Politics

  Geneva / AFP Fatalities among migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean to Europe could outstrip last year’s total even though total numbers fell in the first nine months of this year, the UN said on Tuesday. “The number of refugees and migrants reaching European shores this year passed the 300,000 mark today,” William Spindler, spokesman for the UN refugee agency ...

  Geneva / AFP Burundi’s government is behind systematic human rights violations, including executions and torture, UN investigators said on Tuesday, warning of possible crimes against humanity and the looming risk of “genocide”. “Gross human rights violations have and are taking place, committed primarily by state agents and those linked to them,” the investigators concluded in a report, adding that ...

  STOCKHOLM / AFP At least 20 countries are expected to formally join the Paris Agreement on climate change this week, greatly improving the pact’s chances of coming into force just a year after it was negotiated in the French capital, UN officials say. That’s considered a blistering pace in the world of international diplomacy, reflecting a sense of urgency in ...

  Damascus / AFP Syria’s armed forces said on Monday that a week-long ceasefire brokered by the United States and Russia was over, blaming rebels for the failure of the truce. US Secretary of State John Kerry said meanwhile that the terms had not been met for a key aspect of the deal — US-Russia cooperation against extremists in Syria. ...

  Paris / AFP Western governments need to tackle a growing anti-migrant backlash by helping newcomers integrate faster, the OECD said, following a sharp increase in immigration to its member states. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, a grouping of mostly developed economies, said around 4.8 million people migrated to member countries in 2015 — up 10 percent in ...

  Istanbul / AFP President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday that Turkey could create a 5,000-square-kilometre (1,900 square-mile) safe zone in Syria by pushing further south in its military operation in the country. Turkey launched its operation in northern Syria on August 24, sending in tanks and special forces to support opposition fighters in a bid to remove IS ...

  Moscow / AFP Russia’s ruling United Russia party has won a record number of seats in parliamentary polls that could pave the way for President Vladimir Putin to glide to a fourth term in 2018 elections. With more than 98.3 percent of the ballots counted, United Russia had garnered 54.2 percent of the votes for parties, giving it a ...

  Kandahar / AFP A US air raid has killed eight Afghan policemen in the country’s volatile south, officials said on Monday, in the first apparent “friendly fire” incident since American forces were granted greater powers to strike at insurgents. The incident occurred on Sunday in the Tali area of Uruzgan province, where the Taliban recently attempted to overrun the capital ...

  Zagreb / AFP A former Serb paramilitary commander, extradited from Australia last year, will go on trial in Croatia on Tuesday charged with the torture and murder of civilians and prisoners of war in the 1990s. Dragan Vasiljkovic — or ‘Captain Dragan’ — was handed over by Canberra after almost a decade-long legal battle, becoming the first suspected war criminal ...

  Yangon / AFP At least eight people have been killed and thousands displaced by clashes in southeast Myanmar, rebels and border forces said on Monday, violence that threatens to undercut the new government’s push for peace. Fighting broke out this month between government troops and an ethnic rebel splinter group known as the DKBA in Karen state, near the border ...