May made a rare outing on a radio phone-in during which she faced a call to step down after a tumultuous Thursday in which ministers resigned and members of her own party plotted to oust her.

“I truly believe this is the best deal for Britain,” May said of the proposed EU withdrawal agreement, adding that she was “very sorry” that ministers including Brexit secretary Dominic Raab had quit.

All eyes were on Environment Secretary Michael Gove, the highest-profile pro-Brexit campaigner left standing in May’s cabinet, to see whether he would follow others out the door.

But a source close to Gove, a Vote Leave figurehead in the 2016 referendum on Britain’s European Union membership, said the minister would remain in his post “to ensure the best outcome for the country”.

Many media outlets reported that Gove had been offered the position of Brexit secretary.

May told LBC radio she had a “very good conversation” with Gove and would be appointing a new Brexit chief “over the next day or so”.

“I don’t want to see any of my cabinet colleagues who’ve been doing a good job in the cabinet feeling the need to resign,” she added.

– ‘Stand down’ –

One caller, a local councillor in her centre-right Conservative Party, urged May to “do the right thing in the national interest and stand down”.

She also faced comparisons with prime minister Neville Chamberlain and his 1938 appeasement of Nazi Germany’s dictator Adolf Hitler.

“We are not going to be locked in forever to something that we don’t want,” May insisted.

Brexiteer MPs fear the deal would keep Britain shackled to the Brussels, while EU supporters say it would leave the UK on worse terms than it has inside the bloc and are calling for a second Brexit referendum to break the logjam.

May could yet face a vote of no confidence from her own MPs.

Conservative lawmaker Jacob Rees-Mogg, the high-profile leader of the Brexit hardline European Research Group, submitted a letter of no-confidence on Thursday.

At least 48 letters from Conservative MPs are required to trigger a vote of no confidence in the party leader. But a majority of the party’s 315 lawmakers would have to vote against May in order for her to be ousted — and if she wins, she cannot be challenged for 12 months.

– Allies back away –

May’s Conservatives do not have a majority in parliament’s lower House of Commons and MPs from all sides lined up in the chamber on Thursday to say her draft deal would be voted down, satisfying neither Brexiteers nor pro-EU loyalists.

The Conservatives rely on Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party for a slim majority but the DUP are prepared to vote against the deal, fearing it splits the province off from the rest of the UK in order to prevent a hard land border with the Republic of Ireland.

Asked whether DUP leader Arlene Foster had withdrawn her party’s backing, May said: “I haven’t had a testy exchange with Arlene on that” and insisted the DUP’s overall support for the government was still intact.

The 585-page draft deal aims to ensure a smooth divorce from the EU after more than four decades of membership and outlines a transition period for both sides.

Key provisions seek to avoid a hard border on the island of Ireland, protect citizens’ rights and settle Britain’s last bill.

The pound steadied versus the euro and rose against the dollar, having been hammered on Thursday over the Brexit turbulence.

Sterling was up 0.4 percent at $1.2822 in morning trading, while one euro was worth 88.61 pence.

London’s benchmark FTSE 100 index gained 0.5 percent to 7,071.59 points.

EU member states have until Tuesday to examine the deal and to agree the wording of a parallel political statement setting out goals for the bloc’s future relations with London.

A special EU summit to seal the hard-fought Brexit agreement will be held on November 25.

Friday’s sentencing is the first time the charge of genocide was ever levied against any senior leader of the ultra-Maoist regime, which left an estimated two million Cambodians dead during its four-year reign of terror.

Here is a look back at some key moments in the historic trial.

– Referred to court –

After years of preparation and investigation, on January 13, 2011 four senior leaders are referred to the war crimes tribunal set up on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, formally called the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC).

They are “Brother Number Two” Nuon Chea, rumoured to be the second-in-command to Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot; head of state Khieu Samphan; foreign minister Ieng Sary; and his wife, Ieng Thirith, who was the social affairs minister during the regime.

She is released the following year, suffering from dementia, while Ieng Sary dies in detention in 2013 at the age of 87.

The trial begins on June 27, 2011 but facing criticism that it would take too long, the judges decide three months later to split the proceedings into two: a first “mini-trial” which will focus on “crimes against humanity”; and the second on charges of “genocide”.

– ‘Not bad people’ –

The end of 2011 is marked by memorable testimony by the two defendants.

Khieu Samphan in November hits back at the prosecution for telling “fairy tales” about the Khmer Rouge, insisting that most Cambodians supported the brutal regime.

A month later, Nuon Chea — regarded as the chief ideologue for the movement — says the Khmer Rouge were not “bad people” or criminals.

“I don’t want the next generations to misunderstand history,” he tells the court on December 5, 2011. “Nothing is true about that.”

– Life imprisonment –

Nuon Chea on May 30, 2013 shows the first signs of remorse when he admits he must “take responsibility for the damage” done to Cambodia and expresses his “deepest condolences”.

Yet the truculent defendant stops short of admitting guilt to the charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity, denying any knowledge when it came to the regime’s worst atrocities.

Earlier that month Khieu Samphan offered a “sincere apology” but attempted to distance himself from the regime’s actions, saying he was unaware of his fellow Cambodians’ suffering.

The following year on August 8, 2014, the two are found “guilty of crimes against humanity or extermination … political persecution and other inhumane acts” and jailed for life — a sentence that causes survivors to burst into applause as they weep after a 35-year wait for justice.

– Genocide –

The second “mini-trial” begins July 30, 2014, examining the charges of genocide of ethnic Vietnamese and Muslim Cham minorities. Controversially, these charges do not cover the mass killings of Khmers by Khmers, as the United Nations does not consider that to be genocide.

In September 2016, witnesses testify to how Cham Muslims were mistreated, forced to eat pork and banned from speaking their language while copies of the Koran were burned by Khmer Rouge cadres.

It is estimated that 100,000 to 500,000 Cham Muslims and 20,000 Vietnamese were murdered under the regime.

After almost 300 days of trial of this second “mini” case, June 23, 2017 is the last day of hearing. Over three years, more than 100 witnesses took the stand to denounce the regime’s practice of forced marriages, rape, and mass killings.

On November 16, 2018, the two are sentenced to life in prison on charges of genocide.

The tribunal issues a landmark verdict stating that Nuon Chea is guilty for all crimes perpetrated during the Khmer Rouge regime, given his senior role as second-in-command to Pol Pot.

Khieu Samphan is found guilty of genocide against the ethnic Vietnamese, but not of Cham Muslims.

Prosecutors revealed the existence of the sealed indictment inadvertently in a court filing in an unrelated case, WikiLeaks said.

The exact nature of the charges against Assange was not immediately known.

“SCOOP: US Department of Justice ‘accidentally’ reveals existence of sealed charges (or a draft for them) against WikiLeaks’ publisher Julian Assange in apparent cut-and-paste error in an unrelated case also at the Eastern District of Virginia,” Wikileaks wrote on Twitter.

The still unsealed charges against Assange were disclosed by Assistant US Attorney Kellen Dwyer as she made a filing in the unrelated case and urged a judge to keep that filing sealed.

Dwyer wrote, “due to the sophistication of the defendant and the publicity surrounding the case, no other procedure is likely to keep confidential the fact that Assange has been charged,” according to The Washington Post.

Later, Dwyer wrote the charges would “need to remain sealed until Assange is arrested.”

US media were alerted late Thursday to the inadvertent disclosure thanks to a tweet from Seamus Hughes, deputy director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University. He is known to follow court filings closely.

The father of Rio Nanda Pratama filed the lawsuit Wednesday in the US state of Illinois, where the plane manufacturer is headquartered, over the death of the young doctor who was to have married his high-school sweetheart this week.

Pratama’s fiance Intan Syari, 26, has made headlines after she posed alone for photos in a wedding gown that she was to have worn at the couple’s nuptials in Indonesia.

Syari said her husband-to-be had asked in jest that she carry on with the photo shoot if he did not return from what turned out to be a fatal trip.

The 26-year-old man was among the 189 people killed when the Boeing 737-MAX plunged into the Java Sea on October 29, less than 20 minutes after leaving Jakarta on a routine flight to Pangkal Pinang city. There were no survivors.

The 737-MAX in question had only begun service for budget carrier Lion Air in August.

Questions have swirled about Boeing’s alleged failure to tell airlines and pilots about changes to an anti-stall system that is being investigated for its possible links to the crash.

The jet’s engines are heavier than those installed on prior versions, meaning the plane can stall under different conditions.

Boeing made modifications to the anti-stall system without informing air carriers and their crews, according to the Allied Pilots Association.

“The government investigators typically will not make a determination of who is at fault, and just compensation to these families will not be provided by the governmental investigations,” Curtis Miner from US-based firm Colson Hicks Eidson, which filed the lawsuit, said in a statement.

“That is the critical role of private lawsuits in a tragedy like this.”

There is still no answer to what caused one of the world’s newest and most advanced commercial passenger planes to crash. A preliminary report is expected at the end of the month.

Pratama’s family could not be immediately reached.

In the meeting on the sidelines of a series of leaders’ meetings on East Asian cooperation in Singapore, Li said that China and Myanmar are friendly neighbors and that the solid “paukphaw” (“fraternal” in the Myanmar language) friendship has stayed strong since the two countries established diplomatic relations 68 years ago.

The premier said China attaches great importance to its ties with Myanmar and stands ready to build on the tradition of friendship, enhance political mutual trust and increase the practical cooperation, thereby facilitating the continued steady progress in the comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership between the two sides.

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Chinese Premier Li Keqiang meets with Myanmar’s State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi in Singapore, on Nov 15, 2018. (ZHANG LING / XINHUA)

China is willing to work together with Myanmar in pursuit of further synergy between their development plans and carry out cooperation in human resources and education

Li Keqiang, Chinese Premier

China and Myanmar, both developing nations, face the same task of boosting economic development and improving people’s livelihood, said the Chinese premier.

China is willing to work together with Myanmar in pursuit of further synergy between their development plans and carry out cooperation in human resources and education, Li said.

Such efforts will help Myanmar develop its economy and society and benefit both peoples, he added.

China supports Myanmar’s efforts in maintaining its domestic stability and the approach of trying to resolve the Rakhine issue through dialogues and consultation between Myanmar and Bangladesh, and is willing to provide the relevant parties with necessary support in this regard, Li said.

Suu Kyi said Myanmar and China, both developing nations, have had a solid tradition of friendship. She said Myanmar would like to work with China to boost understanding and support, build on the friendly cooperation and promote joint development.

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Myanmar is willing to strengthen the cooperation with China in economy and trade, human resources and education, she said.

Suu Kyi thanked China for the many times it has extended help to Myanmar, especially the constant understanding and support in regard to the Myanmar peace process and the Rakhine issue.

Myanmar is willing to work together with the parties concerned to create a favorable environment for peace and development in the country, she said.

The Khmer Rouge’s former head of state Khieu Samphan, 87, and “Brother Number 2” Nuon Chea, 92, are the two most senior living members of the ultra-Maoist group that seized control of Cambodia from 1975-1979.

The reign of terror led by “Brother Number 1” Pol Pot left some two million Cambodians dead from overwork, starvation and mass executions but Friday’s ruling was the first to acknowledge a genocide.

The defendants were previously handed life sentences in 2014 over the violent and forced evacuation of Phnom Penh in April 1975.

But Friday’s judgement at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) also found Nuon Chea guilty of genocide against the ethnic Vietnamese and Cham Muslim minority group, among a litany of other crimes.

“The chamber finds that Nuon Chea exercised ultimate decision-making power with Pol Pot and… therefore finds Nuon Chea is responsible as a superior for all the crimes,” presiding judge Nil Nonn said.

“This includes the crime of genocide by killing members of Cham ethnic and religious group.”

Khieu Samphan was also found guilty of genocide against ethnic Vietnamese, though not against the Cham, he added.

Both parties were sentenced to “life in prison”, merging the two sentences into a single term, Nil Nonn said.

Hundreds of people, including dozens of Cham Muslims and Buddhist monks, were bussed into the tribunal, located in the outskirts of Phnom Penh to attend the hearing.

– Cambodia’s ‘Nuremberg’ –

The events covered by the verdict span the four years of the Pol Pot regime, and include extensive crimes against humanity.

“The verdict is essentially the Nuremberg judgement for the ECCC and thus carries very significant weight for Cambodia, international criminal justice, and the annals of history,” said David Scheffer, who served as the UN secretary general’s special expert on the Khmer Rouge trials from 2012 until last month.

The revolutionaries who tried to recreate Buddhist-majority Cambodia in line with their vision of an agrarian Marxist utopia attempted to abolish class and religious distinctions by force.

Forced marriages, rape, the treatment of Buddhists, and atrocities that were carried out in prisons and work sites throughout the country fall under the additional list of charges — which the two men were found guilty of as well.

“(The verdict) will affirm the collective humanity of the victims and give recognition to the horrible suffering,” said Youk Chhang, head of the Documentation Center of Cambodia — a research organisation that has provided the court with evidence.

It could also “provide a sense of closure to a horrible chapter in Cambodian history”.

The hybrid court, which uses a mix of Cambodian and international law, was created with the backing of the UN in 2006 to try senior Khmer Rouge leaders.

Only three people have been convicted by the court, which has cost more than $300 million.

Former Khmer Rouge foreign minister Ieng Sary and his wife died without facing justice, while “Brother Number 1” Pol Pot passed away in 1998.

The number of allegations against Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan was so vast the court split the trials into a series of smaller hearings in 2011.

Many believe Friday’s decision will be the last for the tribunal, which has been marred by allegations of political interference.

Prime Minister Hun Sen — himself a former Khmer Rouge cadre — has repeatedly warned he would not allow more investigations to proceed, citing vague threats to stability.

The court has launched investigations into four more Khmer Rouge cadres, though one was dismissed in February 2017, highlighting the difficulties of bringing lower level members of the brutal regime to justice.

Scheffer said that “challenges of efficiency, funding, and access to evidence” are issues that plague all international criminal courts, but argued the successes of the Cambodian tribunal should not be diminished.

Working as the pilot test project since April this year, the BlocRice app focuses on transparency and traceability using blockchain technology by implementing smart contracts as a tool and interactive consumer communication apps for a better user interface.

‘Party to the contracts’

“Farmers thus gain collective bargaining power since agricultural cooperatives will be party to the contracts,” said Oxfam in Cambodia country director Solinn Lim.

In its first year, Oxfam’s BlocRice project will work with 50 small-scale organic-rice farmers in Preah Vihear province.

The project is taking place through the rainy season in March, the country’s prime season to harvest and sell rice.

Smart contract

Oxfam says after the first BlocRice project completes next year, the platform will be expanded to 1,000 farmers in 2020 and 5,000 in 2022.

The goal is to promote a “smart contract”, a three-way digital contract farming agreement between farmers, exporters and buyers in the Netherlands.

The project digitises and registers these contracts on the blockchain platform. Details such as primary purchase price, trade volume and transportation method are recorded, with cashless payments made to the farmers through bank accounts for traceability.

Oxfam estimates that 60 per cent of Cambodia’s workforce is employed in the agriculture sector, and many of them do not have contracts with their clients.

Lack of market price knowledge and high-interest loans put pressure on farmers to sell produce and clear their debts, it said.