Politics

Beijing / AFP Chinese President Xi Jinping is expected to discuss the deteriorating situation on the Korean peninsula with his US counterpart Barack Obama when he visits Washington for a nuclear security summit next week, a senior Beijing official said on Thursday. North Korea’s most recent atomic test in January and a series of rocket launches are likely to be ...

Seoul / AFP North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un has claimed an “historic” advance in the country’s nuclear strike capability with the successful test of a solid-fuel rocket engine, state media said on Thursday. The announcement came as South Korean President Park Geun-hye ordered the military to “strengthen readiness” in the wake of multiple North Korean threats to launch nuclear and ...

Damascus / AFP Pro-government forces pushed a fierce bid to recapture Syria’s ancient city of Palmyra from extremists on Thursday as Moscow hosted top US diplomat John Kerry for talks on the fraught peace process. The IS group called on civilians still living in Palmyra to leave, as army and pro-government militia battled the extremists on several fronts along the ...

Brussels / AFP Paris attacks suspect Salah Abdeslam wants to be extradited to France “as soon as possible” to face charges following his arrest in Brussels, his lawyer said on Thursday. Asked if his client had prior knowledge about Tuesday’s suicide bombings at Brussels airport and on a metro train, lawyer Sven Mary said in English: “He didn’t know it.” ...

United Nations / AFP The UN Security Council should keep its military liaison office open in Dakhla, Western Sahara, to avoid setting a dangerous precedent, a UN official said. The world body said on Tuesday it had closed the office at Morocco’s request and withdrew three military observers posted there. It was the latest twist in a running dispute between ...

BAGHDAD / AP The Iraqi military backed by US-led coalition aircraft on Thursday launched a long-awaited operation to recapture the northern city of Mosul from IS militants, a military spokesman said. In the push, Iraqi forces retook several villages on the outskirts of the town of Makhmour, east of Mosul, early in the morning on Thursday and hoisted the Iraqi ...

Hanoi / AFP Vietnam on Thursday hit back at Taiwan for taking international media on a tour of a disputed island in the South China Sea, saying the “illegal and worthless” trip had further raised tensions in the hotly contested waters. Taiwanese officials on Wednesday took journalists to Taiping, the largest island in the Spratlys chain, which it controls and ...

Tripoli / AFP It was meant to finally bring an end to Libya’s political chaos and unrest, but the creation of a new UN-backed unity government has only added to the country’s disarray. Desperate to resolve years of political deadlock that has allowed extremists to gain an important foothold on Europe’s doorstep, the United Nations and Western powers have been ...

Geneva / AFP No foreign power should be permitted to interfere in the ongoing Syrian peace talks in Geneva, the lead government negotiator said, denying that high-level US-Russian meetings in Moscow will impact the process. “When we say that the dialogue must be between Syrians, without outside intervention, this also applies to the Russians and Americans,” Bashar Al Jaafari said. ...

Aden / AFP A US air strike on an Al Qaeda training camp in southeastern Yemen killed at least 40 militants, a provincial official and a tribal source said on Wednesday. Another 25 militants were wounded in the Tuesday strike on the camp in Hajr, west of the Hadramawt provincial capital Mukalla, the provincial official said. The Pentagon had spoken ...