Politics

  Stuttgart / AFP Defence Secretary Ash Carter warned on Tuesday that NATO would defend its allies against Russian “aggression” as he presided over the passing of the alliance’s European command to a new general. Carter said NATO would “keep the door open for Russia” for cooperation on global security challenges if Moscow abandoned its “sabre-rattling”. “But it’s up to ...

  TOKYO / AP North Korea, the world’s last great master of Cold War-era spectacle, is likely to deliver a big one when its ruling party holds its first congress in 36 years later this week. What exactly is in store during the congress, which opens Friday and will be presided over by leader Kim Jong Un, remains a well-kept ...

  MADRID / AP Spain’s king signed a decree on Tuesday dissolving parliament and setting a new election for June 26 after legislators chosen in an inconclusive December vote failed to agree on the country’s next prime minister. King Felipe VI signed the order in the presence of parliamentary speaker Patxi Lopez after the midnight Monday deadline for installing a ...

  LA PORTE / AP Back in the part of the country where he last lost to Ted Cruz, Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump is confidently pushing for a win on Tuesday in Indiana that he argues ought to knock the Texas senator out of the race. Buoyed by a sweep of last week’s primary elections along the East Coast, ...

  Denpasar / AFP Police on the Indonesian holiday island of Bali shot dead a French national on Monday after he killed a policeman while resisting arrest, an official said. Amokrane Sabet, reported to be a mixed martial arts fighter, was known as a troublemaker in the area in southern Bali where he lived. “There had been many complaints about ...

  SEOUL/ AP Seoul has instructed its foreign embassies to take extra precautions against possible North Korean attempts to kidnap or attack South Koreans abroad, officials said on Monday. The instruction was issued in response to North Korea’s threat to retaliate for last month’s group defection by 13 North Koreans, who Pyongyang says were kidnapped by South Korean spies while ...

  Canberra/ AFP A mega deal to build Australian submarines was so important, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said on Monday, that he pledged to personally supervise the project as Paris and Canberra bolster defence ties. French contractor DCNS last week beat off competition from Japan and Germany to seal the 12-submarine Aus$50 billion ($39 billion) contract, prompting Valls to make ...

  Paris / AFP Police evacuated more than one thousand people from a makeshift migrant camp near a Paris metro station on Monday, the third time the camp has been cleared in as many months. Shortly after 6:00 am, people who had been staying in the tightly packed tents under an elevated section of the Stalingrad station in the north of ...

  Jakarta / AFP An Indonesian sailor told on Monday how Philippine militants threatened to slit his throat during a terrifying kidnap ordeal, a day after he and nine other crew members were released. The sailors were freed on Sunday in the strife-torn southern Philippines after more than a month in the hands of Abu Sayyaf militants, and flew back ...

  Geneva / AFP Fresh air strikes pummelled the Syrian city of Aleppo on Monday as US Secretary of State John Kerry made a desperate bid to salvage a two-month ceasefire in the war-torn country. The top US diplomat gave some of his most downbeat comments yet after meeting the UN peace envoy on Syria, saying the conflict was “in ...