Politics

  Vientiane / AFP President Barack Obama attends a farewell dinner with Southeast Asian leaders on Wednesday, capping eight years of careful courtship that has created new friends, but left links frayed with America’s oldest regional ally—Thailand. When Obama looks around the gala dinner table in Vientiane, he will find a bevy of new partners. His engagement with former Communist foes ...

  London / AFP Syria’s opposition on Wednesday set out detailed plans for the transition to a democratic state without President Bashar Al-Assad at talks in London with British foreign minister Boris Johnson. Ahead of his meeting with the broad-based High Negotiations Committee (HNC), Johnson told The Times newspaper that the proposals would include a six-month negotiating phase between the regime ...

  Vienna / AFP The UN refugee agency said on Wednesday Austria is in danger of breaking a decades-old tradition of helping those in need, after Vienna moved a step closer to potentially shutting its borders to migrants. “Since World War II, Austria has always adhered to the tradition of protecting refugees. Access to the asylum process has always been a ...

  Istanbul / AFP Washington and Ankara are ready to work together to push IS extremists out of their self-declared Syrian capital of Raqa, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in comments published on Wednesday. Erdogan said he had agreed with President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the G20 meeting in China to do “what is necessary” to drive ...

  Berlin / AFP Chancellor Angela Merkel called on her ruling coalition on Wednesday to resist pressure to change its refugee policy after a stinging defeat to the upstart anti-migrant AfD in regional polls at the weekend. In her first address to parliament since Sunday’s election in the northeastern state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Merkel defended her welcoming stance to refugees ...

  Paris/ AFP Gabon’s Ali Bongo on Wednesday rejected criticism of his disputed presidential election victory, accusing EU observers of bias towards his rival and insisting that only the country’s top court could order a recount. Oil-rich Gabon has been in turmoil since the August 27 poll, in which Bongo’s rival Jean Ping also claimed victory. Several people have been killed ...

Beirut / AFP Despite major setbacks including the loss of access to the Syria-Turkey border and the assassination of several top leaders, the IS group remains a potent force, analysts warn. The increasing pressure on IS, including Turkey’s decision to launch an operation against it in northern Syria, has seen the organisation lose ground at an unprecedented pace. But the extremist ...

  Beirut / AFP The IS group has announced the death in Syria of an Australian extremist convicted over a 2005 plot to bomb the Melbourne Cricket Ground, in a new English-language magazine. Ezzit Raad, who travelled to the Middle East after serving time in jail, died fighting for IS in Manbij near the battleground city of Aleppo in northern ...

  Istanbul / AFP Turkish prosecutors on Tuesday issued arrest warrants for almost 150 teachers who allegedly used an encrypted messaging app employed by followers of the US-based Muslim preacher authorities blame for the botched coup bid, state media said. Police in the central Anatolian city of Kayseri launched an operation with 400 officers in a bid to detain 147 ...

  Paris /AFP Paris will open its first refugee camp in mid-October, Mayor Anne Hidalgo said on Tuesday, unveiling plans to take hundreds of people off the streets as France struggles to accommodate migrants. The emergency shelter, which will have an initial capacity of 400 and be solely for men, will be housed on an old railway site in the ...