Afternoon Briefing Friday 16th January

0:00This episode of the Times Radio News Briefing is sponsored by PwCWC. Staying competitive means getting ahead, not just keeping up. So how do business leaders cut through the noise and focus on what really matters. PwC takes you further with tech, from optimising the systems that put your data to work to scaling AI from proof of concept to competitive edge. PwC helps you meet tomorrow's tech demands so you can compete at a speed that rewrites the rules. Discover more at pwc.co.uk. Hello, this is your Times Radio afternoon briefing for Friday the 16th of January with me, James Kitchen. Robert Jenrick's replacement as Shadow Justice Secretary Nick Timothy has told Times Radio the Conservatives are the only serious party of government.

0:48Mr Jenrick is urging fellow MPs to join him in Reform UK following yesterday's dramatic defection. The party's leader, Nigel Farage, says Tory MPs have until May's local elections to do so. Speaking to Times Radio Breakfast, Mr Timothy insisted the Conservatives will move on. What yesterday actually showed was the contrast between Kemi's leadership of the Conservative Party and the way the other political parties conduct themselves these days because the public, I think, are sick of the backbiting and the backstabbing and the lack of seriousness with which lots of politicians these days take the very significant challenges that the country faces.

1:29The former South Korean president, Yoon Suk-yul, has been sentenced to five years in prison. The leader was found guilty of obstructing authorities over his failed martial law bid in December 2024. The Times' Asia editor Richard Lloyd Parry says there are more charges to come. The most serious is one of insurrection, and there'll be a verdict and sentencing on that next month. The prosecutors have asked for the death penalty for that, to give you an idea. Now, he almost certainly won't get that, but he could get a very long sentence. Venezuela's opposition leader has presented Donald Trump with her Nobel Peace Prize medal following a private meeting at the White House.

2:06In a post on Truth Social, the US president said it was a wonderful gesture, although he continues to overlook Maria Corina Machado as a successor to the captured former president, Nicolas Maduro. Latin America correspondent John Bonfiglio says the meeting was a major defeat for the Venezuelan opposition. The fact that Donald Trump had just that morning, a few hours before he met Maria, he had a very courteous, respectful phone call with Nicolas Maduro's successor, Delcey Rodriguez, as well as the fact that, of course, the meeting was held in private and that there was no joint press conference or official statement from Trump for hours afterwards.

2:41And it tells you, I think, given his instincts as a showman, that Nobel Peace Prize medal or not, he was once again very deliberately sidelining Maria Karina Machado. Britain will provide a further£20 million to support Ukraine's energy infrastructure as Volodymyr Zelensky declares a state of emergency. The funding brings total UK support for Ukraine's energy sector to more than£470 million, helping keep homes heated through winter as Moscow's full-scale invasion approaches its fourth anniversary. The business reporter for the Kyiv Independent, Dominic Culverwell, is living in the capital. For some people, it's a really dire situation.

3:18I mean, I'm lucky I'm a young man, but you have elderly people who live on the 20th floor who are unable to get up and down because when there's no electricity, they can't use the elevator. Of course, some people can't even eat any food in their homes or they can't cook without electricity. So some people are relying on camping stores to cook. Sometimes people's water goes out. I lost my water for 24 hours. And Southeast Water says it's restored supplies to most homes in Kent and Sussex, some after six days of disruption. The last remaining six and a half thousand properties in Tunbridge Wells have been reconnected following Storm Goretti.

3:53The regulator Offwatts investigating the firm over its response to repeated outages. And remember, you can follow The Times Radio News Briefing on Spotify and you can listen live to Times Radio Online.

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