Winning the seat is a key requirement for Anwar to succeed 93-year-old Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, who jailed his former protege and heir apparent on sodomy and corruption charges in 1998 when their relationship soured.

Mahathir returned to the premiership this year after a shock election win, saying he would stay in power for only two years before handing the reins to Anwar.

Anwar was in prison when he forged an unlikely alliance with Mahathir in a bid to unseat then prime minister Najib Razak, who had called elections for May amid massive corruption allegations.

Underscoring the drama of Saturday’s vote, one of Anwar’s six challengers is a former aide who also accused the then-opposition leader of sodomy, landing the 71-year-old in jail for a second time in 2014.

But the charismatic politician is expected to eke out an easy win in the seat, which was vacated after a member of the ruling coalition stepped down to pave Anwar’s return.

Polls opened under cloudy skies at 8:00 am (0000 GMT) in the sleepy southern coastal town of Port Dickson, home to a sizeable ethnic Chinese community that across the country has traditionally been one of Anwar’s pillars of support.

“We are voting for the next premier. We need an influential leader to bring long-overdue progress to Port Dickson,” said 60-year-old voter Lee Tian Hock.

“This morning, I prayed to Allah for a big win for Anwar,” retired truck driver Mat Taib, a member of the country’s ethnic Malay majority, told AFP.

“I want him to be our eighth prime minister.”

About 100 supporters greeted Anwar with shouts of “Reformasi” — his battlecry while in opposition — as he arrived at a polling station.

“Voter turnout is too slow, Hopefully, more will come out to cast their votes after they finish their work in hotels and factories,” he said.

“I will see you in parliament on Monday,” he told an AFP reporter, smiling broadly.

– Charismatic politician –

Anwar campaigned hard over the past two weeks to secure a mandate in the multi-racial constituency, promising voters development, clean government and a boost to local tourism.

He has not discussed the accusations of sodomy — an act that is still illegal in largely Muslim Malaysia — while on the campaign trail. He has always maintained the charges were trumped up to derail his political career.

But he has campaigned doggedly on the multi-billion-dollar graft scandal at state fund 1MDB, over which former leader Najib and his wife Rosmah Mansor facing dozens of corruption charges.

Both face the prospect of spending the rest of their lives in jail in a scandal that saw Najib’s coalition lose office for the first time since the country declared independence from Britain in 1957.

Political heavyweights including Mahathir have campaigned for Anwar in a road back to office that was unthinkable even six months ago.

The duo went onstage together at one campaign event, prompting wild cheers from supporters.

After he was dumped as finance minister and jailed in the 1990s, Anwar led a reformist opposition movement while fighting to overturn his convictions.

Mahathir, his mentor turned tormentor and now ally, came back from retirement to lead the Alliance of Hope coalition that won power in May.

A Saudi delegation was in Turkey for talks on the case, which threatens not only to harm fragile relations between the two countries but also to do serious damage to the reformist credentials of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and the kingdom’s ties to the West.

As the controversy intensified, the Washington Post reported Turkish officials had recordings made from inside the building that allegedly proved their claims Khashoggi was tortured and killed at the consulate.

Big names from media and business have already cancelled appearances at a major conference in Riyadh this month and both the IMF chief and the US treasury secretary made their attendance conditional on the findings in the case.

In the first Saudi ministerial reaction to Turkish accusations that Khashoggi was killed, Interior Minister Prince Abdel Aziz bin Saud bin Nayef condemned “what has been reported in certain media concerning false accusations against Saudi Arabia… in the case of the disappearance of citizen Khashoggi”.

“What has been reported on the matter of orders to kill him is a lie and a baseless allegation,” the minister said in comments carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.

he added the kingdom was “in compliance with international laws and conventions”.

Saudi journalist and Washington Post contributor Khashoggi vanished on October 2 after entering the consulate to obtain documents for his upcoming marriage.

Working group

The Saudi delegation, whose composition was not immediately clear, is expected to meet with Turkish officials in Ankara at the weekend, state media said on Friday.

It is likely that they will take part in a joint working group on the case, whose creation was announced Thursday by Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin following a request by Saudi Arabia.

A Saudi official source quoted by SPA news agency said it was “a positive move” Turkey had agreed to the creation of what it described as a “joint action team”.

The Turkish leadership has so far stopped short of accusing Saudi Arabia, although pro-government media have published sensational claims, including that an “assassination team” was sent to Istanbul to kill Khashoggi.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has challenged Saudi Arabia to provide CCTV images to back up its account that Khashoggi left the consulate safely.

Khashoggi, a Saudi national living in the US since September 2017 fearing arrest, criticised some policies of Mohammed bin Salman and Riyadh’s intervention in the war in Yemen.

The Washington Post reported the Turkish government has told US officials it has audio and video recordings which show how Khashoggi was “interrogated, tortured and then murdered” inside the consulate before his body was dismembered.

Turkish officials contacted by AFP refused to comment on the veracity of the report.

‘Horrified’

IMF chief Christine Lagarde said on Saturday she was “horrified” by reports about the Saudi dissident’s fate, while US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin expressed “concern”.

But both said that for now they still planned to attend an October 23-25 conference in Riyadh, dubbed “Davos in the Desert” after the World Economic Forum in the Swiss resort.

“The answer is for now I am” still going, Mnuchin said. “If more information comes out over the next week, I will obviously take that into account.”

Lagarde said she had to “conduct the business of the IMF in all corners in the world”.

“So at this point of time my intention is to not change my plans and to be very attentive to the information that is coming out in the next few days.”

Bloomberg, the Financial Times, The Economist and The New York Times withdrew as the event’s media sponsors, while the CEO of ride-hailing app Uber, Dara Khosrowshahi said he would no longer be attending unless “a substantially different set of facts emerges”.

– ‘Arguments, shouting’ –

Ankara and Riyadh have been on opposing sides in the region on key issues, including the ousting of the Islamist Egyptian government and last year’s Saudi-led blockade on Turkey’s regional ally Qatar. Yet as key Sunni Muslim powers they have maintained cordial relations.

But despite Riyadh’s agreement on Tuesday to let Turkish authorities search the Saudi mission, the probe has not yet taken place. The two sides have been in intense contacts to resolve the issue, local media reported.

Pro-government Turkish newspaper Sabah said officials wanted to search the building with luminol, a chemical that allows forensic teams to discover blood traces, but the Saudis had so far refused.

Officers were looking into sound recordings sent from a smart watch Khashoggi was wearing when he entered the consulate to a mobile phone he gave to his Turkish fiancee outside, Hatice Cengiz.

Turkish daily Milliyet reported “arguments and shouting” could be heard on the recordings.

As questions swirl over the fate of Khashoggi — a Saudi critic who has not been seen since he walked into the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul on October 2 — some big business names and media outlets have pulled out of the Kingdom’s second Future Investment Initiative.

But Lagarde said her plans were unchanged for now, despite international uproar over the case.

“Human rights, freedom of information are essential rights and horrifying things have been reported and I am horrified,” she told reporters in Bali where the IMF is holding annual meetings.

“But I have to conduct the business of the IMF in all corners in the world and with many governments.”

“When I visit a country, I always speak my mind… So at this point of time my intention is to not change my plans and to be very attentive to the information that is coming out in the next few days.”

Her comments came shortly after US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he also still planned to attend the October 23-25 meeting, dubbed “Davos in the Desert”.

“The answer is for now I am” still going, Mnuchin said.

“If more information comes out over the next week, I will obviously take that into account.”

“Obviously I want to express concern for Mr. Khashoggi and his family,” he added.

“We look forward to getting results of this investigation.”

Riyadh on Saturday dismissed accusations that authorities there had ordered Khashoggi be murdered by a hit squad inside its Istanbul consulate as “lies and baseless allegations”.

But the row has intensified with the Washington Post reporting that Turkish officials have recordings made from inside the building that allegedly prove their claims Khashoggi was tortured and killed at the consulate.

Bloomberg, the Financial Times, The Economist and The New York Times have withdrawn as media sponsors from the event amid questions about the missing man’s fate.

The CEO of ride-hailing app Uber, Dara Khosrowshahi, said that he will no longer be attending the event unless “a substantially different set of facts emerges”.

British entrepreneur Richard Branson said he would suspend two directorships linked to tourism projects in Saudi Arabia over the issue.

Amnesty International demanded the Saudi authorities reveal what happened to Khashoggi as it said Riyadh was “responsible at a minimum for enforced disappearance”.

“Mexico Beach is devastated,” Florida Governor Rick Scott said of the town where Michael made landfall as a Category 4 storm on Wednesday.

“It’s like a bomb went off,” Scott said as he toured the town of 1,000 people on the Gulf of Mexico. “It’s like a war zone.”

Rescue teams were using sniffer dogs in Mexico Beach on Friday to search for victims who may be buried under the rubble in the debris-strewn community.

US media later reported one death in the town — an elderly man found alone, according to Mayor Al Cathey. Officials said his body was found hundreds of yards from his home.

Brock Long, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), warned that he expected the toll to rise.

“I hope we don’t see it climb dramatically but I have reasons to believe we still haven’t got into some of the hardest hit areas,” he said.

Dozens of structures in Mexico Beach — homes, shops and restaurants — were lifted off their foundations by storm surge and 155 miles per hour (250 kph) winds and moved hundreds of feet inland or smashed to bits.

“Very few people live to tell what it’s like to experience storm surge,” Long said. “Storm surge causes the most amount of loss of life.”

– ‘Sticks’ –

State officials said Mexico Beach was under mandatory evacuation orders but some residents decided to stay and try to ride out the storm.

“You hope that somehow at the last minute a bunch of people got up and left or went somewhere else,” Florida Senator Marco Rubio told CNN.

Bob Tenbrunson, a Mexico Beach retiree, rode out the storm at his daughter’s house in nearby Panama City and returned to survey the damage to his home.

“I was going to stay here until it turned to a Cat 4,” he said. “So I followed the mandatory evacuation order and left with my wife.

“Luckily we did not get a surge,” Tenbrunson said of his home. “I’ve got two trees on the roof and a couple of holes on the roof. I have been trying to patch it up the best I can.”

The rest of Mexico Beach did not fare as well, and most beachfront homes, restaurants and stores were obliterated by the storm.

“I spent my life savings and retirement to stay here so I can’t sell it now,” Tenbrunson said. “I just have to be hopeful that (the town) will be rebuilt and fixed.”

Some residents arrived Friday with vans or moving trucks, hoping to recover as many personal effects from their splintered homes as they could.

Others came with nothing — as there was nothing left to save.

Eight deaths from the storm have been reported in Florida, five in Virginia, one in Georgia and three in North Carolina.

The two deaths in North Carolina occurred in McDowell County when a car struck a tree that had fallen across a road, officials said.

Hundreds of thousands of people remain without electricity in Florida, Georgia and Virginia, and officials say it could be weeks before power is fully restored.

Trump to visit

President Donald Trump said he planned to visit Florida and Georgia.

“People have no idea how hard Hurricane Michael has hit the great state of Georgia,” Trump tweeted. “I will be visiting both Florida and Georgia early next week. We are working very hard on every area and every state that was hit — and we are with you!”

Michael was the most intense hurricane to strike the Florida Panhandle since record keeping began in 1851.

Many of the damaged Florida buildings were not built to withstand a storm above the strength of a Category 3 hurricane on the five-level Saffir-Simpson scale.

About 5,000 US servicemen were deployed to help with relief and recovery efforts, the Pentagon said, using 100 helicopters and 1,800 high-water vehicles.

Tyndall Air Force Base, home to F-22 stealth fighters, suffered extensive damage, according to aerial photos of the coastal facility.

Heavy downpours since Wednesday triggered flooding and landslides that hit several districts on Sumatra island.

At least 17 people were confirmed killed in the last three days in North Sumatra province, while five others were killed in West Sumatra, authorities said.

“Eleven students of an Islamic boarding school in Muara Saladi village, Mandailing Natal district, North Sumatra died Friday afternoon during class as they were struck by a building which was destroyed by the flash floods,” spokesman for the national disaster agency Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said.

Dozens of houses have also been destroyed.

“The disaster and search and rescue agency have gone to the districts but have been hampered by the landslides in several areas,” the head of North Sumatra disaster agency Riadil Lubis told AFP.

Landslides and flooding are common in Indonesia, a vast tropical archipelago prone to natural disasters and torrential downpours.

In February, 12 people died when an avalanche of mud and rock cascaded down a steep slope in central Java, Indonesia’s main island.

In June 2016, nearly 50 people died when heavy downpours sent torrents of water, mud and rock into villages also in Central Java province.

The bodies of eight climbers — four South Koreans and four Nepali guides — were spotted among the wreckage of their camp by a rescue team early Saturday morning, but strong winds and icy conditions were hampering the search effort.

A fifth South Korean climber was initially reported missing, but officials have now confirmed that he was at the camp when the deadly storm hit and is believed to have also perished.

“A mountain expedition of five South Korean nationals and four foreigners were swept off by strong winds at the base camp during their climb to Mount Gurja. (They) fell off a cliff and died,” the South Korean foreign ministry said in a statement.

Helicopter pilot Siddartha Gurung was among the first people to reach the site after the deadly storm and described a scene of total destruction with the tents flattened and the climber’s bodies scattered across the area.

“Everything is gone, all the tents are blown apart,” Gurung told AFP.

Gurung landed a helicopter just above the expedition team’s camp, but icy and unstable conditions meant they were unable to retrieve any of the bodies.

Nepal’s tourism department said a second helicopter was being sent to the site Saturday afternoon.

“A helicopter has been sent for second rescue attempt but we are not sure whether it can get close to the incident site,” said spokeswoman Mira Acharya.

– Deadliest incident –

The storm is the deadliest incident to hit Nepal’s mountaineering industry since 18 people were killed at the Mount Everest base camp in 2015 in an avalanche triggered by a powerful earthquake.

The previous year, 16 Sherpas were killed on Everest when an avalanche swept through the Khumbu Icefall.

Wangchu Sherpa, managing director of Trekking Camp Nepal, who organised the expedition, said they raised the alarm after they had not heard from the South Korean team for nearly 24 hours.

“After they (the climbers) were out of contact since yesterday we sent people from the village and a helicopter to search for them,” he said.

The group of South Korean climbers and their Nepali guides had been camped at the foot of the 7,193-metre (23,599-foot) Mount Gurja since early October, waiting for a window of good weather so they could attempt to reach the summit.

Feted South Korean climber Kim Chang-ho, who in 2013 became the fastest person to summit the world’s 14 highest mountains without using supplemental oxygen, was leading the expedition, according to a government-issued climbing permit seen by AFP.

The permit listed four South Korean climbers, but a fifth member had joined the team later, according to Suresh Dakal of Trekking Camp Nepal.

Rarely-climbed Gurja lies in Nepal’s Annapurna region, next to avalanche-prone Dhaulagiri — the world’s seventh-highest mountain.

Gurja was first summited in 1969 by a Japanese team but no one has stood on its summit for 22 years, according to the Himalayan Database.

The South Korean team were planning to scale the mountain via a never-climbed route, according to the Korean Alpine Federation.

Four climbers have perished on Gurja’s flanks and a total of 30 have successfully reached its peak — a fraction of the more than 8,000 people who have summited Everest, the world’s highest mountain.

Thousands of climbers flock to Nepal each year — home to eight of the world’s 14 highest peaks — creating a lucrative mountain tourism industry that is a vital source of cash for the impoverished country.

A study released this week has found that nearly one-third of young Americans are now too overweight to join up, a worrying statistic for military officials already facing recruitment challenges.

“Obesity has long threatened our nation’s health. As the epidemic grows, obesity is posing a threat to our nation’s security as well,” the Council for a Strong America states in its new report.

The Army last month announced it would miss its goal of attracting 76,500 new recruits in 2018. The shortfall is of about 6,500 soldiers — the first time since 2005 the service had missed its hiring targets.

A strong US economy and tight jobs market played a role, but the numbers highlight the dwindling pool of applicants the Pentagon has to draw from.

According to the Defense Department, obesity is one of the top reasons why a stunning 71 percent of Americans aged 17-24 do not meet the military’s sign-up requirements.

“Given the high percentage of American youth who are too overweight to serve, recruiting challenges will continue unless measures are taken to encourage a healthy lifestyle beginning at a young age,” states the study, entitled “Unhealthy and Unprepared.”

Other factors such as prior drug use or a lack of academic qualifications are also taking a toll.

The report, compiled by a group of retired generals and admirals, notes that the obesity issue is a particular worry as it comes when fewer young people are interested in joining the military in the first place.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, a retired Marine general, last month said the shrinking pool of Americans eligible to serve was a “big concern.”

“It’s a sad state of affairs when 71 percent of the 18 to 24-year-old males in this country cannot qualify to enter the United States Army as a private,” he said.

The problem should be addressed at the local level, he said, praising efforts of retired service members who are working in schools “to try to restore physical education where it’s been taken out, to try to get school lunches to be things that fuel the body, instead of just giving them crummy food.”

‘Pudgy soldiers’

The obesity problem persists even after boot camp.

According to retired Army major general Jeffrey Phillips, the military spends more than $1.5 billion each year treating obesity-related health conditions and filling positions vacated by unfit troops.

“I saw it myself: pudgy soldiers visibly pushing, or beyond, the ‘height and weight’ standards,” Phillips wrote in a Military Times commentary.

The new report says the Pentagon has recognized the long-standing obesity problem, and is taking steps to improve the health of its troops.

One Army program, known as the Performance Triad, “aims to improve soldier readiness and encourage healthy behaviors, and to provide support to soldiers in these areas.”

The Army has also introduced a new physical fitness test that measures the likelihood recruits will go on to meet the physical demands of their selected military job.

Many military facilities are equipped with top-notch gyms, and dining facilities on US bases around the world often provide nutritional guidelines.

The report concludes that the solution lies in ensuring children and parents learn about the vital importance of healthy eating and physical activity from a young age.

“Basic training lasts weeks, but building strong troops takes years. Encouraging healthy lifestyles early in life will help our nation prepare for future challenges,” retired Air Force general Richard Myers said.

A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine last year found that 2.2 billion people worldwide are believed to be overweight, and more than one in 10 people are obese, fueling a global health crisis that claims millions of lives every year.

Of the world’s most populous countries, the United States leads the way in terms of obesity among children and young adults, at 13 percent.

The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government rejected the FT’s application to renew Mallet’s work permit last week.

Tong, who is also a senior counsel, told China Daily in an exclusive interview that he believes there is no other reason for this than the invitation of pro-independence activist Andy Chan Ho-tin to talk at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club last month. The invitation was given by Mallet in August in his capacity as a vice-president of the club.

“Mallet was setting a stage for someone to spread separatism. It was more than just news reporting. If he meant to cover news, he could have interviewed the activist himself in his newspaper’s office,” Tong said.

“When a foreigner works in Hong Kong, he has to obey local laws including the Basic Law,” the senior counsel argued.

“He did not respect the Basic Law which stipulates Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China. Disrespect of the Basic Law carries no criminal liability but this does not mean there will be no other consequences,” Tong stressed.

He also rejected commentaries arguing the government had undermined freedom of the press in the city.

“The HKSAR Government has not infringed freedom of press. Many reporters have interviewed that activist before; did you see any of the interviews censored? Was the broadcast of the talk at FCC banned?”

The non-extension of visa had nothing at all to do with freedom of speech, Tong contended. He condemned the “pan-democrats” for “claiming they don’t support Hong Kong independence, yet they twist this issue into a case of violation of freedom of speech”.

A common practice

In Tong’s opinion, many other foreign jurisdictions have similar immigration rules. He also was skeptical of comments by British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt – who said Mallet’s visa denial was “politically motivated”.

He explained that usually British passport holders could stay in Hong Kong for six months without a visa.

“If his work visa is not renewed, this shows the Hong Kong Immigration Department sees him as an extraordinary person whose presence in Hong Kong is deemed undesirable for political and national security reasons,” Tong said.

“Hong Kong independence is the red line that people should not tread. The red line is always there and it has not moved,” Tong said.

“The British foreign secretary’s remark that there is a ‘political reason’ behind Mallet’s visa denial is rather childish,” he said.

The senior counsel said this situation had happened many times before, recalling that other non-residents were not allowed to enter Hong Kong. He cited former leader of Taiwan Ma Ying-jeou and deputy chairman of UK Conservative Party’s human rights committee Benedict Rogers – among others.

“The UK has also banned many people including reporters from entering without explanation. US President Donald Trump often infringes press freedom by not allowing CNN reporters to cover news in the White House and describes news unfavorable to him as ‘fake news’,” he said.

Tong said the Immigration Department had the legal authority not to renew a person’s work visa. It is not obliged to give any explanations.

Reportedly, Mallet will be transferred to Paris next month. Tong could not rule out that the SAR government chose not to extend his work visa because he is deemed “a very unwelcomed person”.

In his view, non-renewal of visa is a lenient measure. “He could be denied entry or deported but the Immigration Department needs to provide stronger facts in those circumstances,” he argued.

Tong said immigration control issues were the internal affairs of the HKSAR which the central government does not interfere with. An adverse response from foreign countries was expected. But he questioned whether this is much help because Beijing was very wary of external forces meddling in Hong Kong affairs.

“The central government authorities absolutely support the HKSAR Government’s decision not to renew Mallet’s work visa,” he added.

The opening ceremony for the Safe Mekong Coordination Centre-Vientiane Capital (SMCC) was attended by the Deputy Minister of Public Security and the Commissioner of Drug Control and Supervision, Major General Dr Somvang Thammasith, and the Director General of the General Police Department, Brigadier General Dr Thonglek Mangnormek.

Speaking at the ceremony, Major General Somvang said: “Currently, drug problems have become a serious issue for many governments in the world. These problems have had a negative impact on the economic and social development, stability and security of the world. lt requires joint collaborative efforts to address this serious threat.”

He added, “The opening of the SMCC is a historical event in the field of drug control in this region. It is an important event and a great opportunity for us to share lessons learned, exchange experiences and intelligence of six member countries, jointly research and find solutions to address drug trafficking, and intercept precursor chemicals in the Golden Triangle area more effectively.”

He highlighted the importance of intercepting and controlling drugs that lead to various crimes and are harmful to the population.

“I would like to urge the member countries of the Safe Mekong Joint Operation Project, namely Laos, China, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, to jointly focus on the following points – strengthening of close cooperation among the six member countries to intercept precursor chemicals trafficking into the Golden Triangle area, and strengthening cooperation among the six member countries to intercept drugs being trafficked from the Golden Triangle area through the member countries to third countries,” he said.

“I would like to urge all coordinators of the six member countries, who are working at the SMCC, to closely cooperate for the exchange of intelligence and information to help each other effectively.”

He said drugs and related issues are a national and global problem. “A single country will not be able to address these problems alone. Thus, it requires joint collaborative efforts to address this serious threat. I do hope that all member countries of the Safe Mekong Joint Operation Project, and international organisations will continue to cooperate and support the Lao PDR in addressing drug problems in order to contribute to a drug-free region in the near future,” he added.

Brigadier General Thonglek said Lao participants in the Safe Mekong Project, since its creation on March, 2013, had cooperated and conducted activities in their own area, officially sharing information and taking turns to host the SMCC.

“During the implementation, we could see the effectiveness of cooperation for drug control by the six Mekong sub-region countries,” he said.

“The Prince Estate has never given permission to President Trump or The White House to use Prince’s songs and have requested that they cease all use immediately,” tweeted the musician’s half-brother Omarr Baker.

The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to an AFP request to comment.

The president’s team have reportedly added “Purple Rain,” one of Prince’s best-loved tracks, to the playlist of recent rallies in the run-up to November midterm elections, including in Mississippi last week.

The complaint adds Prince to a long line of musicians or their representatives who have objected to the billionaire Republican head of state blasting out their tunes at his public rallies.

The Rolling Stones, Adele, Neil Young, R.E.M., Aerosmith, Queen and George Harrison are among acts that have lodged objections to the use of their music at Republican gatherings.

The family of Italy’s late Luciano Pavarotti, one of the most famous tenors of the 20th century, also criticized the use of his signature recording of blockbuster Puccini aria “Nessun Dorma,” a fixture at Trump’s 2016 rallies.

But during a question-and-answer session on Twitter two years ago Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger was quoted as saying there was nothing he could do under US law to stop Trump playing his music.

“If you’re in a public place like Madison Square Garden or a theater, you can play any music you want, and you can’t be stopped. So, if you write a song and someone plays it in a restaurant that you go to, you can’t stop them. They can play what they want,” the Daily Beast quoted him as saying.

While US law could allow an artist to ask for his music not to be played at political campaigns, none have yet followed through with any legal action.

Prince died aged 57 in April 2016 from an accidental overdose of powerful painkillers. He left no will and had no living children, with his siblings put in charge of keeping his estate afloat.