Every time one of the cows on Marten Dijkstra’s dairyfarm in the north of the Netherlands needs to be milked, she makes her own way to the dairy barn and joins a queue to use a robotic milking machine.  

While the cows milk themselves, Dijkstra can avoid one of the most back-bending demands of being a dairy farmer. “It gives me flexibility in my life as well as my back and shoulders,” he joked.

It seems most of his fellow Dutch dairy farmers agree. The milking robot ― first invented by Dutch engineers in the early 1990s ― already outsells traditional milking parlors where cows are taken to be milked in the country. 

And they are just one of a wave of machines now taking over mundane farming tasks in the Netherlands, including harvesting, and fruit and vegetable picking, with almost $1 billion spent on innovation last year by the sector. 

This innovation drive, including increasing use of automation on farms like Dijkstra’s, has helped propel a country with a land mass smaller than the state of West Virginia to become the world’s second-biggest food exporter after the U.S., with agri-food exports worth more than $100 billion.

And it’s dairy, and fruit and vegetables ― where technologies like milking and harvesting robots are becoming commonplace in the Netherlands ― that account for the biggest share of that export revenue. 

“Automation has been part of that success story,” said Erik Nicholson of the United Farm Workers of America. The Netherlands “is seen as a world leader because of the innovation going on there and the output it manages despite its comparatively small size.”

The Netherlands’ high population density compared with other countries has been a driving force behind the automation of its agricultural sector, said Janneke de Kramer, a food and farming robotics specialist at Wageningen University, the country’s main agricultural research institution.

“We have a lot of people in a small area of land, so for a long period now we’ve had to produce more food with less land than other countries,” de Kramer said. “The Dutch agri-sector has been good at working together to develop science and new technology to overcome this.”

The other big issue driving automation is labor shortages. Farmers are aging in the Netherlands and manual farm labor is getting harder to find as migrants from other countries return home ― many put off by poor farm working conditions. Researchers at Wageningen have said roughly one-quarter of Polish workers have left farm jobs in the Netherlands in recent years. 

The local population just “don’t want to work on farms anymore,” said Dijkstra. “We have a greying population here and we’re also having fewer children, too. It’s something we can’t prevent from happening, but one of the solutions for us in farming is automation.”

A Nonstop Pepper Picker

De Kramer’s team of researchers at Wageningen are developing a range of new machines to take over almost all the hard labor being done on Dutch farms today. De Kramer said robots can make up the labor shortfalls and squeeze the most from the country’s agricultural land.

But it is not just about taking away mundane farm jobs that people don’t want to do, said de Kramer. The new wave of technology being rolled out on Dutch farms can also help improve the sustainability of food production, she said, by cutting the use of chemicals and reducing food waste. 

Chemical-based pesticides have been identified as a major risk to wildlife, including wild bee and honeybee populations, as well as a health risk to farm workers. 

Robots being developed by de Kramer’s team can recognize where disease might break out on crops through the use of cameras. They can then dramatically cut back the amount of pesticide applied by a targeted spraying of that area, rather than a blanket approach.

The next big challenge is automating the harvesting of specialty crops ― a breakthrough that could further reduce the need for manual labor on farms. 

Researchers at Wageningen have been developing Sweeper, a sweet pepper harvester. Its robotic arm can move up and down a greenhouse, using cameras and sensors to spot and pick ripened peppers. Not only can it distinguish color, it can also recognize ripe peppers hidden behind leaves. 

The robot was able to harvest a pepper in 15 seconds in tests last year and is expected to be on sale for Dutch farmers within the next three to four years. While humans can pick peppers quicker, the robots can work nonstop and overnight.

“Our challenge is to make robots as smart or nearly as smart as humans,” de Kramer said. ”Humans can detect a lot of things that you need to put into the AI part of the robot to recognize from the pixels it sees. For example, which crop is ripe and the way to pick them, the different diseases or bugs, and how you can distinguish between crops and weeds.” 

The pepper harvesting robot is expected to cost $75,000 to $100,000 when it first goes on sale. But with much of that attributable to development rather than the hardware itself, the cost of each robot will fall in the future, a spokesperson for agro-robotics at Wageningen said.

With so many physical tasks in agriculture, the sector is ripe for further automation, said Michael Chua partner at Mckinsey and co-author of amajor report on the impact of automation on society and work.

“The cost of labor has tended to be low for those manual farm tasks compared to other sectors,” Chua said. “But if labor availability is constrained or automation enables an increase in production or quality for the same cost, that will drive change.”

However, this does not mean that all Dutch farmers are about to be replaced by robots.  

“You will always need a smart farmer alongside the smart machine. You will always need to have someone who knows about the crops and animals there, and checks and improves what the machines are doing. But perhaps in the future farmers can take a holiday,” said de Kramer.

Ripe For Disruption

Declining numbers of people working in agriculture is a trend not just confined to the Netherlands. Only 2% of the U.S. workforce is employed in agriculture today, compared with 40% at the beginning of the 20th century.

Labor shortages, due to an aging workforce and a decline in migrant workers, are also driving up the use of robotics in the U.S. “The abundance of cheap labor has gone,” said Nicholson of United Farm Workers of America. “Automation is seen as a way of maybe addressing that issue. Just as Uber and Lyft have revolutionized how we get from A to B, so tech companies are looking to do the same to agriculture.”

The strawberry sector in particular has seen a surge in interest in robotics. Gary Wishnatzki, owner of Harvest CROO Robotics, told HuffPost that more than two-thirds of the U.S. strawberry industry (in terms of acreage) had invested in his company’s robotic harvester, due to be commercialized within the next three years.

Although automation is touted as a solution for reducing costs for farmers, Nicholson said he fears farmers will not necessarily benefit financially. If they make any cost savings from using robotics, retailers and buyers would just start paying them less. “Revenues will not rise,” he said. 

Back in the Netherlands, a farm full of robotics holds no fears for Dijkstra, who continues to run the farm with his wife and father. He already is looking to see what other farming tasks he can automate. In addition to his robotic milker, he has machines to clean away cow manure and activity monitors attached to his cows to tell him if they are unwell or at a good time for getting pregnant.  

“I can only see upsides,” Dijkstra said. “I bought a tractor recently, but I’m certain that the next one I buy will be a robotic one that does all my mowing for me and can run all day on solar power.”

When Alex Kelly, 23, and his girlfriend of nearly five years moved into their new flat they choose a place with two bedrooms. Not for the comfort of guests. For the comfort of each other.

When they moved in together in Oxford three years ago, the couple intended to share a bed. But it quickly became obvious that it wasn’t going to work: Alex snores, and his girlfriend is a light sleeper who was being kept up all night by his night-time noises. There’s the issue, too, of bedtimes, and the pair not sharing sleep patterns – Alex likes to stay up for a couple of hours after his partner has hit the hay. 

And so they quickly fell into the habit of sleeping apart, with Alex spending almost every other night cramped on the sofa. The discomfort was worth it, he says, because he didn’t have to worry about the guilt of snoring.

But now the couple have made their separate sleeping arrangements permanent: each picking out new furnishings – Alex remembers choosing curtains, excited by the prospect of a bed he would actually sleep in – and retiring each night to their own bedrooms. And they’ve done this without sacrificing their sex life in the process.  

[Read More: When to exercise (and how) for a better night’s sleep]

It’s not something that many couples talk about – especially when they’re younger. But there are a number of reasons why sharing a mattress with your partner might not be ideal, from duvet stealing and snoring, to pets in the bed, a preference for different temperatures or non-stop spooning, and alarms set to all hours. Even the madness of a partner keen to alternate sides of the bed. And while these might be things you can tolerate in the early days of a relationship, they become increasingly wearing as time moves on, your epic tiredness increases, and you keep falling asleep in meetings.

We acknowledge these issues exist – from car manufacturer Ford’s lane-keeping bed, which nudges people back to their own side if they begin to sprawl, to rich, high-profile couples such as the Queen and Prince Phillip, or Gwyneth Paltrow and her husband, Brad Falchukm, who have the luxury of being to be able to spread out across properties. When Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Burton purchased adjoining houses, many couples looked on enviously. 

[Read More: We put 5 sleepy teas to the test – but did they help us sleep better?]

Culturally, however, the idea of admitting we sleep separately from our partners remains uncomfortable; the opposite of what romance is meant to look like. Choosing different beds has even been dubbed ‘sleep divorce’ by some – adding to that nagging suspicion that choosing to sleep apart is the beginning of the end.

But that isn’t stopping people from doing it. 

According to a  UK study of 2000 respondents by online pharmacy Chemist4U, 11% of people in couples choose to sleep separately every night, with 26% do some nights – meaning that more than a third of us sometimes sleep separately from our partners. Of those surveyed 32% admitted to preferring the solo arrangement, a figure that rose to 40% of women.

So why are we so worried about spending a night alone?  

“It’s the script that we’re used to in a relationship,” argues Peter Saddington, a sex and relationship counsellor at Relate, who works with lots of couples who want to entertain the idea of sleeping separately but are worried about what it will mean for their marriage and their sex life. People get anxious about what it means, he explains: “If we can’t sleep together anymore is it a sign of the end days?”

For these reasons, Alex and his partner were self-conscious about their situation, he explains: “We asked ourselves, is this going to start hurting us and making us drift apart? Those sort of worries”. But the benefits of them (both) getting a decent night’s kip also helped dampen those worries. “Everything is easier when we’re not tired,” he notes. Now the pair are open about their set up with friends and family, making no effort to hide that they don’t share a room when people come over.  

[Read More: I Tried Silent Night’s £15 Anti-Snoring Pillow So My Partner Could Finally Sleep – Here’s How That Went]

Lots of couples who are initially sceptical about sleeping apart, come to accept it, says Saddington, noting that they grow to realise a well-rested relationship is the biggest priority.

“It’s like anything new, give it a try. If you do it for a couple of months and it doesn’t work you go back. If you see some improvement you keep going. Or if it feels a lot better then that’s the proof you needed to change everything. It is not always bad news to sleep separately.” 

Carmela Lopez, 59, and her husband Hank who live in San Diego, have been married for 23 years . They began sleeping separately for health reasons, and have done so on-and-off during periods of ill health throughout their lives. When Carmela was recovering from breast cancer surgery she moved into the spare room; now Hank has to wear a CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine to help with sleep apnea, the noise – “like a jet engine” – means she has moved out again.

Throughout, they have managed to sustain their sex life. “Sleep and sex aren’t intertwined for us any longer,” says Carmela. “We have it at times other than bed time. And we are committed to daily physical contact, which we believe is critical to healing.”

Similarly, sleeping apart hasn’t infringed on Alex and his partner’s sex life. “We are terrible at arranging or planning anything in our sex lives, so it’s pretty spontaneous. Just at weekends or afternoons, and we have a night in bed together every few weeks or at the weekend where it doesn’t matter if we are tired the next day.”

[Read More: 3 of the biggest sleep myths, debunked by scientists]

For some people, sleeping separately can even prove a positive for your sex life. “Sleeping in the same bed can become mundane,” says Saddington. “You see your partner not always necessarily looking their best – sweaty, disheveled – but if you’re just there for sex you can put more effort in and present yourself when you’re feeling at your best. For some people it can even heighten excitement.”

But broaching sleeping separately can still feel impossible. It comes down to communication, advises Saddington. “[The] most important part is both of you are in agreement on this. It’s not one person saying I want this and the other person going along with it. You’ve really got to talk about why you want it, and how it’s going to work. Try to explain your position and don’t use blame.”

For too many women at work today, the innocuous question “Would you mind making coffee?” is not a request from a boss. It is an order.

If this question came from a co-worker, you could either say no or conveniently forget how to make coffee, but to preserve a relationship with your manager, the refusal requires more finesse. 

How To Turn Down The Coffee Request 

In the 2014 edition of her book “Nice Girls Don’t Get The Corner Office,” executive coach Lois P. Frankel advises women to turn down office housework like fetching coffee, taking notes or other personal errands that are not part of the job. If the boss makes the request in front of a group, Frankel says to “practice saying in a neutral, unemotional way, ‘I think I’ll pass, since I did it last time.’” That way, you gently but firmly assert that you are not a doormat and you get to make a public reminder to all that your time is being mismanaged.

If it’s a one-on-one request, tell your boss that you can fulfil the request when you are done with your job’s responsibilities. “When asked to do personal errands, let the boss know you’re happy to do them when you have time, but otherwise you don’t want to take away from being able to do a good job at what you were hired for,” Frankel writes.

You may think saying “yes” to serving coffee at a meeting is just a one-time thing, but it can set a precedent for your boss about what kind of office chores and other low-level tasks you are willing to do.

Frankel delivers some real talk when discussing women’s limited options for refusing a boss’ office housework request. “If you carry out the errands, you’ll feel resentful; and if you don’t, you may be fired. Pick your poison,” she writes. “If the errand requests persist, it’s time to look for another job, ask for a transfer, or wait the boss out.” 

Frankel is implicitly acknowledging that saying a direct “no” can negatively affect how you’re perceived if you’re a woman. In a 2005 study, women were rated less favourably when they withheld a work-related favour like staying late to help a colleague prepare for a presentation. Meanwhile, when men did the same, they experienced little effect on their favourability evaluations. 

How Male Allies Can Step Up

Take this positive example from Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens’ recent New York Times obituary, which ended the story of his legislative accomplishments and political history with an everyday anecdote about how he treated female colleagues with less power:

Justice Stevens was known around the court for treating others with sensitivity and respect. One former law clerk, Christopher L. Eisgruber, described in a 1993 essay an incident at a party for new clerks: Before Justice Stevens arrived, an older male justice had instructed one of the few female clerks present to serve coffee. When Justice Stevens entered, he quickly grasped the situation, walked up to the young woman and said: “Thank you for taking your turn with the coffee. I think it’s my turn now.” He took over the job.

Stevens modelled how a male ally in power should intervene and redistribute any thankless task that is being unfairly shouldered by women — that is, by doing it, too.

If you’re a man who notices that one female colleague is regularly or repeatedly asked to fetch coffee or plan happy hours, speak up and say you’ll do it this time. This is one basic, fundamental step that men need to be noticing and practicing to make an equitable workplace for all. 

Women Are More Likely To Take On Non-Promotable Tasks

These kinds of thankless requests go beyond serving and making coffee for your boss. Research published in the 2017 issue of the American Economic Review found that women are more likely to volunteer and get asked to do tasks that are not going to help them rise in their careers.

The study mimicked the personal cost of taking on a task everyone is reluctant to do, such as writing a report, serving on a committee or planning a holiday party. Under a short time limit, someone had to volunteer for the task or the group would lose out on money. If no one volunteered, each person would get a dollar. But if someone volunteered, that volunteer who took one for the team got $1.25, while the other group members got $2. 

Across 10 rounds of experimentation, women were 48% more likely than men to volunteer for a task that would penalise them financially while benefiting the group overall. In general, the participants were not jumping to volunteer, but as the clock ticked down, a woman was more likely to answer the call to do the task no one else wanted to do. 

This is not necessarily because women are inherently more altruistic. When the participants were placed in men-only groups or women-only groups, they volunteered at the same rate.  

These expectations can be deeply ingrained. When a manager was brought in to decide who to pick for a thankless task, the study found they were 44% more likely to ask a woman to volunteer in mixed-sex groups, even when the boss was a woman. “The reason why we ask a female is because we know she is going to say yes,” Lise Vesterlund, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Economics at the University of Pittsburgh and one of the co-authors of the low-promotable task study, told HuffPost. “We’ve all developed this sort of code of conduct where we are always expecting the woman to be the one who steps up and takes on the work that no one else really wants to do.”   

Vesterlund said that solving this volunteer question is, first and foremost, a managerial issue to document and change. “If women are constantly taking notes at meetings or doing pro-bono work or other sorts of less visible tasks, or taking a client that doesn’t bring in as much revenue as what they could be working on, they are not going to be identified as having the talent that they truly have, which is bad for the business,” she said. “It is not optimal to have a highly-skilled woman working at a lower level than what she actually should be working at.” 

Recognise The Trigger That Is Making You Say ‘Yes’

What’s going on in those final moments when the reluctant female participant finally gives in and volunteers? Triggers differ between people, but Vesterlund explained two possible reasons that women volunteer. One is the impulse to just get it over with, because you know you can quickly turn it around and do it well. “A very common trigger is ‘let’s just get it done, this is ridiculous, we are sitting here waiting for someone to take it on,’” she said.

Another trigger is when the non-promotable task is prestigious and your imposter syndrome may tell you that you’ll never get an opportunity like this again. “For me, a big trigger has always been that I feel honoured to be asked and at the same time, I am fearful that I will not be asked again,” Vesterlund said. 

But these tasks take away valuable time. Look beyond the prestige and the times when everyone is waiting for a volunteer, and think strategically about where your main priorities lie. “Every ‘yes’ you have comes with an implicit ‘no’ to something else,” Vesterlund said.

By saying yes to that one task, you may not be able to say yes to the project you actually do want to take on in the future, or you may have to work later, or you may have to see your loved ones less. “The implicit ‘no’ could just be yourself. Are you getting enough sleep? Are you getting enough exercise? I think it’s super important for us that we start thinking about where is the time going to come from when we take on other things,” she said.

Doing a task no one else wants to do may get it done for your company in the short-term, but there may be long-term repercussions for your personal satisfaction. “At some point, if you are doing tasks at work that are sort of beneath the level that you are trained to do work at, then your job is not going to be very satisfying,” Vesterlund said. 

No offense to humans, but we’re pretty sure dogs actually make the best wedding guests.

Hear us out: They look darling in their wedding finery, they provide endless entertainment and, unlike your relatives, they never complain about the food. 

Fearless Photographers, a website dedicated to showcasing the best wedding photography from around the world, recently asked their network of talented photogs to send in their very best wedding pup pictures. They compiled a gallery of the top images and the results are paws-itively precious. 

Below, we’ve rounded up 31 of our favorite photos from the collection. To see the rest, head over to the Fearless Photographers website. 

Actor Rahul Bose, known for films such as Chameli and Mr. and Mrs. Iyer and for recently directing the drama, Poorna, was in Chandigarh shooting for his next film.

The actor was lodged up in JW Marriott and ordered two bananas after a workout session at the hotel’s gym.

Perfectly normal thing to do. However, the actor wasn’t prepared for the bill that arrived. 

The hotel had charged him Rs. 442 for the two bananas.

While it’s not particularly unusual for five-star properties to charge exorbitant amounts for food and beverages, 442 for two bananas is objectively obscene, even by Marriott standards.

(BTW, one can get 4 bananas for Rs. 10 at the neighbourhood vendor).

Bose took to Twitter to make a sarcastic dig at Marriott and Twitter just rolled with it.

Not the ones to give up easily on #BananaGate, HuffPost India has reached out to Marriott to seek a comment and will update the story when we hear from them.

The government on Wednesday reconstituted the Group of Ministers looking after the issues of how to prevent sexual harassment at workplace and strengthen legal frameworks with Home Minister Amit Shah as its head, officials told PTI.

The other members of the reconstituted GoM are: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ and Women and Child Development Minister Smriti Irani.

Apart from Rajnath Singh, who is now the defence minister, the GoM in the last government, had Nitin Gadkari, Sitharaman and Maneka Gandhi as its members.

For the latest news and more, follow HuffPost India on Twitter, Facebook, and subscribe to our newsletter.

The GoM was set up in October 2018 to examine and give recommendations for strengthening legal and institutional frameworks to deal with and prevent sexual harassment at workplace.

The Quint filed an RTI with the Ministry of Home Affairs to seek information on the number of times the last group of ministers met since it was set up and the minutes of the meetings held. It also asked for a copy of the recommendations which the group of ministers was supposed to make within three months. 

While the government said that it is under no obligation to share details, the MHA said the committee has been dissolved. The government added that the “required information is exempted from disclosure under Section 8(i) of the RTI Act 2005.”

(With PTI inputs)

One of the first legislative actions of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in its second term has been to dilute and weaken the implementation of the Right to Information (RTI) Act of 2005. 

On 22 July, the Lok Sabha passed the RTI Amendment Bill, 2019, which removes the statutory protection of tenure, salaries, allowances and conditions of service given to the central and state Information Commissioners, who are the final adjudicators of information requests. Instead, it says that their tenure and salaries shall be “as prescribed by the Central Government”. The changes undermine the autonomy of the commissioners tasked with implementing the law, and thus weakens one of India’s strongest open government and transparency laws.

This is not the Narendra Modi-led government’s first attempt to weaken the autonomy of the information commission officials. Even in its previous term, in July 2018, it had circulated a similar bill, but was forced to withdraw the proposal after public protests by citizen groups and activists. This year, on 19 July, it introduced the new amendment Bill in the Lok Sabha without having made the text available publicly and without any public consultation on the contents of the bill. Ignoring protests by MPs in the Lok Sabha and their requests to refer it to a parliamentary standing committee, the Bill will come up soon before the Rajya Sabha.

For the latest news and more, follow HuffPost India on Twitter, Facebook, and subscribe to our newsletter.

The landmark RTI Act, 2005, allows any citizen to seek information from any government authority on payment of Rs 10. If this information is not provided, the person can appeal to the public information officers (PIOs) appointed in each department. If they are still denied the information, they also have the option of appealing to independent officials who function as Information Commissioners—at the central and state government levels—who then adjudicate the claims to ensure fair implementation of the transparency law. 

The first appeals are usually not successful as they reach officials within the same departments that denied the information request in the first place. Instead, there is far greater chances of success at the stage of second appeal, which lies with the Information Commissioners. 

Currently, section 13(1) and 13(2) of the RTI Act, 2005, fix the term of the office of the Chief Information Commissioner(CIC) and other information commissioners of the CIC at five years, with an age limit of 65 years. Section 13(5) allows their salaries and allowances to be at par with that of the Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioners, respectively, who are paid a salary equal to that of a judge of the Supreme Court, which is decided by the Parliament. Section 16(5) provides that the salaries and allowances, and other terms and conditions of service, of the State Chief Information Commissioners and State Information Commissioners shall be the same as that of the Election Commissioner and the Chief Secretary to the State Government.

A fixed tenure and high status is provided to Commissioners under the RTI Act, 2005, to allow them to carry out their functions with autonomy and impartiality. It is meant to empower them to direct even the highest offices to comply with the law when it comes to making relevant public information accessible to the citizen. This was also the recommendation of the parliamentary standing committee that had reviewed the original RTI law draft in 2004.  

The 2019 amendment bill seeks to modify these protections and empower the central government to prescribe rules to decide the tenure, salaries and allowances of these commissioners. The statement of objects and reasons of the Bill states that the amendments are being brought to correct the inconsistency that the RTI Act, 2005, treats information commissioners on par with election commissioners, and while the election commission is a constitutional body, information commissions are statutory bodies. However, activists in the National Campaign for Right to Information (NCPRI) have pointed out that the same principle of according a high stature and legal protections against interference have been provided to statutory oversight bodies, including the Central Vigilance Commission and the Lokpal. 

According to the annual reports of Information Commissions, 2.23 crore information requests were filed across India from 2005 till 2017. Ordinary citizens routinely use the sunshine law to seek information on the working of social schemes, to access land records, and documents on the use of natural resources, to expose corruption at district and block levels. As per data from the NCPRI, currently, four posts for information commissioners are lying vacant in the Central Information Commission, while nearly 32,000 appeal cases are pending.

The Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative has documented a number of cases of criminal assault on Indians trying to use the law to get information. There are stark gaps in the protections given to citizens and in the implementation of the law. More than 25% of state information commissioners’ positions lay vacant in 2018. 

But there is no evidence that the provisions on autonomy of information commissioners is a hindrance to the institutional framework of the law. 

State information commissioners are appointed by the Governor based on the recommendation of the Chief Minister, Leader of Opposition of the Legislative Assembly and a state Cabinet Minister. They can be removed or suspended only by the Governor. State governments are empowered to prescribe the salaries and allowances and the terms and conditions of service of the officers and employees. 

Allowing the central government to do so for all information commissioners is harmful for the following reasons: it undermines the autonomy of the officials whose role it is to remain independent of the government; it weakens the ability of information commissioners to pass orders to disclose information that the central government may not wish to provide; and it also damages citizens’ access to vital public information, as well as the principles of open government.

“Game of Thrones” star Lena Headey commented on Wednesday’s anticipated appointment of Boris Johnson as the new prime minister of the United Kingdom by sharing this mocking image to Instagram:

Headey captioned the edited image, which featured the faces of Johnson and President Donald Trump superimposed onto those of the twins from the Stanley Kubrick-directed 1980 horror movie “The Shining,” with one word:

“FUCK.”

The British actress took on humanitarian work helping refugees in Europe throughout her time playing Cersei Lannister in HBO’s epic fantasy drama.

She has also become a vocal opponent of the Trump administration’s policy of separating migrant children from their families at the U.S.-Mexico border and the horrific conditions for some detainees:

NEW DELHI— Nine state governments rejected more than 13 lakh forest rights claims of Adivasis and other forest dwellers without following due procedures, show minutes of two recent meetings at the Tribal Affairs Ministry, reviewed by HuffPost India.

Under the Forest Rights Act, each “claim” attests to the rights of an individual or community to continue to live, farm, or gather forest produce, on land now claimed by the Forest or Revenue Department. The admission that 13 lakh claims were wrongly rejected, could affect several million more individuals, assuming each claim represents more than one person.

The previously unreported documents reviewed by HuffPost India show that the representatives of seven state governments admitted that over 11 lakh claims had been rejected without following due procedure, while top officials of the Tribal Affairs Ministry ticked off representatives of the state governments of West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh, who accounted for 1.61 lakh rejected claims between them, for not being sufficiently effective in settling forest rights claims.

The time period during which the claims were filed and processed by all states remains unclear as the minutes do not mention them, however these were the most recent figures available when the meetings were held on 6 March and 18 June.

Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal apart, the numbers of claims rejected by state governments are as follows: Chhattisgarh (4,54,379), Andhra Pradesh (11, 860), Karnataka (2,10,892), Odisha (1,45,750), Madhya Pradesh (2,45,592), Tamil Nadu (10,656) and Tripura (68,388). 

These astonishingly high numbers of rejections of forest rights claims were collated from presentations given by the state government officials during the meetings with the Tribal Affairs ministry officials. 

The meetings between the Tribal Affairs ministry and states were held in the aftermath of two controversial orders passed by the SC in February directing the forced eviction of more than 10 lakh forest dwellers whose claims over land titles under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, better known as the Forest Rights Act (FRA), were rejected. 

The Apex court gave its order of eviction in response to a clutch of petitions filed in 2008 and 2016 by wildlife groups and retired forest officials questioning the constitutional validity of the FRA. After widespread protests and intervention by government lawyers, which was prompted by criticism that the Narendra Modi government failed to put up a legal defense for the FRA, the SC stayed its own order with specific directions to the state governments to disclose whether due process was followed while rejecting forest rights claims. The meetings between the Tribal Affairs ministry and various state governments are a consequence of this direction. Sources told HuffPost India that some of the numbers regarding wrongful rejections quoted above are likely to be put before the Supreme Court at the next hearing of the case.

The candid confessions by seven states that they did not follow due procedures confirms a view widely held by Adivasi rights groups and activists that forest rights claims are dismissed without due process by the forest bureaucracy. The high numbers of rejections done without due process suggest that the narrative of adivasis “encroaching” on forest lands may be exaggerated.  

“Stigmatising Adivasis and other traditional forest dwellers as encroachers is unfair. From 2009 to 2017, none of the Forest Survey of India reports said that forests have been destroyed because of the Forest Rights Act,” said Bhubaneshwar-based activist Y Giri Rao who has been following both FRA implementation and the SC case closely. 

Critically, the deliberations recorded in the minutes of the two meetings also reveal how bureaucratic and political apathy towards proper implementation of the FRA has put millions of Adivasis and other traditional forest dwellers at the risk of eviction from lands which have been, in a vast majority of instances, their homes for centuries. 

Thus far, the estimated number of Adivasis at risk of being evicted was 1.89 million but the question of due procedure had not been raised in court, leading to the assumption among some that these are numbers of encroachers. However, with the confirmation of absence of due procedure in rejecting at least 1.3 million (13 lakh) claims, the scale of the states’ failure to follow the letter and spirit of the FRA has been revealed with evidence for the first time in this case.  

What exactly the states confessed & what that means

Going by official numbers, Madhya Pradesh had the second highest number of claims rejected without due process at 2,45,592 units. The officially recorded synopsis of the presentation of the state tribal department officials before the union Tribals Affairs ministry officials on 18 June 2019 is tellingly worded. 

“The state has found that due procedure was not followed while examining the FRA claims and their settlement and in majority of cases the claimants have not been served with speaking order in the cases of rejection and reasons of rejection were not cited. The claimants were given opportunity to adduce evidence but the forest department did not give its official records due to which evidence could not be adduced,” it states. 

Further, it also states that the state government is reviewing rejected claims on the newly developed ‘MP Vanmitra Portal’ and the State Level Monitoring Committee, led by the Chief Secretary, is reviewing all rejected applications. 

In the case of Chattisgarh, which has the most number of rejections at 4 lakh 54 thousand 379 units, the record notes the state’s failure to follow due process tersely. “Regarding procedure followed while rejecting FRA claims, written information has not been served to the claimants,” the minutes say. The state has started the review of rejected claims suo-moto, it adds. 

The FRA record of both states is significant given that former Congress President Rahul Gandhi had asked party’s Chief Ministers to file review petitions against the SC order. Subsequent to this, party-led governments began a suo moto review of all rejected claims of forest rights. 

Similarly, it is interesting to note the evidently poor record of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government in Uttar Pradesh with large number of rejections of forest rights claims, failure to follow due process and generally lackadaisical handling of the FRA claims process despite Party President Amit Shah  asking the party-led state governments to file review petitions and avoid large scale evictions. 

It required criticism from the Tribal Affairs ministry for the UP state government to begin to address the problem.  “No claimant has been informed regarding the status of their claim, especially rejection. In the meeting state assured to initiate communication now in order to seek petitions while it was recommended to suo moto review all rejection instead of wasting time awaiting petitions,” note the minutes of a meeting held on March 6, 2019. 

The state government of West Bengal also faced criticism for its poor forest rights claims settlement record. “The reasons cited for such high rate of rejection exhibit flawed interpretation of the provisions of the Act and the necessity of capacity building of concerned officers,” read the minutes of the meeting held on March 6. 

Clearly, neither the spirit nor the text of the FRA were being followed by the state governments across party lines in right earnest.   

The February 13 Order & FRA

The FRA has come to be seen as a law about Adivasi evictions following the controversial 13 February order even though it has no provisions for evicting people from lands. 

The Forest Rights Act, passed in 2006 to undo the “historical injustice” to the Adivasis and other traditional forest dwellers, recognises their rights over forest land and other resources which have been a source of their livelihood for centuries.

But sections of environment groups and forest officials, essentially those who are wildlife focused, consider the FRA as a populist measure that is dangerous for forest conservation. 

Thus they filed a petition in the SC questioning the constitutionality of the FRA legislation in 2008. But in 2016, the scope of the issues involved was expanded after an Intervention Application was filed and since then, the SC began looking at the law’s implementation. While the government supported the legislation for the most part, it was inexplicably quiet during hearings in 2017-18 leading up to February 2019 thereby paving the way for the February 13 order, activists say. 

The Forest Rights Act recognises people’s rights over forest land and other resources which have been a source of their livelihood for centuries. Thus when claims are filed by people for ‘forest rights’ the term encapsulates claims made for individual and community land titles as well as forests and their natural wealth except timber. 

The claims for forest rights are first screened at the level of the Gram Sabha, followed by the Sub Division Level Committee and District Level Committees. Data from the minutes of the meetings show that a large number of forest rights claims were rejected at the level of the District Level Committee. 

In the Supreme Court case, with its focus on evictions and encroachments from forest lands, the court interpreted rejections as opening up the window for eviction. But the focus on evictions is wrong given the still pending settlement of rights under the FRA and the regime of transparency it brings in forest management, civil society groups say.  

As Shankar Gopalkrishnan, Secretary General of the Campaign for Survival and Dignity, told this reporter, “FRA is not a legislation about encroachment and eviction. It is a conservation legislation. The question is: should forest officials have absolute life and death power over both forests and people? Or should we have a democratic system with rights for people and accountability for officials?  The FRA upholds the latter. This is the issue that MOTA should present before the court,” he said. 

While the case was scheduled to come up for hearing on Wednesday, July 24, the Apex Court did not take it up for consideration. 

Shankar also emphasised a point that, as the minutes of the meetings show, the Tribal Affairs ministry now agrees to as well. But it remains to be seen if the ministry’s lawyers argue this before the Supreme Court. The point being that rejection of forest rights claims does not open up the possibility for eviction as assumed.  

“We would like the MoTA to tell the states and Court that rejection of claims is not a ground for eviction. A person may have other rights in forests also. FRA is not the only law through which forest dwellers’ rights are recognised.  Many states have their own laws. Also, the Indian Forests Act itself provides for recording of rights,” said Gopalakrishnan.

Former special counsel Robert Mueller acknowledged Wednesday that President Donald Trump could feasibly be charged with obstruction of justice after he left office.

While being questioned by Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) during testimony in front of the House Judiciary Committee, Mueller agreed that authorities could charge the president with a crime.

“You could charge the president of the United States with obstruction of justice after he left office?” Buck asked.

“Yes,” Mueller responded.

Earlier, Mueller confirmed that his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election didn’t exonerate Trump, despite the president’s insistence that Mueller’s investigatory report cleared him of obstructing justice in the probe. 

Mueller wrote in the report that he personally couldn’t make the call on whether the president committed a crime during the investigation. Instead, he cited an Office of Legal Counsel opinion saying a sitting president couldn’t be indicted. His testimony on Wednesday makes it clear that that opinion doesn’t hold once the president leaves office.

While testifying in front of the House Intelligence Committee later on Wednesday, Mueller added that investigators didn’t reach a conclusion about whether Trump obstructed justice because the OLC opinion precluded his office from doing so.

This article has been updated to include comments from Mueller’s testimony in front of the House Intelligence Committee.

LONDON — Queen Elizabeth II’s very first prime minister was the nation’s wartime hero Sir Winston Churchill. After a ceremonial ‘kiss of hands on appointment’ at Buckingham Palace, the 14th premier of her long reign is now Boris Johnson.

With Brexit still unresolved and undelivered, Britain is facing its biggest domestic and international upheaval since 1945. And the main question, at home and abroad, is whether Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson is up to the task.

But what is he really like, and how will his government be different from that of predecessor Theresa May?

For those overseas who don’t yet know Johnson, the easy shorthand is that he is ‘Trump with better jokes -  and bigger brains’.

The US president certainly likes him and his brand of populist, disruptive politics. In a rally in Washington this week, Trump said: “He’s a good man, he’s tough and he’s smart. They call him ‘Britain Trump’.”

In fact, when Johnson was in New York city a few years ago, surrounded by a scrum of photographers trying to take his picture, he spotted a girl walking towards him. Fascinated by the scene, she stopped and he heard her utter the crushing line: “Gee, is that Trump?”

That case of mistaken identity near Central Park didn’t happen just once, it happened three times on Johnson’s trip.

Trump and Johnson have so much in common - physically, politically, temperamentally - that it’s not difficult to see why they would get on famously, or why the American public may get them confused.

Their superficial similarities are obvious, not least the fact that both have almost comical, blond hair that has become their trademark. Both were born in New York, Trump in Queens and Johnson in Manhattan.

The pair share a talent for self-promotion, and for turning their celebrity into raw political impact, in a way that repels and fascinates in almost equal measure.

Andrew Gimson, author of the biography ‘Boris: The Rise of Boris Johnson’, says that the former Mayor of London and foreign secretary has a connection with Trump that few British politicians can achieve.

“There’s a reason why Trump has got where he is: he’s a great performer, always putting on a show of some sort. Boris too is a performer, he wants to amuse people, be interesting. They would recognise they are similar people in that sense,” Gimson says.

“Another connection is that they both gain from being despised by and from annoying a lot of smart, metropolitan people and that really shows their supporters they must be doing something right. Annoying stuck-up, liberal hypocrites is a kind of revenge for them.

“They are anti-establishment disrupters, they shock the so-called grown-up people who think politics has to be done in a very solemn way, that you couldn’t ever announce anything in a tweet. Neither Boris nor Trump are dull.”

There is artifice in their art too. Trump trades on the contrived reality TV image of a successful businessman, even though many of his commercial ventures have turned into epic failures.

Johnson has also spent years carefully crafting his public ‘persona’ of a bumbling, dishevelled gaffe-prone innocent, when in reality he is a ferociously ambitious and competitive individual.

The act, which began during his Oxford student days, has endeared him to many Tory party activists, many of whom think he has a rare gift for putting a smile on their faces. His trademark ruffling of his messy hair was as familiar as his risque jokes and rhetorical flamboyance.

But those who have followed him for years have spotted just how manufactured the performance really is. Sonia Purnell, author of another biography ‘Just Boris: A Tale of Blond Ambition’, worked with Johnson when they were journalists in Brussels in the early 1990s.

“He’s a great actor, he’s a showman. The whole ruffling the hair thing was about making sure he didn’t seem too ambitious. The ‘gaffes’ weren’t really gaffes, they were scripted,” Purnell  says.

Once, during the Conservative party conference in 2007, guest speaker Arnold Schwarzenegger was waiting to come on stage as he heard Johnson speak. “He’s fumbling all over the place,” the Hollywood actor said, sotto voce, although a mic picked up his remark.

But as Purnell points out, Arnie was just another fooled by the Johnson act. “The rambling was written into his speeches,” Purnell says. “It was carefully rehearsed and he would ramble in exactly the same way the next day, to another audience.”

- - -

Boris Johnson’s desire to be funny, or provocative, has often returned to haunt him. His previous columns as a journalist have caused outrage among his critics, not least when he veered into racial slurs.

In one Daily Telegraph column, he joked about “flag-waving piccaninnies” greeting the Queen abroad, adding that when Congolese armed fighters meet Tony Blair they “will all break out in watermelon smiles to see the big white chief touch down in his big white British taxpayer-funded bird”. Johnson has since apologised, but his friends argue that his irony and sarcasm is taken too literally.

When HuffPost UK asked black Britons for their verdict on all this in June, it wasn’t favourable. Kwame Anthony, 45, said he doesn’t follow politics but he has heard of Johnson.

“The first thing that comes to my mind when you said the word ‘piccaninnies’ is slavery. Immediately. It’s a nasty word and any white person who uses it obviously thinks that black people are less than them. Otherwise, why would they use it?”

Tyrone Stewart, 68, said the phrases “reek of empire”, and that Johnson’s use of them “speaks volumes about his position on black people.”

“In Jamaica, we use the term ‘pickney’ to refer to our children and it’s derived from ‘piccaninny’ which, of course, has racist connotations. So, coming from Boris Johnson, and the context that he used it in, is offensive. 

“Johnson’s reference [to watermelons] is similar to the golliwogs that we used to see on the Robertson’s jam jars, back in the day. It’s the same sort of thing.”

On another occasion, writing ahead of Barack Obama’s visit to the UK ahead of the Brexit vote, Johnson described Obama as a “part-Kenyan president”. He claimed Obama removing a bust of Winston Churchill from the White House in 2008 showed he was uninterested in the UK-US relationship.

“Some said it was a snub to Britain. Some said it was a symbol of the part-Kenyan president’s ancestral dislike of the British empire – of which Churchill had been such a fervent defender,” his column in The Sun newspaper read.

Stewart, who owns a shop on a South London high street, told us that Johnson referring to Obama as Kenyan wasn’t, in and of itself, racist, “although we know what he meant.”

Londoner Angela Watson added that the term piccaninny evoked feelings of disappointment and sadness, more than anything else. “If someone walked up to me in the street and called me that word, I would ask them who they are talking to. It’s unacceptable.”

Alwin, who was sitting in a cafe added: “If Boris Johnson can refer to black people in such a dehumanising way, openly and without challenge, yet be headed for Downing Street...what does that tell you about where we are? Politicians should be held to account but they’re not. 

“Watermelon smiles? It tells me that, as a black man, I am inferior. But I am not. This just proves that we have a long way to go in achieving equality in this country.”

George Brown, 58, told us he thinks Boris Johnson is a “self-centred charlatan.”

“We thought we’d hit the bottom - no we haven’t: Boris Johnson is the bottom. He is our Donald Trump along with Nigel Farage, who he will bring along. We are in a Trumpian world, now. God, we have to do something about that!”

Critics of Johnson certainly pounced when Trump grouped him, via a retweet of a message by white nationalist activist Katie Hopkins, with hard right leaders across the globe.

“Trump in the White House, Boris in Number 10, Netanyahu building Israel, Bolsanaro, Salvini, Orban, Kaczyński, & the Right Minded bringing strength in depth”, the tweet read.

That kind of comparison spooks many moderate Conservatives who have lent Johnson their support, in the hope that he will be the centre-ground moderniser who managed to twice win the Mayoralty of London in what is traditionally a ‘Labour city’.

Cabinet minister Matt Hancock, who dropped his own leadership campaign  to back Johnson, is quick to spot the danger of being too closely yoked to Trump.

“On this point about ‘Britain Trump’, Boris Johnson’s politics are essentially a progressive, modernising One Nation Conservative politics. Look at what he did in London,” he said. 

- - -

Still, there’s no question that Johnson and Trump revel in their ability to shock and see political incorrectness as a weapon to fuel the populist surge that thrust them both into prominence. In Trump’s case it led to him becoming president, in Johnson’s case it helped him lead the Brexit uprising in 2016.

That willingness to be rude to opponents, including those in big business, is a hallmark of both. While the president ignores corporate America’s fears of a trade war with China, his British friend exploits a similar disconnect between the ‘working man’ and those who fear his politics leads to economic chaos.

At a private reception to mark the Queen’s birthday, Johnson was asked about employers’ fears that leaving the European Union could damage British jobs in the car-making and aviation industries. “Fuck business,” he replied. His opponents have tried to hang the quote around his neck ever since, including in the Tory leadership race, but he appears to wear it as a badge of pride.

For Trump and Johnson, the guiding rule seems to be Oscar Wilde’s famous line that “there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about”. Narcissism in politics is hardly a rare quality, but both have taken it to a new level.

Much more damaging than the naked self-regard is a perception that both men don’t just dissemble like other politicians, they actually lie. Trump’s lies are so well documented that the New York Times catalogued every one of them in 2017 (he said something untrue every day for the first 40 days of his presidency).

Johnson’s ‘big lie’ is that he said voting for Brexit would result in £350 million a week extra in funding for the NHS, based on the inaccurate claim that the UK ‘sends’ that sum to the EU. The claim, posted on his Vote Leave campaign battlebus, has now landed Johnson in court facing charges of ‘misconduct in public office’.

The former foreign secretary’s previous lies have led to two significant sackings in his career. He was fired from The Times newspaper for inventing a quote while working in Brussels.

He was later sacked as a shadow minister by then Tory leader Michael Howard for lying about having an affair while married. Johnson had described tabloid reports as an “inverted pyramid of piffle”, but when Howard discovered the MP had been “less than frank” he summarily dismissed him.

And when it comes to women, the similarity with Trump is notable. Although Johnson has never harassed or assaulted any of his partners, he is certainly “sexually incontinent”, as one former aide put it. Petronella Wyatt, whose love affair led to his removal from Howard’s team, said that Johnson once told her: “I find it genuinely unreasonable that men should be confined to one woman.”

Like Trump, his marital infidelity has not affected his base of supporters. Stories of ‘bonking Boris’ abound, but unsurprisingly Trump plays down Johnson’s philandering. “Well, it always matters, but I think that it’s certainly not what it was 20 years ago, and not certainly what it was 50 years ago. I think today it matters much less,” he told The Sun tabloid.

Never comfortable with powerful women, Trump may well prefer the macho, ‘best bloke’ mateyness a Johnson premiership offers.

There are undoubtedly some big differences between the pair, not least their intellect and education. While Trump has an infamous problem with remembering simple names of people and places, Johnson has an incredibly sharp memory, and can recall whole passages of conversation between himself and others he met years earlier.

He can recite whole scenes from movies (Apocalypse Now is a particular favourite), sing in German and joke in French.

It won’t be long before Johnson reminds everyone that he was a New Yorker, born if not bred. In recent years, he renounced his American citizenship, amid fears of double taxation.

But prior to that, he once appeared on the David Letterman show and couldn’t resist reaching for the sky. “I suppose I could be president of the United States,” he said. “You know, technically speaking.”

He and Trump will want the last laugh. Yet already for millions, the joke isn’t funny any more.

On the day of the General Election in 2010, Johnson sent former prime minister David Cameron a text message. “Good luck Dave. Don’t worry if you bog it up. Walpole KS, Macmillan KS,….”

The ‘KS’ was a reference to ‘King’s Scholar’, the elite within the elite of England’s famed Eton College where both men had been educated, just like previous prime ministers Robert Walpole and Harold Macmillan. But while Johnson had merited a scholarship, Cameron had not. 

The joke was that if everything went wrong after the Tory leader entered No.10, a certain Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson was ready and willing to step in and sort things out.

Former communications chief at London’s City Hall, Guto Harri, says that the criticism of Johnson as a politician who lacks detail is wide of the mark.

“He’s a big picture man. Like the journalist he is, he will go to the executive summary and find the critical nugget straight away. You see the wood from the trees whereas Gordon Brown and Theresa May are looking at the twigs on the branches,” he says.

“But he can get very micro if he feels he needs to. In Transport for London meetings, he would get stuck into why can’t we move that traffic light on the corner of X street. He loved those artificial models for planning, where are the doors facing, can you get more outside space, can you squeeze a few more trees in. He got into quite a lot of detail.

“On crime, he’d say ‘why could somebody be stabbed in Tottenham last night, where were they, how could the police be within five minutes of where they were stabbed and not get there in 10 minutes’, that kind of stuff.”

Harri adds that Johnson was prepared to get his way too. “The key thing for Boris is this natural journalist’s thing of healthy scepticism. The average politician says I want to do this and the official says well it can’t be done, it’s too expensive of complicated. And they go ‘OK what a shame’. 

“Boris says ‘why can’t it be done?’ That bloody mindedness is why he got a lot done. The advice would be ‘stop and search would help but it’s politically unpalatable’ and he’d say ‘not with me it ain’t’. He ramped it up and two years later there was a 40% drop in violent crime.”

But others stress that while the eight years running London forged long-lasting alliances, its real significance lay in the way Johnson worked.

“It’s actually about that model of governance. He’s very good at setting the tone and then letting people get on with their jobs,” one ally says.

“We need to give him the best platform to be a success, not just for him, but primarily because we’ve got a fucking crisis and we want it sorted.”

One former aide says that Johnson’s almost photographic memory and ability to absorb a complex brief quickly are talents that contrast with his public image as a bumbling politician.

“The thing people don’t seem to understand with him is there’s a very big brain but it works in a different way to other people.

“You can literally plonk something in front of him five minutes before he’s due to meet somebody, five pages, and boom it’s in every single detail. Someone will walk through the door and he will regurgitate a fact about them. He was very good at that.

“He’s not a dot the ‘i’, cross the ‘t’ man. He will absorb the facts, set the tone and direction and expect you to get on with it.”

But for those who want a clue to what a Johnson premiership will feel like behind the scenes, one former official says that he also expects results to come with the autonomy he grants his staff.

“The key thing about the way he operates and I think he’ll do the same at No.10: he will expect you to do it but God you will know if you are not doing it.

“He would say something at a TfL [Transport for London] meeting on a Thursday and if he hadn’t heard back by the Monday, he would be on the phone or he would be texting ‘what the hell is going on?’ If you do deliver, he’s brilliant at encouraging and showering praise, but he is a driver from behind the scenes.

“He’s very consensual, will ask pertinent questions and takes a considered view based on the advice of others. But then he will say ‘right, this is what we are going to do’. He will have heard all the arguments, he may not agree with you, but he’s considered what you’ve said and then expects you to enforce what he wants.”

In his relations with the EU, Johnson certainly won’t be consensual, and everyone in Westminster is assuming he will put down some markers to warn Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron that he is serious about his no-deal threat.

It’s unclear whether Johnson’s new style of leadership will win round his Conservative colleagues and persuade them to back a Brexit deal that May just  couldn’t get through the British parliament.

European capitals will be watching closely for his first few days in office to check whether he really is bluffing about pulling the UK out of the EU ‘do or die’ on October 31. But the rest of the world,  not least Washington, will be watching too.

With files from Nadine White

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal regulators have fined Facebook $5 billion for privacy violations and are instituting new oversight and restrictions on its business. But they are only holding CEO Mark Zuckerberg personally responsible in a limited fashion.

The fine is the largest the Federal Trade Commission has levied on a tech company, though it won’t make much of a dent for a company that had nearly $56 billion in revenue last year.

As part of the agency’s settlement with Facebook, Zuckerberg will have to personally certify his company’s compliance with its privacy programs. The FTC said that false certifications could expose him to civil or criminal penalties.

Some experts had thought the FTC might fine Zuckerberg directly or seriously limit his authority over the company.

“The magnitude of the $5 billion penalty and sweeping conduct relief are unprecedented in the history of the FTC,” Joe Simons, the chairman of the FTC, said in a statement. He added that the new restrictions are designed “to change Facebook’s entire privacy culture to decrease the likelihood of continued violations.”

Facebook does not admit any wrongdoing as part of the settlement.

The commission opened an investigation into Facebook last year after revelations that data mining firm Cambridge Analytica had gathered details on as many as 87 million Facebook users without their permission. The agency said Wednesday that following its yearlong investigation of the company, the Department of Justice will file a complaint alleging that Facebook “repeatedly used deceptive disclosures and settings to undermine users’ privacy preferences.”

The FTC had been examining whether that massive breakdown violated a settlement that Facebook reached in 2012 after government regulators concluded the company repeatedly broke its privacy promises to users. That settlement had required that Facebook get user consent to share personal data in ways that override their privacy settings.

The FTC said Facebook’s deceptive disclosures about privacy settings allowed it to share users’ personal information with third-party apps that their friends downloaded but the users themselves did not give permissions to.

Privacy advocates have pushed for the FTC to limit how Facebook can track users — something that would likely cut into its advertising revenue, which relies on businesses being able to show users targeted ads based on their interests and behavior. The FTC did not specify such restrictions on Facebook.

Three Republican commissioners voted for the fine while two Democrats opposed it, a clear sign that the restrictions on Facebook don’t go as far as critics and privacy advocates had hoped. That wish list included specific punishment for Zuckerberg, strict limits on what data Facebook can collect and possibly even breaking off subsidiaries such as WhatsApp and Instagram.

“The proposed settlement does little to change the business model or practices that led to the recidivism,” wrote Commissioner Rohit Chopra in his dissenting statement. He noted that the settlement imposes “no meaningful changes” to the company’s structure or business model. “Nor does it include any restrictions on the company’s mass surveillance or advertising tactics,” he wrote

The fine is well above the agency’s previous record for privacy violations — $22.5 million — which it dealt to Google in 2012 for bypassing the privacy controls in Apple’s Safari browser. There have been even larger fines against non-tech companies, including a $14.7 billion penalty against Volkswagen to settle allegations of cheating on emissions tests and deceiving customers. Equifax will pay at least $700 million to settle lawsuits and investigations over a 2017 data breach; the FTC was one of the parties. The money will likely go to the U.S. Treasury.

The FTC’s new 20-year settlement with Facebook establishes an “independent privacy committee” of Facebook directors. The committee’s members must be independent, will be appointed by an independent nominating committee and can only be fired by a “supermajority” of Facebook’s board of directors. The idea is to remove “unfettered control” by Zuckerberg, the FTC said.

Since the Cambridge Analytica debacle erupted more than a year ago, Facebook has vowed to do a better job corralling its users’ data. Nevertheless, other missteps have come up since then.

In December, for example, the Menlo Park, California, company acknowledged a software flaw had exposed the photos of about 7 million users to a wider audience than they had intended. It also acknowledged giving big tech companies like Amazon and Yahoo extensive access to users’ personal data, in effect exempting them from its usual privacy rules. And it collected call and text logs from phones running Google’s Android system in 2015.

Amid all that, Zuckerberg and his chief lieutenant, Sheryl Sandberg, apologized repeatedly. In March, Zuckerberg unveiled a new, “privacy-focused” vision for the social network that emphasizes private messaging and groups based on users’ interests.

But critics and privacy advocates are not convinced that either a fine or Facebook’s new model amounts to a substantial change.

If the company’s business practices don’t change as result of the FTC’s action, “there is no benefit to consumers,” said Marc Rotenberg, the president and executive director of the Washington-based nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center.

“The eight-year delay won’t be justified,” he said, referring to when Facebook first told the FTC it would do better.

The fine does not spell closure for Facebook, although the company’s investors — and executives — have been eager to put it behind them. Facebook is still under various investigations in the U.S. and elsewhere in the world, including the European Union, Germany and Canada. There are also broader antitrust concerns that have been the subject of congressional hearings, though it is too early to see if those will come to fruition.

Matt Stoller, a fellow at the Open Markets Institute, which has been critical of Facebook, said the company should admit wrongdoing.

“There should be structural solutions to force competition into the social networking market,” he added. “One of the angles for competition is privacy. They will compete to make a safer space to retain their user base.”

__

Ortutay reported from San Francisco. Associated Press Writer Samantha Maldonado contributed to this story from San Francisco.

Records are meant to be broken ― but maybe not like this.

Olympic swim king Michael Phelps held the world record in the 200 meter butterfly for 18 straight years, lowering it eight times overall, NBC Sports noted. He also won four golds in both the world championships and Olympics in the same event before retiring in 2016.

But 19-year-old Kristóf Milák of Hungary blew Phelps’ record out of the water at the FINA world championships Wednesday in Gwangju, South Korea.

Milak clocked 1 minute, 50.73 seconds ― 0.78 seconds faster than the last time Phelps broke his own standard in 2009.

That is flying. Check out Milák’s margin of victory:

Milák is the first teenager to win a world title in the event since ― who else? ― Phelps in 2003, The Associated Press reported.

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia — Dozens of demonstrators have held solo pickets in St. Petersburg to commemorate a political and LGBT rights activist who was killed over the weekend.

Yelena Grigorieva’s body was found Saturday near her home with eight stab wounds and signs of strangling.

Some participants in Tuesday’s rally said the 41-year-old had received many threats connected with her activism, particularly for gay rights. Homosexuality is not criminalized in Russia, but animosity toward non-traditional sexuality is strong.

Marina Ken, one of the demonstrators, said “Yelena was killed because she was not afraid to tell the truth about the subjects that are traditionally silent in Russia and on the country’s state TV channels.”

Under Russian law, single demonstrators do not need official permission, so holding consecutive solo pickets is a common strategy.

Dating in this day and age comes with a dictionary’s worth of funny lingo ― from “half-night stands” and “monogamish” to “orbiting,” “curving”  and “serendipidating.” Recently, I’ve noticed a term for a specific kind of romantic connection cropping up more often in memes, love articles and conversations among friends: “situationship.”

Assuming you’ve dipped your toes into the dating waters, odds are you’ve found yourself in a situationship of sorts at some time. Maybe it’s even been a more frequent experience for you than traditional relationships. On an early episode of the U.S. edition of “Love Island,” one contestant declared, “I’ve never had a proper relationship. I’ve been in situationships, but never an actual relationship.” 

But what exactly is a situationship? And what are the upsides and downsides of this type of dynamic? HuffPost spoke to a number of relationship experts to find out. 

What Is A Situationship?

“A situationship is a romantic connection that in most cases serves a short-term need in one or both partners but may or may not evolve into something more stable or meaningful,” said Damona Hoffman, a dating coach and host of the “Dates & Mates” podcast.

Samantha Burns, a dating coach and the author of “Breaking Up & Bouncing Back,” described a situationship as a convenient “relationship” that lacks traditional labels and/or a defined, monogamous commitment. While this romantic connection typically involves hooking up, it can also include emotional intimacy and real friendship. 

“It’s like you’re playing house by pretending you’re in a relationship, but with no real consistency, dependency or reliability,” said Burns. “You might go out on a date, Netflix and chill, or go grocery shopping together. It can be a confusing and nebulous time in the relationship, full of uncertainty about what you are and where it’s going.”

If you’re in a situationship, you may have gone on a few dates or even been seeing each other for a few months, but you haven’t yet had the real DTR conversation. 

How Common Is This?

Many attribute the rise of the “situationship” to a millennial tendency to eschew traditional romantic relationships. Hoffman said she first heard the term “situationship” about three or four years ago, and she believes this type of dynamic has become more common with the popularity of dating apps.

“To meet someone new even a decade ago, most people had to put out a lot of effort by going to bars, events, asking friends for setups, etc., and the return on your effort was often pretty low,” she explained. “Now apps have a low barrier for entry. You can create a profile in minutes and start swiping immediately with many matches at the swipe of a button. This has led to people going on more casual dates and putting people in wait-and-see mode until they see if someone better comes along or not, causing the rise of the situationship.”

In addition to allowing people to keep their options open, situationships are fairly common because “daters like to try it on for size before buying, aka entering into a committed relationship,” noted Burns. These connections offer the convenience of having a partner without needing to put work into a full-fledged relationship. Situationships also serve as safe havens for people who fear commitment or emotional vulnerability. 

“The term ‘situationship’ is the latest incarnation in how to define a nontraditional romantic relationship,” said Seth Meyers, a psychologist and author of “Overcome Relationship Repetition Syndrome and Find the Love You Deserve.” Several experts noted that terms/phrases like “friends with benefits,” “fuck buddies,” “bootycalls,” “hanging out” and “it’s complicated” can fall under the same category as situationships. 

“They’re all offshoots of one another and all getting at the same thing: two people who enjoy each other’s company and like each other, but are scared for whatever reasons to actually give the ‘relationship’ more weight,” said Neely Steinberg, a dating coach and image consultant.

What Are The Upsides?

As with most romantic connections, there are upsides and downsides to situationships.

“A positive is that perhaps you get to explore your feelings for the person, your sexuality, and how you operate within a kind of relationship, without the pressures that come with being in a defined relationship like boyfriend/girlfriend,” said Steinberg.

“By not settling down too soon and exploring nontraditional relationship dynamics, the individuals involved can use their experiences to better inform them about what they truly need from a romantic partner,” Meyers noted. 

There’s also the benefit of getting your physical needs met and having a buddy by your side for various activities and events. Younger generations are putting off marriage to focus on their careers and personal growth, so situationships can be great for those who don’t have time for the obligations of a committed relationship.

“If both parties are aware of the undefined status and expectations of their relationship, it can be very fulfilling and convenient,” said Alysha Jeney, a therapist and owner of Modern Love Counseling in Denver. “If both parties understand their relationship and desire the same things from each other, it can make for a very satisfying situation.” 

What Are The Downsides?

Unfortunately, both parties are often not on the same page. If one person has stronger feelings and wants to turn the situationship into a full-on relationship while the other prefers things the way they are, there can be insecurity, frustration, confusion, hurt feelings, resentment and other negative emotions that make for an unhealthy dynamic. 

“People can get stuck in this type of limbo for a long time and not know how to extricate themselves from something that is not ultimately healthy for them,” Steinberg said. She also believes the situationship dynamic doesn’t allow young people to practice important life skills like vulnerability, non-sexual intimacy, having difficult and awkward conversations, resilience, self-respect and boundaries.

“Also, it doesn’t teach people how to be alone and be OK with that or to just sit with the often uncomfortable feelings of being alone and learn how to move through those feelings,” she added.

Another problem with situationships is that they can meet enough of your needs that they stop you from pursuing a more fulfilling match with longer-term potential. So while having a somewhat steady person around can alleviate short-term loneliness, it can also distract you from the real goal of cultivating a committed relationship with a like-minded partner. 

“A situationship is like false comfort and lacks true intimacy and vulnerability. This is a lazy way of dating since you’re half in and half out. You’re not truly courting someone or investing the effort a relationship needs to blossom,” Burns explained.

“A lot of singles struggle to get out of a situationship with the person they’re seeing and into a real relationship with them. This is mostly because neither partner is truly invested, or one is way more into the other person,” she continued. “People are constantly dating with a ‘grass is greener’ mentality, so they are hesitant to commit to one person, and are entering into short-lived situationships, rather than investing fully and giving a defined relationship a real chance.”

What Should You Do If You’re In A Situationship?

Situationships are common in a world full of easy dating options and less emphasis on commitment.  

“It’s challenging to put in the vulnerable work to create and sustain a true connection because there so many avenues that support excitement and instant gratification,” said Jeney. “It doesn’t surprise me that a term like ‘situationships’ is a thing.”

But that doesn’t mean your dating life has to be situationship or bust. 

“I’d encourage singles, especially young ones who are learning about themselves and relationships, to be honest with themselves about what feels right and good to them and to start learning how to trust in their inner voice or gut. If this type of ‘situation’ doesn’t feel right, believe in that and don’t settle for crumbs. You want and deserve the whole cake, right?” Steinberg said. 

These experiences offer opportunities to develop self-awareness, which will serve you throughout your romantic life.  

“If you find yourself in a situationship, yet deep down, don’t really like it and can be honest with yourself about that ... well, this is a great opportunity to explore that more,” Steinberg added. “Ask why you’d stay in something that doesn’t feel right or good. Your answers will tell you a lot about your unconscious, your views about yourself, relationships, love, etc. From there, from that place, you can start to make different choices that feel empowering and healthy to you.”

A favorite summer footwear option is the flip-flop. What’s not to love? It’s easy to put on and take off. It’s often waterproof. You can wear your flops to the pool, or to get the mail very quickly, or to the beach when you need an easy-to-clean option.

But what happens when you start wearing flip-flops more frequently? Maybe to the grocery store, or to a cookout where you’ll be standing around with friends, or even to work. They might be comfortable, but are they actually safe and supportive enough to wear for those longer stretches?

According to Gerardo Miranda-Comas, an assistant professor in the department of rehabilitation and human performance at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, the shoes you choose are an important component in making sound physiological choices.

“Everything is connected,” he said. “Footwear is only one component ... but the footwear you choose will affect the rest of the body.”

Factors to consider before deciding which shoes to wear

Some footwear can change your posture quite substantially, including flat sandals. The type of foot you have ― whether it’s flat or arched ― also matters, said James Holmes, an associate professor of orthopedic surgery and a foot and ankle specialist at Michigan Medicine.

People who are flat-footed need to be particularly aware of what they wear on their feet. The condition ― and your choices of shoes ― can certainly affect your posture, depending on whether your legs curve in or out at the knee. “Both can lead to knee and hip pain,” Holmes explained. 

When it comes to maintaining healthy posture and preventing pain, comfort is the most important factor, Miranda-Comas said.

“The foot affects the ankle, the ankle affects the knee, the knee affects the hip, and the hip affects the spine,” he said. “The body wants to be aligned, and as central as possible; it will adjust for that. A layer of shoe can help stabilize the body and improve alignment in general.” 

This rule goes for flip-flops, yes, but also for all shoes. High heels are something you should also be wary of when it comes to prolonged wear.

“When you’re wearing a heel, you’re going to end up bending the knee more to keep your center of gravity,” Holmes said. “As a result of bending the knee, you’re going to have to bend a bit at the hips, too. You also have to compensate for the shape of the shoe in your back.” This canlead to a slew of problems, including back pain and forefoot issues. 

Whether you’re flat-footed or have a high arch, choosing footwear with an arch that matches your natural arch can help add a little extra support while standing or walking. This will support the body overall.

Not sure what type of foot you have? Runner’s World suggests trying a simple footprint test for determining your own arch, which essentially involves getting the bottom of your foot wet and stepping on a surface like cement to see your shape.

When in doubt, though, or when experiencing back, knee or hip pain you think might be related to the shape of your foot, talk to an orthopedic specialist. 

It’s also important to remember that “flip-flops are not made for you to do a lot of walking on” and they are “not made to be worn all day,” Miranda-Comas said. They’re also not going to “correct an alignment issue” you might be having with the arch of your foot. (Just think about how easy it would be to twist your ankle on uneven terrain or by simply getting the flip-flop caught on something ... you get it.)

There are potential small perks of flat sandals

All that being said, there is some scientific evidence to suggest shoes like flip-flops can help your feet in some cases.

In one Auburn University study, researchers compared the movement of people in flip-flops with people in athletic shoes. Flip-flop wearers hit the ground with less vertical force and did not lift their toes as much as those who had on tennis shoes. This altered the normal movement of their bodies, resulting in shorter strides and a greater back-and-forth ankle motion.

It sounds bad, right? But those micro-movements might not be the worst thing in the world ― as long as you’re not trying to protect your foot from injury or doing the sort of running where it’s easy to lose an unsecured shoe. Flip-flops are not that far off from barefoot walking, and scientists are starting to note that there are keen differences in populations who do and don’t regularly use footwear.

“If you look at populations that don’t wear shoes, they have fewer issues like bunions or hammer toes,” Holmes said. “When you’re wearing shoes, there are muscles in the arch of the foot that don’t need to work at all.” 

The theory there is that these muscles become weaker when they aren’t working; when they are working to grip the ground, they’re building up strength. The way you stride may change altogether, too. And maybe that’s not a bad thing.

“Humans don’t actually need shoes,” Miranda-Comas said. “The barefoot functioning of the foot is actually more natural, and there are good arguments for that.” Hence why there’s a whole movement on choosing minimalist shoes, even for running.

Perhaps the closeness of a flip-flop to a barefoot gait, during light movement, can be a pro for wearing one. A 2013 study of healthy children walking or jogging in flip-flops found that, while the foot does compensate for holding the shoe on, “the overall findings suggest that foot motion whilst wearing thongs may be more replicable of barefoot motion than originally thought.” 

Holmes said he doesn’t see a ton of problems resulting from flip-flop use in practice. Miranda-Comas said choosing a comfortable pair with a supportive arch for appropriate, short-term use is also OK. 

But if you’re going to be walking a long distance, choose ankle and posture support, and overall foot protection. “If you’re going on a walk in Zion National Park, I’d suspect you’d want the tennis shoes,” Holmes said. 

A 9-year-old is recovering after she was tossed into the air by a bison at Yellowstone National Park in the US on Monday.

The unidentified girl from Odessa, Florida, was part of a group of about 50 or 60 people who came within five to 10 feet of the bison.

The group spent about 20 minutes near the animal before it charged, according to a National Park Service press release.

At one point, the bison hit the girl, who flew high into the air, according to 18-year-old Hailey Dayton, who filmed the incident.

“My brother and I were looking at the hot springs, and we saw a bunch of people running down the path to the bridge. We saw through the trees some people petting the bison, super close,” she told NBC News.

Dayton said the bison became “agitated by all the people and noise” and “just kind of attacked.”

She added: “After that, everyone was screaming. There were a bunch of kids crying.”

After the bison left the scene, the girl’s family took her to the Old Faithful Lodge where she was treated by emergency medical providers, according to the press release. She was later released, but the extent of her injuries is unknown.

The incident is still being investigated and no citations have been issued.

Former special counsel Robert Mueller repeatedly contradicted past statements by President Donald Trump during his testimony before the House Judiciary Committee and the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday.

Mueller was there to answer lawmakers’ questions about his report, a redacted version of which was released to the public in April.

Here are the key times when his comments contradicted statements that Trump has made about the report and the topics it addressed:

The Russia probe wasn’t a “witch hunt.”

Trump and his allies have repeatedly referred to the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election as a “witch hunt.” Mueller on Wednesday flatly denied that characterization.

“It is not a witch hunt,” Mueller said of his investigation.

Russian election interference was not a “hoax.”

The president has said he believes the notion that Russia interfered in the 2016 election is “all a big hoax.”

Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) asked Mueller if he would “agree that it was not a hoax that the Russians were engaged in trying to impact our election.”

“Absolutely, it was not a hoax,” Mueller said. 

Russia meddled in the 2016 election and the Trump campaign was happy with it.

Trump has made an arrayof shifting statements over the years on whether Russia interfered in the last presidential election at all and, if it did, the extent to which it intended to promote his campaign. The president has on at least a few occasions claimed that Russia wanted Hillary Clinton to win, despite Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct statements to the contrary.

Mueller on Wednesday confirmed ― in a point-by-point exchange with Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) ― that Russia indeed meddled in the 2016 election and that the Trump campaign appeared to welcome it.

The Mueller report did not find “no obstruction.”

The former special counsel contradicted Trump’s oft-repeated mantra of “no obstruction,” by which the president implied that the Mueller report had proved he never obstructed justice.

Mueller actually found 10 instances of potential obstruction of justice committed by the president, but he did not make a determination on whether to indict Trump.

In a leading question on Wednesday, Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) asked Mueller: “The report did not conclude that he did not commit obstruction of justice, correct?”

“Correct,” Mueller said.

The former special counsel also said Trump could, in theory, be charged with obstruction of justice after he departs the White House.

“You could charge the president of the United States with obstruction of justice after he left office?” Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) asked.

“Yes,” Mueller responded.

The Mueller report didn’t give Trump “total exoneration.”

Trump and his allies have also repeatedly claimed that the report constituted “total exoneration” of the president and his administration.

Nadler on Wednesday asked directly whether the report totally exonerated the president. 

Mueller did not interview with Trump for the FBI director’s post.

The president has claimed that Mueller applied to become director of the FBI and was turned down shortly before being appointed special counsel. Trump was apparently trying to suggest that Mueller was therefore biased against him.

Mueller refuted that during his testimony on Wednesday.

“I was asked to give my input on what it would take to do the job, which triggered the interview you’re talking about,” he said in response to a question from Rep. Greg Steube (R-Fla.). (Mueller had previously served as head of the FBI for 12 years, from 2001 to 2013.)

“I interviewed with the president,” Mueller added, but he noted, “It was about the job, not me applying for the job.”

Trump’s praise of WikiLeaks’ publishing hacked emails was “problematic.”

Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) on Wednesday read out several Trump tweets and public statements in praise of WikiLeaks, which published hacked emails that damaged the Clinton campaign in 2016. Among them were comments like: “I love WikiLeaks,” “This WikiLeaks is like a treasure trove,” and “Boy, I love reading those WikiLeaks.”

In effect, Trump was celebrating the fact that a U.S. presidential campaign had been hacked, likely by a foreign power, Russia, which then passed the information along to WikiLeaks.

“‘Problematic’ is an understatement,” Mueller said, adding that Trump’s statements boost “what is and should be illegal activity.”

Priti Patel has been made home secretary in Boris Johnson’s new-look cabinet. 

Just hours after Johnson was named prime minister, it was revealed that Patel would be taking over the role, which is considered one of the four great offices of state. 

The post was previously held by Sajid Javid, who was named chancellor in Johnson’s shuffle of the Tory frontbench on Wednesday. 

The appointment makes Patel, an Indian-origin MP, one of the most influential politicians in the country – but how much do you know about her? 

What’s Her Track Record In Parliament? 

The MP for Witham in Essex, Patel was first elected back in 2010. Since then, she has served as Exchequer secretary and a work and pensions minister – but it was her stint as international development secretary that landed her in the headlines. Or, more specifically, her *resignation* as international development secretary in 2017. 

The 47-year-old was effectively forced to quit the cabinet after it came to light she had held unauthorised meetings with Israeli politicians, including prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 

Called back from an official trip to Africa by Theresa May after details of the meetings emerged, journalists across the UK tracked Patel’s flight as she headed back to the country for a thorough ticking-off from the PM. 

It’s yet to be seen whether her latest stint in the cabinet will be able to deliver such high levels of drama. 

What’s Her Stance On Brexit? 

To say Patel is a staunch Brexiteer is a bit of an understatement. A campaigner for Vote Leave during the EU referendum, she also launched the anti-EU ‘Women for Brexit’ group, likening the Leave campaign to the fight of the suffragettes. 

Just like women fighting for the vote in the early 20th century, Brexit campaigners were fighting to protect “our democratic freedom”, she said back in 2016. (Helen Pankhurst – great-granddaughter of suffragette leader Emmeline did *not* agree.) 

What Kind Of Home Secretary Will She Be? 

It would be unfair to pre-judge Patel’s performance before she’s even had a single day in office as home secretary. But an appearance she made on Question Time back in 2011 might leave some *slightly* concerned that she’s now in charge of national security. 

Arguing that murderers and rapists get sent to prison, only to reoffend after they are released, she told the audience: “On that basis alone, I would actually support the re-introduction of capital punishment to serve as a deterrent.” 

Sajid Javid has been handed the plum post of chancellor in new prime minister Boris Johnson’s government.

The former home secretary was Johnson’s first appointment as he began a dramatic cabinet reshuffle that saw prominent Brexiteers promoted.

Javid will be replaced at the Home Office by hard Brexiteer Priti Patel, returning to the cabinet having been forced to resign in 2017 for holding unofficial and unsanctioned meetings with senior Israeli political figures.

Javid was widely tipped for the post of chancellor but Patel, a longstanding ally of Johnson, will prove to be a more controversial appointment, having previously expressed ultra-right wing views such as backing the death penalty.

Fellow Brexiteer Dominic Raab was appointed foreign secretary to replace Jeremy Hunt, who quit after being offered an inferior post.

Raab was also handed the title of first secretary of state, meaning he will deputise for Johnson when he is on holiday, or away during prime minister’s questions.

Michael Gove, Johnson’s old Vote Leave partner and 2016 leadership race nemesis, was appointed chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, previously held by May’s number two David Lidington.

Gavin Williamson returned as education secretary just weeks after being sacked from the government for allegedly leaking details about Huawei’s involvement in UK 5G infrastructure from a National Security Council meeting.

In the most eye-catching appointment of a dramatic day, arch-Brexiteer Jacob Rees-Mogg – who proved such a thorn in the side of May – entered the government as leader of the Commons.

One of Johnson’s most longstanding supporters, Ben Wallace, was promoted from security minister to defence secretary to replace Penny Mordaunt, who was surprisingly sacked from the cabinet after she backed Hunt in the Tory leadership race.

Brexit Secretary Stephen Barclay, Health Secretary Matt Hancock and Work and Pensions Secretary Amber Rudd kept their jobs on a brutal evening when 17 of his colleagues, including Hunt, Mordaunt, and former trade secretary Liam Fox were sacked or quit the cabinet.

Other high profile departures included the much-criticised former transport secretary Chris Grayling and ex-business secretary Greg Clark, who is opposed to a no-deal Brexit.

Liz Truss, an early backer of Johnson who had been angling for the chancellor job, was handed Fox’s role as international trade secretary. 

There were cabinet returns for Nicky Morgan, as culture secretary, and Andrea Leadsom, as business secretary.How Johnson’s Ruthless Reshuffle Confirms Brexit’s Very British Coup

Robert Buckland as justice secretary and Robert Jenrick as housing and local government secretary were among those promoted from junior ministerial ranks, 

Backbencher Rishi Sunak was appointed to chief secretary to the Treasury.

Grant Shapps replaced Grayling as transport secretary, after his data wizardry helped Johnson romp into the final two in the Tory leadership campaign.

James Cleverly, the Tory party deputy chairman. has been appointed minister without portfolio and the party chairman.

Independent MP Nick Boles, who served as a Conservative minister under David Cameron, said the party had been taken over by hardliners.

He said: “The hard right has taken over the Conservative party. Thatcherites, libertarians and no-deal Brexiters control it top to bottom. Liberal One Nation Conservatives have been ruthlessly culled.

“Only a few neutered captives are being kept on as window dressing.

“The takeover that started in local constituency parties is now complete. The Brexit Party has won the war without electing a single MP. Boris Johnson isn’t our new prime minister; Nigel Farage is.”

Labour criticised the appointment of “hardline” conservatives in Johnson’s cabinet.

Party chairman Ian Lavery said: “Boris Johnson’s first act as prime minister has been to appoint a cabinet of hardline conservatives who will only represent the privileged few.

“A chancellor who’s consistently called for more tax cuts for big corporations, home and education secretaries who were sacked for breaches of national security and a foreign secretary who doesn’t know the importance of our ports.

“This out-of-touch cabinet pushed for nine years of damaging austerity, while demanding tax cuts for the super-rich and big corporations.

“We need a general election and a Labour government that will bring real change for the many, not the privileged few, which Johnson and his cabinet represent.”

Moderate Tory MPs expressed surprise at the extent to which Johnson wielded the knife.

Many were calling for Hunt to be kept in a senior role after running a widely praised leadership campaign, but he quit as foreign secretary after Johnson tried to offer him another job.

One MP told HuffPost UK the government was “losing some good people”, while another said simply “oh my goodness”.

A Brexiteer MP however said “big change requires big changes”.

Another Tory source meanwhile described Johnson’s reshuffle as “unexpectedly harsh and risky” but questioned whether it was designed to show the EU he was serious about a no-deal Brexit.