Politics

  Kiev / AFP Ukraine on Monday marked the third anniversary of the start of its pro-EU revolution with President Petro Poroshenko’s firm rejection of “the Russian world”. The so-called Euromaidan protests lasted three months and culminated in a bloodbath that claimed the lives of more than 100 largely unarmed people and about 20 anti-riot police. Poroshenko has declared November 21 ...

  Edirne / AFP Turkish authorities on Monday blocked a delegation of national and European Parliament lawmakers from visiting the leader of Turkey’s main pro-Kurdish party who has been held in jail for almost three weeks. The delegation of a dozen members of the Party of European Socialists (PES) sought to make a visit to the head of the Peoples’ ...

  Washington / AFP With his shock victory in the race for the White House, President-elect Donald Trump at last is in position to deliver on one of his most strident campaign promises: to repeal Obamacare. With fellow Republicans in control of the US Congress, Trump has the means and ostensibly a mandate from his party to gut the law. But ...

  Seoul / AFP South Korean prosecutors said on Sunday that President Park Geun-Hye colluded with her close confidante in a corruption and influence-peddling scandal that has sparked massive nationwide protests and calls for her impeachment. Park’s longtime friend Choi Soon-Sil was charged on Sunday with coercion and abuse of power, as was one of the president’s former aides. Another presidential ...

  Paris / AFP France’s right-wing presidential hopefuls kick off their nominating contest on Sunday as a sudden tightening of the race cast doubt on ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy’s chances of regaining the Elysee Palace. A late surge by the third-placed Francois Fillon, who was prime minister under Sarkozy, catapulted him into pole position for the first-round primary vote. A voter survey ...

  Berlin / AFP German Chancellor Angela Merkel told her party on Sunday she will seek re-election next year, a move likely to be welcomed in many capitals as a sign of stability following poll triumphs for Brexit and Donald Trump. After months of feverish speculation, Merkel said at a meeting of her conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) that she would run ...

  Istanbul / AFP President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Turkey should not be “fixated” on joining the EU and has reiterated the idea of joining Russia and China in a Eurasian security group, local media reported on Sunday. His comments come as Turkey’s decades-long hopes of joining the European Union have reached a nadir, driven by the aftermath of the ...

  Aleppo / AFP Syria’s regime on Sunday pursued a relentless assault of rebel-held east Aleppo that has killed more than 100 civilians in recent days, as the UN’s peace envoy arrived in Damascus for talks. Air strikes, artillery fire and barrel bomb attacks continued through the night and into Sunday morning as the army pressed a new offensive that ...

  London / AFP Violence subsided on Sunday in Yemen, a day after the beginning of a 48-hour ceasefire declared by the pro-government Arab coalition battling rebel fighters for almost 20 months. An AFP correspondent in Sanaa said there had not been any air strikes in the rebel-held capital by warplanes of the Saudi-led coalition since the ceasefire entered into ...

  Qabr al Abd / AFP Iraqi civilians who escaped from the IS group stronghold of Mosul said extremists forced them from their villages and drove them “like sheep” to use as human shields. Bashar huddled with his family on the back of an Iraqi security forces pick-up truck after finally fleeing an area of Mosul still held by IS. ...