Parties Reel From UKIP Election Success

UKIP's haul of seats in the council elections is up to 184 with the main parties now mulling the prospect of four-party politics in next year's general election.

Nigel Farage has said his anti-EU party is a "serious player" for 2015 after they added 167 councillors at the expense of the Tories, Labour and Liberal Democrats.

UKIP made gains in traditional Labour and Conservative heartlands, including strong showings in Rotherham - where it returned 10 out of 21 councillors.

It also got a big thumbs thumbs up from 'Essex Man' with a strong showing in areas such as Thurrock, Castle Point and Basildon.

However, it still does not have overall control of any council, and fared particularly poorly in London

Nigel Farage claims the 'UKIP fox is in the Westminster henhouse'

Mr Farage told the leaders of the main parties he would "see them in Westminster" and said the results showed UKIP had the potential to cause an "earthquake" at the general election.

"The UKIP fox is in the Westminster henhouse," he claimed.

"If voters think we are in with a chance of winning next year, then we are."

Sky News projections suggest UKIP would only return one MP next year - its first, but the possibility of it building momentum and wooing more voters over the next year is a major headache for party leaders.

The state of play with just two councils still to announce their results

The Prime Minister conceded the Conservatives had to start delivering on immigration and welfare reform, and said the public had become "frustrated" with the status quo.

Critics have also rounded on Labour leader Ed Miliband, saying he failed to mount a serious campaign to tackle UKIP and pointing to a series of PR blunders in the run up to polling day.

Prime Minister David Cameron said the public had grown 'frustrated'

Mr Miliband, who has promised to help families cut living costs through policies such as freezing energy prices, was accused of being out of touch when he underestimated the cost of a weekly food shop.

Labour's election was far from a disaster - it gained control of five more councils in the election - but the gains are thought to be some way from the shot in the arm the party needs to head towards an overall majority in 2015.

Another hung parliament could be on the cards if voters go the same way in 2015, with Sky projections pointing towards Labour falling short by 18 MPs.

Ed Miliband made several PR gaffes in the run-up to the election

The Liberal Democrats also had a dismal election night as voters ensured Nick Clegg's party lost control of councils in Kingston-Upon-Thames and Portsmouth.

Mr Clegg admitted the party had done badly but said: "Actually I think in the areas where we have MPs where we have good organisation on the ground ... we are actually doing well."

UKIP made gains in areas of Essex such as Southend, where it won five seats

With 159 or 161 councils now declared, Labour have won 3,999 seats, giving it control of 81 councils - an increase of five.

The Conservatives have 2,679 seats overall, controlling 41 councils - down 13; and the Liberal Democrats picked up 882 seats, seeing the number of councils under their control falling from eight to six.

The focus now moves to Sunday night when the count will come in for the European election.

:: Follow all the results as they come in on Twitter with @skyelections.

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Three Killed In Shooting Near Jewish Museum

Three people have been killed and another seriously injured in a shooting outside the Jewish Museum in Brussels.

Belgian Interior Minister Joelle Milquet has tweeted to say he believes it was an "anti-Semitic attack".

Two women and a man are thought to have been killed.

Sky's Robert Nisbet said a local website quoted witnesses as saying an Audi drove up to the museum and two men got out and began firing indiscriminately at passers-by.

They then got back into the car and drove off, La Libre newspaper said on its website.

Belgian Foreign Minister Didier Reynders heard shots and arrived at the scene moments later to find bodies on the ground.

"I am shocked by the murders committed at the Jewish museum, I am thinking of the victims I saw there and their families," he wrote on Twitter.

Police have closed off the area, and a number of ambulances are at the scene.

A Jewish community leader, Joel Rubinfeld, told AFP it clearly "is a terrorist act" and the result of "a climate of hate".

The attack came a day before Belgium's General Election and Euro election.

Nisbet said there are reports one person is in custody.

 

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Iran Hangs Billionaire Over $2.6bn Bank Fraud

A billionaire Iranian businessman convicted of masterminding a $2.6bn (£1.5bn) banking scam has reportedly been hanged in Tehran's notorious Evin prison.

Mahafarid Amir Khosravi was sentenced to death after being convicted of "corruption on earth... through bribery and money laundering", a justice department statement carried by Iranian media said.

Khosravi's lawyer, Gholam Ali Riahi, was quoted by news website khabaronline.ir as saying that his client was put to death without any notice.

"I had not been informed about execution of my client," Riahi said. "All the assets of my client are at the disposal of the prosecutor's office."

Revelations about the scandal swept Iran in 2011 when prosecutors said they uncovered a private umbrella group, led by Amir Khosravi, also known as Amir Mansour Aria, and his brothers, illegally amassing billions of dollars.

The case is said by prosecutors to be the largest fraud case since the country's 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Over the space of two years, Amir Mansour Aria Development Co. bought some 40 companies including state-owned companies like major steel producer Khuzestan Steel Co, and a football club.

They were said to have used forged letters of credit obtained from several major banks whose managers they had bribed.

A total of 39 defendants were convicted in the case. Four received death sentences, two got life sentences and the rest received sentences of up to 25 years in prison.

Mahmoud Reza Khavari, a former head of Bank Melli, a major Iranian bank, escaped to Canada in 2011 after he resigned over the case.

He faces charges over the case in Iran and remains on the Islamic Republic's wanted list. Khavari previously admitted that his bank partially was involved in the fraud, but has maintained his innocence.

The case took on political dimensions when the finger was pointed at some senior officials in the administration of then president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Mr Ahmadinejad, who was elected on an anti-corruption platform, dismissed the attacks as a smear campaign by his opponents.

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Mayor Castrated And Killed In French Village

A French mayor has been murdered and then castrated by an electrician who suspected the official was having an affair with his girlfriend, reports say.

Dominique Leboucher was stabbed in the neck by the 39-year-old man, according to a prosecutor.

Mr Leboucher, 55, was apparently castrated after being killed and then the attacker took his own life, Catherine Denis said.

She added the killer had no previous criminal record and was "clearly very much in love" with his girlfriend.

The mayor's wife said she did not believe her husband was cheating, Ms Denis went on.

Officials at the home of the alleged killer

The killing and reported castration in Bretteville-le-Rabet - a village of 250 people in France's northern Calvados region - has caused shock and horror.

One of the mayor's deputies, Yannick Guesnon, said: "I do not believe this thing about infidelity at all."

He added the attack appeared to be "an act of madness".

Albert Gibot said the attacker was a father-of-two who had "blown a fuse as his partner used to attend meetings of the local council in the evenings".

The mayor, who worked in insurance sales, first became a councillor in 2001 before taking up the post of deputy mayor in 2008.

He was elected mayor in March's municipal elections.

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Thailand Police Confront Anti-Coup Protesters

Police and armed soldiers have been involved in a tense stand-off with protesters marching against the military coup in Thailand.

A group of around 200 demonstrators defied limits on public gatherings imposed since the army took control and refused to obey instructions not to march through Bangkok.

As the protesters marched from a shopping centre in the centre of the city they were met by a line of riot police, backed up by heavily-armed soldiers, and ordered to disperse.

Sky News Asia Correspondent Mark Stone, who is at the scene of the confrontation, said it had been "bloodless, but incredibly tense".

He said: "This is very tense because one of the key conditions the general now in charge of this country made was that he did not want any political gatherings of more than five people."

Soldiers descended from a truck as the situation became more tense

Former Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra was in a "safe place" on Saturday, an aide said, after being held by the army following a coup this week,

The army moved on Thursday after failing to forge a compromise in a power struggle between Ms Yingluck's populist government and the royalist establishment, which brought months of unrest to Bangkok's streets.

The military detained Ms Yingluck on Friday when she and scores of other people, most of them her political allies, were summoned to an army facility in Bangkok. 

Lines of riot police and soldiers confronted the protesters

Thailand has been locked in political crisis since a 2006 military coup that deposed Ms Yingluck's elder brother Thaksin Shinawatra, a billionaire tycoon who clashed with the royalist establishment.

His Red Shirt supporters had warned that any military overthrow of the government could trigger civil war and all eyes are now on how his movement will respond.

US Secretary of State John Kerry said there was "no justification" for the military takeover.

He said it would have "negative implications" for US relations, and demanded early elections.

British ambassador to Thailand Mark Kent said British citizens should "exercise extreme caution" and follow travel advice and media updates."

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Pope Calls For 'Urgent' End To Syrian War

By Tom Rayner, Middle East Reporter

Pope Francis has said there is an "urgent" need for a peaceful solution to the Syria crisis, on the first day of a visit to the Middle East.

The Pontiff was speaking in Amman following a meeting with Jordan's King Abdullah II, in which he also called for a "just" solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

King Abdullah praised the Pope for his "humanity and wisdom" saying his visit would help ease the suffering of the Syrian refugees and the burden of host countries like Jordan where most have fled.

He added the Pontiff had "become a conscience for the whole world".

Pope Francis then held a public mass in Amman's main sports stadium, attended by around 25,000 people, many of whom were Christian refugees who have fled Syria and Iraq.

Pope Francis waves to pilgrims in Amman stadium

The 77-year-old Pontiff did laps of the stadium to adoring cheers in an open-top vehicle, stopping to bless some of those who had gathered and kiss babies.

The whirl-wind visit will last just over 48 hours, but in that time the head of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics will also visit the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Israel, hold talks with national leaders and deliver 13 speeches or homilies.

The Vatican says the aim is raise awareness of the exodus of Christians from the region in the face of increasing persecution, as well as to call for greater unity between the Catholic and Orthodox churches.

In an effort to promote inter-religious dialogue, the Pope will be accompanied by a Rabbi and an Imam, both close friends from his home city of Buenos Aires in Argentina.

But while the Vatican insists the visit is a "strictly religious" mission, the programme is fraught with potential political stumbling blocks, and every word delivered will be subject to intense scrutiny.

The Pope is pictured meeting Jordan's King Abdullah II

On Sunday, he will fly by helicopter to Bethlehem, where he will hold a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas before commencing a public mass in Manger Square, outside the Church of the Nativity.

Mayor of Bethlehem, Vera Baboun, says she believes his message will be one of hope for many Palestinians.

"The Pope is an adamant believer in peace, and adamant believer in the right of the discriminated-against and the marginalised", she told Sky News.

"When he comes here, he will be praying for peace to the Palestinians, praying the message of peace from the place that the message was ordained."

Following the mass he will meet with children at the Deheisheh Palestinian refugee camp near Bethlehem, before heading to Tel Aviv to receive an official welcome to Israel from President Shimon Peres, and then on to Jerusalem.

The 50th anniversary of an historic meeting between Pope Paul VI and Orthodox Patriarch Athenagoras, which ended hundreds of years of division between the two branches of Christianity, will be marked by a joint prayer meeting of Catholic and Orthodox priests at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

The final day of the visit will see Pope Francis visit the grounds of the Al Aqsa Mosque as well as the Western Wall, the most holy site in Judaism, and the Holocaust memorial at Yad Vashem, before a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The visit will conclude with a mass at the Cenacle in Jerusalem, the site at which the last supper is thought to have taken place.

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Tragic Sailors: Skipper 'Dearly Missed'

The family of yachtsman Andrew Bridge say they are "deeply saddened" by the discovery of the upturned hull of the missing boat Cheeki Rafiki.

The search for the four British sailors ended at 3am UK time after a search of the capsized vessel found the only realistic means of survival had not been deployed.

Mr Bridge, the yacht skipper, was one of four men on board the boat which got into trouble on May 15.

From left: Andrew Bridge, Steve Warren, James Male and Paul Goslin

The family statement said: "Andrew will be dearly missed by everyone who knew him. Our thoughts and condolences go out to the families of the rest of the crew on the Cheeki Rafiki.

"We would like to thank everyone who's helped in the search for Andrew including the US Coast Guard, the Canadian Coast Guard, the RAF, Merchant vessels, the yachting community and the British and American Governments."

The raft was found stored in the aft of the boat Pic: US Coast Guard

It added that they had been "overwhelmed" by public support.

US Navy divers found the boat with a missing keel and a completely flooded cabin with shattered windows, said the Coast Guard.

"A US Navy warship smallboat crew and surface swimmer captured underwater imagery clearly identifying the raft in its storage space [behind the wheel]. The image was shared with and acknowledged by the families," said a statement.

"The crew and swimmer deployed to investigate the overturned boat after a helicopter crew located it 1,000 miles offshore Massachusetts and within the US Coast Guard's search area.

The search effort involved military aircraft and ships

It had already been announced that the search would be called off in the early hours of Saturday if no signs of possible survival were discovered.

"None of the current developments" indicate the crew are still alive, said the US Coast Guard.

The upturned 40ft yacht had been found on Friday, with divers first knocking on the hull to check for signs of life.

The men's familes had campaigned for the search to go on

The families had said they were still hopeful their loved ones would be found.

Relatives of Steve Warren, 52, Andrew Bridge, 22, James Male, 23, and Paul Goslin, 56, said they had been told "endless stories" of people surviving for months at sea.

A statement on behalf of Steve Warren's family said it was an "incredibly difficult" time and that the search effort had been "exceptional".

The Cheeki Rafiki had been at a regatta in Antigua

The vessel ran into difficulties on May 15 and began taking on water while returning to the UK from a regatta in Antigua.

Yacht training and charter company Stormforce Coaching said it had been in contact with the skipper at the time, and that the crew were keeping the situation stable.

The original search was halted after 53 hours amid bad weather but resumed on Tuesday after a request from the UK government and a online petition which collected more than 200,000 names.

Rescuers scoured more than 21,000 square miles of ocean during their second search for the boat.

Experts had agreed it would be impossible for the crew to survive outside of the life raft in cold, rough seas for more than 20 hours.

Prime Minister David Cameron tweeted: "My thoughts are with the families of the crew of the Cheeky Rafiki after the sad news its hull has been found with the life-raft unused."

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Labour Badly Bruised By UKIP In Stronghold

Why The Only Way For Essex Is UKIP

Updated: 8:12pm UK, Friday 23 May 2014

By Jason Farrell, Political Correspondent

Standing by the roadside in their purple rosettes are two retired Essex men, Malcolm Elliott and Dave Morrish. They are brothers-in-law, both living in Thurrock.

One is a right-wing Thatcherite - the other a former left-wing activist who emigrated when Margaret Thatcher was in power.

They have never agreed on politics until now. Now they are waiting for their hero of the hour to arrive, Nigel Farage.

As the anticipation builds, Malcolm tells me: "I've been a socialist all my life but not anymore because nobody's listening."

"What do you think of Ed Miliband?" I ask.

"I don't frankly. I don't believe in any of them anymore."

His brother-in-law Dave agrees. "I voted Tory for 47 years. But I feel it doesn't matter if you vote Tory, Labour or the Lib Dems, what you're going to get is the EU and that's what I don't want. Renegotiation is a nonsense. Every European treaty states that it's not negotiable."

In the local elections UKIP has increased its number of seats in Thurrock from one to six, meaning the council is no longer controlled by Labour. Thanks to UKIP the Conservatives also lost control of Basildon, Brentwood, Castle Point and Southend: Essex man is becoming UKIP man.

As Mr Farage arrives the activists can hardly reach him for the cameras. The UKIP leader tells reporters his success in Essex does not mean he will stand for a seat here.

He also fields a number of questions about why his party failed to make the same impact down the road in London, where they only got 7% of the vote.

"We have a weak voluntary structure in London," he says. "We haven't built it. We haven't developed it. We haven't had the right local leaders. Once we get the right local Leaders we will start having results like this in London."

In previous elections this seat has seesawed from red to blue. The nearby parade of shops tells its own story of a community in decline. A pound shop, a Boots, a butcher's and a Greggs are among a row of otherwise boarded and shuttered facades. The butcher tells me that in the last five years for every shop that has closed, nothing has replaced them.

In Thurrock more than one in five children live in poverty. There has been a 200% increase in the use of food banks in recent months. If Ed Miliband's message about the "cost of living crisis" were to resonate anywhere, you would think it would be here. But instead they are more interested in what Mr Farage has to say about the EU and immigration.

In the local coffee shop I ask a group of pensioners why that is. "In this area we've swung between Labour and the Conservatives," says one man. "And what have either of them done for us? They've put their pay up 11% while our pensions have gone up 1%." There are six of them round the table and they all support UKIP.

The current MP is conservative Jackie Doyle-Price. With a shock of bleach-blonde hair and an upbringing on a Sheffield estate, she is far from fitting the Tories characterisation of Etonian established elite, and she is not someone to trot out the agreed party message.   

"There's been a definite mood on the doorstep of people saying the political classes don't speak to us anymore and if you look at the Westminster debate it's become very managerial, very bland, and along come UKIP with some populist messages and people say to themselves, let's give the main political parties a good kicking, and they have."

The overall mood is that Thurrock feels neglected and ignored by Westminster and therefore easily swept along by a new political wind. It seems, for many in Essex, the only way is UKIP.

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Revenge Video Link To Drive-By Mass Shooting

A revenge video in which a young man threatens to slaughter "spoilt, stuck-up, blonde" women is at the centre of an investigation into a drive-by shooting that left seven people dead.

The gunman was among the dead and seven others were injured in Friday night's rampage in Isla Vista - a student enclave next to the University of California, Santa Barbara.

The attacker opened fire as young people were out socialising in the small beachside town on a bustling Memorial Day weekend. 

Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown said authorities are looking at written and video evidence that suggests "this atrocity was a premeditated mass murder".

A social media image of the suspect in the shooting

Officers are looking at a YouTube video in which a young man named Elliot Rodger makes a chilling tirade against women and the rest of humanity, threatening to take revenge.

The person in the video, which was posted the day before the shooting, promises a "day of retribution".

During a rant lasting nearly seven minutes, he says it is "not fair" that he is still a virgin and has never even kissed a girl.

"You throw yourselves at all these obnoxious men," he says, "instead of me - the supreme gentleman - I will punish all of you for it."

The killer was driving a black BMW and had two gun battles with police before crashing into a parked car.

The oceanfront community has been shocked by the killings

Sheriff Brown said deputies had found the attacker dead with a gunshot wound to the head.

It is not known whether he was shot by deputies, or if his wound was self-inflicted.

Sheriff Brown said the shootings occurred at several sites in the town, resulting in nine crime scenes.

He said the gunman is believed to have acted alone.

A semi-automatic handgun was recovered from the scene.

Sheriff Brown said the gunman's name would be released once relatives had been notified.

A student told KEYT-TV he saw shots fired from the car, killing one woman and critically injuring another.

The possible suspect's blog complains that girls do not find him attractive

"I heard shots, screams, pain," Michael Vitak said. "All emotions. I hope she is going to be fine."

One shaken student told the station she had been approached by the driver of a black BMW who flashed a handgun and asked: "Hey, what's up?"

The student, who didn't provide her full name, said she did not realise it was a real gun and kept walking.

She said she felt bullets flying by her head seconds later.

The station said the black BMW slammed into as many as two cars.

The shooting prompted officials to issue alerts urging people to stay indoors.

Little is know about the possible suspect in the shooting.

He apparently kept a blog in which he said: "I wish girls were attracted to me - I don't know why they aren't."

More follows...

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Putin Brands Charles Hitler Slur 'Unacceptable'

Vladimir Putin has branded a comparison made by the Prince of Wales in which the Royal likened the Russian president to Hitler as "not what monarchs do".

Mr Putin said Prince Charles' reported comments were "unacceptable" and "wrong".

The president was talking to leading global news agencies in St Petersburg including the British Press Association ahead of elections in Ukraine on Sunday.

It is claimed the Prince made his comments in a private conversation with a museum volunteer whose Jewish family fled Nazi Germany during the war during a Royal tour of Canada.

Marienne Ferguson, 78, said that after telling Charles the story of how her family fled the Nazis, he replied: "Putin is doing just about the same as Hitler."

It is understood that Charles had been talking to Ms Ferguson about the Nazi occupation of Danzig at the start of World War Two, and had appeared to draw a parallel with Russia's annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea in March.

When asked by the Press Association's chief executive what he thought of what the Prince was reported to have said, Mr Putin replied: "It reminds me of a good proverb: 'You are angry. That means you are wrong."'

He added: "Give my words to Prince Charles.

"He has been to our country more than once, if he made such a comparison, it is unacceptable and I am sure he understands that as a man of manners."

Mr Putin added: "I met him personally, as well as other members of the Royal Family. This is not what monarchs do.

"But over the past few years we have seen so much, nothing surprises me any longer."

Mr Putin's response comes a month before he is due to take part in a D-Day anniversary event with the Prince.

His comments made it clear that the disapproval of prominent international figures such as the Prince of Wales would not influence his actions in the current crisis in Ukraine.

He added: "I will be guided not by what they say about me anywhere.

"I will only be guided by the interests of the Russian people, and I hope our colleagues in Great Britain will keep that in mind and will always remember that when finding solutions to any issues, we are always guided by international law and its norms."

A spokeswoman for the Prince of Wales declined to comment.

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