Politics

  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 ...

  Baghdad / AFP A car bomb targeting Shiite pilgrims killed at least 14 people in southern Baghdad on Monday, security and medical sources said. An Iraqi security command said a suicide bomber detonated the explosives-rigged vehicle, while other officials said it was a car bomb. At least 14 people were killed and at least 41 others wounded, security and medical ...

  KUWAIT CITY / AP The United Nations envoy for Yemen says the country’s government delegation has suspended its participation in peace talks aimed at ending fighting in the impoverished Arab country. U.N. envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed said in a statement that the Yemeni government stopped participating in plenary sessions held in Kuwait on Sunday because of developments in the ...

  ISTANBUL / AP The Turkish military said on Monday that artillery shelling and drone attacks by the US-led coalition have struck IS positions in Syria and killed a total of 63 militants. The state-owned Anadolu Agency said the strikes took out multiple rocket launchers and gun positions. Four drones deployed from the Incirlik air base, a launching point for US-led ...

  Diyarbakir / AFP One Turkish soldier was killed and 20 others were wounded when a car bomb blamed on Kurdish militants exploded in the Kurdish-majority southeast, the army said on Monday. In a statement, the army said a total of 23 people were wounded in the blast which took place late on Sunday, 20 of them soldiers and three ...

  Tikamgarh / AFP As young boys plunge into a murky dam to escape the blistering afternoon sun, guards armed with guns stand vigil at one of the few remaining water bodies in a state hit hard by India’s crippling drought. Desperate farmers from a neighbouring state regularly attempt to steal water from the Barighat dam, forcing authorities in central ...