," said archaeologists who found the remains of this temple in Ostia, Italy.
Artifacts and inscriptions found in the mithraeum suggest that the worshippers venerated both Mithras, a popular god in the Roman Empire, and other gods.
From The Guardian:
Portrait of a Lady, missing for 23 years, believed found by gardener in secret cavity
Lorenzo Tondo in Palermo
Italian police are investigating after a painting believed to be a Gustav Klimt stolen almost 23 years ago was discovered hidden in a wall of the gallery where it had previously been on display.
The location of Portrait of a Lady, one of the world’s most sought-after missing artworks, has been a mystery since it was stolen in 1997.
From Romania Insider:
Romania was the European Union’s biggest exporter of violins to countries outside the EU, with over 14,000 violins exported in 2018, according to data released by the European statistical office Eurostat on Violin Day (December 13). Romania’s exports represented 28% of the total number of violins exporter by EU countries.
Romania was followed by Denmark (12,200 units exported, 24% of the total), Germany (6,400, 13%), the United Kingdom (5,000, 10%), Czechia (2,900, 6%), France (2,700, over 5%), Italy (2,500, 5%), and Belgium (1,800, 4%).