After a violent 24 hours in London marked by a spate of stabbings, US President Donald Trump described the city’s mayor Sadiq Khan as a disaster as he reignited their feud.
In doing so, the US president retweeted the right-wing, anti-Islam campaigner Katie Hopkins, as he told his 61 million followers that Mr Khan was a “national disgrace who is destroying the City of London”.
Mr Trump's diatribe shared Ms Hopkins' tweet where she described the capital as "Khan's Londonistan" – a reference to the so-called Islamification of London.
A highly controversial figure, Ms Hopkins has previously claimed that multiculturalism is causing crime to surge in the UK. She believes a “Muslim mafia” controls parts of the country. Mr Trump has said parts of London were “no-go areas” for police because of the Muslim population.
In less than 24 hours, three people died and another three were injured in five attacks in London. Mr Trump’s detractors have long pointed out that, despite a rise in crime in London, murder rates are still much higher in US cities.
Mr Khan has yet to respond directly to Mr Trump, tweeting yesterday that London’s police “have been working tirelessly all over the weekend to help keep our city safe and uphold the law” after a number of arrests were made.
Mr Khan’s spokesman said the mayor’s thoughts were with the victims’ families and he “is not going to waste his time responding to this sort of tweet”.
He received support from his party leader, Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn, who said it was “absolutely awful to see” the US president “using the tragedy of people being murdered to attack the mayor”.
He said Mr Khan was "rightly supporting the police ... while Katie Hopkins spreads hateful and divisive rhetoric. They seek to divide at a time when we need to come together".
Mr Khan has described the president as having values that are the antithesis of those held by most London residents.
He has been in an almost constant public war of words with the US president. On a recent state visit to the UK, Mr Trump said Mr Khan was a “stone cold loser who should focus on crime in London”.
The London mayor has rallied against the president’s Muslim travel ban and immigration policies that “forcefully separates young children from their parents at the border".
Another point of differences is Mr Trump's support for Boris Johnson, the former London mayor and now front runner to become the new UK prime minister.
“Safe, big city it was when I used to run it. I can tell you, we got crime down by 20 per cent, we got the murder rate down,” Mr Johnson said recently when launching his campaign. Mr Trump has described him as a friend.
During Mr Trump's trip to the UK earlier this month, the opposition slammed the government's decision to grant the president a state visit given his controversial policies and comments.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
In Search of Mary Shelley: The Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein
By Fiona Sampson
Profile
Neil Thomson – THE BIO
Family: I am happily married to my wife Liz and we have two children together.
Favourite music: Rock music. I started at a young age due to my father’s influence. He played in an Indian rock band The Flintstones who were once asked by Apple Records to fly over to England to perform there.
Favourite book: I constantly find myself reading The Bible.
Favourite film: The Greatest Showman.
Favourite holiday destination: I love visiting Melbourne as I have family there and it’s a wonderful place. New York at Christmas is also magical.
Favourite food: I went to boarding school so I like any cuisine really.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
One in four Americans don't plan to retire
Nearly a quarter of Americans say they never plan to retire, according to a poll that suggests a disconnection between individuals' retirement plans and the realities of ageing in the workforce.
Experts say illness, injury, layoffs and caregiving responsibilities often force older workers to leave their jobs sooner than they'd like.
According to the poll from The Associated Press-NORC Centre for Public Affairs Research, 23 per cent of workers, including nearly two in 10 of those over 50, don't expect to stop working. Roughly another quarter of Americans say they will continue working beyond their 65th birthday.
According to government data, about one in five people 65 and older was working or actively looking for a job in June. The study surveyed 1,423 adults in February this year.
For many, money has a lot to do with the decision to keep working.
"The average retirement age that we see in the data has gone up a little bit, but it hasn't gone up that much," says Anqi Chen, assistant director of savings research at the Centre for Retirement Research at Boston College. "So people have to live in retirement much longer, and they may not have enough assets to support themselves in retirement."
When asked how financially comfortable they feel about retirement, 14 per cent of Americans under the age of 50 and 29 per cent over 50 say they feel extremely or very prepared, according to the poll. About another four in 10 older adults say they do feel somewhat prepared, while just about one-third feel unprepared.
"One of the things about thinking about never retiring is that you didn't save a whole lot of money," says Ronni Bennett, 78, who was pushed out of her job as a New York City-based website editor at 63.
She searched for work in the immediate aftermath of her layoff, a process she describes as akin to "banging my head against a wall." Finding Manhattan too expensive without a steady stream of income, she eventually moved to Portland, Maine. A few years later, she moved again, to Lake Oswego, Oregon. "Sometimes I fantasise that if I win the lottery, I'd go back to New York," says Ms Bennett.
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