Politics

Bloomberg Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan was among the targets of a bribery and money laundering probe in that country related to illicit flows of Iranian oil proceeds, a former Istanbul police officer testified in New York. The officer, Huseyin Korkmaz, said the investigation initially focused on the organization run by gold trader Reza Zarrab, but later grew to include ...

Bloomberg Honduran opposition leader Salvador Nasralla says he’s a moderate, pro-US candidate who Washington is wrong to fear, as he demands a full recount of ballots in a disputed election that has plunged the central American nation into its worst crisis in nearly a decade. Nasralla says he is a moderate who the US government has mistakenly branded a radical. ...

Bloomberg President Vladimir Putin flew to Russia’s airbase in Syria and declared “victory” in its two-year military campaign in support of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, as he issued an order to begin withdrawing forces from the war-torn country. Putin’s unannounced stop, where he was greeted by Assad, began a whirlwind day of Middle East diplomacy on Monday that includes talks ...

Bloomberg A Brooklyn man wearing a pipe bomb attached with Velcro and zip ties set off an explosive in the Times Square subway station on Monday morning, injuring himself and three others, sending ambulances racing and commuters fleeing as Christmas shoppers poured into New York City. The 27-year-old suspect, Akayed Ullah, wore the device that went off shortly after 7 ...

Bloomberg President Emmanuel Macron said he doesn’t intend to immediately revive past French Middle East peace initiatives, as Donald Trump’s administration stood behind his decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move the US embassy there. “It is preferable not to multiply initiatives because they end up cannibalizing each other,” Macron said at a press conference in Paris with ...

Bloomberg As delegates from South Africa’s ruling African National Congress gather this week to pick a new leader to succeed President Jacob Zuma, they face a challenge that’s threatening to overshadow the contest: to stop the party from splitting. The likelihood of a breakup is probably the biggest in the ANC’s 105-year-old history, especially if Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, the president’s ex-wife ...

Bloomberg Kenya’s main opposition alliance postponed indefinitely plans to swear-in its leader as president of a so-called People’s Assembly, after the government warned such a step would amount to treason. A ceremony that was to be held in the port city of Mombasa December 12 was called off after “extensive internal consultations and engagement with a wide range of national ...

Bloomberg China expressed pessimism about bringing the North Korean standoff to a peaceful resolution, even as Kim Jong Un’s regime touted new United Nations support for “regular” talks. Chinese Foreign Minster Wang Yi said on Saturday “the outlook is not optimistic” on the Korean Peninsula and urged all sides to end what he said was a “vicious cycle” of confrontation. ...

BAGHDAD / Reuters An Iraqi military parade celebrating final victory over IS was held in Bag-hdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone, an Iraqi military spokesman told Reuters on Sunday. The country’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared final victory over IS after Iraqi forces drove its last remn-ants from the country, three years after the militant group captured about a third of ...

Bloomberg Neither the Palestinian Authority president nor the head of the Coptic Church in Egypt plan to meet with US Vice President Mike Pence when he visits the Middle East later this month, to protest the US declaration that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. The rejections emerged as the Anadolu Agency said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and French ...