Then-President Donald Trump listens as aide Hope Hicks speaks during a Make America Great Again rally at Ocala International Airport in Ocala, Florida on October 16, 2020.

Brendan Smialowski / AFP

• The January 6 House Select Committee released almost 50 witness testimony transcripts Friday.
• One transcript details the committee’s interview with Hope Hicks, a former Trump ally.
• “I just think that he felt like…blaming him for everything that transpired wasn’t fair,” she said.

In a spate of witness deposition transcripts released on Friday by the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection, a transcript reveals that former White House Communications Director Hope Hicks told the committee that former President Donald Trump felt like the blame he received for the riot on Capitol Hill was unfair.

Once one of Trump’s closest allies, 34-year-old Hicks sat voluntarily for witness testimony, a video of which aired during the committee’s final hearing on Monday. She was one of few people in Trump’s orbit that communicated to Trump that he lost the 2020 election, according to the transcript released Friday.

—Lisa Rubin (@lawofruby) December 24, 2022

Hicks talked to Trump on January 11, 2021, days after the deadly insurrection. 

“He asked me if I thought it was really as bad as everyone was making it out to be. And my answer was, yes, I thought it was,” the transcript reads. 

She added: “I think he felt like t wasn’t fair — the response to it wasn’t fair.” 

Hicks, who resigned from the White House on January 12, 2021, said she communicated to Trump that he should change his approach and appear more “rational” to observers.

“And I was just telling him, I think, you know, the more rational you are and restrained you are, the more extreme everybody else will look, so things like banning you from social media I think will backfire, and that, you know, if you focus on the things people really care about and not the election, I think that things will get better quickly for you, in terms of politically,” Hicks told the committee.

She said Trump also asked her if she believed the election was stolen, to which she objected. 

“And then we just sort of exchanged some, you know, pleasantries, and that was it,” she added.

“I just think that he felt like, you know, blaming him for everything that transpired wasn’t fair,” Hicks continued. 

The committee released a thorough report on Thursday of its findings while investigating the Capitol riot and how Trump played a part in it. They also recommended to the Justice Department that Trump face criminal charges for his role in the insurrection.

Hicks was not immediately reachable for comment.

Courtesy of ROMU

• A partial skeleton thought to be 5,000 years old was discovered in Denmark. 
• The skeleton could be part of a collection of “bog bodies” found all over Northern Europe. 
• Evidence also suggests that the “bog body” could have been there as part of a ritual.

An ancient and well-preserved skeleton  — potentially a remnant of a ritual sacrifice practiced over 5,000 years ago — was discovered by archeologists in Denmark. 

Researchers at ROMU, an organization representing 10 museums in Denmark, had been excavating on the site of a planned housing development in the Egedal Municipality, near Copenhagen. 

During their survey, Christian Dedenroth-Schou, one of the team members, came across a femur sticking out of the mud. After digging further into the dirt, Dedenroth-Schou and his colleagues were able to find nearly all the bones from both legs, a pelvis and a jaw. 

Researchers understood it to be a “bog body” which refers to the dozens of usually male bodies found in bogs in Europe. The bodies often remain well-intact, despite being thousands of years old, as a result of the oxygen-deficient and acidic environments of bogs that make it difficult for bacteria to survive. This process is also how peat is formed from sphagnum moss.

One of the most famous bog bodies, the Tollund Man, was also found in Denmark.

Courtesy of ROMU

 

The skeleton is not complete, and there are “no direct traces of sacrifice,” according to ROMU, but archeologists believe that the bog person was not simply the victim of a thoughtless murder, but rather a planned ritual ceremony. 

It is understood that bogs played a significant role for the ancient people of Northern Europe for the resources they provided and were believed to be “the gateway between the world of mankind and the world of the gods,” according to the National Museum of Denmark. 

The bog men unearthed could have been offerings to the gods between 4,300 BC and 600 BC — or between the Neolithic and Iron Ages.

Courtesy of ROMU

A Stone Age-era flint ax, remnants of animal bones, and ceramics were found near the site of the skeleton found in Egedal, which led researchers to the conclusion that the items might have been left as part of a ritual. 

Emil Winther Struve, the lead archaeologist with ROMU, told LiveScience that the ax had never been used, lending credence to the theory that the ax was used as an offering, rather than a murder weapon.

“The find fits into a proven tradition of ritually burying both objects, people, and animals in the bog. This has been widely done throughout ancient times, and this is most likely a victim of such a ritual,” Struve said in a press release. “Previous finds show that it is an area where ritual activity has taken place.” 

Much about the skeleton — including the sex, where the person lived, and when the person died — remains unknown. Emil Struve, the excavation leader, told LiveScience that there was evidence that the body was from the Neolithic because “traditions of human sacrifices date back that far.”

The site has now been drained and the archaeologists are hoping to use DNA technology and do a more thorough excavation to find the rest of the bones, when the ground thaws in the spring. 

“You think about whether that person would be happy to be found, or whether they would rather have rested in peace,” Dedenroth-Schou said in a press release, translated from Danish. “After all, we don’t know much about their religion. Perhaps we are disrupting a notion of the afterlife. But at the same time, we have an important task in ensuring that the remains of a person are not just dug up with an excavator and end up in a big pile of dirt.”

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SHANGHAI/TAIPEI (Reuters) -China expressed anger on Saturday at a new U.S. defence authorisation law that boosts military assistance for Taiwan, while Taipei cheered it for helping boost the island’s security.

China, which considers democratically governed Taiwan its own territory, expressed “strong dissatisfaction and resolute opposition” regarding the U.S. National Defense Authorization Act, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

It said the $858 billion military spending measure, which authorises up to $10 billion in security assistance and fast-tracked weapons procurement for Taiwan, contained provisions that “cause serious damage to peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait”.

China has never renounced using force to bring Taiwan under its control. Taiwan strongly disputes China’s sovereignty claims, saying only the island’s 23 million people can decide their future.

Taiwan’s Defence Ministry expressed its thanks for the U.S. legislation, saying it showed the importance Washington attached to Taiwan-U.S. ties and strengthening the island’s security.

Taipei will discuss the details of the act with Washington and “gradually push forward the budget formulation and actual disbursement of the various Taiwan-friendly provisions”, the ministry said, without elaborating.

The United States is Taiwan’s most important international backer and arms supplier, despite the absence of formal diplomatic ties. U.S. arms sales to Taiwan are a constant irritant in Beijing’s relations with Washington.

Taiwan’s military is dwarfed by that of its huge neighbour China. Its air force in particular has come under strain from having to scramble repeatedly to see off Chinese incursions near the island over the past three years or so.

The defence law contained an amendment restricting U.S. government purchases of products using computer chips made by a group of Chinese companies.

“The case ignores the facts to exaggerate a ‘China threat’, wantonly interferes in China’s internal affairs and attacks and smears the Chinese Communist Party, which are serious political provocations to China,” China’s foreign ministry said.

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Charles Sobhraj, a convicted killer who police believe murdered more than 20 western backpackers on the “hippie trail” through Asia in the 1970s and 1980s, arrived in France on Saturday after nearly two decades behind bars in Nepal, BFM TV reported.

Nepal’s Supreme Court ordered the release of Sobhraj, known as the “bikini killer” in Thailand, and ‘The Serpent” for his evasion of police, earlier this week on health grounds.

A lawyer for Sobhraj in France did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

He had been held in a high-security prison in Nepal since 2003, when he was arrested on charges of murdering American backpacker Connie Jo Bronzich in 1975. He was later found guilty of killing Bronzich’s Canadian friend, Laurent Carriere, and had served 19 years out of a 20-year sentence.

Sobhraj told French news agency AFP on the flight out of Nepal that he was not guilty of murdering Bronzich and Carriere and that the case against him was built on fake documents.

“I have a lot to do. I have to sue a lot of people,” AFP quoted Sobhraj as saying.

Associates have previously described Sobhraj, 78, as a con artist, a seducer, a robber and a murderer.

In 2021, the BBC and Netflix (NFLX.O) produced a drama series based on the story of Sobhraj’s alleged killings.

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NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India has mandated a COVID-19 negative test report for travelers arriving from China, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and Thailand, the health minister said on Saturday.

Passengers from those countries would be put under quarantine if they showed symptoms of COVID-19 or if tests positive were, minister Mansukh Mandaviya said.

Russian troops have utilised tanks, mortars, cannon and rocket artillery to open up hearth on 25 settlements in the Bakhmut direction around the previous day.

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