Politics

  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 ...

  Washington / AP CIA Director John Brennan will tell Congress that IS militants are training and attempting to deploy operatives for further attacks on the West and will rely more on guerrilla-style tactics to compensate for their territorial losses. In remarks prepared for the Senate Intelligence Committee, Brennan says IS has been working to build an apparatus to direct and ...

  Tehran / AFP Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards killed 12 Kurdish rebels near the Iraqi border in clashes in which three guards were also killed, an Iranian news agency reported on Thursday. Wednesday evening’s fighting took place in Oshnavieh in the northwest, the Tasnim news agency said, citing a statement from the Guards. Two separate groups of rebels had slipped ...