Two arrests during visit of President Trump to Scotland
Police Scotland can confirm that a 55 year old man has been arrested and has now been charged in connection with an incident when a powered parachute was flown in the vicinity of the Turnberry Hotel during the visit of President Donald Trump to Scotland. The incident is alleged to have happened around 9.45pm on Friday. He is expected to appear at Ayr Sheriff Court on Monday. A report will be submitted to the Procurator Fiscal. A 64-year-old man was also arrested in relation to alleged threatening and abusive behaviour on the beach at Turnberry on Sunday and was issued with a Fixed Penalty Notice.
Assistant Chief Constable Mark Williams said: “This was a major and complex policing operation involving thousands of officers that impacted right across Scotland. Our priority throughout was to protect the President, maintain public safety and facilitate thousands of people across Scotland to exercise their right to protest peacefully.
“I would like to thank all of the officers and staff from Police Scotland and elsewhere that worked together in helping us achieve this and in particular those who took part in the protests in Glasgow, Dundee and Edinburgh for their good behaviour.”
Meanwhile, Theresa May has revealed that Donald Trump advised her to “sue the European Union” rather than negotiate with the 27-country bloc, in a private conversation that the US president referred to during his visit.
The British prime minister was asked on the BBC’s The Andrew Marr Show what the “brutal” Brexit negotiating advice was that Mr Trump had talked about in their joint press conference outside the prime minister’s Chequers country retreat.
Revealing it for the first time, Ms May said: “He told me I should sue the EU.” After being prompted by a surprised Marr, Ms May repeated: “Sue the EU, not go into negotiations with them, sue them.”
The prime minister smiled, and indicated she had disregarded the advice, saying “actually we’re going into negotiations with them”, in remarks that will be interpreted as a put-down of the president. Mr Trump leaves the UK on Saturday afternoon to fly to Helsinki to meet Russian president, Vladimir Putin.
On Friday, Mr Trump had said he gave Ms May “a suggestion, I wouldn’t say advice” about how to handle the Brexit talks, without revealing what it was. “I think she found it maybe too brutal, and that’s OK. I gave her a suggestion, not advice. I could fully understand why she thought it was a little bit tough.”
Marr’s interview with Ms May comes at a politically perilous moment for the British prime minister, who is facing calls for a confidence vote over her leadership of the Conservative party, and the prospect of her former foreign secretary Boris Johnson spelling out the reasons for his resignation in a Daily Telegraph column on Monday.
Meanwhile, Scottish Daily Mail columnist John MacLeod, pictured left, has stirred the debate on social media with this contribution on Facebook: “Am I alone in being irritated about all the hysterical, British, Scottish virtue-signalling this weekend against Donald Trump? He is even being attacked for not bowing to The Queen yesterday – even though, as a Head of State himself, no one expects him to, any more than she would curtsy to him on a visit to Washington; and neither Jeremy Corbyn nor Nicola Sturgeon make obeisance to The Queen either. Hate, it seems – blind, posturing self-righteous hate – trumps logic.”