Politics

  Fallujah, Iraq / AFP Iraqi forces hunted down holdout extremists in Fallujah on Saturday after retaking the city centre and trained their sights on Mosul, the IS last remaining major hub in the country. While not fully under government control yet, Fallujah is the latest in a string of battlefields losses for IS, which has seen its two-year-old “caliphate” shrink ...

  Aden, Yemen / AFP Yemen’s warring parties exchanged dozens of prisoners captured in fighting for third city Taez on Saturday following mediation by local tribes, the chief mediator said. Saudi-backed government forces which control the city released 118 prisoners, while Iran-backed rebels who control most of the surrounding province freed 76, tribal chief Abdullatif al-Muradi said. Loyalist officials in the ...

  Brussels, Belgium / AFP Dozens of anti-terror raids were carried out across Belgium overnight in a case that needed “an immediate intervention”, and 12 people have been held, federal prosecutors said on Saturday. The raids took place in 16 communes in Brussels, Flanders and Wallonia and “passed off without incident,” they said in a statement, adding that “until now no ...

  London / afp British lawmaker Jo Cox’s alleged killer ranted against “traitors” during a brief court appearance on Saturday, as EU referendum campaigning was suspended for a third day in tribute to her. “Death to traitors, freedom for Britain,” 52-year-old Thomas Mair said when asked to give his name at Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London after being charged with ...

  Beijing / AP Scores of paramilitary police have locked down a restive village in southern China to ward off fresh anti-corruption protests nearly five years after its uprising made it a symbol of grassroots defiance against the Communist Party. A resident from Wukan village in Guangdong Province said by telephone that police swept in late Friday night to surround ...

  lhoknga, Indonesia / AFP Dozens of Sri Lankan migrants stranded on a boat off Indonesia were allowed to come ashore on Saturday, easing a tense stand-off with local authorities that drew international condemnation. The 44 migrants, who include many women and children, had been stuck on a boat off Aceh province for a week as authorities in the western ...

  Geneva / AFP IS extremists are still committing genocide against the Yazidi minority in Iraq and Syria, United Nations rights investigators said on Thursday. “Genocide has occurred and is ongoing,” Paulo Pinheiro, head of the UN Commission of Inquiry (COI) for Syria, said in a statement. “ISIS has subjected every Yazidi woman, child or man that it has captured to ...

  BEIRUT / AP The Russian Defense Ministry says a 48-hour cessation of hostilities has been declared in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo. In past months, Aleppo has been witnessing fierce fighting and bombardment, which has claimed the lives of hundreds of people on both sides of the contested city. Russia says the truce went into effect after midnight ...

  BAGHDAD / AP An aid organization says a two-year-old boy has been killed while fleeing Fallujah with his family amid a government offensive to retake the Iraqi city from the IS group. The Norwegian Refugee Council, which works with refugees and internally displaced Iraqis, cited a relative on Thursday as saying that an IS fighter shot the boy as ...

  Lubumbashi / AFP Several people were killed in clashes between the army and former rebels at a military base in the Democratic Republic of Congo on Wednesday, officials said. Tension had been mounting for days at the military base in Kamina, in the southeast, where more than 2,000 former rebels from various groups are stationed as part of a ...