BEIRUT: A lone gunman who killed an army officer and three Lebanese security personnel in Tripoli had been released from prison on terror charges in mid-2017, Interior Minister Raya Al-Hassan said. The “lone wolf” attacker, Abdul Rahman Mabsout, struck shortly before midnight on Monday, killing a Lebanese army officer and three Internal Security Forces (ISF) personnel.…
DUBAI: A dispute over control of biometric data between the World Food Programme (WFP) and Yemen’s Houthi militia is straining humanitarian efforts and threatens to disrupt aid distribution. In an unusually strong statement the UN agency, which feeds more than 10 million people a month across the Arabian Peninsula’s poorest nation, said last month it is…
BAGHDAD: Baghdad’s Green Zone area, the heavily fortified strip on the west bank of the Tigris River, reopened to the public Tuesday after 16 years — a move meant to portray increased confidence in the country’s overall security situation after years of war.Maj. Gen. Jassim Yahya Abd Ali told The Associated Press that the area,…
UNITED NATIONS: Russia blocked the UN Security Council on Monday from issuing a statement sounding alarm about the increasing fighting in and around Syria’s Idlib province and the possibility of a humanitarian disaster, a council diplomat said.The thwarted statement marked the latest in a series of logjams over Syria in the UN’s most influential body.Fighting…
UNITED NATIONS: Russia blocked the UN Security Council on Monday from issuing a statement sounding alarm about the increasing fighting in and around Syria’s Idlib province and the possibility of a humanitarian disaster, a council diplomat said.The thwarted statement marked the latest in a series of logjams over Syria in the UN’s most influential body.Fighting…
KHARTOUM: Sudan's opposition rejected on Tuesday a plan by military authorities to hold elections within nine months, a prominent opposition figure said, after the country's worst day of violence since ex-president Omar al-Bashir was ousted in April."We reject all that was stated in (Transitional Military Council Head Abdel Fattah) Al-Burhan's statement," said Madani Abbas Madani,…
AZAZ, Syria: At least 19 people were killed Sunday in a car bomb near a bustling market and mosque in a rebel-held city in northwestern Syria, a war monitor said.Four children were among those killed in the explosion in Azaz, in the heart of a Turkish zone of influence in Aleppo province, said the Syrian…
BAGHDAD: The Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council has asked embassies and consulates operating in Iraq to look after the children of convicted mothers from their countries who were involved with Daesh and arrested in Iraq, Iraqi officials said on Sunday.Daesh is one of the most bloody radical organizations in modern history and gained control over almost…
BEIRUT: The official acquittal of Suzanne Al-Hajj, ex-head of the Anti-Cybercrime Bureau in the Lebanese Internal Security Forces (ISF), by the Lebanese military tribunal on Thursday over fabricating evidence to show that actor Ziad Itani was an Israeli spy has set off a big public debate.Although Al-Hajj was acquitted of the main charge, she was…
JERUSALEM: Palestinian worshippers clashed with Israeli police at a highly sensitive Jerusalem holy site on Sunday as an Israeli holiday coincided with the final days of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.Muslim worshippers at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound were angered over Jewish visits to the site holy to both religions.According to police, protesters barricaded themselves…
JERUSALEM: Palestinian worshippers clashed with Israeli police at a highly sensitive Jerusalem holy site on Sunday as an Israeli holiday coincided with the final days of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.Muslim worshippers at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound were angered over Jewish visits to the site holy to both religions.According to police, protesters barricaded themselves…
BEIRUT: Israel attacked Syrian military positions in the country’s south early Sunday, killing three soldiers and wounding seven others, Syria’s state-run media reported.Israel’s military confirmed it targeted several military positions in Syria, including two artillery batteries, several observation and intelligence posts and an SA2 air defense unit. It said it was responding to two rockets…
BEIRUT, MOSCOW: A spike in violence in and around an opposition bastion in northwest Syria has killed 948 people in a month, almost a third of them civilians. A September deal was supposed to avert a full-out regime offensive on Idlib province and adjacent areas held by Syria’s former Al-Qaeda affiliate Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham. But…
BEIRUT, MOSCOW: A spike in violence in and around an opposition bastion in northwest Syria has killed 948 people in a month, almost a third of them civilians. A September deal was supposed to avert a full-out regime offensive on Idlib province and adjacent areas held by Syria’s former Al-Qaeda affiliate Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham. But…
KHARTOUM: The central Khartoum military region accused “unruly elements” of attacking a vehicle used by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and seizing it near the protest site.“The protest site has become unsafe and represents a danger to the revolution and the revolutionaries and threatens the coherence of the state and its national security,” Gen.…
ANKARA: The delivery schedule for Russia’s S-400 missile defense systems to Turkey is continuing as planned, Turkish Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hami Aksoy said on Friday, dismissing reports of delay.The US and Turkey have been at odds over Ankara’s decision to purchase the S-400s, which Washington says are not compatible with NATO systems and poses a…
DUBAI: Iran on Friday rejected what it says were “baseless” accusations made at an Arab summit, claiming Saudi had joined the United States and Israel in a “hopeless” effort to mobilize regional opinion against Tehran, state media reported.Saudi Arabia’s king told an emergency Arab summit that decisive action was needed to stop Iranian “escalations” in…
JERUSALEM: Two Israelis were wounded, one critically, in a knife attack in annexed east Jerusalem on Friday, police said.Police said the attacker had been “neutralized” without specifying whether he had been killed or wounded.The Old City, where the attack took place, has been the scene of numerous stabbings of Israelis by wildcat Palestinian assailants in…
IRBIL, Iraq: It was looking to be a good year for farmers across parts of Syria and Iraq. The wettest in generations, it brought rich, golden fields of wheat and barley, giving farmers in this war-torn region reason to rejoice.But good news is short-lived in this part of the world, where residents of the two…
IRBIL, Iraq: It was looking to be a good year for farmers across parts of Syria and Iraq. The wettest in generations, it brought rich, golden fields of wheat and barley, giving farmers in this war-torn region reason to rejoice.But good news is short-lived in this part of the world, where residents of the two…
