Politics

Geneva / AFP Syria’s warring sides prepared on Sunday for a new round of peace talks after locking horns over the fate of President Bashar Al Assad, with the regime insisting his ouster was a “red line” while the opposition vowed to see him go—dead or alive. The UN-brokered indirect negotiations are due to begin in Geneva on Monday, the ...

Ankara / AP Turkish authorities on Sunday declared new 24-hour, indefinite curfews for two mainly-Kurdish towns where Turkey’s security forces are set to launch large-scale operations to battle Kurdish militants. Turkey has imposed curfews in several flashpoints in the southeast since August to root out militants linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, who had set up barricades, dug ...

Kuwait City / AP Kuwait’s ambassador to Lebanon says a third Kuwaiti citizen has been killed in the Mediterranean country in the past three days. The official Kuwait News Agency reported late Saturday that Ambassador Abdulaal Al Qenai said Lebanese authorities informed him of the murder in the town of Burj Hammoud, northeast of the capital, Beirut. Two other Kuwaitis ...

Caracas / AP Hundreds of opponents and supporters of President Nicolas Maduro held rival marches in Caracas, with anti-government forces demanding Venezuela’s leader step down and his sympathizers denouncing US. sanctions on some top officials. The marches were animated but peaceful, unlike massive anti-government protests in 2014 that left dozens dead and barricades burning in the streets. Government critics dressed ...

Beijing / AP China’s chief prosecutor said on Sunday that battling “infiltration, subversion and sabotage by hostile forces” is a key priority this year, with terrorists, ethnic separatists and religious extremists all in his crosshairs. In a speech to the annual session of China’s national legislature, Cao Jianmin also listed combatting cybercrime and ensuring national sovereignty in cyberspace as items ...

Bloomberg A day after violent protests prompted Donald Trump to cancel a rally, the Republican presidential front-runner blamed the activist group MoveOn.Org and supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders for the chaos, while defending his own “harassed” supporters. “When they have organized, professionally staged wise-guys—we’ve got to fight back. We’ve got to fight back,” Trump said at an event in Dayton, ...

Sydney / AFP The family of MH370 passenger New Zealander Paul Weeks is suing Malaysia Airlines in an Australian court for the “sudden shock” and “mental harm” they suffered after the plane vanished, a report said on Sunday. Weeks, who was based in the West Australian city of Perth, was one of 239 people on board the Boeing 777 Kuala ...

Seoul / AFP North Korea on Sunday blasted Seoul’s accusation that Pyongyang had launched a series of cyber attacks targeting South Korean government officials, calling the allegation a “bullshit” fabrication. Seoul’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) last week accused North Korean agents of hacking into the smartphones of dozens of key South Korean officials, stealing phone numbers and texts. The accusation ...

Seoul / AFP Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party braced for a backlash in key state polls on Sunday over the German leader’s liberal refugee policy, while the right-wing populist AfD prepared to scoop up the protest vote from angry voters. More than 12 million voters headed to the ballot box to elect three new regional parliaments for the southwestern states of ...

Bloomberg President Barack Obama has narrowed to three finalists a list of potential US Supreme Court nominees to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia, all of them federal appeals judges, according to a person familiar with the matter. The candidates are Merrick Garland, Sri Srinivasan and Paul Watford, said the person, who asked not to be identified because the details ...