Politics

Mogadishu / AFP Special forces operatives in two helicopters staged an overnight raid on Somalia’s Shebab insurgents, government officials and the Al-Qaeda-linked gunmen said on Wednesday. The raid, reportedly by foreign troops, targeted the Shebab-controlled town of Awdhegele, some 50 kilometres (30 miles) west of Somalia’s capital Mogadishu. “There was an operation by Special Forces late last night around Awdhegele ...

brussels / ap European Union leaders hoped early Tuesday they reached the outlines for a possible deal with Ankara to return thousands of migrants to Turkey and said they were confident a full agreement could be reached at a summit next week. After months of disagreements and increasing bickering among the 28 EU nations, French President Francois Hollande said that ...

United Nations / AP Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is planning to hold a donor’s conference before June to help tens of thousands of Sahraoui refugees from the 40-year-old dispute over the Western Sahara who are facing one of the world’s forgotten humanitarian crises. UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said that Ban understood the anger of the refugees living in “some of the ...

Jerusalem / AFP Israel is razing Palestinian homes and other buildings constructed with international aid at an “alarming” rate, the UN says, with more demolitions so far this year than in all of 2015. In total 121 structures funded partly or fully by international donors were demolished in the occupied West Bank between January 1 and March 2, overtaking the ...

Seoul / AFP South Korea on Tuesday accused North Korea of hacking the smartphones of government officials, and unveiled new sanctions on Pyongyang over its recent nuclear test and long-range rocket launch. The National Intelligence Service (NIS) said the North had stolen phone numbers and texts from the phones of dozens of key officials between late February and early March. ...

Kabul / AP Six months after fleeing a Taliban assault on her city, the owner of an Afghan radio station devoted to women’s rights is back home and returning to the airwaves. Zarghona Hassan is a lifelong activist and the founder of a radio station in Kunduz that until last year reached hundreds of thousands of listeners across northern Afghanistan, ...

Washington / AFP Voters in four US states headed to the polls on Tuesday to confirm or rein in Donald Trump’s status as clear Republican frontrunner in primary contests that Democrat Hillary Clinton hopes will further solidify her lead over Bernie Sanders. As the race for the White House heats up, the spotlight shifts to Michigan and Mississippi, where both ...

JERUSALEM / AP Israel on Tuesday refuted a White House claim that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “surprised” the Obama administration by cancelling a planned visit to Washington, saying that the White House knew Netanyahu was considering not coming. Netanyahu had been expected to visit later in March on a trip coinciding with a major pro-Israel group’s annual summit, but his ...

CANBERRA/ AP The US Air Force will continue to fly daily missions over the South China Sea despite a buildup of Chinese surface-to-air missiles and fighter jets in the contested region, with both nations’ militaries in discussions to avoid any miscalculations, a top US general said on Tuesday. Gen. Lori Robinson, the commander of the Pacific Air Forces, also urged ...

Tehran / AFP Iran conducted multiple ballistic missile tests on Tuesday in an exercise to demonstrate “deterrent power,” a move that comes in defiance of US sanctions imposed over its missile programme in January. The announcement by the official IRNA said the tests showed the country’s “all-out readiness to confront threats” against its territorial integrity. State television a short time ...