Politics

  Paris / AFP French President Francois Hollande said on Tuesday the battle against unemployment was not yet won as he vowed to stick with his controversial attempts to reform the labour market. The reforms have sparked two months of street protests and led to an unsuccessful attempt to bring down the government. But Hollande said he placed the need ...

  Vienna / AFP Major powers, including the United States, met in the Austrian capital on Monday to discuss the expanding presence of the IS extremist group in conflict-ridden Libya, just across the Mediterranean from Europe. IS has taken advantage of the chaos left by the toppling and death of longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011, which led to rival ...

  Baghdad / AP Iraqi security forces and allied fighters launched an operation on Monday to retake the town of Rutba from the IS extremist group, the military said. Special forces, soldiers, police, border guards and pro-government paramilitaries are involved in the operation to retake the Anbar province town, Iraq’s Joint Operations Command said in a statement. Tanks and artillery ...

  JAKARTA / AP Rescuers on Monday found the bodies of six university students who were among nearly two dozen who went missing in rain-triggered floods and landslides at a waterfall in western Indonesia, an official said. The disaster occurred on Sunday as more than 70 students were visiting the Air Terjun Dua Warna waterfall in North Sumatra province. Twenty-one ...

  ISTANBUL / AP A Turkish news agency says Turkish shelling and air strikes by the US-led military coalition killed 27 IS militants in Syria. Citing military sources, the state-run Anadolu agency said the militants were killed on Sunday as they were about to fire rockets toward Turkey. The Turkish border town of Kilis has been pummeled in recent months ...

  SEOUL / AFP South Korea, the United States and Japan will hold their first joint military training next month focused on cooperating to detect signs of missile launches from North Korea and trace missile trajectories, a Seoul defense official said on Monday. The drills, set for around June 28, will be held on the sidelines of biennial multinational naval ...

  Dhaka / AFP Bangladesh police have arrested a senior official from the main opposition party and accused him of plotting against the state following his meeting with an Israeli political adviser, an official said on Monday. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government is stepping up a crackdown on political opponents in Muslim-majority Bangladesh, which is also reeling from a wave ...

  Berlin / AFP With a spoon and spatula in hand, Zaid, a 23-year-old Iraqi refugee, lifts the lid on a large pot filled with goulash and potatoes as he begins his shift. From 6:30 to 8 pm, he is employed by the city of Berlin to dish out dinner to 152 other Syrian, Iraqi, Afghan and Moldovan refugees in ...

  WASHINGTON / AP President Barack Obama cast Donald Trump’s positions on immigration, trade and Muslims as part of an ignorance-and-isolation philosophy that the president says will lead the US down the path of decline. Obama used his commencement speech Sunday at Rutgers University to tear into the presumptive Republican nominee, without ever mentioning his name. Time and again the ...

LONDON / AP Presidential candidate Donald Trump says he may have a poor relationship with British Prime Minister David Cameron in light of his criticism of Trump’s call for all Muslims to be temporarily banned from entering the United States. Trump’s comments, broadcast on Monday on ITV’s “Good Morning Britain,” are certain to cause unease in Britain, where America is seen ...