Boko Haram insurgents attacked the outskirts of Borno state capital Maiduguri in Nigeria on Saturday morning and at least 11 people were killed in the fighting, residents and security sources said. The attack occurred barely a day after the inauguration of President Muhammadu Buhari, who swore to crush the Islamist militant group and move the command center for military operations away from the capital Abuja to Maiduguri. A military source
Saudi Arabia’s branch of militant group Islamic State has said it wants to clear the Arabian Peninsula of Shi’ite Muslims and urged young men in the kingdom to join its cause, the U.S.-based SITE monitoring center has reported. Islamic State claimed two suicide bombings carried out on May 22 and May 29 on Shi’ite mosques in eastern Saudi Arabia, where the bulk of the Saudi Arabia’s Shi’ite minority lives. In
MAIDUGURI, Nigeria (Reuters) – A bomb went off inside a mosque near the Monday Market in Nigeria’s northeastern city Maiduguri in Borno state on Saturday afternoon, residents and a security source said. “I was walking towards the mosque when the bomb went off inside,” resident Ibrahim Mohamed told Reuters. Many casualties are feared, the sources said, as people were heading there for prayer. (Reporting By Lanre Ola and Ardo Abdallah
By Andreas Rinke BERLIN (Reuters) – Russia has imposed an entry ban on 89 European politicians and military leaders, according to a list seen by Reuters, a move that has angered Europe and worsened its standoff with the West over Moscow’s role in the Ukraine conflict. More than 6,200 people have been killed in fighting between Ukrainian government forces and pro-Russian separatists. Russia dismisses accusations from Ukraine, NATO and Western
LONDON (AP) — Saracens became English rugby champions for the second time in five seasons by displaying their big-game experience to beat Bath 28-16 in the Premiership final at Twickenham on Saturday.
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Legislators in Puerto Rico have started to debate a proposed $9.8 billion budget amid growing concerns about the U.S. territory’s economic crisis.
The Islamic State jihadist group launched an assault on the largely Kurdish city of Hasakeh in northeast Syria on Saturday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. “IS fighters started an assault on Hasakeh city and reached the city’s southern periphery, where they are clashing with pro-regime forces,” said Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman. Syria’s official news agency SANA said loyalist forces had “foiled a terrorist attack by IS on
BRNO, Czech Republic (AP) — In a rare gesture of reconciliation, hundreds of Czechs have participated in a 20-mile walk to remember some 1,700 ethnic Germans who died 70 years ago during their expulsion from the Czech city of Brno.
The United States said on Friday that China had placed mobile artillery weapons systems on a reclaimed island in the disputed South China Sea, a development that Republican Sen. John McCain called “disturbing and escalatory.” Brent Colburn, a Pentagon spokesman traveling with Defense Secretary Ash Carter, said the United States was aware of the weapons. McCain, chairman of the Senate’s Armed Services Committee, said the move would escalate tensions but
Alexandrov, 28, says he’s a Russian soldier who was captured in east Ukraine after being sent there on active duty with Russian special forces to help separatists fighting Kiev. “I was carrying out my orders.” Yet Russian President Vladimir Putin, in the face of widespread evidence to the contrary, has repeatedly said there are no Russian soldiers in Ukraine – only volunteers who have gone to help the separatists of