Politics

  Ulan Bator / AFP The Dalai Lama met with Buddhist worshippers on Saturday during a four-day visit to Mongolia, despite Beijing’s strident demand that he be barred from entering the country. China is “firmly opposed to the anti-China separatist activities by the Dalai Lama in any country, in any name, and in any capacity”, foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said. ...

  Mosul / AFP Iraqi forces piled pressure on the IS group around Mosul on Thursday, moving closer to cutting off the extremists’ escape route west to Syria and thrusting deeper into the east of the city. Pro-government paramilitaries advancing on the town of Tal Afar, which commands the city’s west approaches, entered its airport, while troops moving up from the ...

  Moscow / AFP Russian air strikes have killed at least 30 extremists in rebel-held Idlib province in northwestern Syria, the defence ministry said in a statement on Thursday. The strikes, which began on Tuesday, were part of a major operation against extremists in Idlib and Homs which saw the first missions carried out by Russian warplanes taking off from ...

  Dhaka / AFP A Bangladesh court on Thursday issued an arrest warrant for the country’s opposition leader after she failed to appear for a hearing over the date of her birthday. The bizarre controversy, which has been raging for more than a decade, centres on the fact that Khaleda Zia celebrates her birthday on August 15, the day Bangladesh’s former ...

  Ankara / AFP Turkish police on Thursday detained the pro-Kurdish co-mayor of the southeastern city of Van in the latest raids targeting municipal chiefs, expanding a widespread crackdown that has sparked international concern. Bekir Kaya was taken into custody as part of a “terror investigation”, the official news agency Anadolu reported, saying he was accused of membership of the outlawed ...

  Brussels / AFP European Union member states on Thursday approved visa-free travel for Ukraine citizens, long sought by Kiev to help cement ties as it combats pro-Russian rebels in the east. Visa-free travel was part of an EU-Ukraine partnership accord signed in 2014 as the country, a Soviet-era satellite, angered Moscow by casting its lot with the West. In return ...

  Paris / AFP Despite voting to leave the EU, Britain is deepening defence ties with France, agreeing to pool missile development research centres in a step presented on Thursday as “historic”. European countries have been slow to pool arms know-how, fearing an erosion of their sovereignty. The deal announced at a Franco-British defence council in Paris goes much further than ...

  NEW YORK / AFP President-elect Donald Trump and his team are battling back against charges of chaos and infighting as they race to set up an administration. The incoming Republican administration got an unlikely boost from outgoing Vice President Joe Biden, who said that “no administration is ready on Day One.” Trump stayed out of the public eye on Wednesday, ...

  Seoul/ AFP South Korean President Park Geun-Hye will not be ready to appear before prosecutors until next week despite their demand to question her sooner over a snowballing political scandal, her lawyer said on Thursday. Park, who would be the first sitting president to be interrogated in a criminal case, has seen her approval ratings plunge in recent weeks, with ...

  Kuala Lumpur/ AFP Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak warned on Thursday violence would not be tolerated at a major anti-government demonstration planned for the weekend. Leading NGO and civil-society alliance Bersih called the rally in the capital to demand the scandal-tainted prime minister’s resignation. Bersih has urged its supporters to converge on Kuala Lumpur in its signature yellow T-shirts on ...