Politics

PARIS / AFP Europe and Russia are set to launch an unmanned spacecraft on Monday to smell Mars’ atmosphere for gassy evidence that life once existed on the Red Planet, or may do so still. ExoMars 2016, the first of a two-phase Mars exploration, will see an orbiter hoisted from Kazakhstan at 0931 GMT Monday on a Russian Proton rocket. ...

Havana / AFP The European Union and Cuba signed a deal to normalize relations, including an agreement on the delicate issue of human rights—a breakthrough just ahead of US President Barack Obama’s historic visit to the island. The agreement, the culmination of nearly two years of negotiations, is a further step toward ending the communist country’s status as a pariah ...

BLOOMBERG Hundreds of thousands of Brazilians are gearing up to march in Sunday’s anti-government protests, which could tip the balance against President Dilma Rousseff in her struggle to remain in office. As of Friday evening, more than 360,000 people had signed up on a Facebook page pledging to take part in opposition marches, a 20 percent increase from Thursday morning. ...

BEIRUT / AP After five years of bloodshed — after a quarter of a million deaths, and the flight of millions of refugees — Syria has arrived at a critical juncture: A diplomatic framework is in place to end the carnage, a two-week-old partial ceasefire is holding, and peace talks are set to resume in coming days. “The indicators from ...

Athens / AFP Greece aims to deal swiftly with the migrant overflow at the Idomeni refugee camp on the Greek-Macedonian border where some 12,000 people are camping in miserable conditions waiting to cross. “I hope the situation at Idomeni is resolved within a week without recourse to force,” Mega television on Saturday quoted Dimitris Vitsas, the minister charged with coordinating ...

London / AFP Britain said on Saturday it was sending more troops to Iraq to bolster its mission training up the armed forces taking on the IS extremist group. Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said a further 30 troops would be deployed to provide training in logistics and bridge-building, as well as specialist medical staff. The move would take the total ...

France / AFP French police arrested 14 people on Saturday after a far-right group took to the streets for an anti-immigrant rally in the port town of Calais, where thousands of migrants are living in improvised camps. The roughly 80 activists blocked off two bridges close to the city centre and burned tyres, waved banners and set off smoke bombs, ...

Damascus / AFP President Bashar Al Assad’s ouster remains a “red line” for the Syrian government, the war-wracked country’s foreign minister said on Saturday ahead of fragile peace talks in Geneva. Walid Muallem also told a news conference in Damascus that the government delegation to the talks due to start on Monday will wait no more than 24 hours for ...

Seoul/ AP North Korea said on Saturday its military is ready to pre-emptively attack and “liberate” the South if it sees signs that American and South Korean troops involved in annual joint military drills are attempting to invade the North. The declaration from General Staff of the North’s Korean People’s Army on state media is the latest outburst over the ...

Bloomberg The Kremlin is putting “unprecedented” pressure on opposition activists as President Vladimir Putin prepares for his toughest electoral test amid Russia’s longest recession in two decades, according to his former prime minister. “The authorities understand that 2016 will be decisive because the economic and political situation is acute,” Mikhail Kasyanov, who was premier from 2000 to 2004 and is ...