Politics

Reuters A Bahraini military court sentenced six Shi’ite Muslim men to death and revoked their citizenship after they were convicted on charges of forming a terrorist cell and plotting to assassinate a military official, Bahrain news agency BNA reported on Monday. The men, including one soldier, were accused of several militant attacks and of attempting to assassinate a commander of ...

Reuters Egypt’s Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry will visit Addis Ababa next week for talks with his Ethiopian counterpart, a foreign ministry spokesman said, in a bid to end a standoff over a multi-billion dollar dam project on the Nile river. The dispute, which also involves Sudan, centres on control of a share of the waters of the Nile that stretches ...

Bloomberg The United Nation’s latest sanctions on North Korea are more likely to hurt ordinary people in the isolated nation than slow Kim Jong-Un’s push to develop missiles capable of hitting the US with nuclear weapons. The UN Security Council unanimously approved new steps targeting North Korea’s economy following last month’s launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile. The new restrictions ...

Bloomberg Cyril Ramaphosa, the newly-elected leader of South Africa’s ruling African National Congress, has a tenuous hold on power in the party after his allies fell short of securing outright control over its top leadership body. A lack of support from a clear majority of the 86 voting members of the ANC’s National Executive Committee will limit his scope to ...

Bloomberg President Donald Trump’s Christmas wishes include a peaceful America, he said while taking phone calls from children tracking the global travels of Santa’s sleigh — although the president’s social-media activities suggested otherwise. “I think we want peace. What do you think? Peace for the country,” Trump told a young boy. “We’ve got prosperity. Now we want peace,” the president ...

Bloomberg North Korea rejected tighter United Nations sanctions aimed at curbing its nuclear expansion, describing the move as an “act of war” and vowing to avenge US sympathisers who approved it. The US “must abandon its hostile policy” towards North Korea, “learn to co-exist” and “wake up from its pipe-dream of our country giving up nuclear weapons,” the Korean Central ...

Bloomberg Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic probably won’t seek a second term, as he intends to complete the work needed to lead his country into the European Union when his mandate ends in 2022. Vucic, who as the leader of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party is the Balkan state’s most powerful politician, said in an interview that he’d announce proposals to ...

Bloomberg Poland defied the European Union’s unprecedented call for member states to punish it for failing to uphold the bloc’s values, signing into law a judicial overhaul that puts the country at risk of economic sanctions and losing its voting rights. President Andrzej Duda announced the decision, hours after the European Commission said the government in Warsaw posed a threat ...

Bloomberg Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski survived a pell-mell impeachment effort over allegations that he lied about dealings with Brazilian construction company Odebrecht SA, which is at the center of the biggest corruption scandal in Latin America’s history. After a congressional session that lasted more than 13 hours, lawmakers in the opposition-dominated chamber fell short of the two-thirds majority needed ...

Bloomberg Thousands of Israelis demonstrated against government corruption as police move to wrap up an investigation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on suspicions of bribery. In addition to the weekly march in central Tel Aviv by liberal opponents of the government, which police said drew about 5,000 people, about 500 conservatives normally allied with Netanyahu held a parallel protest in ...