Politics

ADDIS ABABA / WAM Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Monday that he is ready for a historical peace deal with Israel based on a two-state solution, the WAFA News Agency has reported. “We are waiting for Israel to respond to the initiative of the US President Donald Trump for a historical peace deal based on a two-state solution,” said ...

Bloomberg President Xi Jinping’s complaint about a ‘negative’ turn in China’s relationship with the U.S. showed the challenge facing Donald Trump when the two leaders meet in Germany this week. Xi’s comment during a phone call with Trump on Monday followed several assertive U.S. moves in Asia, including a naval patrol past a Chinese-controlled islet a day earlier. The American ...

Bloomberg The interior ministers of France and Germany agreed on new measures meant to help Italy as it struggles to cope with rising migrant arrivals, pledging to boost support for the Libyan coast guard and speed up their relocation under a European Union accord. At a dinner in Paris with interior ministers Gerard Collomb of France, Thomas De Maiziere of ...

Bloomberg Chancellor Angela Merkel urged Germany’s partners in the Group of 20 states to avoid deeper divisions in economic policy as these may become irreconcilable, and to seek inclusive “win-win” solutions that benefit all instead. Commenting in her weekly podcast, the German leader said the G-20 summit in Hamburg this week offers a good platform for states to air their ...

Bloomberg Scandal-hit Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe faces one of the biggest tests of his four and a half years in power, after his ruling party lost to an upstart outfit in an election for Tokyo’s assembly. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) as projected to win its lowest number of seats ever in the capital in a poll that can be ...

BEIRUT / DAMASCUS / Reuters Three car bombs exploded in Damascus on Sunday, state media said, killing at least seven people in the first suicide bombings in the Syrian capital since extremists attacked in March. A police officer at the scene of one of the blasts put the death toll there at seven with 13 more people wounded. The Syrian ...

DIYARBAKIR / Reuters Kurdish militants shot and killed two officials from the ruling AK Party in southeast Turkey over the weekend, while the Turkish military killed more than a dozen militants in air strikes, state authorities said on Sunday. Orhan Mercan, the AKP’s deputy head in the Lice district of Diyarbakir province, was shot in front of his home on ...

Reuters President Bashar Al Assad has appeared on the Syrian currency for the first time, his portrait printed on a new 2,000-pound banknote that went into circulation on Sunday. Central bank governor Duraid Durgham said the 2,000-pound note was one of several new notes printed years ago but the decision to put it into circulation was delayed “due to the ...

Bloomberg South African President Jacob Zuma lashed out at critics within his African National Congress, saying they’re threatening the ruling party’s hold on power. “Factionalism is a cancer that must be rooted out,” Zuma, 75, said Friday in his opening address to a six-day ANC conference in Johannesburg that will discuss issues ranging from land reform and ownership of the ...

Bloomberg President Xi Jinping warned a divided Hong Kong that challenges to China’s rule wouldn’t be tolerated and said the city’s leaders must find new ways to profit from Chinese economic clout. Xi’s stern speech on Saturday — at a ceremony in which he swore in Carrie Lam, 60, as Hong Kong’s first female chief executive — capped a three-day ...