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By Mariam Karouny and Orhan Coskun BEIRUT/ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey shot down a drone on Friday in an incident highlighting the dangers of multiple air combat operations over Syria, where government troops and their allies backed by Russian jets have launched an offensive against rebels near Aleppo. The army offensive south of the city, backed by Hezbollah and Iranian fighters, further expands its 10-day-old counter-attack in western Syria against insurgents
By Ari Rabinovitch JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Palestinians set fire to a Jewish shrine in the occupied West Bank and an attacker disguised as a journalist stabbed an Israeli soldier on Friday as tensions ran high after more than two weeks of violence. Israel’s military said about 100 people converged on the tomb of the biblical patriarch Joseph in the Palestinian city of Nablus and set parts of it ablaze before
By Ahmed Elumami TRIPOLI (Reuters) – Tripoli’s government on Friday named the two new Libyan suspects in the Lockerbie bombing investigation as Abdullah al-Senussi, the former spy chief of ousted leader Muammar Gaddafi, and a second man, Mohammed Abu Ejaila. Jamal Zubia, director of the media office of the Tripoli government, sent a message to journalists confirming the names but saying the Libyan attorney general’s office had not been officially
The United States has confirmed that Iran tested a medium-range missile capable of delivering a nuclear weapon in “clear violation” of a United Nations Security Council ban on ballistic missile tests, a senior U.S. official said on Friday. “The United States is deeply concerned about Iran’s recent ballistic missile launch,” U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power said in a statement.
By James Mackenzie and Jibran Ahmad KABUL (Reuters) – The Taliban on Friday brushed aside a U.S. decision to delay withdrawing troops from Afghanistan, saying it would do nothing to save an “unwinnable war” and promising to step up its campaign against the Western-backed government in Kabul. President Barack Obama’s decision to drop plans for a radical reduction in U.S. forces next year was greeted with relief by the administration
By Stephanie Nebehay GENEVA (Reuters) – The European Union must quickly establish adequate centers to receive and register asylum seekers in Greece and Italy and then distribute them across the bloc before winter sets in, the United Nations said on Friday. More than 591,000 people have crossed the Mediterranean by sea this year, including 450,000 to Greece, and this week 85 boats have been arriving daily on the island of
The leader of last month’s failed coup in Burkina Faso, General Gilbert Diendere, has been charged with crimes against humanity, a senior military justice official said on Friday. The elite presidential guard led by Diendere took the country’s president, prime minister and cabinet members hostage, soon before scheduled elections. “General Diendere is being prosecuted for crimes against humanity … We have formally charged 23 people,” Colonel Sita Sangare, Burkina Faso’s
VATICAN CITY (AP) — The American archbishop who welcomed Pope Francis to the final rally of his U.S. tour warned Friday that Francis’ big family summit of bishops risks doing serious harm to the Catholic faith if it endorses changes to the church’s practice on marriage.
French film-maker Luc Besson was found guilty earlier this year of plagiarising cult classic “Escape From New York” with his sci-fi thriller “Lockout”, according to documents seen by AFP on Friday. US director John Carpenter sued the makers of the 2012 film after spotting a slew of similarities with his 1981 science fiction favourite, in which Manhattan is turned into a huge prison island and Kurt Russell plays iconic anti-hero
PRAGUE (AP) — Hundreds of people are beating drums in Prague to mark the 74th anniversary of the first Czech Jews sent to Nazi death camps during World War II.
